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Encouraged, I gave his shoulders a light shove. “Wake up.”

Still unconscious, he sank deeper into the seagrass, his nails curving into claws and his skin turning gradually, unmistakably green.

I backed away.

A dozen times I’d witnessed my brothers transform into cranes. Every dusk and dawn, for the longest, most excruciating minute, Raikama’s curse shattered their bones and ripped apart their muscles, contorting their limbs into wings and stick-thin legs, their noses into long dark bills, and their hair into crimson crowns.

I’d never forgotten the sound of their screams.

Seryu’s transformation was nothing like my brothers’. It was swift and effortless, as if he were slipping into a suit of armor. Scales ridged over what had been smooth human flesh, and his legs, sprawled over the morass of seagrass, stretched into a long and winding tail. Whiskers sprouted from his cheeks, and lastly, his horns appeared, half covered by a mass of dark green hair.

He blinked awake, his red eyes wide and his face as pale as it’d been earlier. But maybe being unconscious helped him recover more quickly this time, for he grabbed me by the sleeve. “You must have a death wish, Shiori. Didn’t Aunt Nahma tell you to play along?” He groaned, rubbing the singed scales on his spine. “Never mind. Get on. The sharks will be on our tails shortly.”

“What happened back there with your grandfather?” I asked shakily. “I thought dragons couldn’t harm each other, but he…he—”

“Grandfather is a god of dragons,” Seryu replied. “He created the oath; he is not bound by it. Which is why we need to get someplace safe. Now.”

I understood. But first: “We have to rescue Kiki.”

“Did you hear a word I said?” Seryu’s exasperation manifested in a grumble. “It’s bad enough you went back for the stone boy. Forget about Kiki.”

“Forget about her? You know what Kiki means to me. She has a piece of my soul.”

“Had,” Seryu corrected. “And it was a small piece. You won’t die without it. You will die, however, if you keep arguing.”

“But—”

“We can look for her when the search storms recede.” He cocked his head at a whirling column of water and air by the palace, twisting and churning as it scanned every rock, creature, and leaf for Seryu and me. “They’ll catch you in their current and take you to Grandfather if we don’t hurry.”

He grabbed my arm, but I struggled, trying to wade through the seagrass. My knees knocked against stone, and I gasped.

“There’s Gen!” I cried. “Oh, thank the Strands, I think he’s still breathing. We need to bring him too.”

“We don’t have time for him,” Seryu huffed.

“No arguments.” I was already trying to heave Gen onto Seryu’s enormous back. “He’ll die if he stays out here.”

“Why should you care?”

“He’s a child! Every day he’s here is a month his family wonders what’s happened to him.” I thought of how much misery I must have brought Father when my brothers and I disappeared. “We have to help him.”

“This is your only chance to go home. To be with your beloved lordling and your brothers. Isn’t that what you’ve been agonizing over this entire week?”

It was. And I mourned the precious, precious time that I would never get back. But Raikama had sacrificed far more than time for me. I would do right by her.

“I came here to find the Wraith,” I replied. “If I leave, the journey will have been for nothing.”

“Grandfather isn’t going to tell—”

“Elang knows who the Wraith is,” I said, cutting him off.

Surprise sprang on Seryu’s brow, but he shook his head. “Visiting Elang is out of the question. He despises humans. He’d never welcome you.”

“If you won’t come, then I’ll go on my own.”

“On your own?” Seryu laughed. “You can’t even swim to the surface on your own.”

A beaked whale loomed above us, blanketing the seagrass in shadow. Seryu shoved me down to my stomach. “Quiet,” he whispered.