He sounded more anxious than the subject deserved. Laurence patted his foreleg where he could reach it. ‘No, I am very well.’
‘I am very sorry to have snatched you away so,’ Temeraire said, some tension gone at the warmth in Laurence’s voice. ‘Pray do not be angry; I could not let that man take you.’
‘No, I am not angry,’ Laurence said; indeed, so far as his heart was concerned there was only a great, swelling joy to be once again aloft, to feel the living current of power running through Temeraire’s body, even if his more rational part knew this state could not last. ‘And I do not blame you for going, not in the least, but I am afraid we must turn back now.’
‘No; I am not taking you back to that man,’ Temeraire said obstinately, and Laurence understood with a sinking feeling that he had run up against Temeraire’s protective instincts. ‘He lied to me, and kept you away, and then he wanted to arrest you: he may count himself lucky I did not squash him.’
‘My dear, we cannot just run wild,’ Laurence said. ‘We would be truly beyond the pale if we did such a thing; how do you imagine we would eat, except by theft? And we would be abandoning all our friends.’
‘I am no more use to them in London, sitting in a covert,’ Temeraire said, with perfect truth, and left Laurence at a loss for how to answer him. ‘But I do not mean to run wild; although,’ a little wistfully, ‘to be sure, it would be pleasant to do as we liked, and I do not think anyone would miss a few sheep here and there. But not while there is a battle to be fought.’
‘Oh dear,’ Laurence said, as he squinted towards the sun and realized their course was southeast, directly for their former covert at Dover. ‘Temeraire, they cannot let us fight; Lenton will have to order me back, and if I disobey he will arrest me just as quick as Barham, I assure you.’
‘I do not believe Obversaria’s admiral will arrest you,’ Temeraire said. ‘She is very nice, and has always spoken to me kindly, even though she is so much older, and the flag-dragon. Besides, if he tries, Maximus and Lily are there, and they will help me; and if that man from London tries to come and take you away again, I will kill him,’ he added, with an alarming degree of bloodthirsty eagerness.
They landed in the Dover covert amid the clamour and bustle of preparation: the harness-masters bellowing orders to the ground crews, the clatter of buckles and the deeper metallic ringing of the bombs being handed up in sacks to the bellmen; riflemen loading their weapons, the sharp high-pitched shriek of whetstones grinding away on sword-edges. A dozen interested dragons had followed their progress, many calling out greetings to Temeraire as he made his descent. He called back, full of excitement, his spirits rising all the while Laurence felt his own sinking.
Temeraire brought them to earth in Obversaria’s clearing; it was one of the largest in the covert, as befitted her standing as flag-dragon, though as an Anglewing she was only slightly more than middling in size, and there was easily room for Temeraire to join her. She was rigged out already, her crew boarding; Admiral Lenton himself was standing beside her in full riding gear, only waiting for his officers to be aboard: minutes away from going aloft.
‘Well, and what have you done?’ Lenton asked, before Laurence had even managed to unfold himself out of Temeraire’s claw. ‘Roland spoke to me, but she said she had told you to stay quiet; there is going to be the devil to pay for this.’
‘Sir, I am very sorry to put you in so untenable a position,’ Laurence said awkwardly, trying to think how he could explain Temeraire’s refusal to return to London without seeming to make excuses for himself.
‘No, it is my fault,’ Temeraire added, ducking his head and trying to look ashamed, without much success; there was too distinct a gleam of satisfaction in his eye. ‘I took Laurence away; that man was going to arrest him.’
He sounded plainly smug, and Obversaria abruptly leaned over and batted him on the side of the head, hard enough to make him wobble even though he was half again her size. He flinched and stared at her, with a surprised and wounded expression; she only snorted at him and said, ‘You are too old to be flying with your eyes closed. Lenton, we are ready, I think.’
‘Yes,’ Lenton said, squinting up against the sun to examine her harness. ‘I have no time to deal with you now, Laurence; this will have to wait.’
‘Of course, sir; I beg your pardon,’ Laurence said quietly. ‘Pray do not let us delay you; with your permission, we will stay in Temeraire’s clearing until you return.’ Even cowed by Obversaria’s reproof, Temeraire made a small noise of protest at this.
‘No, no; don’t speak like a groundling,’ Lenton said impatiently. ‘A young male like that will not stay behind when he sees his formation go, not uninjured. The same bloody mistake this fellow Barham and all the others at the Admiralty make, every time a new one is shuffled in by Government. If we ever manage to get it into their heads that dragons are not brute beasts, they start to imagine that they are just like men, and can be put under regular military discipline.’
Laurence opened his mouth to deny that Temeraire would disobey, then shut it again after glancing round; Temeraire was ploughing the ground restlessly with his great talons, his wings partly fanned out, and he would not meet Laurence’s gaze.
‘Yes, just so,’ Lenton said dryly, when he saw Laurence silenced. He sighed, unbending a little, and brushed his sparse grey hair back off his forehead. ‘If those Chinamen want him back, it can only make matters worse if he gets himself injured fighting without armour or crew,’ he said. ‘Go on and get him ready; we will speak after.’
Laurence could scarcely find words to express his gratitude, but they were unnecessary in any case; Lenton was already turning back to Obversaria. There was indeed no time to waste; Laurence waved Temeraire on and ran for their usual clearing on foot, careless of his dignity. A scattered, intensely excited rush of thoughts, all fragmentary: great relief; of course Temeraire would never have stayed behind; how wretched they would have looked, jumping into a battle against orders; in a moment they would be aloft, yet nothing had truly changed in their circumstances: this might be the last time.
Many of his crewmen were sitting outside in the open, polishing equipment and oiling harness unnecessarily, pretending not to be watching the sky; they were silent and downcast; and at first they only stared when Laurence came running into the clearing. ‘Where is Granby?’ he demanded. ‘Full muster, gentlemen; heavy combat rig, at once.’
By then Temeraire was overhead and descending, and the rest of the crew came spilling out of the barracks, cheering him; a general stampede towards small-arms and gear ensued, that rush that had once looked like chaos to Laurence, used as he was to naval order, but which accomplished the tremendous affair of getting a dragon equipped in a frantic hurry.
Granby came out of the barracks amid the cavalcade: a tall young officer dark-haired and lanky, his fair skin, ordinarily burnt and peeling from daily flying, but for once unmarred thanks to the weeks of being grounded. He was an aviator born and bred, as Laurence was not, and their acquaintance had not been without early friction: like many other aviators, he had resented so prime a dragon as Temeraire being claimed by a naval officer. But that resentment had not survived a shared action, and Laurence had never yet regretted taking him on as first lieutenant, despite the wide divergence in their characters. Granby had made an initial attempt out of respect to imitate the formalities which were to Laurence, raised a gentleman, as natural as breathing; but they had not taken root. Like most aviators, raised from the age of seven far from polite society, he was by nature given