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Prologue Serpents’ End

They had co were already fading in herway to the desperate needs of the present Sisarqua opened her jaws and bent her neck It was hard for the sea serpent to focus her thoughts It had been years since she had been completely out of the water She had not felt dry land under her body since she had hatched on Others’ Island She was far from Others’ Island’s hot dry sand and bal in on this densely forested land beside the chill river The th was hard and abrasive The air was too cold, and her gills were drying out too quickly There was nothing she could do about that except to work h and came up with a mouthful of silver-streaked clay and river water She threw her great head back and gulped it down It was gritty and cold and strangely delicious Another ain

She had lost count of how ested when finally she felt the ancient reflex trigger Working the muscles in her throat, she felt her poison sacs swell Her fleshyruff Shuddering down her full length, she opened her jaide, strained, gagged, and then met with success She cla it only as a thin, powerful streaed with venom With difficulty, she turned her head and then coiled her tail closer to her body The extrusion was like a silvery thread, thick and heavy Her head wove as she layered the inding over herself

She felt a heavy tread nearby, and then the shadow of the walking dragon passed over her Tintaglia paused and spoke to her “Good Good, that’s right A nice even layer to begin with, one with no gaps That’s right”

Sisarqua could not spare a glance for the blue-and-silver queen who praised her Creating the case that would shelter her during the re months of winter took all her attention She focused on it with a desperation born of weariness She needed sleep She longed to sleep; but she knew that if she slept now, she would never wake again in any forht Finish it, and then I can rest

All around her on the riverbank other serpents labored at the sa them, humans toiled Some carried buckets of water from the river Others mined chunks of silvery clay frosters trundled the barrows to a hastily constructed log enclosure Water and clay were duh; other workers used shovels and paddles to break up the lue It was this slurry that Sisarqua had consu her case The lesser ingredients were just as essential Her body added the toxins that would plunge her into a sleep half a breath above death Her saliva contributed herof her case Not just her own memories of her time as a serpent, but all the memories of those of her bloodline spooled around her as she wove her case

Missing were the ons tending the serpents as they h memories to recall that there should have been at least a score of dragons present, encouraging the their own regurgitated saliva and history to the process But there weren’t, and she was too tired to wonder how that lack ht affect her

A great weariness washed over her as she reached the neck of her case It had to be constructed in a way that would eventually allow her to draw her head in and then seal it behind her It caons who had tended the serpents had sometimes helped them seal their cases But Sisarqua knew better than to hope for that help Only 129 serpents had in the desperate upriver rounds Maulkin, their leader, had been gravely concerned that so few of the year, there should have been hundreds of serpents, and at least asin the sea, and then co their species It was hard to hear that they ht be too few and too late

The difficulties of the river journey had reduced the number still further Sisarqua was not certain how ht, but the graver neas that fewer than twenty of the survivors were female And all around her, exhausted serpents continued to die Even as she thought of it, she heard Tintaglia speak to a hu your hahs of memory clay Let the others keep alive the memories of his ancestors” She could not see, but she heard the sounds of Tintaglia dragging the dead serpent from his unfinished cocoon She son devoured his carcass Hunger and weariness cralia’snow The clay was in her gut and must be processed