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‘A RE YOU SURE you’ll be warm enough?’ Jani Khuprus asked him again.

Selden rolled his eyes at Reyn in sympathy, and the Rain Wilder found himself smiling. ‘I don’t know,’ Reyn replied honestly. ‘But if I put on any more layers of clothing, I’m afraid I’ll slip out of them when the dragon is carrying me.’

That silenced her. ‘I’ll be fine, Mother,’ he assured her. ‘It won’t be any worse than sailing in foul weather.’

They stood in a hastily cleared area behind the Traders’ Concourse.

Tintaglia had demanded that henceforth every city in the Traders’ control must have an open space sufficiently large for a dragon to land comfortably.

And whenever a dragon chose to land in a city, the inhabitants must guarantee the creature a warm welcome and an adequate meal.

Negotiating what an ‘adequate meal’ was had taken several hours.

The meat had to be alive, and equal at least the size of a ‘well-fleshed bull calf at the end of his first year.’ When told she was more likely to get poultry, as Bingtown lacked grazing lands for cattle, she had sulked until someone had offered her warmed oil and assistance in grooming her scales whenever she visited. That had seemed to mollify her.

Days had been taken up with such quibbling, until Reyn had thought he would go mad.

The dozen or so surviving pigeons that served Bingtown and Trehaug had been flown into a state of exhaustion.

The terse missives sent and received had seemed incapable of explaining all that was going on in both cities.

Reyn had been relieved when a single line informed them that his stepfather and half-sister had returned to the city in good health.

Bendir had left Trehaug to venture upriver to locate the place Tintaglia had indicated on the tiny river chart they’d sent.

He would begin both to ponder a method of deepening the river, and to survey for signs of a buried city.

Content that her goals were being advanced, Tintaglia had finally agreed to depart to search for Malta.

Reyn was surprised at how many folk had gathered to watch his departure, probably more from curiosity than any deep concern for his mission.

Malta’s life or death would little affect them.

‘Are you ready?’ Tintaglia asked him irritably. Through their bond, she spoke in his mind, so that he could feel her annoyance.

Resolutely, he set her emotions aside from his own. Unfortunately, that left him with little more than nervousness and dread. He stepped up to the dragon. ‘I am ready.’

‘Very well then,’ she replied. She swept her gaze over those assembled to bid them farewell. ‘When I return, I expect to see progress. Great progress.’

Selden broke suddenly from his mother’s side and thrust a small cloth bag into Reyn’s hands. It rattled. ‘Take these. They were Malta’s. They might help you get through.’

Gravely Reyn poked the mouth of the small bag open, expecting some token of jewellery. Instead, he found a handful of tinted honey drops. He looked up from the candy in puzzlement. Selden shrugged.

‘I was at our old house yesterday, seeing what was left there. Almost everything had been stolen or destroyed. So I looked in some of the less obvious places.’ Selden grinned, abruptly a small brother.

‘I always knew where Malta hid her candy.’ The smile softened at the edges.

‘She loves honey drops. But they might keep you going in the cold. I don’t think she’d mind if you ate them. ’

It was so Malta. Hoarded sweetness against an uncertain tomorrow. Reyn tucked the bag into the top of his pouch. ‘Thank you,’ he replied gravely. He pulled a wool veil down over his face and tucked it into the throat of his jacket. It would keep his face warm, but limited his vision.

‘That’s wise,’ Selden observed encouragingly.

‘You’ve been changing a lot, you know. When I first saw you, I didn’t think Malta would mind much.

But you’re a lot more lumpy now.’ The boy lifted an unselfconscious hand to his face, and ran his fingers over his eyebrows.

‘She’s going to have fits when she sees me,’ he predicted merrily.

The dragon reared back onto her hind legs. ‘Hurry up,’ she ordered Reyn tersely. To Selden, she spoke more gently. ‘Move to the side, small minstrel, and turn your eyes away. I would not blind you with dust blasted by my wings.’

‘I thank you, Great One. Though to be blinded might not be so great a loss, if my last sight were of you, gleaming silver and blue as you rose. Such a memory might sustain me to the end of my days.’

‘Flatterer!’ the dragon dismissed his words, but she did not hide her pleasure. As soon as Selden was clear, she snatched Reyn up from the ground as if he were a toy. She held him around his chest, his legs and feet dangling.

She shook out her wings and crouched on her powerful hind legs.

Once, twice, she flapped her wings in a measuring way.

He tried to call a farewell, but could not summon enough breath.

She sprang upward with a suddenness that snapped his head back.

The shouted farewells were lost in the steady thunder of her wings.

He closed his eyes against the cold wind.

When he forced them open again, he looked down on a glittering carpet of blue and grey, a pattern rippling slowly across it.

The sea, he realized, was very, very far below him.

Nothing was below him except deep, cold water. He swallowed against a rising fear.

‘Well. Where did you want to go?’

‘Where do I want to go? To wherever Malta is, of course.’

‘I told you before, I can sense she is alive. That doesn’t mean I know where she is.’

Desolation swallowed Reyn. The dragon took sudden pity on him.

‘See what you can do,’ she suggested. Through her, he again shared her awareness of Malta.

He closed his eyes and slipped into that sensing that was not hearing nor sight nor scent, but an eerie shadow of all three.

He found himself opening his mouth and breathing deep as if he could taste her scent on the cold air.

Something of himself, he was sure, flowed out to meet her.

They merged in a warm sleepy lassitude. As they had when they shared the dream-box, he experienced her perceptions of her world.

Warm. A slow rocking motion. He breathed deep with her, and tasted the unmistakable smell of a ship.

He loosened his awareness of his own body and reached more boldly for her.

He felt warm bedding around her. He caught the deep rhythm of her breathing and then shared it.

She slept with her cheek on her hand. He became that hand, cradling the warm softness of her cheek.

He caressed it. She smiled in her sleep.

‘Reyn,’ she acknowledged him, without recognizing his true presence.

‘Malta, my love,’ he returned her greeting gently. ‘Where are you?’

‘In bed,’ she sighed. There was warm interest in her voice.

‘Where?’ he persisted, regretfully ignoring that invitation.

‘On a ship. Chalcedean ship.’

‘Where are you bound?’ he asked her desperately. He could feel his contact with her fading as his irritating questions clashed with her dream. He clung to her, but her mind pulled away from sleep, disturbed by his insistence that she answer. ‘Where?’ he demanded. ‘WHERE?’

‘Jamaillia bound!’ Malta found herself sitting bolt upright in her bedding.

‘Jamaillia bound,’ she repeated, but could not recall what prompted the words.

She had the tantalizing feeling that she had just left a very interesting dream, but now could not remember even a scrap of it.

It was almost a relief, really. By day, she could control her thoughts.

Nights were when her treacherous mind brought her dreams of Reyn, achingly sweet with loss.

Better to awake and remember nothing than to awake with tears on her face.

She lifted her hands to her face and touched her cheeks.

One tingled strangely. She stretched, then conceded she was irrevocably awake.

She threw back the coverlet and stood up, yawning.

She was almost accustomed to the opulence of the chamber now.

That had not dulled her pleasure in it. The captain had allotted her two deckhands and permission to search the hold for whatever might make the Satrap more comfortable.

She had cast aside all moderation. A thick rug of soft wool on the floor and brightly-figured hangings warmed the room.

Candelabra had replaced the smoky lantern.

Stacked blankets and furs made up her pallet.

The Satrap’s bed was lined with thick bearskins and sheepskins.

An elaborate hookah squatted next to it, and a damask drapery around it curtained him from draughts.

From behind the drapery came his fitful snore.

Good. She had time to dress herself before he woke.

Moving quietly, she crossed the room to a large trunk, opened it and dug through the layers of garments within.

Fabrics of every hue and texture met her questing hands.

She selected something warm, soft and blue and pulled it out.

She held the robe against her. It was too large, but she would make it do.

She glanced uncomfortably at the Satrap’s bed hangings, then pulled the blue robe over her head.

Beneath it, she let her nightgown fall, then thrust her arms through the long blue sleeves.

A faint perfume clung to it, the scent last worn by its owner.

She would not wonder how the trunk of lovely clothing had come to the Chalcedeans.

Going in rags herself would not restore life to the rightful owner.

It would only make her own survival more precarious.