Islands’ sakes, hundreds of eyes were fixed upon her. Nobody dared to laugh, although the temptation must have been almost unbearable. And here came Master Kassik, to top it off, wearing that ‘I’m about to chew over that Pygmy troublemaker’ expression she knew all too well. Pip would have loved to leap off a convenient Island, just then.
Nak cleared his throat self-importantly. “Pip, do I recall someone saying, ‘Will you behave yourself before I put your scaly backside over my knee and paddle it like the naughty little Dragon you are’?”
The Dragon Rider was beaming around the hall, consumed by his own cleverness, when Pip coughed up her very first fireball. She could not help it. Nak’s words made her world turn white with rage. Flame rocketed toward his back. But when the smoke cleared, she saw Kassik holding a table horizontally to shield him and Nak. The Master lowered the charred wood, glaring at her.
Pip shuffled her paws.
His voice boomed to the rafters of the dining hall, “And that, students, is why you never insult a Dragon. Remember this lesson.” More quietly, he said to her, “Pip, please. No random transforming into Dragon form.”
“Yes, Master Kassik.”
“And no fireballs indoors.”
“Yes, Master Kassik.”
“Nak?”
“Dreadfully sorry, Dragon-Pip.” He bowed with a typically Nak flourish, and added in a whisper, “Perfect fireball, my beauty.”
Her claws scraped and clicked on the wooden floor as she slunk out of the dining hall, not for the first time, in disgrace.
* * * *
Having raided Mistress Mya’adara’s store for a used tunic top and trousers, Human-Pip wandered down to the infirmary, mired in a veritable jungle thicket of thoughts. Great. Just when she had escaped attention for a couple of days–well, five days since waking the Dragons to the Singing, her latest foray into notoriety–then she had to practically leap into Master Shambithion’s lap. She slapped her forehead with her hand. ‘Ridiculous, Pip.’
If she wasn’t the one making trouble, then trouble had a way of following her instead.
Rajion called her over. “Pip. Come help me with this ear infection.”
“Cardiata, isn’t it?” said Pip.
The Yellow fledgling flashed her fangs in a brief grin. “Ay, Onyx. I finally found out why I broke my wing primary. I felt as though I was flying through glue.”
“Ear infections can be a beast to detect and treat,” said Rajion, with a flash of his fangs for his pun on the word ‘beast’. “Can you fetch me the green solvent wash from that shelf, Pip?”
“How is your wing, mighty Cardiata?”
Pip could not reach the shelf, to her annoyance. She cast about for a stool or step to use.
“Mighty?” Cardiata snorted. “Maybe in a hundred years when I’m a Dragon Elder. Being the Dragon, of course, I persisted with my training even when I knew something was wrong. The bone’s knitting up well. Rajion says I have some healing power. How is it being a Dragon, Pip? Different?”
“Magical,” said Pip, scrambling down from the stool with a metal pot balanced on her shoulder. “I’ve never been happier–or more terrified when Imogiel made me jump off a building, yesterday.”
Cardiata’s expression told her that it was hard for a Dragon to imagine being frightened about leaping off a height. Fine if one was born to it–as a Pygmy girl was born to the jungle and its ways, she realised. Her Human brain insisted she had to be two leagues short of a full Island. But she sensed an inner presence. The Dragon self. It was not new. She felt as if a secret long-hidden beneath dark waters, had finally broached the surface of her consciousness. How was it being a Dragon? She shook her head. Crazy. Captivating. It gave her fiery shivers.
Rajion growled, “Ay, any tips you can give young Pip here to help her avoid visiting my infirmary again, or randomly flying into mountains when rescuing Riders, would be appreciated. Now, scrub your arms, little one, and I’ll teach you how to find an ear infection.”
Two hours later, wrinkling her nose at the medicinal smell of her arms and clothes, Pip returned to the first year girls’ dormitory. It was dark and quiet. She hesitated in the doorway. Odd.
A hand reached out of the shadows and yanked her inside.
Pip nearly leaped out of her hide–or into it–but her blushes were saved by one fact. She knew that hand. A lamp-shutter squeaked open and Maylin’s cheeky grin popped into view. She dropped something onto Pip’s head. “Party queen.”
“Huh?”
“
SURPRISE!
”
Lights blazed from a hundred lamps, lighting a dormitory packed to the rafters with squealing, giggling students–most of the first year girls class, she realised, and not a few from the second, third and fourth years. Colourful cloth streamers had been tossed over all the beds and across the curtained windows. She smelled spicy fried sweet potato chips, and several other unfamiliar scents she could not identify.
“Darn it,” cried Yaethi. “I was convinced the shock would turn her into a Dragon.”
“What’s going on?” Pip asked, as she was led into the middle of the dorm, between the crowded bunk beds. “What’s in the barrel?”
“Sugared Shapeshifter,” said Kaiatha.
“Sweet, sticky Pipsqueak,” Maylin chortled.
They were so excited. Pip eyeballed her friends suspiciously. “What have you been up to?”
Yaethi arranged a deep blue velvet cloak across her shoulders. “Your Dragonish majesty,” she said, with an exaggerated bow. “We are gathered to celebrate your ascension to the airy spaces. We look forward to your performance of the song you have prepared for us.”
“I’ve …
what?
”
Seated on the end of the bed nearest the barrel, Casitha strummed a few chords on her harp. “The
Lay of the Pygmy Dragon.
Go on, Pip. You know this tune, don’t you?”
“No. Casitha, Kaiatha–honestly, I’m a terrible singer.”
“Earplugs,” called Maylin.
Pip’s mouth dropped open as every girl in the dormitory began pulling bits of cloth out of their pockets and stuffing them into their ears. They knew. They had prepared for this. Well, most of them had heard her trying to sing in music class. They were nothing but a bunch of rascally, chattering monkeys. She burned with embarrassment–but it was very funny.
“Here are the words,” said Maylin, handing her a scrap of parchment. “We’ll join in for the chorus. Where it’s written, ‘chorus’. See?”
“I can read.”
Her friend added, with a fake-sweet smile, “Just to make you aware that the penalty for singing poorly, is that you get to fish the sweets out of the bottom of the barrel for us.”
Maylin sounded far too pleased with herself, Pip thought crossly. “You know I can’t reach in there.”
“Then you might have to climb inside.”
Pip sniffed at the top of the barrel. “What is that? It smells like–”
“Sugar bamboo sap,” said Yaethi.
There was a chorus of catcalls and laughter around the room. Pip had no idea that sugar bamboo sap was stored in barrels, but it did form the basis of many of the sweets enjoyed by Jeradians. She also knew that she was destined to end up in the barrel, no matter what. Her dignity might as well be tossed into a Cloudlands volcano.
She wrinkled her nose at her friends. “When did you–you troop of rascally, chattering monkeys–arrange this?”
“Last week,” said Maylin. “But I penned your song this evening after the salad incident, which was so inspiring, Pipsqueak, I can hardly tell you.”
“I’ll whack her for you,” said Kaiatha, punching Maylin’s arm much more gently than Pip would have.
Casitha plucked her harp. “You may start, Pip.”
Pip’s eyes jumped to the first line. She sang:
A Pygmy thief I’ve always been …
“Hey!” Pip glared at the scroll.
“Mind you don’t end up all sticky,” Kaiatha advised. To her amazement, the tall Fra’aniorian Islander had pulled on a
falki
just like Master Kassik’s. She drew herself up, affecting a deep voice. “Pip. Step into my office.” Her imitation of Kassik’s accent and mannerisms was uncanny. The girls rolled about, crying with laughter as Kaiatha, clasping her hands behind her back, declaimed, “You’re the smallest student in my school, but a Dragon-sized troublemaker! You’ve barely been here a month and you’re wearing a path to my door!”
Pip was hard-put to sing anything after that. But she tried:
I broke the Master Adak’s arm,
And caused him grievous bodily harm,
Along with a class of innocent boys,
To whom I showed all my toys …
Her howl of embarrassment at that line was drowned out in Maylin leading the students in raucous chorus:
There’s a Dragon! A Dragon, a tiny Pygmy Dragon,
She’s cute and sweet and rather neat,
But she’s sitting in my salad.
Oh, she’s sitting in my salad!
After that, protestations to the contrary, Pip ended up being upended and dumped into the barrel to fish for sweets.
F
OR the flight
to Fra’anior Island, Emblazon took Pip under his wing, in the Dragon way. Three Dragons they were–Brown, Amber and Onyx, but only two of the three would carry Riders. Emblazon wore a quadruple saddle, bearing Oyda and Nak, Durithion and Kaiatha on his broad shoulders. Maylin made a snide remark about him being the ‘love seat’, which made Emblazon’s eyes whirl in amusement. Master Kassik planned to carry Casitha, Maylin and Yaethi, with a seat spare in his quadruple harness to accommodate Pip when she tired of being aloft and needed to change into her Human form again.
As Casitha and Human-Pip checked Emblazon’s saddle fixings, the young Dragon commented,
Ay, would you look at this? Oyda shines.
Pip turned, but not in time to avoid a poke in the ribs. “Islands’ greetings, Pipsqueak,” said Oyda, bright of eye. Her smile dared Pip to comment.
Thou, my beloved Rider.
Emblazon’s feelings washed over Pip. It was not romantic love, but a fondness as deep as the Cloudlands, full of nuances that she could only guess at. Mutual dependency? Respect? The love of a brother-creature for his sister? There was glowing Dragon pride and no small measure of delight.
Oyda wore figure-hugging leather Dragon Rider trousers in a light green colour, a jewelled weapons belt for her sword and daggers about her slender waist, and a filmy top of creamy Helyon silk, modestly buttoned at the throat and wrists, but which revealed enough of her very brief, Western Isles style upper-body armour to make Pip blush. Her hair gleamed like a Dragon’s wing in the early suns-shine and her gold-flecked eyes danced. Her arms had been healed enough by Rajion’s magic for the casts to be removed.
Nak, swaggering across the remote balcony high up the school building, which Kassik had chosen for their launching place, was about to sing out a greeting when he spied Oyda.
“With reference to our previous conversation, Pip,” said Oyda, “I’ve come to a decision.”
“It worked,” she said dryly, pointing with her chin. “I’ll go transform, while you complete your conquest. Be nice, Oyda.”
“Huh. You just wait till it’s your turn, Pip.”
Poor Nak. He looked like a stunned ralti sheep, unable to speak, too amazed to deliver one of his usual poetic sallies. A bemused smile lit his face as he gazed at Oyda with unguarded fondness–and desire. Pip realised that behind the mask of the confident philanderer, as Mistress Mya’adara had labelled him, momentarily stripped bare by his wonder, lay a gentle and genuine heart. She ducked her head, discomfited.
“Islands’ greetings, Rider Nak,” said Oyda, coyly formal. “A little early for you, isn’t it? This is what you miss every dawn.”
“Ay,” said Nak. He was clearly heedless of anything to do with the dawn’s beauty. “That
is
what I miss, every dawn.”
There was a long silence, as if two adjacent volcanoes secretly planned a simultaneous eruption. Pip, having transformed behind Emblazon’s sheltering bulk, found that her Dragon-hearing caught the leap in Oyda’s heart rate perfectly. Then, Nak spotted Pip and almost dived at her. “Pipsqueak! Gleaming up a storm there, my favourite Dragoness–after Shimmerith, naturally. Ready to fly?”
“Ready, Rider Nak.”
Across the balcony, Master Kassik looked on with an unexpectedly melancholy expression. Pip wondered again what weighed so heavily on his thoughts. But the huge Brown Dragon only flexed his talons in the turf. “Mount up, students. Dragon Rider class is about to take off.”
A low chuckle rumbled from his chest.
Despite his white hair–in Human form–Dragon-Kassik seemed younger than she had taken him to be. He was not nearly as old as Zardon, surely? His movements were lithe and his scales, less weather-beaten. Yaethi had been trying to read up on Shapeshifter Dragons. How old could they get? How did the shift or transformation between their two forms work? Where did the Dragon part exist when a Shapeshifter assumed their Human form? There was little information available. Pip hoped they might find out more from the Dragon lore at Fra’anior Island.
Just look at Nak. Climbing Emblazon’s knee behind Oyda, with her pert rear waving just inches from his nose, the experienced Dragon Rider slipped and fell on his own backside.
Oyda smiled down at him. “Alright there, Nak?”
“Thou treacherous distraction.” He wagged his forefinger at her.
“Oh?”
Emblazon said to Pip,
If you can’t manage a vertical take-off as yet, little one, make your leap off the edge of the balcony. I’ll join you just as soon as Oyda and Nak stop playing.
Playing? Pip chuckled to herself. Did Dragons see their Riders as pets?
Walking on level ground as a Dragon was another matter. Her muscles were so powerful and springy, they kept wanting to bounce her off the ground. Master Kassik had a couple of final words for his Riders, crouching at the edge of the balcony above a two hundred-foot drop. Yaethi looked as green as a tree frog. Casitha’s hands were white-knuckled on the spine-spike ahead of her. Maylin acted relaxed, but she checked and rechecked her buckles ten times while Pip watched.
Why not a vertical take-off? Pip’s thigh muscles knotted as she coiled her body. No Pygmy had ever had thighs like hers. She blasted forty feet into the air, so surprised that she almost forgot to beat her wings. Wow! She flipped over, dropping toward Master Kassik as he glided away from the balcony with understated elegance, giving his inexperienced Riders an easy introduction to Dragon flight. She wobbled and bumped into the Brown Dragon’s right wing.
Pip, pay attention.
Kassik’s wingtip tapped her back.
Tangling with another Dragon’s wings is regarded as rude–or aggressive.
Sorry, Master.
Call me Kassik in my Dragon-form,
he replied.
Pip smiled as Maylin threw her a jaunty salute. They climbed swiftly into the still morning. Emblazon rose behind her, cleaving the air with formidable wing-strokes. The wash of his passage buffeted her as he took the lead.
Keep up, little one,
he said in passing.
And show mighty Kassik your respect. That is the Dragon way.
Pip bowed in the air, a little stung by his tone. Did Dragons get the morning grumps? Journeywoman Jellis, the first year mathematics tutor, was notorious for having the temper of a wounded rajal in the first lesson. Nak was a different man after noon–although, right now, he seemed only too pleased to occupy the position right behind Oyda, between Emblazon’s three-foot spine-spikes. He chattered away with the ease of a sprightly parakeet. Pip focussed her Dragon hearing as Imogiel had suggested she practice doing. What she heard was Duri dropping a feather-kiss on Kaiatha’s cheek. She could hear the gentle smack of lips from a hundred and fifty feet away?
They were so lucky. And so mushy around each other.
She scanned the Island-World as they rose above the volcano’s rim. Unreal. Wondrous. She had once looked to the sky above her cage wall and dreamed of freedom. Here it was–hers for the taking, only, someone out there wanted all Dragons dead.
To the east, the twin suns hung like a pair of shining flara-fruit a handspan above the horizon. South, the mountain-scape of central Jeradia jutted into the roseate dawn, a blush upon each sharply delineated peak. To the north and east and west, Jeradia Island dropped in a series of steep stone steps into the Cloudlands, a rough white and gold carpet which stretched to the horizon. Northwest, out of sight, was Yaya Loop Cluster, the first set of Islands for which they were bound, a day’s flight distant. Yaethi said that the Yaya Islanders were a strange, clannish group who worshipped a great golden serpent they called H’ssathass. They had a fondness for murdering outsiders. Dragonships avoided Yaya Loop, preferring the longer route she had taken with Zardon, northeast toward Sylakia Island along the Spine Islands before cutting over to Erigar Island. Yaya was directly en route to Fra’anior, but the second leg would be a two-day flight northward over the Cloudlands, skirting the Western Isles.
At that moment, Pip’s head lifted. A disturbing Dragon-sense prickled down her spine. Something far away, she thought–the Shadow Dragon? No. Zardon? It didn’t feel quite the same …
The Amber Dragon said,
Pay attention, Pip, I’m talking to you.
She flexed her flight muscles, catching up with Emblazon. She might not have his power, but she also had a great deal less weight to shift about, she thought uncharitably.
The vastness of the sky cowed her. It pressed in with a palpable weight and presence, making her wish for sheltering jungle boughs or even the comfort of her cage. Her Dragon hearts pounded in her chest and belly. Pip felt her chest close. Relax. She had to concentrate on flying. There was Kassik, climbing behind her with his improbably slow wingbeat. Yaethi gave her a timid wave. Her eyes jumped to magnify Yaethi, confusing her. Her friend’s throat bobbed as though she were about to throw up.
PIP!
Emblazon thundered.
Will you listen?
Sorry, mighty Emblazon.
To the others, he said, “Listen as I instruct Pip in the art of flying. It is essential for every Rider to understand the mechanics and the art of flying–if your Dragon is wounded, or if you wish to make a long crossing between the Islands, this is required knowledge.”
Pip hid her scowl. Islands’ sakes, something must have bitten Emblazon today to make him bristle like a jungle porcupine. Was this the pride Oyda had spoken of? She took the position Emblazon indicated, just off his left wingtip, where she would not be disturbed by the wash of his passage.
“When I speak to you, Pip, you will fly here,” he said, still unnecessarily stern. “When Dragons are flying in a Dragonwing, they make a V-shaped formation–like any migrating bird–where one Dragon will slipstream the next. It is efficient, reducing the energy a Dragon expends in flight by twenty to thirty percent. Where is the formation position, Pip?”
“I don’t know, mighty–”
“Back of my tail, thirty feet left or right,” he instructed. “For you, closer than a full-sized Dragon. Go there, Pip. Tell me when you find the place.”
Pip bled a little speed, trying to control her flight in relation to Emblazon, but the buffeting of his wake knocked her all over the sky–at least, that was how she felt. Pip flexed her wings powerfully to catch up with him again. Her Human mind laughed in delight at this idea. Somewhere, a Pygmy girl was running around flapping her arms, she imagined, while her Dragon-form achieved the humanly impossible with relative ease.
Kaiatha asked, “Mighty Emblazon, how big is your wingspan?”
“A hundred and twelve feet,” he replied.
“And still growing,” Oyda put in, earning herself a growl of appreciation from her mount.
Kassik rose to join the echelon, demonstrating without words where she was supposed to be, but on the opposite side of Emblazon’s tail. She had not expected to feel any effect, but her gloriously sensitive Dragon hide immediately noted the differences in the wind’s action, a slight sucking forward and a sense that the huge Amber Dragon’s wash helped rather than hindered her flight. But she barely had time to notice before Emblazon had her moving forward again to listen to a long lecture on how poor her flying form was, and how exactly she should correct her mistakes. He seemed eager to perfect her flying all at once, and she spent the entire morning practising the right wing-stroke, faster and slower beats, loops and spirals and dodging imaginary attacks.
By the time they reached a tiny, uninhabited outlying Island of the Yaya Loop Cluster late that afternoon, Pip was so bone-weary that her legs buckled on landing and she chewed up a goodly stretch of sand alongside the lake Kassik had chosen for their night’s rest. She lay and wheezed. Her flight muscles burned. Pip closed her eyes and fervently wished she could have flown with Shimmerith rather than the relentless Emblazon. He was so mean. Her request for rest in the early afternoon had been met with a ‘practice’ fireball fired at her tail.
“Ooh,” someone groaned.
“Numb bum?” came Maylin’s voice. “Me too. How do you fly all day, Oyda?”
“You become accustomed,” said the Rider.
Pip wanted to protest that they had been sitting on their collective backsides while she was actually flying, but she was too tired to complain.
“Duri, Kaiatha, loosen the saddles and see to our Dragons’ needs. Maylin and Casitha, you can set up camp,” said Nak. He was clearly grinning as he added, “Yaethi, I invite you to unlace my boots and massage my feet.”
“Belay that,” sniffed Oyda. “Help me collect wood for a fire, Yaethi.”
A huge paw lifted Pip’s chin. “Still with us, little one?” asked Kassik, his cool yellow eyes appearing concerned. “That was a long first flight for a fledgling.”
“I think I’ll regret being alive tomorrow, Master–Kassik,” she said. “Emblazon’s a good teacher. I’ve learned heaps already.”
“Hmm.”
Pip wondered what exactly his snort was meant to convey. Kassik indicated the small, clear lake. “Why don’t you clean up, Pip? Wet your throat, but don’t drink too much too fast. Your Dragon self will recover faster than you think.”
Duri came over to bow to Kassik. “Master, may I hunt for you?”