Dragons Dawn

“I thought the big sleds were coming back.”

Only when they’re recharged and serviced. I wish they’d mentioned that earlier.” Desi’s voice rose in a quaver of frustration. “All my schedules . . . gone. What’m I to do, Sean? We’ll be under Threadfall again here soon and all that stuff – ” He flourished a sweat-grimed rag at the bulk of orange cartons. “ – is irreplaceable. If only – ” He broke off, but Sean had a good idea what the man had almost said. “You’ve done great, Sean, great. I really appreciate it. How much did you say is still to be shipped forward?”

“We’ll have cleared it tomorrow.”

“Look, then, the day after . . .” Desi rubbed at his face again, trying to hide his flush of embarrassment. “Well, I heard from Paul. He wants you riders to start making your way to Seminole, and cross to the north from there. And . . .” Desi screwed up his face again.

“You’d like us to take some of the orange out of danger?” Sean felt resentment welling up again. “Well, I suppose that’s better than being good for nothing at all.” He strode off before his temper got the better of him.

Faranth and Sorka come, Carenath said in a subdued tone. Sean altered his course to their point of arrival. He could not fool Sorka, but he could work off some of his fury during the unloading.

“All right, what happened?” Sorka said, pulling him to the seaward side of her golden queen, where they were shielded from the other riders, who were still sorting packages into the color-coded areas.

Sean set his fist violently into the palm of his other hand several times before he could put words to the humiliation.

“We’re considered nothing but bloody pack animals, donks with wings!” he said finally. He did remember to keep his voice down, though he was seething.

Faranth turned her head around her shoulder, regarding the two riders, hints of red begi

“Now, see what you’ve done,” Sorka said with a sigh.

“What’s the matter, Sean?” Dave asked, squeezing past Polenth.

Sean took a deep breath, burying anger and resentment. If he could not control himself, he could not control others. There were flares of the yellow of alarm in the dragons who looked down at him. He had to quiet them, himself, and the other riders. Sorka was right. He had done something he had better quickly undo.

“We seem to be the only available aerial transportation unit,” he said, managing a sort of a smile. “Desi says all the big sleds are grounded until they’ve been serviced.”

“Hey, Sean,” Peter Semling protested, jerking his thumb over his shoulder at the masses of material on the beach. “We can’t shift all that!”

“No way.” Sean made a decisive cut with his hands. “That’s not been laid on us. When we’ve cleared Landing, Paul wants us to cross to Seminole and make the final crossing north from there. That’s okay.” He gave a genuinely rueful smile. “But Desi would like us to take some of the irreplaceable stuff with us.”

“So long as everyone understands we’re not in the freight business,” Peter said in an aggrieved tone that echoed Sean’s sentiments.

“That’s not at issue, Pete,” Sean said firmly. “We’re coming along as dragonriders, coming along fine. But Desi’s caught between a rock and a hard place and he needs us.”

“I just wish we were needed for what we’re supposed to do,” Tarrie remarked.

“Once we’ve fulfilled our commitment here,” Sean said, “we concentrate on that, and that alone. I mean to see us all teleporting by the time we reach Seminole.”

“To places we’ve never seen?” asked the practical Otto.

“No, to the places we’ve just been. Look on our flight to Seminole as a chance to see the most important stakes in the south,” Sean replied in a bracing tone. He was surprised to find himself believing it. “We’ll need such reference points to teleport when we’re fighting Thread.” Sorka’s face was glowing with pride as he managed not only to turn around his own anger but to restate the dignity of their future. Above their heads, the yellow was fading from dragon eyes. “I can smell food. I’m hungry. Let’s go eat. We’ve earned it.”

“We’re going to have to hunt the dragons before we go skiting across the continent,” Peter said, jerking his chin toward the animal enclosures.

Sean shook his head, smiling as he remembered Emily’s oblique warning. “Can’t go to that well twice, Pete. Tomorrow, we’ll hunt the critters that got through the roundup in the Landing area.” He began to push through the ring of dragons. “Food tomorrow, Carenath,” he said, affectionately clouting the bronze as he passed him.

Fish? Carenath queried in a tone that carried dismay.

“Meat. Red meat,” Sean said. He laughed when some of the dragons bugled gratefully. “But this time we won’t kidnap it for you.” Then he put an arm around Sorka and started up the beach to the cooking fires.

The next day, as the three wings of dragonriders crossed the Jordan River, they spread out in three different directions, bypassing the ash-covered settlement and heading south and east at low levels.

Faranth says that she has found ru

Sean had his binoculars trained on a little valley. They were north of the path of the two Threadfalls that had dropped on that area, so there was vegetation to attract grazers.

“Tell her we’ve hit pay dirt, too.”

Not meat? Carenath asked wistfully.

Sean gri

Porth says they’ve enough for all of us, Carenath reported as he touched down gracefully and dipped his shoulder for Sean to dismount.

“Tell Porth we’re grateful, but you’d better hurry to catch that lot,” Sean advised. The herd was making all possible speed down the valley. He had to shield his face from the gravel and omnipresent thrown up by Carenath’s abrupt departure. Bright streaks followed the bronze. “Welcome back,” Sean said derisively as he distinguished blue and greens among the small colorful fire-lizard bodies following Blazer as she led the way.

The rest of his wing soon joined him. Even Nora Sejby managed a creditable landing on Te

“Nice catch, Carenath!” Sean passed the binoculars to Nyassa to check on Milath.

“Seemed to me there were quite a lot of cattle in that bunch,” Jerry said, pulling off his helmet and ruffling his sweat-damp hair. “What’ll happen to them?”

Sean shrugged. “The best stock went north. These’ll survive, or they won’t.”

“Sean, look who’s come to di