Dragon Haven Read Online Free PDF

water. It had begun to split at the end, but luckily it hadn’t reached the quick yet. “I’ll go ask Captain Leftrin if he has twine and tar to spare. While we’re at it, let’s look at the rest of you. Are your other claws all right?”
    “They’re all getting a bit soft,” Sintara admitted. She stretched her other front foot toward Thymara and spread her toes, extending her claws. Thymara bit her lip as she checked them;they were all slightly frayed at the ends, like hard driftwood finally surrendering to damp. Thinking of wood gave her a possible solution. “I wonder if we could oil them. Or varnish them to keep the water away.”
    The dragon twitched her foot back, very nearly knocking Thymara over. She examined her claws herself and then responded with a reserved, “Perhaps.”
    “Stand up and stretch out, please. I need to check you for dirt and parasites.”
    The dragon rumbled a protest but slowly obeyed. Thymara walked slowly around her. She hadn’t imagined the changes. Sintara had lost weight but gained muscle. The constant immersion in river water was not good for her scales, but walking against the current was strengthening the dragon. “Open your wings, please,” Thymara requested.
    “I’d rather not,” Sintara replied primly.
    “Do you want to shelter parasites in their folds?”
    The dragon rumbled again but gave her wings a shudder and then unfolded them. The skin clung together like a parasol stored too long in the damp, and it smelled unpleasant. Her scales looked unhealthy, the feathery edges showing white, like layers of leaves going to mold.
    “This is not good,” Thymara exclaimed in dismay. “Don’t you ever wash them? Or shake them out and exercise them? Your skin needs sunlight. And a good scrubbing.”
    “They’re not so bad,” the dragon hissed.
    “No. They’re damp in the folds and smelly. At least leave them unfolded to air while I go get something to help your claws.” Heedless of Sintara’s dignity, Thymara seized the tip of one of the dragon’s finger-ribs and pulled the wing out straight. The dragon tried to close her wing but Thymara held on stubbornly. It was entirely too easy for her to hold the wing open. The dragon’s muscles should have been stronger. She tried to think of the right word for it. Atrophy. Sintara’s wing muscles were atrophying from disuse. “Sintara, if you don’t listen to me and take care of your wings, soon you won’t be able to move them at all.”
    “Don’t even think such a thing!” the dragon hissed at her. She gave a violent flap and Thymara lost her grip and fell to her knees in the mud. She looked up at the dragon as Sintara began indignantly to fold her wings again.
    “Wait. Wait, what’s that? Sintara, open your wing again. Let me look under it. That looked like a rasp snake under there!”
    The dragon halted. “What’s a rasp snake?”
    “They live in the canopy. They’re skinny as twigs but long. They’re really fast when they strike, and they have a tooth, like an egg tooth, on their snouts. They bite and hold on, and dig their heads in. And then they just hang there and feed. I’ve seen monkeys with so many on them that they look like they have a hundred tails. Usually the animal gets an infection around the head and dies from that. They’re nasty. Unfold your wing. Let me look.”
    It hung from high under the wing, a long nasty snakelike body. When Thymara braved herself to touch it, the dangling thing suddenly lashed about angrily and Sintara gave a startled chirp of pain. “What is it? Get it off me!” the dragon exclaimed and thrust her head under her wing and seized the parasite.
    “Stop! Don’t bite it, don’t pull on it. If you rip it off you, the head will tear free and stay inside and make a terrible infection. Let go, Sintara. Let go of it and let me deal with it!”
    Sintara’s eyes glittered, copper disks whirling, but she obeyed. “Get it off me.” The dragon spoke in a tight, furious