Kira Sunstrider crouched in dry grass and counted the wolves that were starving her clan. Six of them. Their gray coats twitched with a strange blue shimmer, and they had ruled her hunting grounds for eleven days. Her clan had gone hungry for ten. Kira meant to rule every scattered clan on the plains one day. She could not lead women who watched their children grow thin. Her spear was old. Half her hunting party carried spears with cracked shafts. Six wolves against seven half-fed women was a fight she would lose. So Kira had left the pack alone and gone looking for something better. She found it under a hill of broken stone. A metal door, rusted and marked with faded symbols from the old world. Vines with glowing leaves gripped the frame, feeding on the light that leaked through cracks. Kira cut them away and pried the door open. Inside sat rows of blades, coils of strong cord, and long weapons she did not fully understand. A hunter's storehouse, sealed and forgotten. She armed every woman in her party. They returned at dusk. Kira set the cord as a trap across the narrow gully where the wolves slept. She drove them toward it with fire and shouting. The pack bolted. Three wolves hit the cord and fell tangled. Her women speared them fast. The other three broke free and scattered into the dark. Kira had won the ground. Her clan would eat by morning. She stood over the dead wolves and felt the fear leak out of her hunters' faces. Then the sky changed. A shadow slid across the moon. Wings spread wide above the gully, broad and dark, edged with a cold blue glow that matched the shimmer in the wolves' fur. The creature dropped low. It was a dragon, larger than any beast Kira had ever seen, its long neck bent as it studied the bodies below. It made no sound. It only watched, and its watching felt like a claim. Kira understood. The wolves had not been the true masters of this land. They had been the dragon's hunters, driven ahead of it. She had killed the creature's pack. Now it looked at her women the way she had looked at the wolves. The dragon beat its wings once and rose. It circled the plains, slow and certain, then flew toward the far ridge where the great sacred tree stood. Lanterns glowed among its branches. Whole families lived in that tree, clans she needed if she ever hoped to rule them all. The dragon settled into the high canopy and folded its wings. Kira lowered her spear. She had driven off the wolves and fed her clan. She had also woken something worse, and it had chosen to roost above the very people she meant to win.