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“No family! I’ll not have my daughter’s hatchlings slipping around on guano. Hear me, Larb, as soon as cousins and friends appear, my cooks will be asking their grandmothers for bat recipes.”
NaStirath returned with Aethleethia and the hatchlings, along with a party of blighters pushing barrows.
“I thought we should dry and salt some fish,” NaStirath said. “In case we get trapped in here by more of those—what were they called, Larb?”
“Ugly bas—”
“Their real name, Larb,” Scabia said.
“Griffaran. After a manner, your ladyship.”
“Good idea. DharSii, get that lot down into the kitchens. See what else we need if we are trapped in here. You might think about putting a few blighters on watch. Larb, go through all the main passages. Use your ears, listen for more of those things.”
“Me stomach’s—”
“Going to be filled as soon as you finish, so the sooner you begin, the sooner you eat,” DharSii supplied.
“NaStirath, stay behind, would you?” she asked.
The others moved off in the direction of the kitchens, Aethleethia and the hatchlings helping to move nets full of fish.
“I should have brought more salt from the sheep-lick, I know,” NaStirath said. “I’ll see to it right away.”
“Not, it’s not that, NaStirath. I’ve been lying here thinking about something.”
“That the great hall needs better drainage?” he said, looking at the puddles on the floor beneath the circular opening at the top.
“I won’t live forever. I might not live another day; my hearts give a flutter now and then with these injuries, and I don’t like—”
“Matemother, you’ll outlive us all,” NaStirath said. He was skilled at coming up with the right thing to say. That might be useful to a dragon in charge of a hall and its residents. She drew back from making up her mind one more time, considering.
“I certainly hope not,” she said. “It’s the natural order of things for me to precede you by a good many years. I wouldn’t want to outlive my daughter. You—it depends on what day I’m asked. Today I would not wish to outlive you. However—”
“Let’s change the subject, Matemother.” NaStirath probably decided she was winding herself up into a roaring mood that would reopen her wounds.
“No. I want you to listen. If I should die, I want you to take over Vesshall and the Sadda-Vale.”
“Me? Why not Aethleethia? She’s your own flesh and blood. Or DharSii—he’s a relation.”
“It’s too much for her. She needs to get those hatchlings flying. As for DharSii, he’s only half here in spirit even when his body rests on his perch. I expect he’ll be leaving to join Wistala anytime. You’ll have to be responsible for once in your life. We are, it seems, at war with the Empire.”
NaStirath looked shocked. “I don’t know one end of a spear from another, and I’ve only ever used my fire to relight the kitchen hearth. I’m no warlord.”
“The best generals rarely are.”
“I’d much rather be a fool.”
She found the energy to take a deep breath and slap her tail down. “You no longer have that luxury, dragon. You no longer have that luxury. It’s time to remove those last bits of shell from your scale. You have no reason to be confident in yourself because you’ve never been challenged. Well, dragon, the challenge is coming, whether you want to play the fool or no. You can either rise to it or die as the joke you’ve lived.”
She let that sink in a moment before continuing.
“You may not credit this, NaStirath, but I am glad you’re my daughter’s mate. You have brains, anyone who knows you will agree, but you just play with them rather than put them to use. You have strength and health—they’ve just never been tested by enemies and privation. You can be pleasing when you choose, which makes all the times you choose not to be doubly frustrating.
“For once, NaStirath—for once—prove yourself a dragon. No jokes, no tricks, no idle chatter. Your sires couldn’t all have been ninnies. Reach down deep inside and find whatever drops of their blood are left in you. Let those hatchlings tell proud tales of their father to their own eggs someday.”
NaStirath opened his mouth, let it hang for a moment, and shut it again.
Shut it? No quip? No jibe. Perhaps there was hope.
