Book 1 of the Dragonfate series. Debts and balance are everything to dragons. In a world where a misstep can make a dragon a slave to the nearest opportunist, where Ruby Dragons are feared and hated as the worst of the evil, half-Ruby Kyaza has lived a life built on distrust and violence. When the ancient magic of Dragonfate enslaves him yet again, he is thrust against his will among humans with the command to do what he has sworn he will never do again: to kill. However, when he is suddenly indebted to Hallen, the human boy he was meant to kill, things get complicated. Though Kyaza cannot bring himself to trust a human, and though Hallen hates Ruby Dragons above all else, a magic even deeper than the slavery of Dragonfate binds them. Their lives are vastly different, the rift between their histories unbreachable; and yet, as the malice of both humans and dragons closes in on them, they must learn to work together . . . or die.