Dragonbards Read Free

dropped out of the sky, flaring her wings to land beside
him. “South!” she bellowed.
    “We’ll separate,” Teb said. “Seastrider and
I, Windcaller and Kiri and Marshy will go south.”
    “It could be a trick of the dark, to
separate us,” Camery said.
    “It could be. We will take care.” They might
not be able to touch one another’s thoughts so far apart, with the
dark so strong.
    Camery and Colewolf mounted up, and the
black dragons headed north. They traveled in silence, searching the
ice cliffs.
    The white dragons moved fast to the south,
Teb leaning down between Seastrider’s wings to watch the frozen
land. Marshy rode in front of Kiri, his legs tucked into
Windcaller’s harness. The dragons skirted just above the crashing
waves, watching the white cliff for caves, for claw marks in the
ice, or any sign that a dragon had passed this way. They were
gripped by the bleakness of the frozen land, by the absence of
life. Teb looked across at Kiri.
    I could have sent you with your father. But
. . . I like having you with me.
    She looked surprised; then her eyes softened
with pleasure.
    “Cave ahead!” Marshy shouted. “Cave!” The
child leaned so far out into the wind that Kiri grabbed his
shoulders. A thin opening yawned in the cliff. The dragons circled,
to hover beside it.
    “Go in,” Teb said. “Can you get in?”
    Seastrider studied the black hole, sensed
the cave’s emptiness, and slid into the dark slit folding her wings
close as Teb lay along her neck. Windcaller followed, Kiri and
Marshy crouching low. The roof brushed their backs.
    Inside, the cave opened out into a large,
echoing chamber that was almost warm. The riders slid down. Teb
took a candle from his pack and struck flint. Flame chased the
dragons’ shadows up the frozen walls.
    “There!” Kiri said, pointing to where claw
marks scored the ice. Each set of claws was as wide as Marshy’s
head—this was a young dragon, not yet full grown. The two dragons
sniffed at the marks. Marshy stood on tiptoe and pressed his
fingers into the deep scratches. His small hand trembled. His
cheeks burned and his gray eyes glowed with a bright, urgent
knowledge. Ahead of them somewhere in this frozen land was a very
special dragon—the dragon with whom he must be paired. And ahead of
them somewhere, his dragon was sick, perhaps dying. He knew this
with a deep, instinctive insight.
    Deeper in the cave was a tumbled pile of
sheep bones and the backbone of a deer. Marshy found where the
young dragon had slept, a circle where the ice had melted and
refrozen.
    “A female,” Marshy said, kneeling beside the
slick circle to pick up a white dragon scale. All white dragons
were female. Each pearly scale was as big as the little boy’s palm.
The look on Marshy’s face was the same as Camery’s when she and
Nightraider had found each other. It was the same look that had lit
Colewolf s eyes when he met Starpounder, after believing for so
long that there were no more dragons on Tirror.
    Teb watched Kiri and touched her thoughts.
She was glad for Marshy; her mind filled with a prayer to the
Graven Light that they would find Marshy’s young dragon in time.
But she was torn, too, with a desolate yearning for that moment
when she would join with her own dragonmate. Unsteady questions
seared her, and the thought that she might never know her own
dragon.
    Kiri traveled with Windcaller, but both she
and Windcaller searched for another. There was no deciding who
would belong to a certain dragon. Such a thing was without choice,
established by powers far greater than even bards and dragons could
control.
    “Please,” Marshy said, “we must hurry. She
is sick, maybe dying.” The two dragons were poised at the mouth of
the cave. The bards mounted and headed south again, watching for
any movement across the ice plain that was fast dimming toward
night. But it was not until the sky was nearly dark, the plain
turned to heavy gray, that the two dragons sensed