Page 454 of Kingdoms of Night

She couldn’t tell him about the only other amethyst she’d seen try to have eggs. They’d become stuck in the dragon’s body. The eggs wouldn’t come out, no matter how many tried to help her. Even the dragon keepers hadn’t been able to reach up inside her and turn the eggs so they could come out.

That dragon had died here in this cave. Her soul likely lingered in this place where there were only empty halls and hollow sounds. Tanis knew that she was still here because her soul had never joined the crystals. She was one of the few dragons who had not joined the ancestors.

Some part of her screamed that this was her moment. This was the moment when she had to lay the eggs or they would all die.

She lifted her head, shaking free from Rowan’s touch. Arching her neck, she squirmed in the hole she’d made for herself and then let out a roar that shuddered through the cave. A few stones fell in the distance at the sound. A rumbling echo that made it sound as though the entire cave was about to fall down around them. Let it. The pain that splintered through her body was unlike anything she’d felt before. A ripping. A tearing. The horrible sensation didn’t stop, it couldn’t, and then suddenly it was all over.

She slumped down onto the stones, panting with her eyes squeezed shut.

Neither elf tried to speak to her. Perhaps that was for the better, because she couldn’t form any sense of word or sound other than ragged breaths.

She’d done it, though. She’d laid the last dragon eggs that would ever be here, as far as she knew. These were the children that could change the world.

Finally, when she caught her breath and her body no longer felt as though it would rip apart at any movement, Tanis shifted. The elves wanted to see, she was certain of that, and she was also curious to see what her younglings looked like.

“All purple?” Aster asked. She trailed her hand along Tanis’s side as she made her way toward the dragon eggs.

“I doubt that.” Tanis’s voice still sounded rusty, as though she’d hurt herself with that scream. “Dragons never know what color egg we’re going to lay. It’s always a mystery, although I know there have been a few sapphire dragons in my line.”

“And the father’s line?”

She saw Rowan tense up at the mention of the father. His reaction shouldn’t make her feel so much pride, but it did. At least he was a little jealous that there had been someone before her.

She focused back on Aster. “Attor’s line is a mystery to me. I only know that he spent many years in the north. I wouldn’t be surprised if...”

“A golden egg,” Aster interrupted. The words were filled with awe.

Gold dragon eggs always looked like they were made of molten metal. They were rather beautiful. She would have been surprised if Aster hadn’t been impressed.

“And?” she asked. There couldn’t only be one. She prayed there was more than that.

“A purple,” Aster replied, her voice slightly muffled with the stones that surrounded them. “And a crimson, like their father.”

Tanis waited for more to be announced, but that was where Aster stopped. She felt her heart sink. “Only three?”

It was a small clutch. She’d hoped for many more. At least five. That would have given the lines of dragons a chance. But three? What if they didn’t survive?

Rowan walked in front of her and forced her eyes to him. “They’re going to be fine, Tanis. Remember? They will be safe here. We’ll come get them when the world is ready for them.”

Of course. Of course they would.

She turned, ignoring the crunch of stone above her and the tiny shards that rained down on her back. And there they were. Three eggs, so perfect that it made her heart ache. Tanis laid her head down next to them, gently nudging each one with her nose.

“I will not forget you,” she whispered. “I will come back for you. On my life, I promise you this.”

And then they had to leave the cave. She could risk someone knowing what she had done here. So she didn’t give herself any time with her children.

They left, and then she brought the mouth of the cave to the ground with one heavy strike of her wings. The sound of the crashing rubble mimicked the sound of her heart breaking yet again.

CHAPTERTWELVE

CHAPTER 12

The winter came sooner than any of them wished. Rowan had survived the winters in Umbra. He knew just how difficult the cold could get, but he’d made it with help. His clan of elves had always banded together to keep everyone warm and well cared for. His house had already been built, and he’d taken that for granted.

By the time they reached the hidden mountain valley where Tanis thought they would be safe, he’d already tasted snow on the wind. Rowan worked feverishly with his sister, both of them trying their best to build a home for them.

Tanis even stayed as a dragon, felling trees for them and stripping the branches off with her teeth. They wouldn’t have made it through the winter without her help. Those logs became the walls that kept them alive.

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