Page 148 of Dragon Strike (Age of Fire 4)

Tuve smiled. “A little oliban ash and witch hazel in the nostrils, mistress,” she said quietly. She took out a thinner brush and blackened it and went to work again.

“They’re hypocrites,” Takea said, tapping a scale that needed to be removed. “The Anklenes have three thralls to every one the Firemaids have. If they’re so concerned about how they’re treated, they can start with their own. The thralls die like flies over there. Bad air from all those illumination lamps.”

“Some say they only report them dead, then sneak them to the surface.”

“I’ll wager they eat them. Always counting and measuring things. No one will cheat you like the one doing the accounting, my father used to say.”

“Not enough honest dwarves to go around,” the Firemaid in charge of the thralls said. “You can trust dwarves. They’ll cut their own throats before they lie. If only they wouldn’t starve themselves. Not like elves, who play games with definitions of truth and falsehood. Now a good stupid man, that’s almost as good as a dwarf. If you ever mate and set up in a cave of your own, Tala, look for the ones who count on their fingers instead of in their heads. That’ll be a thrall you can trust.”

Wistala’s painting thrall gestured to a younger version of herself with similar thick hair. The girl brought forth a polished sheet of tin. Wistala saw herself, as in a silvery pool at sunset. Her eyes looked bigger and brighter.

“Have her show her teeth, Tuve,” Takea said. “She’s a Firemaid now, and she does have a royal set of renders. She should be showing a lot of tooth.”

Tuve smeared a foul-tasting grease on her teeth. Wistala’s lips retreated in disgust, practically of their own accord.

“That’ll impress the Tyr!” Ayafeeia said, having completed her own preparations in a very few moments with the aid of a single thrall. “Though the rest of him’s a bit of a wreck, he bears very fine teeth.”

“The Tyr’s sure to remember you!” Takea said.

Chapter 15

The Copper sent the body-thralls away to hear the report from Gnash. He’d given her just a taste of his blood and promised her the use of a steer once her report was done.

“I saw them myself, great one,” Gnash said. “Mighty birds, with men lumpy under fur riding them. They flew low over the kern, only at night and in cloud or rain, and dropped a bitter powder, like dried dung.”>Wistala thought the Queen was struggling with her firebladder. “But social gossip doesn’t concern our brave Firemaids. I came to deliver my mate’s word. Consider it a summoning. The Tyr would like to see this new Firemaiden and hear her account of matters in the Upper World.”

Wistala felt the tingle of the gazes upon her such that it made her scales ripple. “I—I thank you for the opportunity to obey, my Queen,” Wistala said.

“Don’t let me stop you from enjoying your feast. You look as though you could use it. Ayafeeia, see that a body-thrall with sharp snippers and fresh file attends to her. Her scales are running quite wild.”

“Yes, my Queen.”

The Queen drew Ayafeeia away and said a few more words, quietly. They crossed necks again.

“Such an insult,” an old Firemaid said, interrupting Wistala’s concentration. “Send a renegade with a demand. We’ll give her war, if she wants it.”

“I expect she does want it,” Ayafeeia said, leaving Nilrasha.

Behind her, the Queen touched nose-tip with a very young drakka standing sore-footed at the end of the line as she departed. A dragonelle at the opposite end said something quiet about on the climb since she lost her hatchling teeth in milkdrinker’s hill.

Eyes narrowed in thought, Ayafeeia watched the Queen take off. “The losses from the dragon-riders are still within this generation. We’ve just completed a hard war with the demen. She knows we are weak.”

Wistala had heard much talk of battles with the Ghioz. “How does she know? Spies?”

“Quite possibly,” Ayafeeia said. “There are dragons who weigh gold above blood.”

“A curse on such dragons,” Takea said, looking directly at Wistala. “If I learned of one, I’d not rest until I saw her head left dry atop some mountain.”

Wistala began to believe she’d dropped into a whirlwind: suspicions, jealousies, politics, worries of civil war, war in the Lower World, worries of war with the surface. Still, dragons did thrive on challenge, Father always said. Dragon eat challenge and vent victory. It was surfeit that beat you.

“May I ask a question?” Wistala asked.

“Of course,” Ayafeeia said. “That’s the beginning of wisdom.”

“Why did she call you ‘maidmother’ at some times and ‘sister’ at others?”

“We are sisters after a fashion, though one presses the issue in this case. Her mate was married to my sister.”

“I still say she did it,” someone said quietly.

---