Free Shapeshifters by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes Page A

the city. Their reputation is not kind, and I do not like their presence inside our walls. They say they are only here to trade. My sister insists they are as human as we are, and should be trusted as we trust our own.
    A few lines were translated on each of the next few pages, and then came the words I did not want to read.
    In the back. She showed them only kindness. She treated them only warmly. They have nothing to gain. Trust a snake to attack just because a trusting back is turned.
    I shuddered, putting the journal aside. Was I following in my ancestor’s footsteps, giving trust to a cobra despite every warning? Was I making the same mistakes, to ultimately end with the same fate?

T HE NEXT TWO DAYS PASSED TOO QUICKLY. Between preparation for the coronation and the looming war I felt powerless to stop, I had no time even for nerves … for which I was grateful. Neither did I have time to formulate a plan.
    The morning before the coronation, I found on my bed two gifts, one from Eleanor Lyssia and one from the Aurita, a small shop run by a family of jewelry makers whose craftsmanship I favored but whose work I owned only one piece of. The family was too poor to be giving many pieces away but refused to sell anything to me at its full value.
    I opened the package from Eleanor Lyssia and found inside a beautiful silken dress, the quality of which amazed me. The material was sosoft it seemed to flow across my hands, alive, as I held it; the color was a beautiful burgundy that complimented my golden hawk’s tones perfectly. I wondered how many hours she had dedicated to the intricate feather design carefully embroidered around the waist. Surely this was the work of the master seamstress, not the young girl I knew was the apprentice?
    Yet there was Eleanor’s signature, discreetly woven into the hem of the dress in matching burgundy thread.
    The jewelry sent by the Aurita matched the dress beautifully. A fine gold chain suspended a garnet above the hollow of my throat; wisps of gold little wider than threads hung below the stone and made my skin seem to glisten.
    The only other piece I owned from the Aurita was a delicate handflower, with similar fine gold chains trailing from a ring on my middle finger and across the back of my hand to a bracelet of twisted gold. The ring had been inset with a garnet that would match this, and as I recalled it, I decided I would wear that as well—if I could remember where I had put it.
    Carefully, I removed the dress and laid it across the foot of my bed. The delicate necklace I placed on the nightstand nearby, and then I went to riffle through my jewelry box to find the handflower.
    When I could not find it there, I checked my nightstand and the trunk that sat at the foot of my bed. Neither surface held the elusive handflower, but a brief search under the bed revealed something that glinted in the faint light.
    I reached for it and then frowned as I realized it was silver, not gold.
    As I pulled the ring into the light, it took me several long moments to realize what it was … and several more moments to convince myself I was right.
    The stone was an oval of black onyx, inset in silver, and as I held the piece in my hand, I felt suddenly light-headed. The ring was heavy and larger than I wore—designed for a man’s hand. It fit loosely on the first finger of my right hand, where it sat in satirical challenge.
    I dropped heavily onto the bed, unsettling the beautiful burgundy dress. Without a doubt I knew that this was what Zane Cobriana had pressed into my hand, most likely intended as a symbol of his protection if I ventured into serpiente land. And of course, if this was real, if I wasn’t dreaming now—and for a moment I hoped wildly that I was—I had not been dreaming then. I must have half-woken, roused by his presence.
    I felt the heat rise in my cheeks as I reexamined my fuzzy memory of that night. I recalled my outrageous behavior and of