with you.
He sat down on a stone and watched her carefully. 'I'm not a rider; I'm just a Scales. Do you know what that means? It means I look after a dragon. I do the feeding and the grooming. Like a stable hand. I look the way 1 do because of her. When they come out of their eggs, dragons carry a disease. It did this to me. Even with the potions from the alchemists, it does this. Don't be afraid, though. This happened to me a long time ago. It's dormant now. Until the next hatchling I'm given to care for. I'm not allowed to ride her, by the way. She says your name is Nadira.'
She is confused. She doesn't understand how we got to be here. She still believes we will hurt her.
'We got lost,' said Kailin. 'We came from Queen Shezira's eyrie. I don't suppose you've heard of her…'
No.
'Queen Shezira's daughter is marrying King Tyan's son. Snow and I were supposed to be wedding gifts. We were attacked by other dragon-knights. I don't know who they were. We escaped and ran away. We've been lost in these mountains for weeks. I don't suppose you know where we are?' Kailin stretched his shoulders and winced.
Very slightly, the woman shook her head.
Little One Kailin, what is Soul Dust?
'I don't know.' Kailin looked at the woman. 'What's Soul Dust?'
She flinched and looked away, and Kailin saw her eyes pause on something lying among the rocks. A tiny leather pouch.
Men who make it bought her for pleasure. She wants it. She needs it like food or drink. She took some and ran away. She was being punished for this. Punishment. Revenge. Retribution. Yes, I understand this. It is wasteful. Foolish.
'They did this to her because she stole from them?'
That is what is in her mind. Another Little One, Maryk, he is the one who did this. I see that name in your thoughts too.
'They raped and beat her and left her to die. They left me to die too. Why?'
We are alike. We both miss our own kind in the same way. We miss what they could be, or should be, but not what they truly are. I have to go now, Little One Kailin. I have not finished hunting for the day. I will not be long.
Snow turned and Kailin watched her launch herself down the river, the same way the men had gone. That could have been coincidence, but something in the tenor of Snow's last thoughts said otherwise. She'd gone to find them. She didn't look back, and by the time he made himself stand up and call after her, she was too far away to hear his thoughts any more.
When she came back, he meant to ask her what she'd done and to tell her that it was wrong, but he never got a chance. Even as the thoughts were forming up in his head, she came crashing into his mind.
More dragons are coming.
28
The Hunters and the Hunted
When the white dragon came back, she caught them all by surprise. Sollos had barely started on the fire when a great shadow flashed over his head. The knights looked up and stared as the dragon wheeled overhead. She was clutching something in one claw, Sollos saw. She flared her wings and stretched out her massive hind claws, swooping down like an eagle towards them. When she landed in the river bed and took a few steps to steady herself, the mountains seemed to shake. Then she stood there, still, poised on her hind legs, wings not quite fully folded, head raised a little on her long neck, her massive tail stretched out straight behind her for balance.
Sollos retreated slowly from the beginnings of his fire towards the woods. He'd seen dragons stand like that before. So had the riders, who began to fan out across the river bed.
'How long before your own dragons get here, Rider Semian?' Sollos muttered. Semian wasn't there to answer, but Sollos already knew as much as he needed to. Not for some time.
Slowly, the dragon reached down with one forelimb. She opened her claws. There was a man curled up in there.
Holy Ancestors, Sollos thought when the man got up. It's the Scales. He looked well enough. A bit stiff and battered perhaps, and he walked a little awkwardly, but for a man stuck on his own in the Worldspine for a month he was remarkably alive. Maybe having skin as hard as stone that flakes like slate helps with that.
Rider Semian and Master Huros came running out of the trees. They ignored him and went straight towards the dragon. Kemir came after them and stopped at his shoulder.
'Oh well! That's going to make all this a lot easier.' He grinned.
'She's very tense.'
'Who?'
'The dragon, you idiot. Look at her.'
'Mmmm.' Kemir nodded. 'Ready to run. Wouldn't you be? Do you suppose she even remembers her knights after all this time. How do you know she's a she-'
Sollos shushed him. The Scales was walking towards the dragon-knights. He seemed very unsure of himself.
'That's enough!' Rider Semian held up a hand and stopped the Scales when they were still a good twenty feet apart. Semian had the alchemist beside him and one other knight. The rest of the riders were still slowly spreading out, edging towards the trees. Sollos did the same.
'Um, what is your name, Scales?' shouted the alchemist.
The Scales replied, but quietly. Sollos couldn't hear him.
'Scales Kailin. We, er, are here to take you home. You and your dragon.'
'Queen Shezira will congratulate you herself,' called Rider Semian. 'Her dragon is still intact, and has not been lost. She will be greatly pleased. There may be a reward.'
The Scales said something else. Sollos screwed up his eyes and strained forward, as if that might help him make out what the Scales was saying.
Then Kemir had a hand on his shoulder and was tugging him back towards the forest. 'I don't like the way this is going.'
'Did you hear him? What did he say?'
'He said no.'
Kemir was right; Sollos could see that by the way that the alchemist and Rider Semian were standing.
'This is not a request, Scales,' shouted Rider Semian. 'This is an order!'
Kemir was still edging back into the trees. He was stringing his bow.
The alchemist suddenly Stepped forward and walked up to the Scales. Sollos had no idea what they were saying, only that the alchemist looked very determined, and the Scales looked, well, if anything, he looked stunned. Aghast.
Something in the air changed. Sollos felt an irrational anger build up inside him. The Scales was gesturing frantically at the alchemist, trying to make him… Trying to make him stop? The dragon had lowered itself to all fours. It was utterly still. Sollos could feel the tension radiating from it like waves of heat.
Kemir put a hand on his shoulder again. 'You know what? I think we should back off a little way further.'
'Yes.' He took a step backwards. Then another. 'Yes, I think we should.'
When the dragon moved, it was so quick that Sollos barely saw it. Its head and body stayed exactly where they were; its tail, all hundred feet of it, flicked like a whip. In the blink of an eye it flashed over the dragon's head. The tip coiled around the alchemist, lifted him up into the air and held him inches from the dragon's bared teeth. For long seconds everyone froze except for the Scales, who sank to his knees, wrapping his arms around his head. And then everything happened at once.
