"Hush now," Jeid said, but his voice was kind. "There will be time for tales. First we must do something about your wounds."

She looked down at herself. Her ragged cloak—a patchwork of rat furs—barely hid her body, revealing many scratches and bruises. Her wrists and ankles were still a raw mess. Her feet were the worst; the welts from the blazing pyre were infected and turning green.

What must I look like to him? Laira thought, feeling ashamed. A scrawny thing barely larger than a child, clad in filthy rags, her jaw crooked, her hair sheared short, infected and foul—hardly the kind of weredragon he had dreamed of someday meeting, she reckoned. She half-expected him to toss her out into the cold.

And yet he didn't, and his eyes remained kind, and he brought forth clay bowls of ointments. When he smiled at her, it filled her with as much warmth as the tea, for it was a smile of relief, of goodness.

He likes me here.

"This should help the infection," he said, dipping the cloth into the bowl. "It might sting a bit, but—"

A loud voice boomed from the cave entrance.

"Jeid Blacksmith! What in the name of sanity do you think you're doing?"

Laira leaped up and the bowl clattered down. She sucked in her magic, prepared to shift, to blow fire, to attack any enemy who approached. Had Zerra found her? Had her father's soldiers tracked her down?

When she saw the figure at the entrance, however, she tilted her head, keeping her magic at bay, not yet shifting.

An elderly man stood there, glaring at Jeid. He wore blue robes and a woolen cloak and hood. His beard was long and white, his eyes glittering blue, his eyebrows snowy and bushy. He held a staff formed of an oak's root; the root split at the top into wooden fingers, clutching a blue crystal.

"I am healing her—" Jeid began.

"You were about to burn her feet off." The elderly man scowled. "Root of blackthorn? That's used to heal frostbite, you fool. The lass is clearly suffering from infected burns. She needs greenroot, for stars' sake."

The old man stepped forward and smacked Jeid on the shoulder. The big, burly bear of a man scowled and stepped back with a grunt.

Laira gazed at the pair with wide eyes.

"Ignore my dolt of a son," said the old man. As he approached Laira, his scowl faded, and the kindliest, warmest smile she had ever seen creased his face and twinkled in his eyes. "Grizzly means well—that's what we call him, you can imagine why—but he has the brains of a pebble. All muscle and no wit, that one. Call me Eranor, my dear, or Grandpapa if you like. I am a grandfather to any who enter my home." He pulled a packet from his cloak and unrolled it, revealing green paste. "This will do the job much better."