The Book of Air: Volume Four of the Dragon Quartet

THE DRAGON QUARTET:

BOOK FOUR

THE BOOK OF AIR

Marjorie B. Kellogg

Also by Marjorie B. Kellogg:

The Dragon Quartet

THE BOOK OF EARTH

THE BOOK OF WATER

THE BOOK OF FIRE

THE BOOK OF AIR

By Marjorie B. Kellogg with William Rossow:

LEAR’S DAUGHTERS

(The Wave and the Flame | Reign of Fire)

Copyright © 2003 by Marjorie Bradley Kellogg.

All Rights Reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-101-66452-0

Cover art by Dan Craig.

DAW Book Collectors No. 1275.

DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Group (USA).

All characters in this book are fictitious.

Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

The uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED
U.S. PAT. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES
—MARCA REGISTRADA.
HECHO EN U.S.A.

Version_1

For
Dorothy Koehler
, and all other friends of dragons.

And for
Jim Hansen
, who told it like it is.

As always, thanks are due to Lynne Kemen and Bill Rossow, literary critics
par excellence
, to Vicki Davis, to my agent, Joshua Bilmes, and to my oh-so-patient editor and publisher, Sheila Gilbert.

Apologies are due to all the readers of THE DRAGON QUARTET who had to wait so long for this final volume! Real life just got the better of me.

Table of Contents

PROLOGUE: The Creation

IN THE BEGINNING, AND A LITTLE AFTER . . .

PART ONE: The Summoning of the Hero

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

PART TWO: The Journey into Peril

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

PART THREE: The Call to the Quest

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THIRTY

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

The Creation
IN THE BEGINNING,
AND A LITTLE AFTER . . .

I
n the Beginning, four mighty dragons raised of elemental energies were put to work creating the World. They were called Earth, Water, Fire, and Air. No one of them had power greater than another, and no one of them was mighty alone.

When the work was completed and the World set in motion, the four went to ground, expecting to sleep out this World’s particular history and not rise again until World’s End.

The first to awaken was Earth.

He woke in darkness, as innocent as a babe, with only the fleeting shadows of dreams to hint at his former magnificence. But one bright flame of knowledge drove him forth: he was Called to Work again, if only he could remember what the Work was.

He found the World grown damp and chill, overrun by the puniest of creatures, Creation’s afterthought, the ones called Men. Earth soon learned that Men, too, had forgotten their Origin. They had abandoned their own intended Work in the World and thrived instead on superstition, violence, and self-righteous oppression of their fellows. They
had forgotten as well their primordial relationship with dragons—all, that is, but a few.

One in particular awaited Earth’s coming, a young girl who knew nothing of the secret duty carried down through the countless generations of her blood. Her name was Erde, and she knew her Destiny when she faced a living dragon and was not afraid.

Thereafter, Earth’s Quest became her own, and together they searched her World for answers to his questions. Some they found and slowly, along with his memory, Earth’s powers reawakened. But the girl’s World was dark and dangerous and ignorant, and the mysterious Caller who summoned Earth could not be found within it. One day, blindly following the Call, Earth took them Somewhere Else.

In that Somewhere Else, they found Earth’s sister Water, and her Companion N’Doch. N’Doch’s World was hot and crowded and full of noise, and mysterious to Erde until she understood that she had traveled to Sometime, as well as to Somewhere. It became her task to teach N’Doch about the dragons and their Quest, for he did not know his Destiny, and did not join them willingly at first.

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