The moon hung low and heavy in the sky, a sliver of polished bone against a canvas of deep, star-dusted violet. The streets of the dragonkin city were quiet now, the earlier, boisterous energy of the market having given way to a silent, watchful peace. My footsteps were the only sound as I made my way through the sleeping city, the weight of Yumi, now fast asleep in my arms, a strange, comforting anchor in the storm of my own thoughts.
I stopped before a modest but elegant mansion, its walls carved from the same dark, volcanic stone as the surrounding mountains, its windows glowing with a soft, warm light. This was it. The home of the girl whose fate was now inexplicably, and irrevocably, tied to my own.
I knocked.
