S’ban drew a deep, steadying breath and then knelt slowly beside his daughter so that he was at eye level. “If they don’t find it soon, Serth will die.”

Bekka was quiet for a long moment, her chest heaving in silent sobs. Finally, after a false start, she whispered the worry that had overwhelmed her: “Will you go with him, like Tannaz?”

“No,” S’ban told her, grabbing her tight against him and burying his face in her chest. He pushed back, his eyes streaming even as he forced a smile, “I couldn’t leave my best girl!”

“You mean me?” Bekka whispered, glancing up at Serth in complete amazement that her father, who had been bonded with the blue dragon for tens of Turns before she was born, would ever for a moment consider her more important. “You’d stay for me?”

“That’s what we do,” S’ban assured her, “when we’re parents.”

Bekka stood up, pulling back from her father just enough that she could look him squarely in the eye, her hands still resting on his shoulders.

“Then you’d have to come with me to the Healer Hall, because I’m going to be a healer.” She glanced over her shoulder challengingly to Tintoval, who nodded in fierce agreement. “And if they don’t find the cure at Benden, I will!”

S’ban’s face worked for a moment as he battled his emotions. It was Serth, however, who finally said it, as he lifted his head from Tintoval’s inspection and curled his neck around so that he could look directly at Bekka and S’ban.

She is your child, he said, so forcefully that Fiona could hear him easily. She saw that Bekka, Tintoval, and Terin could all hear him, too. She will do what she says.

The blue paused for a moment, quickly turning his head aside to cough, then turning back again. You must stay for her. Promise me.

“I promise,” S’ban said quietly, tears leaking down his cheeks.

Again Serth twitched away to avoid spraying them with flecks of green ooze as he coughed, and again he came back, his head level with Bekka’s, his gaze steady on his rider.

You will be proud of her, Serth said. She is special, this one.

After that, Serth turned his head back straight ahead and closed his eyes, his breathing labored but steady.

“I’ll stay with you tonight,” Bekka said, moving to wrap herself around her father as tightly as she could. S’ban nodded his head against hers and clutched her close.

Tintoval glanced at Fiona, seeming both embarrassed to be sharing the intimate father-daughter moment and at the same time accepting of the gift that was given them. She made to leave, but Bekka glanced up at her.

“I’ve got to go now, Father,” Bekka said, stepping out of her father’s arms.

“No,” Tintoval said instantly, shaking her head. “You can stay.”