Those few followers she knew personally were out there somewhere, among the rapt throng. She wished she could find one of them, to derive a measure of comfort, like a familiar blanket to hold during long, frigid nights. Knowing she was in the right would have to shore up her courage.

“What’s the use of thinking ourselves better if we can’t hold children of our own? The time has come for reconciliation, and through reconciliation will come solutions—and the future we long for.”

Her words must’ve touched her followers because the murmurs that had threaded through her soliloquy strengthened into applause and even shouts of approval.

“At dusk this evening, I will make an announcement to reward your faith. Some call us a cult. The Sun Cult. But we are not a religion. We all have our means of worshiping the Dragon. This, our gathering, is a meeting of forward-thinking individuals. And finally, with hope, I can say that two such individuals are here among us, joined in a vow of cooperation.”

With a swell of pride behind her breastbone, she once again lifted her hands—this time in triumph. “Northern and Southern, at last you will have better than bellowed accusations of past crimes and threats of retribution. You will use peaceful voices in thoughtful discussion. As the woman you call the Sun, I swear it.”

The applause was breathtaking. Slack, stunned faces transformed. Kavya saw relief and curiosity, but mostly joy. Some embraced or turned to clap each other on the back. None gave any sign of typical clan suspicions, either physically or with what she could sense of the crowd’s mood. Neither Indranan faction seemed to remember that they’d warred for countless years, or that fresh blood spilled a generation before—at the massacre known as the Juvine—had renewed three millennia of hatred.

Kavya lowered her head and interlaced her fingers. Her mother had taught her, You can hold our homeland in your hands. The rise and fall of your fingers become our mountains and valleys.

That was Kavya’s earliest memory. Her last memories of her mother were colored by madness and an indescribable sense of loss.

She needed order. Although beautiful, the ridges of rock that marked the far western edge of the Himalayas had no order. Random peaks. Irregular riverbeds. High glaciers that changed with the seasons and the passing of time, and trees that bent beneath fierce wind and heavy snow. Kavya aligned her knuckles. None stood higher than the others. Only then did she feel calmer, which was more important than happiness. Those who’d gathered in the Pir Panjal could be happy. She still had work to do.

When she lifted her face to the crowd, she unclasped her hands and lowered them straight to her sides. The silk of her sari was more luxurious than any she’d ever owned. She gently toyed with the flowing fabric. “Now,” she said, “our day must continue as it has. With purpose. Join me in the noon benediction.”

She was no cult leader, but she understood the importance of ritual. The rituals she’d fashioned were an amalgam of practices from all Five Clans. Words from each language. Praise to each version of the Dragon. Affirmation of each special gift. Although the origin of her work had focused on peace among the Indranan, she’d since expanded her purpose to include all of the Dragon Kings. They needed each other. She was convinced.

Thus the words she spoke in daily blessing were meant to appeal to as many as possible, just as her appearance was. Once again, Kavya’s brain—her entire body—ached from the effort. And once again, she persevered.

“Eat, my friends. Peace be with you.”

She turned to the rear of the altar and descended. She was alone. No one followed her. Even her bodyguards maintained a respectful distance on the other side of a natural archway. She basked in the privilege of lowering her mental shields and releasing the crowd from the spell of her mind. There was no need for anonymous luminosity when she was alone.

Yet she was so very alone.

How could she be otherwise?

Pashkah would find her someday. Her triplet would kill her or she would kill him. Relying on even the most devoted follower was a risk she rarely took. That meant hiding her real self. She had long since abandoned the innocent child named Kavya of the Northern Indranan. The little girl she’d been was a photograph faded to gray.

“Very pretty words.”

Her head jerked up by reflex. An Indranan so lost in thought was a telepath stripped naked of defenses. For a slip of a moment, she couldn’t remember how to hide. The danger of her mistake shot flame through her bones.

Had he been Pashkah . . .

Instead the man was a stranger. Not exactly slim, but not overly brawny, he straddled the solid middle ground where muscle and skill hid beneath an unassuming exterior. He was paler than members of her clan, although he retained the golden shimmer of the Dragon Kings. And as a Dragon King, that meant exceptional male beauty. Dark hair was tipped with glinting silver—not the gray of an old man, but a gleam like the shine of mica flecks. His hair didn’t reach his collar, but it was long at his crown and stood in disarray.

He wore lightweight layered sweaters, cargo pants, heavy black boots, and an open leather coat lined with wool. No ceremonial robes. Just the clothes of a human. The straight, narrow swords that crossed in an X at his back, however, were the weapons of a Pendray. He radiated wildness, from that mass of careless hair to the way his relaxed, almost negligent stance proclaimed him a killer.

Her gift would confirm what made her senses prickle and cringe. In self-defense, she reached out to learn his identity and his intentions.

And to her profound shock, she couldn’t read his mind. Not a single thought.

“Who are you?”

He walked toward her with swagger, leading with his shoulders. His scabbards moved with a hiss of leather over leather. Bright blue eyes narrowed. “You’ll find out before I’m through with you.”

—

The Sun was a fraud.

Worse, she was a vile manipulator.

As an upward surge of violence scribbled red across his vision, Tallis of Pendray could’ve been staring at the interior of a slaughterhouse. Droning pulses of cruelty beat a counterpoint to the rhythm of his heart. He wanted to loose his fury.

He needed to stay in control.

Otherwise he would never be able to discredit the Sun and thwart the commands she had thrust into his mind for two decades.

Always dripping in gold. Always riding away on the back of the Dragon.

A berserker rage would ruin months of preparation—sensible, rational preparation. Finding her hadn’t been easy. Everyone knew of the Sun Cult, but its ever-changing location had taken him almost a year to pinpoint. It was bad enough that the gift of Tallis’s clan, the Pendray, was the mindless fury of a berserker. Because the Sun had deluded him for so long, he’d come to prize rationality. He would not be a pawn to his blood-born impulses or a puppet to a charismatic charlatan.

Yet . . . she was real.

Some part of him had always feared he was well and truly mad. What if he’d been acting on a delusion so clear and all-consuming that he needed a scapegoat? How convenient to blame bloodied hands on a woman conjured by a guilty, disturbed conscience, then top off his mental self-defense with delusions of the Dragon. He put away his doubts and laid the gory blame where it belonged—there on an altar of stacked rocks the color of bronze.

His only regret was that, truth be told, the Sun’s professed ambition was noble and worth his sacrifices. Her appearances were rare enough to be treasured, but constant enough to reinforce her design for the future of the Dragon Kings. And Tallis’s role in it.

However, the violence he’d guided to the home of his niece, Nynn, had sapped his optimism. Whether the Sun’s plan to unify the clans would protect the Dragon Kings from extinction was no longer his concern. After what he’d endured, what he’d done, what he’d become for her—he deserved to embrace a personal grudge.