by Hobb, Robin
Tintaglia stretched out and closed her eyes. Then she shifted and tried a different position. It was worse. It was not the stony ground that discomforted her, but the broken shaft and the arrow head and the infection that surrounded it. She lifted her wing and craned her neck to sniff at it, then snorted. Bad. Rotting meat smell. The claws on her forepaws were too large to be of any use; clawing at it only made it hurt more. And the end of the broken arrow shaft was no longer even visible. She feared that instead of being pushed out of her body by the infection, the missile was actually digging in deeper.
Icefyre landed nearby in a rush of dust from the braking beat of his wings. We should hunt more.
I want to sleep.
He lifted his head and snuffed the air. That arrow festers. You should pull it out.
I’ve tried. I can’t.
He leaned closer, snuffing at her injury, and she allowed it, but not graciously. Of old, sometimes humans used poisoned weapons against us. They would dip the heads of their lances in filth before they tried to stab us. They knew that they could seldom kill us outright but that a lingering infection might kill a dragon.
She flinched away from his scrutiny and immediately craned her neck to inspect the wound. Do you think this arrow was poisoned?
Impossible to tell. He seemed very calm about it. Do you wish to hunt again?
What did they do, the dragons with poisoned injuries?
They died. Some of them. Sometimes they went to the Elderling healers for aid. Little human hands can sometimes be useful in cleaning a wound. The silver water could cure many ills. I am going hunting. Are you coming?
Do you think I should go back to the Rain Wilds and try to find my Elderlings? Malta and Reyn?
The black dragon looked at her for a time. Whatever thoughts he had, he was not sharing with her. When he spoke, it was only to say, I do not think I could trust a human again. Even an Elderling.
I might trust them. If I had to. Malta and Reyn have both served me before; they would serve me again, I think.
Again, he was quiet. Then he said, The silver well of Kelsingra. It was a rare and wondrous thing and to drink from it brought dragons great strength. Sometimes it was used for healing. You could go there, to Kelsingra.
I’ve been to Kelsingra. The well is no more. The city was empty and dead, with dust blowing through the streets. And when I went to the well, the windlass had fallen to ruin. Even if there had been Elderlings there at that moment, they could not have drawn the silver for me. She did not speak of how angry it had made her; of how she had trampled and broken what remained of the windlass and shoved it down the fruitless well.
Kelsingra. Icefyre spoke the word regretfully. It was a place of wonder, once. If, as you say, it is abandoned and empty, then that is a loss. I recall it as a place of poets chanting my praises as Elderlings worked scented oil into my scale-beds. There were baths there. And sunning spots. Fat herds of all sorts of meat creatures: bullocks and sheep and swine. They made many memorials to us, statues and mosaics.
He held his thoughts still, and Tintaglia’s mind wandered. She had her ancestors’ memories of Kelsingra, but they were faded and scentless. Her own perceptions of the abandoned city overlay them and dimmed them even more.
I go to hunt! Icefyre announced abruptly. I hunger still.
I am going to rest. She recognized suddenly a determination that had been forming in her for some days. And then I am going back to the Rain Wilds.
Perhaps later we will go there. The feel of his thought was dismissive of her idea. Perhaps another time, I will go to see Kelsingra for myself. When I decide the time is right to go. He turned away from her and leaped into the air. The wind of his battering wings rushed past her, stirring her injury to a dull ache.
Wearily she settled herself for sleep. It was difficult to find a position that did not irritate her wound. It was getting worse; she could smell it, and the spreading poison from the infection was a throbbing deep in her muscles. It was not healing and she could do nothing to better it. The longer she waited, the weaker she would be. But Icefyre cared nothing for that.
And abruptly she knew that when she awoke, she would not wait for him to return or for his decision. She needed the services of her Elderlings, Reyn with his strong hands and Malta’s clever little mind. It was time to go home.
Back to the Rain Wilds.
About the Author
ROBIN HOBB was born in California but grew up in Alaska, where she learned to love the forest and the wilderness. She has lived most of her life in the Pacific Northwest and currently resides in Tacoma, Washington. She is the author of the Rain Wilds Chronicles, the Farseer Trilogy, the Liveship Traders Trilogy, and the Tawny Man Trilogy. Her books under the pseudonym Megan Lindholm include Wizard of the Pigeons, The Windsingers, and Cloven Hooves. She is also the author of The Inheritance, a collection of stories written under both names. Her short fiction has won the Asimov’s Readers’ Award and been a finalist for both the Nebula and Hugo awards.
www.robinhobb.com
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Also by Robin Hobb
THE RAIN WILDS CHRONICLES
Dragon Keeper
Dragon Haven
THE SOLDIER SON TRILOGY
Shaman’s Crossing
Forest Mage
Renegade’s Magic
THE TAWNY MAN TRILOGY
Fool’s Errand
Golden Fool
Fool’s Fate
THE LIVESHIP TRADERS TRILOGY
Ship of Magic
Mad Ship
Ship of Destiny
THE FARSEER TRILOGY
Assassin’s Apprentice
Royal Assassin
Assassin’s Quest
WRITING AS MEGAN LINDHOLM
Harpy’s Flight
The Limbreth Gate
The Windsingers
Luck of the Wheels
Wizard of the Pigeons
Reindeer People
Wolf’s Brother
Alien Earth
Cloven Hooves
The Gypsy (with Steven Brust)
ROBIN HOBB/MEGAN LINDHOLM
The Inheritance
Credits
Cover design by Richard L. Aquan
Cover illustration © by Jackie Morris
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
CITY OF DRAGONS. Copyright © 2012 by Robin Hobb. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-156163-4
EPub Edition © FEBRUARY 2012 ISBN: 9780062101068
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