City of Dragons. Робин Хобб

to find a game trail, a fresh one they hadn’t hunted before. Until they struck one, it would be hard going. They were both breathing hard, but Tats was less winded than he would have been when they first left Trehaug. Life on the Tarman expedition had muscled and hardened all of them, she thought approvingly. And all of the keepers had grown, the boys achieving growth spurts that were almost alarming. Tats was taller now and his shoulders broader. His dragon was changing him, too. He alone of the keepers had been fully human in appearance when they had left Trehaug. Offspring of the freed slave population that had immigrated to Trehaug during the war with Chalced, his slavery as an infant had been clearly marked on his face with his former owner’s tattoo. A spider web had been flung across his left cheek, while a small running horse had been inked beside his nose. Those had changed as his dragon had begun to scale him. The tattoos were stylized designs now, scales rather than ink under skin. His dark hair and dark eyes remained the same as they had always been, but she suspected that some of his height was due to his transformation to Elderling rather than being natural growth. His fingernails gleamed as green as Fente, his ill-tempered little queen dragon. When the light struck his skin, it woke green highlights on his scaling. He was leaf shadow and pine needle, the greens of her fores … She reined in her thoughts.

      ‘So. You think you’ll live out your life here?’ It was a strange concept to her. She’d been at a bit of a loss since they’d achieved their goal of finding the city. When they all left Trehaug, they had signed contracts, acknowledging that their goal was to settle the dragons upriver. Finding the legendary city of Kelsingra had scarcely been mentioned. She’d taken the job to escape her old life. She’d thought no further in her plans than that. Now she ventured to picture herself living here forever. Never facing again the people who had made her an outcast.

      The other half of that image was never going home again. She hadn’t liked her mother; and it had been mutual. But she had been very close to her father. Would she never see him again? Would he never know she’d achieved her goal? No, that was a ridiculous thought. Captain Leftrin was going to make a supply run back to Cassarick. Once he arrived there, the news of their find would swarm out like gnats to every ear in the Rain Wilds. Her father would soon hear of it. Would he come here to see for himself? Would she, perhaps, go home to visit him? A night ago, at the meeting, Leftrin had asked if anyone wanted to go back to the city. A silence had fallen after his query. The keepers had looked at one another. Leave their dragons? Go back to Trehaug, to return to their lives as pariahs there? No. For the others, the answer had been easy.

      It had been less easy for her. There were times when she wanted to leave her dragon. Sintara was not the most endearing creature in the world. She ordered Thymara about, exposed her to danger for her own amusement, and once had nearly drowned her in the river in her haste to get a fish. Sintara had never apologized for that. The dragon was as sarcastic and cynical as she was magnificent. But even if Thymara was considering abandoning her dragon, she did not want to get back on the Tarman and go downriver. She was still sick of being on the barge and of the endless journeying in close quarters. Going back to Trehaug with Leftrin would mean leaving all her friends, and never knowing what they discovered in the Elderling city. So for now she’d stay here, to be with her friends and continue her tasks as a hunter for the dragons until Leftrin returned with fresh supplies. And after that? ‘Do you plan to live here forever?’ she asked Tats again when she realized he hadn’t answered her first question.

      He replied quietly, in keeping with their soft tread through the forest. ‘Where else could we go?’ He made a small gesture at her and then at his own face. ‘Our dragons have marked us as theirs. And while Fente is making more progress toward flying than Sintara is, I don’t think either queen will be self-sufficient soon. Even if they could hunt to feed themselves, they’d still want us here with them, for grooming and companionship. We’re Elderlings now, Thymara. Elderlings have always lived alongside dragons. And this is where the dragons are staying. So, yes, I suppose I’m here for the rest of my life. Or for as long as Fente is.’

      He lifted a hand and pointed silently in what he thought was a better direction. She decided to agree with him and took the lead. He spoke from behind her as they slipped single-file through the forest. ‘Are you saying what I think you’re saying? Are you truly considering going back to Trehaug? Do you think that’s even possible for ones like us? I know that Sintara doesn’t always treat you well. But where else can you live now? You have wings now, Thymara. I can’t see you climbing and running through the tree tops like you used to. Anywhere you go, people are going to stare at you. Or worse.’

      Thymara folded her wings more tightly to her body. Then she frowned. She hadn’t been aware she was going to do that. The foreign appendages were becoming more and more a part of her. They still made her back ache and annoyed her daily when she tried to make her worn clothing fit around them. But she moved them now without focusing on the task.

      ‘They’re beautiful,’ Tats said as if he could hear her thoughts. ‘They’re worth anything you have to endure for them.’

      ‘They’re useless,’ Thymara retorted, trying not to let his compliment please her. ‘I’ll never fly. They’re like a mockery.’

      ‘No. You’ll never fly, but I still think they’re beautiful.’

      Now his agreement that she could never fly stung more sharply than his compliment could soothe. ‘Rapskal thinks I’ll fly,’ she retorted.

      Tats sighed. ‘Rapskal thinks that he and Heeby will visit the moon some day. Thymara, I think your wings would have to grow much bigger before you could fly. So big that perhaps you’d be bent over by the weight of them when you walked. Rapskal doesn’t stop to think how things really work. He is full of his wishes and dreams, now more than ever. And we both know he wants you and will say anything to you that will win your favour.’

      She glanced back at him, a sour smile twisting her lips. ‘Unlike you,’ she observed.

      He grinned at her, his dark eyes alight with challenge. ‘You know I want you. I’m honest about that. I’m always honest with you, Thymara. I think you should appreciate the truth from a man who respects your intelligence rather than preferring a crazy man full of wild compliments.’

      ‘I value your honesty,’ she said and then bit her tongue before she could remind him that he hadn’t always been so honest with her. He hadn’t told her that he was mating with Jerd. But neither had Rapskal admitted it to her. Of course, in Rapskal’s case, he hadn’t really concealed it from her. He simply hadn’t thought it all that important.

      After all, most of the male keepers seemed to have enjoyed Jerd’s favours. And probably continued to, for all Thymara knew. The question came back to her. Why was it so important to her? Tats wasn’t with Jerd any more. He didn’t seem to attach any real importance to what he had done. So why did it matter so much to her?

      Thymara slowed her pace. They were approaching an opening in the forest and where the trees thinned there was more light ahead. She made a motion to Tats to be quiet and slow his pace, took the best of her unsatisfactory arrows and set it to the bow. Time to move her eyes more than her body. She set her shoulder to a tree to steady her stance and began a slow survey of the forest meadow before them.

      She could focus her eyes but not her unruly thoughts. Jerd had been very quick to cast off the rules of their Rain Wilds upbringing. Girls such as she and Jerd and Sylve were not allowed to take husbands. All knew that Rain Wild children who were scaled or clawed at birth would likely not grow to adulthood. They were not worth the resources it would take to raise them, for even if they lived, they seldom bore viable children. Those who tried usually died in labour, leaving the monsters that survived the births to be exposed. Husbands were forbidden to those strongly Touched by the Rain Wilds, as deeply forbidden as mating outside the marriage bed was forbidden to all Rain Wilders. But Jerd had chosen to ignore both those rules. Jerd was lovely, with her fair hair and piercing eyes and lithe body. She had chosen which keepers she wished to bed, and then picked them off one at a time like a cat at a mouse nest, and with as little compunction about the outcome of her appetite. Even when some of the youths came to blows over her, she seemed to accept it as her due. Thymara had been torn between envy for the freedom Jerd had