The sound of Kazul’s coughing grew louder as Cim­orene sped back the way she had come. At the mouth of the cave, Cimorene paused and set down the lamp, then unscrewed the top of the green jar. Inside was a thick, emerald-colored liquid about the consistency of honey. She looked out at Kazul. The dragon’s head jerked with each cough, and the scales on her neck were beginning to turn pink around the edges. For a long, careful moment Cimorene studied Kazul’s movements. Then she leaned back and threw the emerald liquid, jar and all, into the dragon’s open mouth just as Kazul took another gasping breath.

The jar landed on Kazul’s tongue. The dragon’s mouth closed, and she swallowed convulsively. Sudden silence descended.

“Are you all right now?” Cimorene asked after Kazul had taken several deep breaths without a renewed bout of coughing.

“I will be,” Kazul said. She sounded exhausted, and her movements as she slid into the cave were slow and uncertain.

“What happened?” Cimorene said, backing out of the way so that Kazul would not have to exert herself to go around.

“I got a breath of the smoke when the plant in your hand burned,” Kazul said as she settled to the floor just inside the entrance. “Lucky it was only a breath. I’ll need a few days of rest, but that’s better than being dead.”

Cimorene stared at her, appalled. “What was that plant?”

“Dragonsbane,” said Kazul. Her eyes closed and she slept.

Kazul continued to sleep for most of the next three days. She woke only long enough for Cimorene to pour a couple of gallons of warm milk mixed with honey down her throat from time to time before she lapsed back into unconsciousness. Cimorene was very worried, but there wasn’t much that she could do. Sick dragons are too large and heavy for normal nursing to be of much use.

On the afternoon of the third day, Kazul woke up completely for the first time since her collapse.

“Thank goodness!” said Cimorene as Kazul shook her head experimentally and sat up. “I was beginning to think you were going to sleep for a month.”

“I might have if I’d gotten more than a whiff of that smoke.” Kazul stretched her neck in one direction and her tail in the other, trying to work out some of the kinks.

“If I’d known it was so dangerous, I’d never have brought any of that purple plant back with me,” Cim­orene apologized. “You might have done worse than sleep for a month. You might have—” She stopped, unwilling to complete the thought.

“I might have died?” Kazul said. “Unlikely. If a dragon isn’t killed outright by something in the first five minutes, recovery is only a matter of time. That applies as much to dragonsbane as to a knight’s magic sword.”