After finding a compass and clues left by Kallista's father, Leo Babbage, Trenton and Kallista head west aboard their homemade mechanical dragon to search for the missing inventor. The teenagers hope to find answers about their mountain city of Cove, but instead, they find only a blackened forest, ruined buildings, and a small underground city. Almost immediately, Trenton and Kallista are caught up in a civil war between a clan of scavengers called Whipjacks and the Order of the Beast, people who believe that dragons are immortal and divine. Stranded in a new city, the two friends meet Plucky, a Whipjack girl with mechanical legs, and Ander, a young member of the Order who claims humans are able to communicate with dragons. Can they trust anyone, or have they unknowingly stepped into a trap? And high above in the sky, the dragons are gathering . . . ''An amazing adventure that will grab hold of you and never let go.'' --Jennifer A. Nielsen, New York Times bestselling author, praise for the series ''A joy to read from cover to cover. Highly recommended.'' -- Midwest Book Review J. Scott Savage is the author of the Farworld middle-grade fantasy series and the Case File 13 middle-grade monster series. He has been writing and publishing books for over ten years. He has visited more than 1,200 elementary schools, dozens of writers conferences, and taught many writing classes. He has four children and lives with his wife, Jennifer, and their Border Collie, Pepper, in a windy valley of the Rocky Mountains. As he turned away from the clearing, a shadow dropped over his shoulder. He looked up, expecting to see a cloud. Instead, he found himself staring straight into the gold eyes of a deadly red dragon no more than one hundred yards above them. Sunlight glittered off the beast's crimson scales as it cut through the air toward them. "Watch out!" he screamed to Kallista. Drawing back its sinewy neck, the dragon roared and dove toward them. Ramming the lever on his right as far forward as it would go, Trenton sent Ladon plunging toward the ground, the red dragon following closely behind. Kallista's head snapped left, and her eyes went wide. Surprised as she was, though, her reflexes were sharp as a blade. At the same time as the dragon opened its huge fang-filled mouth, Kallista yanked the flight controls hard to the right. Trenton ducked his head, expecting a ball of flames. Instead a thick yellow cloud spewed from between the dragon's jaws. Kallista's maneuver meant they avoided almost all of the cloud, but a few droplets beaded on the sleeve of Trenton's jacket. Everywhere the liquid touched, the leather bubbled and foamed. Yelping, Trenton wiped his sleeve on Ladon's metal skin. The yellow drops fizzed, marking the metal, before disappearing. "What is that?" Kallista shouted. "Some kind of acid," Trenton yelled back. Correcting its course, the red dragon closed on them again. Less than twenty feet above the forest, Trenton searched for an opening to fly into, but the treetops were too dense to break through. Behind them, the monster roared and shot another stream of yellow acid.