Alta

are older before you can volunteer to train with the traditional Jousters, and if you change your minds, there will be other chances with tame dragons in the future.”

There was a shuffling of feet, and then, almost as if they had read one another’s minds and found reinforcement in numbers, a group of five separated from the main group. Lord Khumun gave them a perfectly friendly little nod, and heartened by this, they filed out of the room.

“Now, as for the rest of you, for those of you who do not know this young man, this is Jouster Kiron, rider of Avatre, who will be supervising you, guiding you, and training you.” Now Lord Khumun gestured to Kiron, who came forward from where he had been standing off to one side. He was wearing the Altan Jouster’s “uniform” now: the soft, wrapped kilt that covered a hardened leather, groin-protecting loin cup such as the ones that bull dancers wore; the leather harness with hardened-leather shoulder and bicep armor; the wide stiff leather belt; the hardened shin guards. His hair had been cut at chin-length, and he carried his helmet, hoping that he did not look as young as he felt.

“Kiron, rider of Avatre, only the second bonded and tame dragon in all the world, will now describe to you exactly what your duties will be—in detail—for the next year or so. And once again, any of you who believe this to be beneath their dignity, please, remove yourselves.” Lord Khumun looked them over and heaved a theatrical sigh. “I have undertaken to supply an egg to every boy who remains and passes through the initial training. Frankly, I would be just as pleased to see your ranks thinned a little further.”

There was a weak chuckle at that, as Kiron took a deep breath, reminded himself that he, at this moment, as he stood, was the equal to any of the boys here in rank. Yes, even the prince. I am a Jouster, even if I have never ridden to combat. I have a dragon who answers only to me. And without me, there will be no tame dragons to Joust for Alta. He was a unique and valuable weapon in the Altan arsenal. There were several pairs of princes. There was only one Kiron, one Avatre.

“First,” he said, “you’re going to start by becoming dragon boys yourselves, serving dragons we already have. You will take the place of the dragon boys in this compound until such time as you understand the serving of a dragon completely.”

A couple of the boys gulped. He didn’t blame them. Three of the dragons that had been here had been actual killers; they could only be handled with their jaws muzzled, which had made feeding them—exciting. These three had been handled only by men, two of them, at all times.

“There are no more killer dragons in the compound,” he announced. “Lord Khumun and I have had some success with retraining the dragons that are currently here using falconry techniques.” Was he sweating? He hoped not. He wanted to look confident. He had to get their respect now, or he could have trouble with them later. “It has taken us most of a moon, but even the killers are now on reasonably good behavior, for wild-caught dragons.”

And that had been an ordeal! But the results had been striking. Or at least, it was now possible for the dragons to be handled and groomed without the risk of a dragon boy losing life or limbs.

“But although they are no longer killers, you must remember at all times that they are still dangerous.” He swallowed, and was very glad that his voice had broken during the moon he and Lord Khumun had been doing the retraining. Having his voice crack and squeak would have done nothing to add to his air of authority. “We will be handling them with choking chains, and you will never actually be alone with your charge; the current dragon boy will always be with you to help get you out of difficulty. But make no mistake about it, you will be doing the work. And once your egg hatches, you will still be doing most of the work. We have decided that the first several moons with the dragonet are absolutely crucial, and if your dragonet sees someone else, or worse, is fed by someone else, we don’t know if she or he will bond properly to you. So you are going to have to be comfortable with doing a great deal of manual labor.” He tried to look apologetic, but he had the feeling he wasn’t succeeding. When he thought about what he’d had to go through—feeding and tending three dragons at once, one of them secretly—he couldn’t feel at all sorry for them. “So, until the eggs get here, this is how your days will go —”

He’d practiced this speech in front of Aket-ten so many times that he didn’t have to think about it anymore. He just told them, clearly and precisely, how much work they would be doing. And although they would not be tending to the Jouster as well as the dragon, nor would they be required to do all the work of repairing harness and weapons and drying tala and the rest, they would be continuing whatever studies their fathers deemed necessary. He had to hide his grin when he saw Orest’s face fall at that news—nor was Orest the only one to look disappointed.

“There will be tutors coming here, to avoid the waste of time it would take for you to come to them. Most of us will share tutors and lectures.”

But not me. I get Master Arit to myself. Lord Ya-tiren said so. He was getting a tutor all to himself to accelerate his reading ability; Lord Khumun had decided that until he knew how to read well, he would be getting the extra tutoring. Master Arit was pleased with his progress. He could read simple things now. He had a new shrine to his father’s spirit, and he could read the prayers for the dead inscribed on its side. Master Arit was certain that with the full attention of a very good tutor—and his own determination—he would pass for a boy as well educated as Orest within a year.

“Your day will begin when you rise about dawn. This is when your dragon will rise. It will take your dragon some little time to come out of the torpor of sleep, and you will take this time to ready his morning meal.”

He continued describing what their days would be like; when he was done, four more boys decided that this project was not to their taste. That left them with eight, of which the prince, looking more eager than ever, was still one. Kiron was surprised, a little, and yet, considering what he had heard about Toreth, perhaps he shouldn’t have been. He had never, ever heard anyone say that either of the princes was afraid of a little hard work.

“You’re sure, now,” Lord Khumun said earnestly, looking each and every one of them in the eyes. “You’re absolutely sure that you can undertake this, and that in fact, you want to?”

Each of them nodded soberly but with a glow of anticipation. Even Orest.

“All right.” He looked over at Kiron. “Four eggs in a clutch, you say?”

“That’s what I was told, and that was what I observed, my Lord,” he replied firmly. “Mature females always lay four eggs.”

“Then we’ll stake out our two female desert dragons and hope for the best,” the Lord of the Jousters decided. “We’ll wait to see if we need to go after swamp dragon eggs only after we find out what is going to happen with the desert dragons.”

Kiron nodded; that would be his choice, too. The swamp dragons had proved to be a bit more reptilian in nature than the desert dragons, and a bit more difficult to handle, although it had been the wild-caught male desert dragons that had proven to be the killers.

Maybe because they once ate a man. That was always problematic; once a wild dragon tasted human blood, it always knew that eating a human was an option.

The two desert dragon females that had been taken from Tian Jousters were lazy—half the reason they’d been caught was that they very much preferred to be fed rather than to hunt. Being lazy was an advantage now on a number of counts. In the past, they had proved that they were unlikely to fight their chains when staked out as “bait.” This meant, when they were taken off the heavier dose of tala, so that they would come into season properly, it would still be possible to handle them. They would probably not try to fight off their would-be mates, and in fact, might well be quite responsive. And when they finally began laying their eggs, they were less likely to be aggressive about defending the newly laid eggs than a more active dragon.

The last advantage was that Kiron knew exactly what to expect and how to incubate a desert dragon egg. Swamp dragons—that was going to be a matter of experimentation, as far as he was concerned. If they could get eight fertile desert dragon eggs—

Eight boys, eight eggs. Nine was a good size for a wing. They could learn and drill together, learn to fight as a group.

“If the gods are kind, both dragons will mate, and all the eggs will be fertile,” he replied.

“I will be making sacrifices today, and every day until hatching,” Lord Khumun said firmly, and cast a now- steely eye over his new volunteers. “And so should you all.”

And so they did. But not before Kiron put them through their first day with utter disregard for their comfort.

They drew lots for which boy was assigned to which dragon, that way no one could claim that Kiron had shown any favoritism in his assignments. As it happened, Orest and Toreth got the two easiest to handle, saving