Tooth and Claw Read Free Page A

alcoves so they were obliged to spread themselves out almost as if they were in a field, but it was their own field, and they were accustomed to such spreading out and might have missed it if alcoves had been carved.
    The two sisters were delighted to welcome their brother Avan back into their company. Since he went to Irieth they had seen him only for a day or two, for his work in the Office for the Planning and Beautification of Irieth kept him fully occupied. For a time, Avan regaled them with stories of his life in the capital, emphasizing his triumphs and playing down his narrow escapes to such an extent that they each secretly felt they might have done as well if they had had claws and were able to make their way in the world.
    “But you’ll be coming home now, of course?” Haner asked at last, wiping the tears of laughter from her silver eyes.
    “Home? You mean home here? I dare not. I can’t think how you come to suggest it.” All at once Avan became aware that the old servant Amer had stopped polishing Haner’s tail and both his sisters were staring at him. “Did you really think I meant to do so?”
    “Why, yes,” Selendra said, after a quick glance at her sister and their attendant showed neither of them were about to speak. “We thought that after Father died you would come home and be Dignified as he was. Penn is a parson, and besides he has a house and a wife away at Benandi. You could have this establishment—”
    “I see you have thought it all out,” Avan said, pulling himself to his feet. “My dear maidens, have you not considered that in addition to being seventy feet long and fire-breathing, Father is, or rather was, nearly five hundred years old? I am barely one hundred, barely twenty feet long, and have no fire as yet, nor much prospect of gaining any soon. I am doing well enough in my career for one who began it when I did, but that was hardly ten years ago and I don’t taste dragon meat twice in a year. Also I couldn’t bring mycareer here with me. If I set up as Dignified, all the neighborhood Dignifieds and Illustriouses would eat away at our territory and eventually at us, sure as sunrise. There would be no way I could stop them, hardly more than you two could alone.”
    The two maidens looked at each other in dismay, and Amer gave a little cry of fear. “Then what will become of—of the establishment?” Selendra asked, not yet bold enough to ask yet about their persons.
    “I don’t know why you haven’t asked Penn this, or Father,” Avan said, shifting uncomfortably. “I am not the eldest. Nobody consults me about this sort of thing. But I dare say Daverak will take it on until one of his children is old enough to manage it for himself. That was part of the agreement when he married Berend, I believe, if Father should die before I was strong enough. Did nobody tell you any of this?”
    “You may not be the eldest, but you are a dragon grown. We are just useless females,” Selendra said, her violet eyes flashing. “Afterthoughts. Nobody tells us anything. We are doubtless to be the dinner for the rest of you, and I would have appreciated a little time to prepare myself for that.”
    “How?” Avan asked, amused and intrigued despite himself.
    “By flying right away,” Selendra answered, daringly.
    “No, I was teasing,” her brother said. “Your future is assured, both of you. Neither of you shall be dinner. Penn wrote to me that according to our father’s wishes the gold was to be divided between me and you two, except for a symbolic piece each for the others. The establishment will go to Berend’s children. One of you will go to live with Berend, and the other with Penn.”
    Amer and Haner gave little cries, and Sel flung her arms and wings around her sister.
    “Anyone would think I had suggested you would be eatenimmediately,” said Avan. “You’re the most ungrateful sisters a dragon ever had.”
    “Couldn’t you take us?” Selendra asked. “We have