Nobody asked Wren if he wanted the job. The soldiers just pushed the kingdom's last dragon egg into his arms and told him to walk. The queen's order sat folded in his pocket: deliver it to the Cinder Tower, sealed and whole. So down the mountain road he went, the cold egg against his chest. Then, near a sharp bend in the trail, the shell started to warm. It shook in his hands. With a soft, wet snap, a crack split across it.

Wren froze. The order said to deliver the egg sealed and whole. A hatched egg would be worthless to them. He sat on a flat rock, cradled the egg in his coat, and let it crack. He wanted to see what came out before he decided anything.

The shell broke, but what crawled out was wrong. The little dragon was twisted and weak, one wing crumpled under it. It could barely lift its head. Wren realized the long cold journey had hurt it badly.

Wren refused to give up. He tucked the weak dragon inside his shirt for warmth and fed it drops of water from his fingers. Slowly, color crept back into its scales. By morning, the little dragon could lift its crumpled wing.

The dragon healed completely. It grew strong and bright, and the wing that had been hurt now beat as hard as the other. Wren and his dragon climbed to the highest peak together and watched the sun rise over a free world. He had saved the last of its kind.