Avatre got a little more height; Aket-ten had done her best to convey what the dragon’s duties were going to be this morning, and apparently Avatre had understood. As Toreth and Huras gradually, and successfully, exerted more and more control over their mounts, Avatre kept watchful vigil just above them. Whenever either of the two looked as if she was going to take command of the situation to do what she wanted, Avatre followed Kiron’s directions and made a feint at her. Avatre might not be fully grown yet, but she had the superior position, and the other two hated physical confrontation with another dragon. Historically, they closed for combat with great reluctance, and never tried to lay into an enemy dragon with tooth or claw the way the swamp dragons sometimes did.

Finally they were answering the simple commands that the boys gave them with a minimum of objection, and Kiron got a little more height to let the boys put the two dragons through their paces. Up here, with the sun beating down on them, it was hot already, though the first hints that the kamiseen would start soon were definitely in the wind. All three dragons were soon moving easily and freely, and the little grunts and hisses of complaint from below stopped coming. Kiron was enjoying himself completely, and so was Avatre, when he looked down to the landing courtyard and saw someone waving a bit of white linen in the signal that the proper riders were ready to go out.

There was a moment of confusion for the two adult dragons, who were not used to landing so soon after taking off; Avatre had to come down very near to them in order to persuade them to land. And they hissed a bit in complaint when they saw their proper riders and realized that the first flight had been nothing more then a warm-up.

But though they hissed, they took to the sky again with no sign of reluctance, and joined up with the rest of the wing. Only when he was sure that they were not going to give their riders any trouble—and thus a reason to object to this training scheme—did Kiron turn toward the boys of his own wing.

Huras looked a little pale. Toreth, however, was gazing after the departed dragons with a look of longing.

“It will be too long until the day after tomorrow,” said Toreth.

Huras snorted. “For you, maybe,” was all he said.

Kiron recalled his own first experience with real flight, and sympathized. But he didn’t offer that sympathy to Huras, who would only learn that one got used to flying by actually getting used to it. And he wanted to be a Jouster—Jousters didn’t ride their dragons on the ground.