The ice around the NightWing cracked and splintered just as it had before, and Foeslayer slowly opened her eyes. Surprise flashed across her face when she saw Winter there.

“This is a first,” she said. “I’ve never been brought back by the same dragonets before. Did you want a chance to kill me, too? Seems a little over the top, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Listen,” Winter said, “I don’t know if you even realize how much you stole from us when you took away our animus magic.”

The gifts of light … of order … and, running like a hidden current through every dragonet’s understanding of himself, the gift of faith in their tribe that came from the indisputable wisdom of how IceWings handled their magic.

“Imagine what our kingdom would be like if we still had animus dragons,” Winter went on. “What else would we have invented?”

“I suspect you wouldn’t have stayed in your little kingdom much longer,” Foeslayer answered him. “Have you considered that your perfect tribe might have used the magic for evil as well as good?”

Was that true? Would we have done something terrible with it? What kind of gift might Queen Glacier have asked for during the War of SandWing Succession?

He shook out his wings. “When you stole Prince Arctic, you stole all our future gifts, everything that we might have become, and I can see why some dragons would think that’s unforgivable.” His scales felt heavier and heavier as he went on. “But … this. This imprisonment, for centuries, keeping you alive only to die over and over again. I feel like … I feel like perhaps you’ve been punished enough.”

Foeslayer turned away from him and rested her talons on one of the frozen dragonets, hiding her face. After a moment she said, in a muffled, fractured voice, “I didn’t steal him.”

“Prince Arctic?” Winter said.

“I didn’t steal him.” Foeslayer lifted one wing so she could meet Winter’s eyes. “I fell in love with him.”

An entire history of a tribe, the story of a war, the foundation of an ancient hatred — it all shivered in Winter’s mind like stepping onto the thinnest layer of ice.

“And he loved me, too,” Foeslayer said. “That’s the truth, although no IceWing has ever listened long enough to hear it before.”

Everything was splintering apart.

“We didn’t mean to ruin everything,” she said. “Or start a terrible war, or make two tribes hate each other for all eternity. We just wanted to be together.”

He believed her. He wouldn’t have a month ago, but now he believed her because he knew exactly how that felt. Because he could imagine throwing everything away, too, for the chance to be with Moon.

If they dared to start something … could he and Moon end as badly as Foeslayer and Arctic?

Would he risk it, even after seeing where it might lead?

It’s different, he told himself. Queen Diamond cared very much what happened to Prince Arctic. No one cares at all what happens to me.

“So now you know,” Foeslayer said, rolling the spear over to him. “Ready to kill me?”

He shook his head. “I’m getting you out of here.”

The NightWing’s eyes gleamed, dark and glittering in the light from his moon globe. “That’s impossible, I’m afraid,” she said. “Every time I’ve tried to cross the chasm, some kind of invisible wall drives me back. I assume the enchantment was crafted to keep me here forever.”

“Maybe,” Winter said. “But IceWings are careful planners, especially when it comes to animus gifts. I’m sure Diamond left a way to free you, in case they needed you to negotiate with the NightWings.” He stepped back, studying her from wings to tail. “It must be your shackles — that’s what’s been animus-touched, right?”

She lifted one back foot and then the other. “Well, they’re impervious to fire,” she said. “And nothing happens when I smash them against the walls, except it makes my ankles really hurt. So I’m guessing they’re enchanted, yes.”

“Whatever will break them,” Winter said, “I bet can only be done by a member of the royal family. If I know IceWings anyway. But you’re in luck, because that’s what I am.” He tried not to think about his name on the rankings wall — his name glittering at the top, and then Tundra’s claws scratching through it, marking him as dead.

He picked up one of the spears and pointed it at the shackles. “Hold still.”

“Oh dear,” Foeslayer said, closing her eyes.

With a swift jabbing motion, Winter struck the closest shackle with the tip of the spear.

It bounced off, reverberating in his claws. The shackle looked untouched.

Winter set the spear down again and crouched to examine the shackles. There was a small diamond shape indented on the side of each one. Carefully he poked the diamond with one claw, but that didn’t do anything either.

One more possibility. Something only an IceWing could do, which made it safe because no IceWing would ever, ever free a NightWing.

He reached inside him for the lurking snowstorm and then breathed out, covering the diamond with frostbreath.

The shackle sprang apart, clattered to the floor, and shattered into tiny pieces.

Foeslayer sat up, staring at the other shackle with hope and disbelief warring in her eyes.

“Wait,” Winter said. He touched the other shackle. “I should — I have to make sure of one thing. If I free you, you have to promise you won’t go hurt any IceWings. I don’t want a whole new cycle of vengeance and war to start. Do you understand? It ends here.”

“I never want to see an IceWing ever again in my whole life,” Foeslayer said fervently. “Set me free, and I’ll go straight home to the Night Kingdom, and you’ll never see me again.”

The Night Kingdom.

The lost city of night — Foeslayer knew exactly where it was. She could help them stop the prophecy.

“Actually,” Winter said, “I want to come with you.”

This was his future now. Not prince among IceWings, not Queen Glacier’s nephew, not a warrior struggling his way up the rankings under the disapproving gaze of his parents.

He was a dragon who had friends from other tribes. And he was going to save Jade Mountain with them.

He leaned forward to breathe frostbreath on the last shackle.

Moon, Qibli, Kinkajou … I’m coming. Wait for me. I’ll be there soon.