The battle between Baliper and Kalo had been brief; they stood at a distance from each other, snorting and posturing. Spit cavorted mockingly, a safe distance from the much larger drakes, randomly spitting acid as scampering keepers cried out warnings to one another. Sintara saw Alise watching her; the woman’s eyes were large and anxious. When she stared at the woman, she backed up, lifting her hands to shield her face. It only made Sintara angrier. She fixed her fury on Mercor.

‘Don’t threaten me, drake.’

He turned his head slightly sideways. His wings were still half-open, ready to deal a stunning slap if she sprang at him. He spoke quietly, only into her mind. Not a threat, Sintara. A promise.

As he closed his wings, his musk wafted toward her again. She knew her scales flushed with colours in response, the reflexive biological response of a queen in oestrus. His black eyes whirled with interest.

She lifted onto her hind legs and turned away from him. As she sprang into the sky, she trumpeted, ‘I hunt where I will, drake. I owe you nothing.’ She beat her wings in hard, measured strokes, rising above them all.

In the distance, green Fente trumpeted, shrill and mocking.

‘Thymara!’

She turned slowly at the sound of Tats’s greeting. Tension knotted in her belly. She had been avoiding this conversation. She’d seen in Tats’s eyes when she first returned from Kelsingra that he knew what had happened between her and Rapskal. She hadn’t needed or wanted to discuss it with him. On the days since then, she had not avoided him completely, but she had thwarted his efforts to find her alone. She had found it almost as difficult as avoiding being alone with Rapskal. Tats had been subtle about trying to corner her. Rapskal had shown up on her doorstep the evening they had returned from Kelsingra, smiling far too knowingly when he asked her if she’d care to go for an evening walk.

He had come to the door of the small cottage she shared with Sylve and ostensibly with Jerd as well. The three had moved in together almost as soon as the keepers had settled in the village. Thymara could not recall that it had been a much-discussed decision; it had just seemed logical that the only three female keepers would share lodgings.

Harrikin had helped them select which of the dilapidated structures they would claim as their own, and he had spent more than a few afternoons helping them make it habitable. Thanks to Harrikin, the chimney now drew the smoke out of the house, the roof leaked only when the wind was extremely strong, and there were shutters for the window openings. Furnishings were sparse and rough, but that was true of all the keepers’ homes. From Carson, they had crudely tanned deer hides stretched over pole frames as a basis for their beds, and carved wooden utensils for eating with. Thymara was one of the best hunters, so they always had meat, both to eat and to trade to other keepers. Thymara had enjoyed her evenings with Sylve, and enjoyed them even more when some of the other keepers came by to share the fireside and talk. At first, Tats had been a frequent guest there, as had Rapskal.

Jerd spent few nights there, returning sporadically to shuffle through her possessions for some particular item, or to share a meal with them while she complained about whichever of the males she was currently keeping company with. Despite her dislike for Jerd, Thymara could not deny a perverse fascination with her diatribes against her lovers. She was appalled at Jerd’s casual sexuality and her tempers, her spewing of intimate details and how frequently she discarded one male keeper to take up with another. She had cycled through several of the keepers more than once. It was no secret in their small group that Boxter was hopelessly infatuated with her. He alone she seemed to spurn. Nortel had been her lover for at least three turns of her heart, and copper-eyed Kase had the distinction of having literally put her out of his cottage as well as his bed. She had seemed as astonished as angered that he had been the one to put an end to their liaisons. Thymara suspected that Kase was loyal to his cousin Boxter and wanted no part of breaking his heart.

But that first evening after her time with Rapskal in Kelsingra, of course, Jerd had been home, and full of small and cutting comments. She took care to remind Thymara that Rapskal had once been her lover, however briefly, and that Tats, too, had shared her bed. Her presence had not made it any easier to tell Rapskal gently that she did not want to walk out with him that evening. It had been no easier to refuse him the next day, nor to put him off on the next. When finally she had told him that she doubted the wisdom of what she had done, and that her fear of conceiving a child was greater than her lust for him, Rapskal had surprised her by nodding gravely.

‘It is a concern. I will take it on myself to find out how Elderlings once prevented conception, and when I know it, I will tell you. After that we can enjoy ourselves without fear.’ He had said these words as they walked hand in hand along the riverbank, only a few evenings ago. She had laughed aloud, both charmed and alarmed, as she always was, by his childlike directness about things that were definitely not childish.