Queen Coral rose to her feet, knocking Moray aside. She shot back across the cave to the door, but the skinny green dragon was gone. Anemone yelped a stream of bubbles as the queen blasted up the tunnel with her in tow.

Tsunami started after them, then turned and looked down at the last egg. Moray had already followed Coral. Whirlpool was hovering uselessly in the doorway. If Tsunami went after Coral as well, who would be left to guard the egg?

But no one can get in except through that door, she thought, staring around. That door from that tunnel. So how did someone get past Tortoise?

She turned in a circle, staring at the smooth walls. Come to think of it . . . how did Webs get in here to steal my egg? Surely there had been guards back then, too. Surely the queen had tried to protect her eggs, even six years ago. Webs couldn’t have fought past them alone. So how did he get in?

Tsunami narrowed her eyes at the nests and the stone dragon. A secret entrance. There must be.

Well, one thing was for sure. She wasn’t leaving this egg alone in here.

She crouched beside the nest and gently lifted up the last intact egg. It was surprisingly heavy — or perhaps not that surprising, considering a baby dragonet was supposed to pop out of it in a day or two. Cradling the egg to her chest, Tsunami swam out the door of the cave.

Whirlpool flashed a whole lot of stripes at her, waving his talons indignantly and pointing at the egg.

Tsunami gave him a wide-eyed, puzzled expression. Maybe you should have taught me some real Aquatic, sea slug. Then you could yell at me all you want, she thought.

He lit up his scales again. With a friendly smile, Tsunami lit up the same patterns back at him, then added squid-brain with her tail stripes, like Riptide had taught her. She swam away up the tunnel, leaving him gaping in surprise behind her.

As she swam up and around, she started to hear shrieks of pain echoing through the water. She hesitated, then beat her wings faster.

In the main entrance hall, Queen Coral had Tortoise pinned under her talons. A crowd of SeaWings had gathered, watching in silence.

The skinny green dragon was shrieking in one long, high-pitched scream. Tsunami stopped and pressed herself back against the wall, horrified. Queen Coral had already yanked out each of Tortoise’s teeth one by one. They rose through the water, tiny and white, toward the roof. Now Coral had her claws stabbed into Tortoise’s exposed underbelly. Clouds of blood filled the water, nearly hiding the queen and Tortoise in a red haze.

Would I have to do that, if I were queen?

Could I ever, ever do that?

Anemone had rolled herself into a ball, floating in the water above her mother with her eyes tightly shut and her talons over her ears.

Queen Coral’s scales lit up in a slow, menacing way. Tsunami didn’t understand most of it, but she guessed Tortoise was hearing about how she’d failed the queen.

Tortoise’s stripes flashed weakly.

The queen snarled and twisted her claws harder into Tortoise’s underbelly. Tortoise gurgled up a bubble of blood. Her stripes flashed again, and then, as her head began to loll sideways, she spotted someone in the crowd around them. She clutched at the queen’s talons and pointed, her stripes flashing frantically.

She was pointing straight at Shark.

He stared back, unblinking as always.

Queen Coral leaned down, pressing Tortoise into the floor. One more message flared through her scales, and then she seized Tortoise’s head in her talons and smashed it against the rough coral floor.

Tsunami turned away just in time, huddling around the egg with her eyes closed. She didn’t care if she looked like a one-year-old dragonet, hiding her face. She did not want that image in her head for the rest of her life.

What was Tortoise saying about Shark?

Whatever it was hadn’t convinced Queen Coral, anyhow.

Tsunami kept her eyes closed until she felt the eddies from other dragons swimming away. She peeked around and saw Moray busily cleaning up the blood and bone fragments that were floating around the main hall.

GROOOOOOOSS, Tsunami thought. Moray must really adore Coral to be willing to do that.

Tortoise’s body was hooked on an outcropping of coral by the front door, like a used-up deer carcass waiting to be taken to the trash heap after dinner. Queen Coral loomed over Shark, clutching Anemone to her chest and exchanging a heated luminescent conversation with her brother. All the other SeaWings had scattered to faraway parts of the palace.

Tsunami started toward her mother, but stopped as a strange shape flashed by one of the windows. What the — that wasn’t a dragon. She swam a bit closer and peered out.

Sharks — actual, dead-eyed sharks with enormous jagged teeth — were swarming around the front entrance, sniffing at the blood that still leaked from Tortoise’s body. They were bigger than Tsunami had expected — big enough to eat a dragonet the size of Anemone, she guessed — but even as she watched, two SeaWing guards darted down and killed five of them with a few blows of their tails.

She turned back and saw Whirlpool swimming up to Queen Coral. He interrupted her conversation, waving his talons furiously and pointing at Tsunami.

Uh-oh. Tsunami took a deep breath and held the eggshell closer. Well, I’m not giving this up.

Queen Coral swam over with a half frown on her face. She pointed to the egg and gestured commandingly for Tsunami to give it to her.

Tsunami flashed her stripes in one of the few patterns she knew. I will protect. She wasn’t sure how to say it. She pointed at the egg. I will protect.

The queen blinked. She lit up a few of her stripes, including one pattern on her snout that Tsunami recognized as how.

Tsunami shook her head. She didn’t have enough Aquatic to answer that. I will protect, she said again.

She spotted the eyes of several SeaWings peering around doorways at her. Most of them looked shocked and disbelieving. She saw her sister glance from Tsunami to the crumpled remains of Tortoise, then back again. Anemone’s face was pale and anxious.

Oh.

Tsunami realized what they were seeing. She was putting herself in Tortoise’s place. She was taking the job nobody wanted. She hadn’t even thought of it that way.

Which meant, if she failed . . . she might be punished the same way, too.