He strode over to a deep purple egg that had a golden sheen to it. He pointed at it, but I noticed that he didn’t touch it.
“You’d think because of the coloring this egg must surely hold a Midnight Gold-wing, wouldn’t you?”
There were some nods and murmurs of agreement.
“Well, it might,” Master Yarsmouth agreed, nodding. “But then again, it might just hold a common Brown. Remember the old saying—‘you can’t tell by the shell.’ Also, a Gold or Silver or Bronze-wing might come from a smaller egg and common Blue or Green might come from a larger one. You simply won’t know what kind of dragon you’re getting until it hatches.”
“So there’s no way at all to predict what you’re going to get?” Bugs asked, frowning.
“I’ll tell you what you’re going to get, boy, if you’re lucky enough to be chosen.” Master Yarsmouth frowned at him. “You’ll get the best friend of your life—a being who loves you more than anything or anyone else in this whole benighted world. Take it from a man who lost his dragon—it’s a love like no other, so you’d better not take it for granted.”
His brown eyes shimmered for a moment, and I realized he was on the verge of tears. My heart clenched in my chest for him. I didn’t really understand the bond between a dragon and its rider, but I’d seen the passionate intensity of emotion my father shared with F’lorn. When both of them chose to die together, I’d understood that they couldn’t bear to be separated, even in death.
How difficult must it be for Master Yarsmouth to be here watching as new riders found their dragons on every Hatching Day, knowing that his own dragon was gone and could never be replaced? Because once bonded to one dragon, a rider could never bond to another. If he lost his dragon that part of him—the part that was able to form a mental and emotional connection with a dragon—was an open wound that could never be healed.
I felt for him deeply as he turned for a moment and sniffed loudly. When he turned back to us, his eyes were dry, but I could see the pain etched on his face. I wished I could do something to distract him from the obviously sad memories he was probably having of his lost dragon, so I raised my hand again.
“Sir,” I said. “What about the golden eggs—back there?”
I pointed to the back of the Hatching Grounds where the pure golden eggs lay glimmering in the black sands.
“Ah—those are duds.” Master Yarsmouth shook his head sadly. “You’d think they’d hatch the most magnificent dragons of all, but the gold eggs never hatch. No matter how hard the candidates try to make contact with them, they’re always silent.” He gestured at the eggs. “Of course, we never get rid of any eggs because you never can tell if a drakeling might change its mind when it smells the right rider but none of those eggs is under a century old and none has hatched in my lifetime or in the lifetime of the Master who tended the Hatching Grounds before me either.”
“I see. Thank you.” I nodded politely, but I couldn’t stop staring at the golden eggs, shoved into the back corner of the grounds like forgotten treasure. Why didn’t they hatch? Why didn’t they find any of the cadets that came to see them on Impression Day worthy of bonding?
“How do you know those eggs aren’t dead?” Toady asked, nodding at the golden ones.
“Why because, boy—a dead egg will rot. And there’s nothing so bad as the smell of a rotten dragon’s egg!” Master Yarsmouth gave a hearty laugh and held his nose. “We had one a few years ago that stunk up all of the Old Drake. Why, you could smell the stench all the way down to the Mess Hall! Not many people had an appetite that day, I can tell you!”
Some of the cadets laughed at his exaggerated gestures, but I thought I could still see the pain behind his eyes. The life of every dragon was precious to him, I thought. A dead egg was sad because of the lost potential.
“Luckily, that doesn’t happen very often,” Master Yarsmouth went on. “Our female dragons lay healthy, sound eggs and almost all of them hatch. Only a few don’t.”
He nodded to the back of the grounds again and I saw there were some other colored eggs not far from the golden ones. Drakelings who had decided to stay in the shell because the right rider hadn’t come for them. They could dream away their days forever unless just the right scent woke them from their slumber.
That made me think of the golden eggs again. I wished I could see them up close. I couldn’t say why, but they seemed to draw me—especially the one near the end of the pile. It was smaller than all the others—barely half the size of my torso, I estimated. But though I knew it wouldn’t wake for me or anyone else, my palms itched to slide across its smooth, golden surface and see if I could sense the life of the sleeping drakeling within.
“Well, that’s enough for now,” Master Yarsmouth remarked, clapping his hands with finality. “It’s almost time for your next class. But I’ll be seeing the lot of you back here again soon,” he added. “These eggs are almost hardened—Impression Day isn’t far off!”
This announcement was greeted with a muted cheer—no one seemed to want to be too loud, probably because the Hatching Grounds felt like a nursery and we didn’t want to wake the infants sleeping in their shells.
But someday very soon, those shells would harden and then I would find out if any of the dragons inside would have me…or if, as Professor Leesbruck thought, I would never be able to bond with a dragon of my own.
27
AURORA
For the rest of the day, I was stuck in a haze. So much had happened that I wished I could just crawl into a quiet corner and try to make sense of it all.
I couldn’t spare the time, however, because life at the Academy never slowed or stopped. I had to go on with classes and dinner—where Ryse Skoren and Chud Larson were both eating calmly at the same table—as though nothing had happened.
Larson didn’t so much as glance at me, which made me cautiously optimistic. But I had to stop looking at him because my eyes kept catching Ryse’s. When that happened, I blushed and looked quickly down at my plate, but I could still feel him staring at me.
I barely ate anything but my single spoonful of Dragon Custard. I simply wasn’t hungry.
After dinner and bathing time in the Cook-pot, it seemed as though the awful day was finally winding down and I was glad of it. I left the other cadets splashing and laughing and, wrapped in my towels, made my way back to the dorm.
But just as I stepped inside, someone grabbed me by the throat and shoved me against the wall.
