A sudden shift in the position of his body freshened Wintrow’s physical pain. Air flowed over him and the warmth of the sun touched him. Even that contact scoured his denuded flesh. But worst of all was the voice that called to him in a mixture of gladness and concern. “Wintrow? Can you hear me? It’s Vivacia. Where are you, what are you doing that I cannot feel you at all?”

He felt the ship’s thoughts reach for him. He cringed away, unwilling to let her touch minds with him. He made himself smaller, hid deeper. The moment Vivacia reached him, she must know all that he did. What would it do to her, to confront what she truly was?

Do you fear it will drive her mad? Do you fear she will take you with her? There was fierce exultation in the voice as it framed the thought, almost like a threat. Wintrow went cold with fear. Instantly he knew that this hiding place was no asylum, but a trap. “Vivacia!” he called out wildly, but his body did not obey him. No lips voiced his cry. Even his thought was muffled in the dragon’s being, wrapped and stifled and confined. He tried to struggle; he was suffocating under the weight of her presence. She held him so close he could not recall how to breathe. His heart leaped arrhythmically. Pain slapped him as his body jerked in protest. In a distant world, on a sun-washed deck, voices cried out in helpless dismay. He retreated to a stillness of body and soul that was one degree of darkness away from death.

Good. There was satisfaction in the voice. Be still, little one. Don’t try to defy me, and I won’t have to kill you. A pause. I really have no desire to see any of us die. As closely interwoven as we are, the death of any of us would be a risk to the others. You would have realized that, if you had paused to think. 1 give you that time now. Use it to ponder our situation.

For a space, Wintrow focused only on his survival. Breath caught, then shuddered through his lungs again. His heartbeat steadied. He was peripherally aware of exclamations of relief. Pain still seethed. He tried to pull his mind back from it, to ignore its clamor of serious damage to his body so that his thoughts could focus on the problem the dragon had set him.

He cringed at her sudden flash of irritation. By all that flies, have you no sense at all? How have creatures like you managed to survive and infest the world so thoroughly and yet have so little knowledge of yourselves? Do not pull back from the pain and imagine that makes you strong. Look at it, you dolt! It is trying to tell you what is wrong so you confix it. No wonder you all have such short life spans. No, look at it! Like this.

THE CREWMEN WHO HAD CARRIED THE CORNERS OF THE SHEET SUPPORTING Wintrow’s body had lowered him gently to the deck. Even so, Kennit had seen the spasm of fresh pain that crossed Wintrow’s face. He supposed that could be taken as an encouraging sign; at least he still reacted to pain. But when the figurehead had spoken to him, he had not even twitched. None of the others surrounding the supine figure could guess how much that worried Kennit. The pirate had been certain that the boy would react to the ship’s voice. That he did not meant that perhaps death would claim him. Kennit believed that there was a place between life and death where a man’s body became no more than a miserable animal, capable only of an animal’s responses. He had seen it. Under Igrot’s cruel guidance, his father had lingered in that state for days. Perhaps that was where Wintrow was now.

The dim light inside the cabin had been merciful. Out here, in the clear light of day, Kennit could not insist to himself that Wintrow would be fine. Every ugly detail of his scalded body was revealed. His brief fit of spasms had disturbed the wet scabs his body had managed to form; fluid ran over his skin from his injuries. Wintrow was dying. His boy-prophet, the priest who would have been his soothsayer, was dying, with Kennit’s future still unborn. The injustice of it rose up and choked Kennit. He had come so close, so very close to attaining his dream. Now he would lose it all in the death of this half-grown man. It was too bitter to contemplate. He clenched his eyes shut against the cruelty of fate.

“Oh, Kennit!” the ship cried out in a low voice, and he knew that she was feeling his emotions as well as her own. “Don’t let him die!” she begged him. “Please. You saved him from the serpent and the sea. Cannot you save him now?”

“Quiet!” he commanded her, almost roughly. He had to think. If the boy died now, it would be a denial of all the good luck Kennit had ever mustered. It would be worse than a jinx. Kennit could not allow this to happen.

Unmindful of the gathered crewmen who looked down on the wracked boy in hushed silence, Kennit awkwardly lowered himself to the deck. He looked long at Wintrow’s still face. He laid a single forefinger to an unblemished patch of skin on Wintrow’s face. He was beardless still and his cheek was soft. It wrung his heart to see the lad’s beauty spoiled so. “Wintrow,” he called softly. “Lad, it’s me. Kennit. You said you’d follow me. Sa sent you to speak for me. Remember? You can’t go now, boy. Not when we’re so close to our goals.”