She was very fond of jewelry. He always associated it with the change in her.

It was after he’d given her a crystalline bauble, the same one AuRon had worn into the Lavadome, bringing the Red Queen’s peace offer, that she’d grown more assertive. He’d tried the jewel himself first, of course, to make sure there wasn’t any danger. All it did was sharpen up the senses and clarify the thoughts. Both of which Imfamnia needed—desperately.

He found her lounging in her modest bath. It was nothing compared to the epic pools of steaming water that SiMevolant had been so fond of. This was more of a dipping pool in a tile room, where thralls could easily work you over with bristle brushes and polishing cloths, depending what the scale needed, lubricated by warm water.

He dismissed the thralls. They always did gossip.

“I suppose you’ve heard RuGaard is in Hypatia,” NiVom said.

“I’ve heard little but,” Imfamnia said. “What will we do about it?”

“I’m tempted to wait until he’s at the base of Nilrasha’s refuge and then drop her on him. She’s heavy enough to kill whoever she falls upon.”

“You always were direct,” Imfamnia said.

She touched her snout to his. She’d scented herself with something intoxicating, probably some distillation of hominid female musk. “I’m famished,” he said. “I’ve been flying too much lately. I think we both need to spend a few secluded days figuring out what to do about him. Dine in, two servants only, hours of undisturbed sleep—”

She brushed him gently across the neck with her wingtips.

“And a deep pool for mating purposes,” he continued. “Seeing you wet and glistening gives me an appetite for you. Too bad SiMevolant’s old baths are defunct.”

“So what do we do about RuGaard?” Imfamnia asked, redirecting his thoughts.

“I’ve ordered the whole Aerial Host to Hypatia. Between them and the Hypatians, they’ll make short work of him.”

“That’s like sending arrows to enemy archers,” Imfamnia said, looking at her scale and then glaring at him as if to ask: What, do you expect me to nibble the rough edges myself? “Why on earth would you do that?”

“He’s a serious threat. I’ve heard his rule spoken of as in better days.... And that, after all I’ve done for the Lavadome and Empire.”

“Well done, my love. All the scoundrels are either dead or fled, and it sounds as though RuGaard has finally gone mad and will take a number of disloyal dragons down with him. We should capture him, decorate him for helping us sniff out traitors, then remove his head.”

NiVom nuzzled her. She was more for flattery than praise, so he glowed when it came. “My one fear is that he’ll run back north three times as fast as he’s marching south. Yes, the Host will encircle him, and that’ll be the end of it. We can get on to more important matters, like acquiring prawn-farms on the Sunstruck Sea. I do enjoy a big, fat prawn in butter.”

NiVom ordered a meal. Imfamnia ordered her favorite dessert, iced cream. “A double helping. No, a triple. In case NiVom wants some.”

“Yes, my Queen,” the old Ghiozian croaked.

They made small talk over dinner. He was worried enough about RuGaard’s challenge that the taste of the food was spoiled, and subsequently his appetite. He called for more water.

His dinner wasn’t sitting well. He burped, and it put a nasty, numbing stickiness in his mouth. His heartsbeats increased.

“I feel dreadful,” he said.

“I shouldn’t wonder,” Imfamnia countered. She sniffed his breath and her eyes narrowed. “You’re never very careful about what you eat. I think the cooks could put carrion in front of you and you’d have it with wine.

Breathing with difficulty, he staggered toward her.

“You’ve outlived your usefulness, dragon. It’s time I took charge of things,” she said.

“What—how?” he managed.

“It’s the same poison we used on those louts at the feast. I scooped out the marrow in those bones and loaded it in.”

He lost the rest of her conversation to confusion and darkness. Along with everything else.

Chapter 15

The Aerial Host’s temporary riverbank camp in Dairuss was flanked by reeds and bulrushes along a sandbar where supplies were to be landed. But the supplies never appeared. Only a fishing boat or two arrived, filled with men who moved on as quickly as wind and current allowed. The dragons and men had little to do but forage, look up- and downriver in the hope of a supply barge, and attract flies.

Three days of idleness and confusion about their provision reduced AuSurath the Red’s forty dragons and riders to something more like an irritated gang than like the stronger half of the Aerial Host.

He swelled with pride every time he considered that he captained these dragons and their riders, probably the most powerful fighting force under the sun. Even the Tyr’s Demen Legion wouldn’t stand a chance against it, aboveground or below.

Which made lounging in the summer sun, waiting for a new set of orders, all the more frustrating.

Something had rattled NiVom. That was the only explanation that made sense to AuSurath the Red. Indecision was bad for morale from top to bottom. The flight lines sensed confusion at the top and it made them nervous. The officers had the frustration of seeing plans cast aside and replaced by last-moment improvisation—then when the improvisation didn’t work out, they were blamed for inadequate planning and leadership.

This sort of confusion weakened the dragons and their riders and left them vulnerable. They would have accepted delays and disorder had they only camped a horizon or two into Ironrider territory across the river. Empty bellies were expected on a campaign, almost as a planned incentive to make them edgy and in a fighting mood.

He’d been proud of them until now. The campaign against the princedoms of the Sunstruck Sea proceeded well, with only two casualties, and those were just wounds to dragons who would return to duty. This despite the fierceness of the Heavy Wing of the Aerial Host’s zeal to avenge their losses from the Fallen Queen’s Feast in Ghioz. They’d grown expert at tower-baiting, waiting for the southerners to launch their missiles, then dropping or bouncing boulders in to wreck the fortifications. Courier after courier returned to the Sun King’s palace at Ghioz bearing the choicest of the valuables sniffed up from gardens and wells, while the rest went down hungry gullets to replace arrow-loosened scale.

Yes, he could be rightfully proud of the job they were doing on the turban-wearing humans.

Then new orders came from NiVom, bearing his seal. They were to disengage as soon as practicable with an eye toward preserving the campaign camps, or within two full days of receiving the orders, whichever came first, and fly immediately to the Iwensi Gap, where the Falnges River flowed down to Hypat through the Red Mountains. There they’d be supplied by barges while they reorganized with the remainder of the Aerial Host for a campaign in northern Hypatia.

They retreated from the campaign, covering the ground forces that had to walk and take rivercraft for as long as they could, then turning northwest for Dairuss. They flew with minimal rest and no food, and made the landing along the riverbank after three very hard days of flight. The weather was idyllic, wonderful summer weather and at just enough of an altitude to allow for pleasantly cool nights, and the dragons recovered their strength with but one day of rest, aided by baths and great draughts of river water from the clean center channel.

A second order was waiting for them at the landing, and this one caused dismay in AuSurath. It simply read: Wait for further orders.

Idiots! If they were going to wait, why couldn’t they have ordered them to a city with garrison facilities? The City of the Golden Dome, the capital of Dairuss and Mother’s Protectorate, was less than half a day’s flight away. There were old halls to serve as sleeping shelter, markets full of food, an Imperial paymaster to draw funds, diversions for the men, and hunting in the mountains for the dragons. Everything his wing needed to wait for NiVom to decide where to send them.

Instead, they sat on the riverbank, supplying the mosquitoes with generous helpings of hominid blood (the dragons urinated in bits of rag and stuffed them in their ears to keep the mosquitoes away and out of the one area of their hide that was vulnerable to the tiny insect lances), but all the men could do was soothe the bites with river-mud.

AuSurath called his officers together. Nothing to do but organize some kind of games or entertainments. Perhaps the men could cook for the dragons, or the dragons could cook for the men.

They’d commandeered some of the fishermen’s catch. It would be enough to feed the riders properly, anyway. An enterprising rider had found beds of wild onions beside the river, so skewered fish and onions looked to be the menu, unless one of the promised supply barges arrived. As for entertainments, there was a good deal of driftwood along the riverbank that hadn’t yet been gathered for cooking fires. Perhaps they could have some kind of carving contest, with the winning dragon and rider pair being given a trip back to the palace at Ghioz to figure out just what in the glowering mood was the reason for this hungry delay.