The Lost Heir by Tui T. Sutherland Read Free Book Online Page B

challenging than Shark’s. She was not about to start her life with the SeaWings by kowtowing to every soldier dragon who came along. Even if he was her uncle.
    Shark narrowed his eyes until they nearly disappeared into his scales. “What makes you believe this snip of a dragon comes from the stolen royal egg?” he asked Riptide.
    “Why, do you lose a lot of eggs?” Tsunami jumped in. “Maybe whoever’s in charge of defense isn’t doing such a good job, then. Oh, wait, that’s you, isn’t it?”
    “Her story makes sense,” Riptide said desperately. “She knew about — about Webs. He raised her. And look at the glow patterns under her wings.”
    All of the SeaWings craned their necks to stare at Tsunami’s wings. She snapped at a couple who got too close, then peered around to see what they were seeing.
    Under her wings, when she lit them up, the luminescent stripes formed spirals around the outer edges. Starbursts shaped like webbed dragon footprints branched away from the lines in the middle. Was that weird? She glanced at the other SeaWings. Most of them had smaller starbursts and no spirals. Only Shark’s patterns matched her own.
    Because we’re both royal.
She lifted her head and met his gaze triumphantly.
But one day
I
shall be queen, and you will always be nothing but a soldier.
    Shark let out a long hissing breath. “Very well,” he said. “Kill the other four and bring her.”

“Don’t you touch them!” Tsunami yelled. She whirled and smacked a SeaWing out of the sky as he reached for Clay. Starflight had already ducked below Clay’s massive wings. Glory drew her neck back and bared her fangs.
    “I am the queen’s daughter, and I order you to leave these dragonets alone,” Tsunami shouted.
    The guards looked from her to Shark uncertainly. His eyes were pale reflecting pools, hiding his thoughts. He slowly raised one talon and made a strange circling motion with it — a sign in the SeaWing language, Tsunami guessed. Whatever it was, it worked. To Tsunami’s relief, the guards backed away.
    But when she glanced at Riptide, she noticed that he still looked tense and unhappy.
Maybe he’s just afraid of Shark,
she thought.
    “Very good,” she said, trying to sound like she was in command. “Now take us to my mother.”
    “The queen is conducting business at the Deep Palace,” Shark said flatly. “We will take you to the Summer Palace, where you may wait for her.” He made another talon signal, and two of the guards broke away from the group, winging off across the water.
Taking the message to my mother,
Tsunami thought, her wings expanding with joy. They were so close to every thing she’d always imagined.
I’m going to meet my parents today.
    Islands flashed by below them as they flew on, now with a tight guard of SeaWings. Some of the islands were small patches of sand, barely big enough for one dragon to land on, and others were towering, jagged rocks shooting out of the water. Ahead, Tsunami saw one that looked like a huge dragon skeleton, with holes and gaps all through the pale stone.
    The stone skeleton’s nose pointed toward another island, this one ringed with forbidding-looking rocks and presenting only a high, sheer cliff face on all sides. The top was a rioting jungle. Thick green vines and trees pressed so close together that there was not a single spot clear enough to land on.
    Tsunami was startled when Shark suddenly swerved and dove toward the base of the cliff. He splashed down between two spiraling rocks, sharp and evenly matched like dragon horns, and vanished into the azure water.
    She blinked. Where had he gone? The water was so clear here that she could see fat black turtles strolling across the sand at the bottom of the sea.
    But then, one by one, half the guards around them dove for the same spot, and each of them disappeared the same way — gone before the bubbles of their splash had cleared.
    “Clay, stop,” she said, brushing his wing.