Page 10 of The Priory of the Orange Tree

“Perhaps you will, too, honorable Turosa.”

The corner of his mouth twitched before he strode ahead to rejoin his friends from the North House.

“He should speak to you with more respect,” Ishari murmured. “Dumu says you score better than him in most combat.”

Tané said nothing. Her arms prickled. She was the best in her house, but so was Turosa in his.

A fountain carved into the image of the great Kwiriki—the first dragon ever to take a human rider—stood in the outer courtyard of the temple. Salt water poured from his mouth. Tané washed her hands in it and placed a drop on her lips.

It tasted clean.

“Tané,” Ishari said, “I hope all goes as you desire.”

“I hope the same for you.” They all desired the same outcome. “You were last to leave the house.”

“I woke late.” Ishari performed her own ablutions. “I thought I heard the screens in our room opening last night. It unsettled me … I could not sleep again for some time. Did you leave the room at all?”

“No. Perhaps it was our learnèd teacher.”

“Yes, perhaps.”

They proceeded to the vast inner courtyard, where the sun brightened the rooftops.

A man with a long moustache stood atop the steps with a helm under his arm. His face was tanned and weathered. Clad in armored sleeves and gauntlets, a lightweight cuirass over a coat of darkest blue, and a high-collared surcoat of black velvet and gold-brocaded silk, he was clearly both a person of high rank and a soldier.

For a moment, Tané forgot her dread. She was a child again, dreaming of dragons.

This man was the honored Sea General of Seiiki. Head of Clan Miduchi, the dynasty of dragonriders—a dynasty united not by blood, but by purpose. Tané meant to have that name.

Upon reaching the steps, the apprentices formed two lines, knelt, and pressed their foreheads to the ground. Tané could hear Ishari breathing. Nobody rose. Nobody moved.

Scale rasped against stone. Every sinew in her body seemed to tighten.

She looked up.

There were eight of them. Years she had spent praying before statues of dragons, studying them, and observing them from a distance, but she had never seen them this close.

Their size was breathtaking. Most were Seiikinese, with silvery hides and lithe, whiplike forms. Impossibly long bodies held up their splendid heads, and they each had four muscular legs, ending in feet with three claws. Long barbels swirled from their faces and trailed like the lines of kites. The majority were quite young, perhaps four hundred years old, but several carried scars from the Great Sorrow. All were covered with scales and ringed with sucker marks—keepsakes from their quarrels with greatsquid.

Two of them possessed a fourth toe. These were dragons from the Empire of the Twelve Lakes. One of them—a male—had wings. Most dragons were wingless and flew by means of an organ on their heads, which scholars had named thecrown. The few that did grow wings did so only after at least two thousand years of life.

The winged dragon was largest. If Tané had stretched to her full height, she might not even have been able to reach between his snout and his eyes. Though his wings looked fragile as spidersilk, they were strong enough to whip up a typhoon. Tané spied the pouch beneath his chin. Like oysters, dragons could make pearls, one in a lifetime. It never left the pouch.

The dragon beside the male, also Lacustrine, was close to his stature. Her scales were a pale, clouded green, like milk jade, her mane the golden-brown of riverweed.

“Welcome,” the Sea General said.

His voice rang out like the call of a war conch.

“Rise,” he said, and they obeyed. “You are here today to be sworn to one of two lives: that of the High Sea Guard, defending Seiiki from sickness and invasion, or a life of learning and prayer on Feather Island. Of the sea guardians, twelve of you will have the honor of becoming dragonriders.”

Only twelve. Usually there were more.

“As you will know,” the Sea General said, “there have been no hatchings of dragon eggs for the past two centuries. Several dragons have also been taken by the Fleet of the Tiger Eye, which continues its repulsive trade in dragonflesh under the tyranny of the so-called Golden Empress.”

Heads bowed.

“To bolster our ranks, we are honored to receive these two great warriors from the Empire of the Twelve Lakes. I trust this will herald a closer friendship with our allies to the north.”

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