Dragonbards Read Online Free PDF Page A

Kiri, his face all alight with wonder. “Her name is
Iceflower.”
    Kiri hugged him. “She’s lovely, Marshy.” The
young dragon nuzzled Kiri’s hand. Iceflower’s face was finely
sculptured. The pearly hues of her scales caught the colors of the
fire. Marshy’s eyes were filled with dreams that now, for the first
time, could come true. Kiri kissed him on the forehead and turned
away, putting aside her own disquiet.
    The food smelled wonderful. She supposed she
would feel better once she’d eaten. But she couldn’t get her mind
from the dragonlings—was one of those young creatures meant to be
her own? She tried to touch the dragonlings in thought as they
moved across Yoorthed’s winds, tried hard to sense that subtle
bonding that would mark one special dragon. Her thoughts came back
to her empty.
    She tried to sense her father and Camery,
too, but there was no hint of the two bards. Fear for them chilled
her—though she knew it was the enemy doing this, the power of the
dark clouding their silent speech. She shook her head, tried to
marshal her thoughts, and went to sit with Teb.
    As they ate, Teb and Kiri told the dwarfs
all they could about the war. On the smaller continents, where Teb
and the dragons had been able to bring the past alive, slaves had
awakened and remembered their own worth, and had risen to kill
their dark masters. But that was only on the small continents. Teb
and the dragons, alone, had not been a large enough force to take
on the big continents where kings had been mind twisted or
replaced. Now that Teb had found the other bards, and now that
there would be more dragons, their band would have formidable
power—but against a formidable enemy.
    “If . . .” Kiri began, then
stopped, her voice drowned by the thundering voices of dragons.
Bards and dwarfs, jumped up and pushed through the cave door into
the moonlight.
    The night was filled with dragons, rearing
and careening as they greeted each other. Nightraider and
Starpounder towered blacker than the sky, in a sparring greeting
with Seastrider and Windcaller. Crowding around the big dragons
were four strapping dragonlings, three dark males and a female.
    From inside the cave came a faint, coughing
roar, and Iceflower stumbled out behind the dwarfs, with Marshy
beside her. The four dragonlings gawked at her and at the little
boy.
    “Your bard . . .”
    “You found your bard.”
    “Small . . . he’s so small.”
    “Young . . .”
    The dragonlings began to nose at Marshy and
sniff him all over.
    “You’re alive,” said the white sister,
nosing at Iceflower. “We’re very glad you’re alive.”
    “Not dead like Snowlake,” said the
blue-black dragon.
    “I nearly was,” said Iceflower.
    “We searched for you,” said the red-black.
“We had no sense of you. The dark . . .”
    “They were still searching when we found
them,” Camery said.
    “Iceflower was drugged,” Teb said. “A
drugged seal.”
    Camery reached to stroke the sick
dragonling. “Did the dark mean to kill you, young one? Or did it
mean to capture you?”
    “I suspect to capture and train her,” Teb
said, filled with sharp memory of the time when the dark tried to
warp his own mind to their evil way.
    Camery touched Teb’s cheek and hugged
him.
    “Did you see any ships?” he said.
    “No. The dragonlings saw ships near the
otters’ bay at Cekus some weeks ago and felt the terrible power of
the dark.”
    “Maybe we can send Quazelzeg’s ships to the
bottom for the sharks,” Teb said, “before we leave this land.”
    Kiri had moved away, by herself. Teb watched
her, feeling sharply her disappointment that none of the
dragonlings was for her. He followed her and took her hand, and she
leaned her forehead against his shoulder.
    “There will be other dragons, Kiri.”
    “Where? There are no other dragons.”
    He lifted her chin. “Once, you thought there
were no dragons on Tirror.”
    “But . . .”
    “There will be other dragons.” He