Clearsight’s heart thudded with terror as she crept off the stage into the crowd, leaving Darkstalker’s grand scene in the middle of Arctic’s confession. The black leather case crumpled around the scroll as she clutched it under her wings.

She couldn’t save Arctic. The next few minutes were inevitable, and terrible, and far too horribly clear in her mind already. Blue IceWing blood everywhere. No, he was lost … and now she had to save Fathom, and Indigo, and maybe the queen, and the whole rest of Pyrrhia, if she could.

It was a slim chance, and it only might work because she could thread the possibilities and read the ripples better than Darkstalker could. He was distracted by his vengeance and his horror show, and she’d spent the entire flight home untangling the one frail thread of hope until she knew what she had to do.

As she ducked through the crowd, avoiding all the looks and whispers, she ran directly into a set of familiar talons.

“Clearsight!” Listener whispered, grabbing her shoulders. “What. Is. HAPPENING.”

Clearsight shook her head. “I can’t … I can’t explain.”

“I can!” Listener said. “Your boyfriend is a psycho, just like I always thought!” She finally noticed the tracks of tears on Clearsight’s snout and leaned in to wipe them away. “Oh, moonbeam, you’ll be all right.”

“No,” Clearsight said. She seized one of her friend’s talons in hers. “Listener, this is important. Remember when you told me that you did want to know the future if it meant saving your family’s lives? If something really, really bad was about to happen?”

Listener fell back, a look of dawning fear on her face. “What’s going to happen, Clearsight?”

“I don’t know, exactly,” Clearsight said. But if her plan failed, and Darkstalker returned, even stronger and more furious than before, without her to hold him back anymore … it was all destruction and death and nothing but darkness from there. “But it’s really bad. Please, Listener, if you’ve ever believed anything I’ve said, do this for me. Find my parents, gather your family, and leave the Night Kingdom. Fly as far and as fast as you can. Take them somewhere safe where … where no one will ever find them.”

She was suddenly aware that other dragons were listening, that she had the attention of several frightened faces.

“And the queen?” Listener asked.

“If you can get to her,” Clearsight said, “tell her to escape, too. I’ll give you all as much time as I can, but I don’t know if my plan will work.” Will he come after me? Will he kill the queen first? Will I survive what I’m about to do?

“Clearsight —” Listener started, reaching for her.

Clearsight threw her wings around her friend, hugging her fiercely. “Thank you for being you,” she whispered in her ear. “I hope your life is everything it should be.”

Then she pulled herself away and shoved through the crowd, ducking under long necks and wings until she was far enough from the stage to take flight for the palace.

Fathom was waiting in his room, where she’d told him to go, pacing back and forth and twisting his talons together.

“Did he suspect anything?” he asked as she swooped in over the balcony.

“Not yet,” she said. “We have to keep you away from him until it’s done, or he’ll hear something in your thoughts.” She pulled out the scroll. “Here.”

“I don’t want to touch that,” he said, backing away.

“We have to. We have to use it to make something that will stop him,” she said. She brushed a tear out of her eye. There was no time for crying, none.

“Not with his scroll,” Fathom said, shaking his head. “It could be enchanted to signal him whenever someone else uses it. Or it might kill anyone else who tries to write in it. Or he might know, somehow, every spell that’s written in it. We can’t use that.”

“I don’t think he was that devious when he first made this,” Clearsight said with a stab of sorrow for that dragon Darkstalker had been, that day when everything had looked so bright up ahead. “But you’re right, he might have added it later. We have to risk it, though.”

Fathom put one talon over hers, stopping her. “I’ll do it. I’ll use my own power.”

“Your oath,” Clearsight said. “You can’t —”

“I have to,” he said. “It’s the only way. This is just like my grandfather … I’m the only one who can.”

The timeline thread trembled in Clearsight’s mind and she steadied herself on it, focusing as hard as she could. “Quickly, then. Remember, he’s invulnerable and immortal now.”

“I know,” he said. “I think I know what to do, but I need something to enchant. You can’t take anything with you.” Fathom’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Or else he’ll know … he’ll guess … if he suspects …”

“I know,” Clearsight whispered back. Her breath caught on a sob. “He might kill me.” That future was horribly clear, real behind her eyes even as her mind refused to believe it. She wrestled the bracelet off her arm. Moonstones and copper wire, his gift to protect her — the one she’d known would be important one day. “Use this. But make sure it keeps the enchantment it already has, too.”

Fathom turned the bracelet over in his claws, tears brimming in his eyes. “Are we really doing this?” he asked. “Shouldn’t we use the soul reader on him first, to make sure he’s as far gone as we think?”

“We don’t have time, and he’s left us no choice,” she said. “It only gets worse from here, Fathom. There are some futures that aren’t completely terrible, but there are many more that are too frightening to risk. This could be the last moment we have where we’re both free and thinking for ourselves. It’s our only chance to stop him.”

“All right.” He held the bracelet between his talons and closed his eyes, concentrating fiercely. Finally he handed it back to her. It looked and felt exactly the same.

“It’s done,” he whispered.

“You’re sure this will work?” she said.

“You’d know better than I would,” he said.

That was true. She could see that the spell was strong; it would work — if she could get the bracelet on Darkstalker’s arm. If he didn’t figure out what she was doing. If she was fast enough … if, if, if …

“Thank you,” she said. “If this works, you’ve saved the world, you know.”

He shifted his wings, looking down at his talons as if they might accidentally set something on fire. “It’ll be more you than me,” he said. “Be careful.”

She hugged him and thrust the scroll into his claws. “One more thing,” she said. “I — I’m afraid he did something to Indigo.” He looked up, his eyes wide. “Search through here and find it. I don’t know how he hid it from me, but it must be in there somewhere. Maybe you can bring her back, or … well, whatever it is, you should know the truth.”

He nodded, barely breathing.

“Then hide that scroll and get as far away from the Night Kingdom as you can. Whatever you do, don’t destroy the scroll, or else he’ll get all his power back.” Clearsight rubbed her eyes, stepping toward the window. She knew she would never see him again. “Good-bye, Fathom.”

“Good-bye, Clearsight. Good luck.”

She was out in the sky a moment later, flying on aching wings toward Agate Mountain, far to the east. She didn’t look back, but she knew Fathom was standing in the window, watching her go.

The timelines were all narrowing to one moment now.

She flew toward her last chance to save the future.