Free Moon Rising by Tui T. Sutherland

the sleepers, several of their dreams echoed with images from the war, a few of them nearly as bad as Moon’s nightmare.
    She stretched her mind until she found Winter and Qibli’s cave by the little spark the scavenger gave off, even in his sleep. The IceWing was deep in a sleep without dreams, but Qibli’s dreams were worried in an odd way and seemed to involve other SandWings throwing snakes at him.
    All right, so if it wasn’t one of the students in the sleeping caves, it had to be one of the older dragons. Maybe it was time to try to find Stonemover. If she could track down his cave on her own, she could ask if he was the voice in her head.
    She stepped over to the doorway as quietly as she could, but her tail bumped one of the scroll racks and it rattled across the floor. Kinkajou made a sleepy noise of protest. In her dream, Carnelian growled and whirled around to face a new attacker.
    Moon held her breath until they were still, and then she picked up her map of the academy, whisked into the hallway, and turned to head deeper into the mountain. Her guess was that Stonemover lived on the far side, probably as far from the school as he could get so he wouldn’t be disturbed. She chose the quietest, darkest paths, breathing out small plumes of flame to study the map as she went. Stonemover’s cave wasn’t marked, but there were notes on the map about areas to avoid: “passage too narrow for dragons down this way” or “swarms of bats here.”
    As the voices from the school grew quieter, she listened intently for anything else — a different mind, or the sound of dragon claws. She knew the other mind reader could shield his thoughts from her, but perhaps if he was distracted, or she caught him unguarded, or if she managed to get closer to him … well, maybe something would filter through.
    And then, in a dark tunnel with a low roof, to her surprise, she did hear someone.
    Lost another scale today, I think. And she didn’t come. But then, why would she?
    That was followed by a long sound, like a mental sigh — and then she heard the echo of a real sigh reverberate off the walls around her. It came from a branch of the tunnel off to her right. She ducked her head and climbed up the passageway.
    This mind’s thoughts were very, very slow, as if they were boulders being pushed up a hill. Hungry again. Nothing I can do about that.
    Moon hesitated. He didn’t sound like the dragon she’d been talking to, but she’d come this far.
    She heard scales scraping against stone. Cautiously she crept around the next corner … and there he was.
    A huge dragon lay stretched out against the cave wall with his eyes half closed. A torch flickered from a post near his head. His scales were shades of gray and black, and he looked weighted down, almost more like a statue than a real dragon.
    But real black eyes opened to stare at her as she came in.
    “Hello,” she whispered.
    “Hrmmm,” he said. There was no flash of recognition in his eyes. Surely if this were the dragon in her head, he’d know who she was.
    “Are you — are you Stonemover?” she asked.
    He exhaled slowly. Without lifting his head, he answered, “Unfortunately, yes.”
    “I’m Moonwatcher,” she said.
    “My first visitor from the academy,” he rasped. “Apart from Sunny, of course. She said I might have other dragons to talk to from time to time. But there has been no one so far. Not even Sunny today.”
    “It’s only the first day,” Moon explained. “I’m sure someone else will be along soon. And it was probably a really busy day for Sunny.”
    “Hrmmmmm,” he said again.
    There was a long pause, and Moon couldn’t help thinking that for a dragon who supposedly longed for company, he certainly had very little to say. He didn’t even have very much to think . His mind was slowly revolving back around to how hungry he was.
    She couldn’t ask him if he’d been talking to her in her head. If it wasn’t him — and she was fairly sure