“What Napoleon would make of her, if she should throw in with him, I don’t like to think,” Granby went on. “Of all the dragons to come into the world unharnessed!”

“We will deliver her to Dover,” Laurence said firmly. “I am sure Whitehall will be delighted to restore her to Prince Mianning, and repair the alliance with China thereby. I trust we can rely upon their skill in the handling of dragons, from there, to make her happy to be the future Emperor’s companion. You will recall that they do not harness beasts, until later in their lives, at all.”

“I suppose we can’t do better,” Granby said. “The Chinese may say what they like, and I am sure it answers for them; but I should be a great deal easier if this one had a captain to call her to order from the moment she came out of the shell.”

“You will permit me a little skepticism as to the hypothetical man’s likely success,” Tharkay said, coming back into the barn and putting down an armful of potatoes and carrots, which he might as well have conjured out of the air. “There is a vegetable garden against the side of the house; it seemed likely,” he answered their surprised looks. “We are fortunate in our choice of hiding-place, I think: there were some letters inside from a son gone to be a soldier, written to a widowed mother—the latest half a year old, from Smolensk, and unopened. I dare say there are many young men who will not be coming home.”

The sunrise was giving a mellowing warmth to the weathered grey boards of the barn, and gilding the edges of the bare branches. There was a comfortable familiarity to all the arrangements of the farm that made the absence of life all the more disquieting. There ought to have been lowing cows and a gabble of chickens, and a farmer hurrying with half-closed eyes to tend his stock. Instead, empty stalls and silence, and untended fields just beyond the doors: the cost of Napoleon’s wars.

They roused Iskierka just enough to start the fire with a gout of flame spat onto their carefully scraped ground; her eyes lidded down again at once. The half-frozen bounty of the garden roasted in the coals as they warmed their hands and numbed feet, and melted snow to drink hot out of a tin pail left hanging on a hook. Laurence scratched in the dirt his best memory of the coastline, and they considered the distance.

“We had better go by sea, if we think they can manage it,” Granby said.

“I will be so bold as to be certain that we are scarcely a hundred miles from Eastbourne, flown north-north-west,” Laurence said, “and once we are fairly into the Channel, most ships of the blockade can throw us out some pontoons if we should get into trouble with a cross-wind. We may have some difficulty signaling, if they do not recognize us.”

“That don’t worry me,” Granby said. “It would be wonderful indeed if any captain who has been in the Channel since the year seven didn’t remember Iskierka, and curse to see her coming to snatch a prize out from under his teeth. They would be heartily delighted to see her drown, but I suppose they shan’t turn us away if we appear on their doorstep, as it were. We’ll have to go on from there to Dover straightaway, though—there’s a covert at Eastbourne, but it is not much more than a courier-stop; they won’t like us dropping by with a couple of heavy-weights and a fresh-hatched beast.”

“Do you insist upon making for a covert?” Tharkay said, unexpectedly. “I trust you will forgive my raising a point of concern,” he added, when they looked in puzzlement, “but do you suppose your hatchling likely to be impressed by the conditions she will find at Dover, compared with those she has lately left behind—before she set them on fire, that is.”

“Well,” Granby said, and halted there. Of course he could not without pain admit any evil of Britain’s coverts, when held against those of France, and Laurence shared his sentiments of loyalty to the service; but there was no denying that the disparity would be a marked one, unless such changes had been made in their five years’ absence as they could hardly hope for. Temeraire had kept up an irregular correspondence with Perscitia, a comrade of his breeding-ground days who had energetically pursued in his absence the liberties—and prosperity—of dragons. Her letters when they came were universally a litany of complaint, cataloguing obstruction in every direction.

“Let us get out of France, first,” Laurence said, after a moment. “We must content ourselves with escaping Bonaparte’s borders before we can entertain other concerns.”

—

Laurence stirred in the late afternoon, conscious of some near presence, and opened his eyes to find the dragonet staring very intently directly into his face, the long arrow-shaped head extended to the full length of her serpentine neck. He could see her colors now, and also the difficulty of making them out: the underlying color of her hide was certainly black, but heavily overlaid with an opalescence of red and green and blue which became dominant at the extremities of limbs and wings, almost casting off a reflection.

“Good,” she said, drawing back to let him sit up. “You have woken up. I am very sorry to be the cause of difficulty, but I am afraid I must have some more food at once.”

She was not wrong about the difficulty. The sun was still well up, despite winter, and neither Temeraire nor Iskierka could possibly go aloft in settled countryside like this and not be noticed at once against the sky. The farmers would certainly raise an alarm, and even if there were no pursuit close enough to pounce upon them immediately, the entire coast in flying distance would be roused against them.

“Over the Channel, Temeraire will certainly be able to get you a decently sized tunny to eat,” Laurence said. “Can you only wait until sunset?”

She looked up at the sky, and then turned back and said firmly, “I cannot.”

“I don’t see that we must wait. I would not mind a cow myself, now I think of it,” Iskierka muttered, having been half-roused by the discussion.

“That is all we need,” Granby said, rubbing a hand over his own face as he sat up.

“Perhaps we might make some broth, if anything more can be found,” Laurence said.

They all dug in the garden for a few more leavings of vegetables, and Tharkay managed to take a squirrel with a stone, although this was not much to put into their stolen pot. A few handfuls of old barley were the only other addition, found in a cupboard. As they stirred the fire urgently, Granby said to Laurence, under his breath, “Are you sure you don’t want to try and put some harness on her? I suppose Temeraire wouldn’t like it in the least, but a dragonet’s hunger is no joke. Her patience will go hang before we can make this fit to eat, I expect.”