Bolt did not even glance back at her, but continued to peruse the open sea before them. “Oh, please! I have a nose. I can smell it on you. Take it off. It does no honor to the one it was once part of, nor you to put him to such a purpose.”

The thought that the charm had once been part of a dragon suddenly made Etta’s flesh crawl. She longed to take it off. However, “I must talk to Kennit first. He will tell me when he is ready for us to have a baby.”

“Never,” Bolt said flatly.

“What?”

“Never wait for a male on any such decision. You are the queen. You decide. Males are not made for such decisions. I have seen it time and time again. They would have you wait for days of sunshine and wealth and plenty. Yet to a male, enough is never sufficient, and plenty never reached. A queen knows that when times are hardest and game most scarce, that is when one must care most about the continuance of the race. Some things are not for males to decide.” She lifted her hand and smoothed her hair back. She flashed Etta a confiding grin that was suddenly very human. “I’m still not used to hair. It fascinates me.”

Etta found herself grinning in spite of herself. She leaned on the railing. It had been a long time since there had been another woman to talk to, let alone one who spoke as forthrightly as a whore herself. “Kennit is not like other men,” she ventured.

“We both know that. You’ve chosen a good mate. But what is the good of that if it stops there? Take it off, Etta. Don’t wait for him to tell you to do it. Look around you. Does he tell each man when the time is right for his task? Of course not. If he had to do that, he might as well do every task himself. He is a man who expects others to think for themselves. I’ll venture a wager. Has he not already hinted to you that he needs an heir?”

Etta thought of his words when she had shown him the carved baby. “He has,” she admitted softly.

“Well, then. Will you wait until he commands you? For shame. No female should wait on a male’s command for what is our business. You are the one who should be telling him such things. Take it off, queen.”

Queen. Etta knew that by the term, the dragon meant no more than female. Female dragons were queens, like cats. Yet, when Bolt said the word, it teased to mind an idea that Etta scarcely dared consider. If Kennit were to be King of the Pirate Isles, what would that make her? Perhaps just his woman. But if she had his child, surely, then…

Even as she rebuked herself for such ambitions, her hand slipped under the silk of her shirt to the warm flesh of her belly. The little wizardwood charm, shaped like a human skull, was strung on a fine silver wire. It fastened with a hook and loop. She compressed it with her fingers and it sprang open. She slipped it out, careful of the hook, and held it in her hand. The skull grinned up at her. She shivered.

“Give it to me,” Bolt said quietly.

Etta refused to think about it. She held it out in her hand, and when Bolt reached back, she dropped it into the ship’s wide palm. For a moment, it lay there, the silver wire glittering in the sun. Then, like a child gulping a sweet, Bolt clapped her cupped hand to her mouth. Laughing, she showed Etta her empty hand. “Gone!” she said, and in that instant, the decision was irrevocable.

“What am I going to say to Kennit?” she wondered aloud.

“Nothing at all,” the ship told her airily. “Nothing at all.”

THE TANGLE HAD GROWN IN NUMBERS UNTIL IT WAS THE LARGEST GROUP OF serpents claiming allegiance to a single serpent that Shreever had ever known. Sometimes they separated to find food, but every evening found them gathered again. They came to Maulkin in all colors, sizes and conditions. Not all could recall how to speak, and some were savagely feral. Others bore the scars of mishaps or the festering wounds of encounters with hostile ships. Some of the feral ones frightened Shreever in their ability to transcend all the boundaries of civilized behavior. A few, like the ghostly white serpent, made her hurt with the simmering agony they encompassed. The white in particular seemed frozen into silence by his anger. Nevertheless, one and all, they followed Maulkin. When they clustered together at night, they anchored into a field of swaying serpents that reminded Shreever of a bed of kelp.

Their numbers seemed to reinforce their confidence in Maulkin’s leadership. Maulkin near-glowed now, his golden eyes gleaming the full length of his body. By their numbers, too, they provided what each might lack individually. They comforted one another with the memories each held, and often a word or a name from one would wake a recollection in another.

Yet despite their numbers, they were no closer to finding the true migration path. The shared memories only made their wandering more frustrating. Tonight, Shreever could not rest. She untangled herself from her sleeping comrades, and allowed herself to drift free, staring down at the living forest of serpents. There was something tantalizingly familiar about this place, something just beyond the reach of her memory. Had she been here before?