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The story so far…

At the end of Eye of the Tempest, Jane found herself the champion of her supernatural brethren, cast to battle an ancient evil Forces working for her nes that took the shape of dragons and who thrived on chaos and destruction

In Teinal, Blondie, to Great Britain in order to keep Morrigan frooal There, Jane learned e and the structures that kept it both secret and secure Morrigan, however, threatened both Her behavior beca very public attacks that risked the secrecy of their species

For Morrigan was keeping her own secrets She’d ed with the Red, whose corporeal form was on had found a way to resurrect herself by an/the Red could shapeshift between Alfar and dragon, or a hybrid of both

Having a way to resurrect theoal was now to awaken her consort, the White Jarl, Morrigan’s lover who an’s chosen vessel for the White

Jarl, however, was less keen on an, and had to be kept under aruard while Jane, Anyan, and Blondie were the to keep the bones of the White out of Morrigan’s hands Morrigan needed those ancient relics to resurrect the White, and so Jane’s an away fro was ever simple in the Great Island, however, the supernatural name for Great Britain, as both the Alfar who ruled and the rebels anted their oer both sought to use Jane against the other Anyan and Blondie ed to keep her mostly safe, but besides those two, there was really no one she could trust

A lesson she learned the hard way after a trap was laid for the Red, using the White’s bones as bait Everything was going according to plan until the rebel leader’s brother turned against the prisoner He also brought Jarl to Morrigan, so that she could coan/the Red could corievously wounded herself – killed Jarl Thinking themselves triumphant, Jane turned to the Red…

Who, in dragon for onto the pile of bones A few chanted words later, and the Red’sto her feet minutes later, Jane was relieved to see Anyan still breathed

Her relief was short lived, however, for when her lover sat up and blinked…

His eyes were the green, slit eyes of a dragon Jane’s great love shifted into a dragon and fleith the Red And then she discovered her greatest ally, Blondie, was dead

Leaving Jane all alone

Chapter One

The agony was excruciating, a white heat at the center of my consciousness Like that pinprick in space that pulls everything into its ever-widening gyre, the black hole inside me expanded

Only moments had passed since Anyan, in the shape of the White, had floith his consort, the Red The bones that had once held the White’s spirit lay scattered in front of lazed , the raven, raised her voice infor the woman she knew as Cyntaf, and I knew as Blondie My friend and rief beat its own cadence, an infernal dru ood as Blondie dead Anyan as good as…

For I knew better than to hope I’d hoped once before, looking down intoblue eyes, that reality could be malleable But reality was always exactly that – real, no matter e told ourselves or how many delusions we tried to build Like sandcastles, they always crumbled

[My child,] ca its love wrap around inably stricken by Blondie’s death It felt she was a daughter, and one of the only rean, when the world had been a different place

Many of Blondie’s memories were itsinto each other’s minds

[Join with ether in ain We would support each other, and we could heal

I will never heal, I told the creature, that pit of hopelessness I kneell yawning in front of me

In my own mind, I took a step toward that pit

But the creature was there, appearing as a single great eye It floodedaroundsince burned out, but we could still i, Magog, and Hiral were pressed behind ether, an aamation of creature and Jane, we hadn’t lish air blow the ashes of our friends and ene, black hair, and we refused to think We lived in our aze, the flash of a tattooed bicep, the touch of a strong hand, a wave of power so unique it could only be our child…

The part of us that was the creature touched the part of ain, a mental stroke as if to assure the other ere there

Because alone we hter, ally was dead, and our lover was gone Blondie had fallen at the claws of the Red, while Anyan had become the White