There was a loud SNAP. Frost shrieked.
Jandra blinked her eyes. The person who had jumped in front of her was Burke's daughter, Anza. Anza was dressed in black buckskins and had at least a dozen blades strapped to her body. It was said that Burke had trained Anza in the art of combat from the day she'd learned to walk. Frost fell to his knees in front of Anza. Anza shifted her body slightly and Jandra could see that she had Frost's middle and ring fingers in her grasp, bending them back much further than unbroken fingers could possibly bend.
Anza pushed Frost away and stood between Jandra and the crowd, drawing a long slender sword from the scabbard slung over her back. The razor-sharp edge gleamed like a mirror in the smoky light.
Men at the back of the mob looked around and wandered off, as if suddenly remembering other appointments. Some of the nearer men looked down at the ground as they, too, walked away. Only two men remained behind to help Frost back to his feet.
Frost looked as if he were on the verge of spitting at the two women. Then, his eyes flickered upwards. Burke was at the window above, looking down sternly.
Frost growled, 'Wait until Ragnar learns of this!'
'Why don't you go tell him?' said Burke. 'He can come to me if he wishes to discuss the proper punishment for a man your age threatening teenage girls with violence. I'm disappointed in you, Frost. You're one of the best fighters I know. But there's a fine line between a fighter and a bully. I would advise you to learn where that line is.'
Frost glared as he turned away, leaving the two woman alone.
Anza gazed up at her father, a smug look in her eyes.
'Don't feel proud,' Burke scolded. 'You just ruined the hand of one of my most experienced blacksmiths. And Jandra, that was a damned stupid thing to do. Why didn't you let them eat the varmint? It may be small and cute, but it's still an earth-dragon. We killed them by the thousands to take Dragon Forge. What's one more dead lizard?'
'This is only a child!' Jandra protested. 'He's innocent! He's more frightened of us than we are of him.'
'Where'd the lizard go?' Burke asked. He was still in his chair, and couldn't look straight down.
Jandra studied the area. Had the dragon slipped away while she was distracted? Finally, she noticed a shadow on the wall, and a peculiar outline. She knelt and reached toward the shadow.
The outline on the wall shifted color slightly. The eyes became visible as they looked at her. The chameleon-like camouflage vanished as the dragon shifted back to a deep green hue, almost black. It held a skinny arm toward her, the claw at the end outstretched like a human hand, though it had only three fingers. These digits ended in claws that any bobcat would have envied.
'No eat?' the dragon child asked.
'No eat,' said Jandra, taking his hand. 'I'll protect you.' She lifted the dragon child up and hugged him to her chest.
'Good boss,' he cooed.
IT WAS LATE morning when Vulpine, the Slavecatcher General, drifted down to the rocky bank, his eyes drawn to the blue-scaled corpses being picked at by black-feathered buzzards. The buzzards hopped away as he landed, some taking to the air to perch in the branches of nearby pines, others, more bold, backing up only a few yards to glare at him. Even though the faces were mutilated, with the eyes torn away and the flesh around the mouths pecked and peeled, Vulpine recognized these dragons, fellow slavecatchers, good and honorable defenders of order. He shivered as a chill wind stirred his feather-scales.
There were human corpses as well, similarly mutilated by the buzzards. Vulpine recognized them as Hemming and Turpin. The world was no worse off without them. He noted that Shay wasn't among the corpses, nor was there any sign of Chapelion's stolen books.
Had Shay somehow managed to kill three slavecatchers? It made no sense. It was plain that all three dragons had been downed by arrows. He'd heard about the new bow that had caused the massacre at Dragon Forge, a weapon with more than twice the range of a longbow. Dragon Forge was barely ten miles distant. Had these slavecatchers fallen victim to a rebel patrol?
He noted something odd about the arrows. He reached out and plucked one from a corpse and held it to better catch the light. His eyes weren't playing tricks. These arrows were yard-long, perfectly straight shafts of living wood. The fletching at the end wasn't feathers, but fresh green leaves growing in perfect symmetry. Stranger still, the killing end of the twig showed no trace of an arrow head. The wood simply narrowed down to a hard, thorn-like point. What tree grew such twigs? One final artifact of the arrow disturbed him. The shaft couldn't have been in the corpse for more than a day, judging from the condition of the bodies. Yet, the part of the arrow that had been buried in the body was covered with white, threadlike projections, as if the arrow had been taking root. The shaft sported several fresh pale bumps, like it was budding.
Vulpine snapped the shaft. The bark that peeled away from the jagged break was bright green and full of sap. He sniffed the wood. It was an unremarkable odor; he still couldn't identify the species. The biologians back at the College of Spires perhaps could assist, though his gut told him that this was something new under the sun, that no one had ever seen living arrows before. Most biologians were rationalists, but Vulpine was old enough and wise enough to suspect there were invisible forces beyond the comprehension of dragons. Most slaves believed in magic, in ghosts and witches, angels and demons, and Vulpine had some sympathy with these beliefs.
He felt a chill creep along his spine as a shadow passed over him. The long fringe of feathery scales along his neck stood on end. He looked up, then immediately let out his breath and chuckled. It was only Balikan, a young slave-catcher he was training, drifting down from the sky to join him. The vultures skittered back even further, but Vulpine was glad of his company.
Balikan wrinkled his nose in disgust at the odor. The corpses weren't rotting yet, but their bowels had emptied, and the gallons of blood that had seeped into the gravel had its own aroma. Vulpine had barely noticed; he'd been around corpses so often the odor had little effect on him.
'By the bones,' Balikan said softly. 'Who could have done this?'
'That, my young friend, is an excellent question.'
'I don't see Shay's body. Could he-?'
'Doubtful,' said Vulpine. 'Shay's never held a bow in his life. Nor has he displayed much in the way of a spine. He probably groveled for mercy when the slavecatchers caught up to him. Someone else killed these dragons. They must have been hidden in the trees.'
Balikan scanned the steep bank, his eyes darting from branch to branch.
'I don't think they're still around,' said Vulpine. 'These corpses are at least twelve hours old. Maybe sixteen.'
'How can you tell?'
Vulpine nudged the twisted talon of the nearest corpse with a hind-claw. 'They plainly didn't die today. The bodies are cold and stiff-it takes several hours to lose body heat, although one cold night on a damp bank can do it. Rigor mortis sets in little by little-the degree these limbs are contracted tells me it hasn't reached its peak. I also know it's not been more than a day because the buzzards haven't made much progress.'
Balikan shuddered. 'I've never been around this many dead bodies.'
'Get used to it,' said Vulpine. 'You'll see many more in the coming days.'
'Why, sir?'
'King Albekizan kept this kingdom stable for almost half a century. Now he's dead, and his son didn't last a month before a human assassinated him. The humans have taken advantage of all this instability and captured Dragon Forge, just to the west of here.' He pointed to the brownish tint in the sky, evidence of the distant smokestacks. 'I suspect that's where Shay is, along with Chapelion's books.'
'Then he's escaped for good,' said Balikan.
'Nonsense,' said Vulpine. 'I've had a few slaves vanish on me over the years. I can't claim a perfect record. But I've never let a slave go when I still had a lead simply because pursuing that lead was dangerous. Dragon Forge is a magnet for slaves. Shay and these two fools were among the first to hear the rumors and make a break for it, but they won't be the last. Our jobs are going to be much more difficult if the humans are allowed to hold on to Dragon Forge. It's imperative that we sky-dragons act now to strangle this revolution while it's still in its cradle.'
'But, the humans defeated an army of sun-dragons!' said Balikan. 'They slaughtered earth-dragons by the thousands. Why will we fare any better?'
Vulpine chuckled. 'Besting an earth-dragon isn't so hard. In my experience, the average human is twice as
