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They came on the ninth day.
Kael had been training since the hatching — learning to read the air currents that flowed through the Red Zone, practicing the carved-channel techniques Verath taught him, trying to build some kind of communication with the hatchling he had named Ember. The name had come naturally; the creature produced heat like a furnace, curling against his chest at night like a living ember, and whenever Kael spoke the word aloud, Ember chirped and pressed closer.
That morning, Verath told him to climb to the highest point of their volcanic ridge.
Why?
Because you will need to see them coming.
He climbed. The Red Zone spread beneath him in a vastscape of black glass and orange lava rivers, the air shimmering with heat that made the horizon dance. He was looking for threats — predators, lava flows, anything that might kill him — when he saw the grey.
It moved against the landscape in a way nothing natural did. A line of figures in grey robes, moving in formation across the volcanic plain, their pace unhurried and purposeful. Seven of them. No — eight. One walked slightly ahead of the others, and something about the way he carried himself made Kael’s skin prickle with warning.
He counted three blades per figure. Crossbows on their backs. No horses — nothing lived in the Red Zone long enough to be domesticated here. They moved on foot, patient and relentless, like wolves who knew their prey could not outrun them.
Kael descended at speed.
They are here, he said.
Verath’s eyes were already closed. I know. I can hear them — their footsteps sound like grief on glass. They will reach us in approximately four hours.
What do we do?
We do what dragons do. We wait. We show them that the Red Zone has not forgotten how to be dangerous. And then, if you are smart — smarter than they expect — you use the terrain to turn their numbers into their weakness.
The hatchling looked up at Kael from the volcanic rock where it sat, golden eyes wide and unafraid. Ember chirped, and the sound was small and fierce and utterly certain of something Kael could not name.
You are not afraid, he told it.
Ember breathed out — a tiny jet of flame that illuminated the dark cave walls for a half-second. No, the fire said. I am not.
Kael thought about the Iron Priests and their leader walking toward them across the glass. He thought about Verath, dying slowly, too weak to fly but not too weak to fight. He thought about Ember, a creature that should not exist, that represented a bloodline the priests had tried to exterminate for two centuries.
He thought about the channels he had carved in the lava rock. The way the flows moved. The points where they pooled and accelerated and could be redirected with the right interruption in the right place at the right time.
Show me, he said to Verath. Show me how to hurt them without letting them hurt us.
Verath opened her eyes. Both of them burned with something ancient and fierce.
First, you must understand what we are fighting, she said. The Iron Priests are not soldiers. They are missionaries. They believe with absolute certainty that dragons are an abomination — that our ancestors made a pact with something dark, and that every generation since has been cursed to live with the consequences. They believe the mountains should belong to humans alone, and that dragons are a contamination that must be cleansed.
And the priest in front? Kael asked.
His name is Aldric Gaine. Verath’s voice turned cold in a way that made the air feel heavier. He killed my last rider. My last bonded human. He caught her in the mountain pass and burned her alive because she would not tell him where the eggs were hidden. He has been hunting my line ever since.
Kael felt something shift in his chest — not fear, not anger, but something colder and more useful. A clarity that made every decision suddenly simple.
Then I know what to do, he said.
He picked up Ember, positioned the hatchling on his shoulder where it could see everything, and walked out of the cave into the afternoon heat. Four hours. He had four hours to turn the Red Zone into a weapon.
He began to dig.