“Oh, I hope I don’t get that job,” mumbled Giles.
“GILES!” Evander barked.
The boy winced.
“You will have to do one of these duties. Stop grousing.”
Giles looked at his feet, crestfallen, and Samara grimaced at Evander. A stab of conscience reminded him that these were children, far from home. Still, he couldn’t put out the fire smoldering behind his breastbone. Almost a week had passed, and he hadn’t been called to a war council, hadn’t seen or heard from Valenna, and the conscripts’ constant complaints threatened daily to upend his calm.
He tossed in his cot at night, anxiety clawing away sleep, and he was exhausted. Where was Valenna? Had Cadmus moved her to another manor house, deeper in Sennalaith? Had he locked her away? He’d asked cautious questions, tried to plumb the other officers for information, but he got nothing.
“Dreadnoughts are slow and stupid,” Evander continued, dragging his mind from Valenna to the training. “If I guided her head-first into a cliff, she’d obey without hesitation. If I told her to dive into the ground, she’d do it and break my neck and hers.This is both an advantage and a danger. They are also deaf, so not easily frightened in battle.”
“And they breathe fire,” Samara shouted from the fence. “And they have pockets of gas in their bellies. We know all this!”
“Then you can think about lunch,” Evander said evenly. “But I didn’t ask for your input, so be quiet. Now, as I was saying, they do breathe fire, but only every fifteen seconds. They have a pocket of gas in their bellies. If struck by a phoenix, another dragon’s fire, or enough scattershot, they will blow up. They also often blow when they make impact with the ground.”
“Will there be a test?” Rosemary asked.
“Yes. It’s colloquially known as a battle, and if you fail, you die.”
The conscripts fell very quiet, and even the surly Ignatius pulled out his notebooks and pencil and began to jot down notes.
“Dreadnoughts aren’t aggressive toward people, but they will eat smaller dragons. In battle, they’ll go after the enemy’s little fighter dragons. When shooting a fighter dragon, avoid their sides and back; the scales are thick. Aim for the soft spot between their front legs. Now, the pilot must be careful not to allow the dreadnought to become distracted so the razer can line up a good shot.”
“Who will be the pilot?” Elspeth shouted.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
Giles pushed Samara forward.
“As long as she agrees not to drive us into the ground,” Evander said.
Again, Evander’s conscience niggled at him. He was failing miserably at this.
The dreadnought’s huge tongue, as wide across as Evander’s body, picked at its teeth.
“Can a spark sparrow penetrate that thing’s hide?” Samara asked.
“No,” Evander replied. “But sparksparrows can pierce right through you.”
“Or, they could give us steel armor so we don’t get impaled or gutted or shot full of holes,” Rosemary complained.
Evander shook his head. “Metal armor is a thing of the past. We will be assigned dragon scale vests. These will help against shotfire balls from long distances, glancing blows from cutlasses, and some scattershot. Again, they only help.”
He touched his shirt as he spoke, wondering if Samara was telling the truth about its magic. “Go take the smaller dragons and run through some maneuvers. The same ones we learned in Silvanlight. It’ll improve your balance.”
Cheered by the prospect of riding the little fighter dragons, all the conscripts dispersed … except Samara. She followed Evander to Hera’s paddock, climbed onto the fence, and balanced on the top rail, her hands on her knees.
“They don’t like you,” she said.
“No?” Evander replied with mock surprise. He hopped into the paddock and reached his hand out to Hera, who was munching on a sheep, its hooves sticking out of her mouth like walrus tusks.
Haldir passed, casting Samara and Evander a dark look. Once he was out of earshot, Samara whispered, “They’re all mumbling that they want to kill him.”
Evander was running his hands down Hera’s legs to gauge the moisture of her skin. He stopped and stared at the girl, his eyebrows raised. “Are you mad?”
“It wasn’t my idea. They want to punish someone for Lysander. They wanted to kill you at first, but I’ve done my best to convince them it’s more Haldir’s fault than yours.”
