The Dragon Keeper

Page 11

Thymara had no trepidations about her precarious roost. Her mind was occupied and her silver-gray eyes filled with the wonders unfolding below her.
The sun had risen high enough that its slanting rays could reach over the tall branches of the forest and rest on the serpent cocoons littering the beach. It was not an exceedingly warm day for summer, but some of the cases had begun to steam and smoke as the sun warmed them. Thymara focused her attention on the large case directly below her. The rising steam reached her, carrying a reptilian stink with it. She narrowed her nostrils and gazed in rapture. Below her, the wizardwood of the log was losing it solidity.
Thymara was familiar with wizardwood; for years her people had used it as exceptionally strong timber. It was hard, far beyond what other people called “hardwood.” Working it could blunt an ax or dull a saw in less than a morning. But now the silvery-gray “wood” of the dragon case below was softening, steaming and bubbling, sagging to mold around the still form within it.
As she watched, the form twitched and then gave a lively wriggle. The wizardwood tore like a membrane. The liquefied cocoon was being absorbed by the skeletal creature inside the log. As Thymara watched, the dragon’s meager flesh plumped and color washed through it. It was smaller than she had expected it to be, given the size of the case and what she had heard of Tintaglia. A cloud of stink and moisture wafted up, and then the blunt-nosed head of a dragon thrust clear of the sagging log.
Outside!
Thymara felt a wave of vertigo as the dragon-speak touched her mind. Her heart leaped like a bird bursting into upward flight. She could hear dragons! Ever since Tintaglia had appeared, it had become clear that some folk could “hear” what a dragon said, while others heard only roaring, hissing, and a sinister rattling. When Tintaglia had first appeared in Trehaug and spoken to the crowd, some had heard her words right away. Others had shared nothing of her thoughts. It thrilled Thymara beyond telling to know that if a dragon ever deigned to speak to her, she would hear it. She edged lower on the branch.
“Thymara!” her father warned her.
“I’m careful!” she responded without even looking at him.
Below her, the young dragon had opened a wide red maw and was tearing at the decaying fibers of the log that bound her. Her. Thymara could not say how she knew that. For a newly hatched thing, her teeth were certainly impressive. Then the creature ripped a mouthful of the sodden wizardwood free, tossed her head back, and swallowed visibly. “She’s eating the wizardwood!” she called to her father.
“I’ve heard they do that,” he called back. “Selden the Elderling said that when he witnessed Tintaglia’s emergence, her cocoon melted right into her skin. I think they derive strength from it.”
Thymara didn’t reply. Her father was obviously right. It did not seem possible that an enclosure that had held a dragon would now fit inside the belly of one, but the dragon below her seemed intent on trying to consume it all. She continued to struggle free of the confining case as she ate her way out of it, ripping off fibrous chunks and swallowing them whole. Thymara grimaced in sympathy. It seemed tragic that something so newly born could be so ravenously hungry. Thank Sa she had something she could eat.
A collective gasp from the watching crowd warned Thymara. She clutched her tree limb more tightly just in time. The gush of pushed air that swept past her nearly tore her loose and left her branch swaying wildly. An instant later, there was a huge thump that vibrated through her tree as Tintaglia landed.
The queen dragon was blue and silver and blue again, depending on how the sunlight struck her. She was easily three times the size of the young dragons who were hatching. Watching her fold her wings was like watching a ship lower its sails. She tucked them neatly to her body, then folded them tight to fit as closely against her as a bird’s wings so that her scaled feathers seemed a seamless part of her skin. She dropped the limp deer that hung from her jaws. “Eat,” she instructed the young dragons. She did not pause to watch them, but moved off to the river. She lowered her great head and drank the milky water. Sated, she raised her head and partially opened her wings. Her powerful hindquarters flexed; she sprang high, and two battering beats of her wide wings caught her before she could plummet back to earth. Wings beating heavily, she rose slowly from the riverbank and flew off, upriver, hunting again.
“Oh.” Her father’s deep voice was heavy with pity. “What a shame.”
The dragon below Thymara was still tearing sticky strips of wizardwood free from her case and devouring them. A gray swathe of it stuck to her muzzle. She pawed at it with the small claws on her stubby front leg. To Thymara, she looked like a baby with porridge smeared on its cheeks and hair. The dragon was smaller than she had expected, and less developed, but surely she would grow to fulfill her promise. Thymara glanced at her father in puzzlement, and then followed his gaze.