—

“I hope they do not mean to try to put me in a cave, for I will not have it,” Iskierka said loudly, with a snort of flame for the benefit of the two large dragons presently guarding them, who eyed her nervously. The training grounds stood at the foot of a steep cliff wall pockmarked with wide cave-mouths, and many dragons were peering out of them interestedly at the prisoners. Temeraire for his part had lived in a cave before, and in any case had no heart to defend his prerogatives against any kind of insult at the moment. He felt his spirits would have been ideally matched to a tenancy in a dismal swamp, or perhaps upon some comfortless lichen-covered rock.

But they were not taken to a cave. A small dragon, something between a Pou-de-Ciel and a Pascal’s Blue, landed before them and announced in an incongruously deep voice, “Follow me, if you please,” in French; he brought them over the wide martial fields to a spacious building, constructed of stone, with a small but elegant fountain in front. Plainly it had drawn upon the dragon pavilions of China for inspiration, but in style Temeraire had not seen anything like it: the roof was raised up on tall smooth round pillars, and there was something very pleasingly mathematical about the proportions of the rectangular floor, made of white marble and marvelously warmed through from beneath. Iskierka immediately sprawled herself to her full length upon it with a sigh. “Well, I call that something like,” but Temeraire sat on his haunches and curled his tail about himself, resentful of this reminder of the perversity of the world.

“I wonder that you can make yourself comfortable under these circumstances,” he said bitterly. It seemed to him almost heartless.

“I do not see that the circumstances are so very bad,” Iskierka said maddeningly. “I was quite tired and hungry, and you could not even keep up with me, flying. Now we will have a rest, and eat something, and then we will find out where the egg and Granby are, and we will go and take them back.”

“You are being unutterably stupid,” Temeraire said. “They will not keep them in the same place. If we should try and get Granby and Laurence, the French will order us to put them back or else they will hurt the egg; if we should try and get the egg, they will order us to leave it or else they will hurt our captains. We are prisoners twice over, and there is nothing we can do about it. I dare say Lien is congratulating herself all this time,” and he added, low, “on how well her plans have come about.”

“I think you are the one being stupid,” Iskierka said, mantling in some heat. “It is quite the other way round. If they should hurt Granby, even a little, or the egg, even a little, I will certainly burn up all of them, and they must know it. They will not dare harm them, I am sure: you see how respectful they are being.”

“Oh! There is no use arguing with you,” Temeraire said, but secretly felt a little comforted: perhaps there was something in what Iskierka said. The French did know enough to be wary of them both.

“Anyway,” Iskierka said, “it is just as I told Granby, and as I told you: if they have the egg, there is no use our being anywhere else. I am just as pleased to be nearer the egg, and having a good dinner: here it comes! Now pray don’t be absurd and sit there without eating: as though that would do any good.”

The dinner was not elaborate, but a good hot porridge flavorful with meat, and it was brought to them in large bowls. “There was no time to make anything more,” the deep-voiced dragon, whose name was Astucieux, explained apologetically, which implied there should be something better in the morning, and seemed to bear out Iskierka’s way of thinking. Temeraire found his appetite quite restored by the thought, and made a hearty meal, but when the dishes had been removed, they were left alone again with their guards, a ring of large dragons, who became silent, looming shadows as the light failed.

Far off he still heard companionable chatter, voices calling to one another from the caves; the warming orange glow of firelight shone all over the large nearby field, and faintly in the distance he could glimpse yellow squares of windows looking out of a large building, if he stretched up on his rear legs. He sank down again. The distant noise only made him feel their isolation more, and his worries returned afresh. After all, how would they know if anything had happened to Laurence or to Granby or to Tharkay; or to the egg; the French would certainly lie to conceal it, if any of them came to harm.

“I beg your pardon,” he called out to the guards, and one of them came close, warily: she was a Grand Chevalier, very near Maximus’s size—and Temeraire realized in surprise she was not under harness, and indeed looked rather ill-kept, as French dragons went; her scales between her shoulders, where she could not have reached with her snout, were even dirty.

“What do you want?” she demanded.

“I am Temeraire,” he said, meaning to be polite. “Will you pray tell me your name?”

“I am Efficatrice, but I don’t see why you should care,” she said. “Unless you mean to make up to me, and you can stop that right away, if you do. I am not stupid, and I mean to win my harness: so don’t suppose you can practice any tricks upon me.”

“Win your harness?” Temeraire said, baffled, but the Chevalier evidently thought she was being insulted, for she drew herself up and regarded him very coldly out of narrowed eyes.

“I shall,” she said, “see if I don’t, even if I am too large,” which was not a complaint Temeraire had ever heard leveled against any dragon before, in the West.

“Well, it would be silly to say you are not large, but I do not see that you are any larger than you ought to be; I have seen Chevaliers nearly your size before,” he said, “and I am sure I wish you every success, although perhaps I shouldn’t,” he amended, “since you are on the French side, but Laurence is quite friendly with De Guignes, after all, so I suppose it does not matter in that way: but whyever cannot you have a harness, if you want one?”

“We eat too much,” she muttered, after a moment, “and we quarrel with other big dragons, and so cannot work well together. But I will not quarrel,” she finished.

“You are certainly being quarrelsome with me,” Temeraire said, “even though I am being perfectly civil, when anyone would agree I have been badly wronged: when all of you are egg-stealers. And all I want is for you to take a message, to whomever has charge of this place, that I can repose no confidence whatsoever in the safety of my egg, and require assurances at once.”