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—Then Diamondflame will answer to the Dragonmeet! Out of my way!— Jewelclaw ordered, wings fanning. —They will be my captives!—
—No!— Scamp’s voice was shrill, but firm. —She’s the one who’s raising Skysong!—
—Raising? Or imprisoning?— demanded the adult.
Numair crossed his arms. “If you know anything about the young members of your race, you know that captivity is not an issue,” he said mildly. “I do not believe there is a cage that could hold Kit—Skysong—if she wished to get out.”
Leaf, still on Daine’s shoulder, extended its head to chitter angrily at Jewelclaw. After a moment’s pause, Jelly thrust its head through Numair’s collar and chimed in.
—Must we tell Grandsire you took them from us?— Grizzle asked.
—The old newt has gone senile!— snarled Jewelclaw. —And I’m not the only one to object! I’m not finished with this!— He took to the air, the back draft of his wings making both humans and dragonets stagger.
—He is not senile!— Scamp shouted. If Jewelclaw heard, he gave no sign, flying off with hard, rapid wing beats. In a small voice she added, —I bet his mother was a wyvern.—
—Scamp!— cried Grizzle, shocked.
—I don’t care. He’s rotten. He’s always rotten. Come on,— she told Daine and Numair. —Before anyone else comes after us.—
When they reached a bridge that looked as if it had been spun from glass, the two young dragons raced ahead as if it were rough and sturdy wood. Daine and Numair, certain that mere humans might just slide off, were testing the bridge with their feet when crackling filled the air. Grizzle and Scamp halted in midspan, raising themselves up on their hindquarters as Kitten so often did. Jelly retreated inside Numair’s shirt, while Leaf raised its head, looking for the cause of the disturbance.
—There has been a change.— The voice boomed in their minds and all around them.
—Grandsire, Jewelclaw came and yelled,— cried Scamp.
—I know it. He and the other Separatists have been dinning my ears since our guests came through the portal. They have called the Dragonmeet.—
Scamp shrank inside her skin.
—Uh-oh,— Grizzle whispered softly.
—Take them to the amphitheater,— ordered the voice. —Do not enter the floor with them, mind. Sit among our people.— Voice and presence faded from their surroundings.
—Turn back,— Grizzle told them, dropping to her fours. —At least it isn’t far to go.—
Daine and Numair exchanged glances. They needed to talk. “May we get a drink?” asked the girl as they stepped off the bridge. “And I need to relieve myself.” The dragons nodded. Daine stepped into a cluster of bushes to empty her bladder, first making sure that her urine wouldn’t run into the water. Finished, she joined Numair. They crouched beside the stream to drink and wash their faces.
“What do you think?” asked the mage softly.
“We have to go. We can’t force dragons, only persuade,” she reminded him.
Scamp and Grizzle looked down at them from the top of the stream bank. —Are you finished?— Grizzle inquired. —It’s a bad idea to keep a Dragonmeet waiting.—
Grizzle led them uphill from the bridge, following a broad track through knee-high grasses. When they crested the hill, they stood on the uppermost edge of a deep, tiered bowl in the earth. It was too regular to be natural, though grass flourished on the tiers. The floor of the amphitheater and the long ramps that cut it into eighths were bare earth, beaten and gouged by centuries of pressure from dragon paws and talons. At the far end of the giant oval was the only other exception to the grass carpet, a heap of glistening blue stones that was piled above the arena’s rim.
Each tier was dragon-sized, big enough to contain even the largest of them when they crouched on all fours. A number of dragons were already present. Jewelclaw, for one, was installed near the western ramp. Miniature lightnings still played over his blue-green scales. He glared at them and returned to whatever he was saying to a sixty-foot dragon whose scales had the white glimmer of pearl. As Jewelclaw spoke, bursts of fire—Daine thought of heat lightning—came and went along the bigger dragon’s hide.
Grizzle saw what the girl was looking at. —The pearly one—that’s Moonwind,— the dragonet explained. —She’s one of the oldest. Her grandson Summerwing was the last dragon to willingly visit the mortal realms. That was before the Dragonmeet put a ban on visits. Um . . . —
—Stay away from Moonwind,— Scamp said bluntly. —She isn’t even nice to people she likes.—
“Just how old is this dragon?” asked Numair.
Scamp cocked her head, blinking. —Fifty-five centuries, I think.—
—Fifty-nine,— Grizzle corrected her. —Come on. This way.— She started down the ramp, headed toward the arena floor.
“Your grandsire said you weren’t to come with us,” Daine said quietly, watching the adult dragons. They were huge creatures whose scales blazed with color, some of them twenty or thirty feet longer than Moonwind. The girl didn’t know if their kind formed lynch mobs, but there was enough mob feeling here that she didn’t want to take any chances.
Busy watching the larger dragons, she didn’t see the seven young ones until they swarmed around the humans, curiosity in their eyes. One was nearly as small as Kitten, still unable to use mind speech. Others were as big, or bigger, than Scamp and Grizzle. Behind them, walking majestically, as befitted their age, came a handful of dragons fifteen and twenty feet long, the length that Kitten’s mother had been—adolescents.
—We’ll all escort you,— Grizzle announced proudly. The humans were swept along by young dragons, unable to protest, across the beaten earth of the arena floor.
The price of their escort was a hail of questions about the mortal realms. Daine left Numair to answer. She was counting the adults present—thirty-three thus far—when the air exploded to her right. Where there had been nothing but empty space a moment ago, a sixty-foot black dragon crouched.
—Aunt Nightbreath!— cried Grizzle. —You’re not supposed to materialize so close to everyone else!—
—Oh, tut,— the dragon replied, coolly amused. —I haven’t fouled anyone in a materialization since I was your age.— There was more than a hint of wicked glee in her eyes as she added,—I was in a hurry. This may be my only chance to see humans before these two are made into fertilizer for Moonwind’s rosebushes.—
The young dragons protested her cynicism. Daine reached out instinctively, and Numair took her hand. He kept it as they reached the center of the Dragonmeet floor. Their escort remained with them when they stopped at last.
Three dragons appeared on the highest part of the arena. The blast of air caused by their arrival made the humans stagger. Daine gulped, and clutched Numair’s hand tighter. All of the newcomers were over a hundred feet long. The biggest, whose scales were a pale, delicate green, was fully a hundred and twenty feet in length.
—That’s Wingjade,— Scamp whispered, seeing where Daine looked. —My father.—
“Biiiig,” commented Leaf.
“Too big,” squeaked Jelly, its head protruding from the V of Numair’s shirt.
—We start,— boomed a golden dragon directly across the amphitheater from the mortals. —Diamondflame is charged with ignoring the will of the Dragonmeet, and with permitting humans to enter the Dragonlands. Humans, the question is asked: Why have you come here?—
“You should do the talking,” Numair told Daine softly. “You are Kitten’s guardian.”
Daine was about to reply when a mind voice yelled, —No one cares what they want ! Kill them!— Looking around, the girl saw a mottled black-and-white dragon who sat up, balanced on his back legs. —Kill them, and bring Skysong home!— Slowly he fell back to his fours.
Nearby, a second dragon reared onto its haunches. —Our law bids us to first hear what they have to say.—
Moonwind sat up. —They and their defenders lost their right to claim jus
tice under our law when my grandson was murdered by their kind. Look at them. Already they cause trouble here. Already they try to seduce our young away from us.—
—We aren’t seduced!— cried a younger dragon hotly. —They’re new; they’re different. We could learn from them—except you and your crowd have closed minds!—
—Silence!— roared Moonwind. Daine and Numair cringed away from the force of her rage, while the young dragon who had spoken clawed at his muzzle.
—Now you’ve done it,— whispered Grizzle to the gagged youngster. —You’d better hope that she takes the Silence off you before you get too hungry.—
—If you felt that humans were not to be treated with under our law, Sister Moonwind, you should have amended the law in the four centuries since your loss,— snapped a new adult. —You know as well as I that all changes in law must be reviewed, debated, and considered. You cannot demand that it be changed here and now.—
