The wind tore at its eyes and muzzle and filled its vast wings. And the merest tease of its shoulder muscles brought it swooping down at reckless speeds to smash froth from the tips of the poisoned waves or snatch at the brine with powerful claws. Water flashed in the sunlight. Sea spray chilled its armoured face, its nostrils. And then it would rise again, the cold metal-scented air buffeting its neck and keening in its ears. The beast’s vision was keener than that of human or Unmerkind and it allowed Ianthe a view far across the Sea of Kings to the dark and fiercely ragged island rising above the horizon like a claw reaching from a pool of blood. Other serpents were hunting there, their lithe cross-shaped bodies soaring or else folding closed and plunging dagger-like into the waters. ‘Peregrello Sentevadro was once a mountain,’ the dragon said. ‘Now the less poetic of your kind call it the Dragon Isle.’ The beast made a growling laugh in its throat.
