A sudden gust of wind-driven rain spattered against her face and scattered her dream memories. Sintara opened her eyes to night and storm. The shelter Thymara had built for her was a flimsy thing, a lean-to of logs thatched with branches. Her bed was a thick layer of pine boughs that kept her from the ground, but not by much. She had grown since Thymara had built it, and now she was cramped when she curled herself within its confines. The girl should have built it larger, with thicker walls, perhaps covered in mud, and thatched it more tightly. Sintara had told her so. And her keeper had responded irritably, asking her how long she wished to go without food while Thymara spent her time building her a shelter. The thought of the girl’s answer renewed her annoyance with her. She did nothing well. The dragon must shiver in a poorly built shelter even as her hunger clawed at her guts. She had no satisfaction anywhere in her life. Only hunger, discomfort, and frustrating dreams.

Sintara slithered from the low-roofed shelter on her belly. It was raining. It seemed always to be raining. The clouds covered the moon and the stars, but she widened her eyes and saw without effort. Here in the open forest of scattered trees and brush, the keepers had built a village of shelters for the dragons. As if they were humans who always had to cluster close to one another! None of the sheds was sturdy or intended to be permanent. Hers was no worse than any of the others and better than most. It still stirred vague ancestral memories of stables and kennels. They were shelters for animals, not housing fit for the Lords of the Three Realms.

True, the keepers had little better for themselves. They had moved into the remnants of the shepherds’ and farmers’ homes that had been built on this side of the river in ancient times. Some were little more than standing walls, but they had made them somewhat habitable. She’d heard their talk and thoughts. They believed that they would be far more comfortable if only they could get across the river to where grand Kelsingra had withstood the depredations of time and weather. They could have gone, one at a time, ferried across by foolish Heeby who seemed to think herself more carthorse than dragon. But they would have had to abandon the dragons to do so.

And they had not.

She resented the tiny trickle of gratitude she felt for that. Gratitude as an emotion was both unfamiliar and uncomfortable, something inappropriate for a dragon to feel, especially toward a human. Gratitude implied a debt: But how could a dragon be indebted to a human? As well be indebted to a pigeon. Or to a piece of meat.