“You did wonderfully!” Aket-ten exclaimed. “And we won’t tell Ari any details. You’ve done it, Nofret—she’s accepted you as a feeder, if not a nest tender. Yet.”

“Yet?” Kiron responded instantly, with astonishment. “You think Coresan is actually going to accept Nofret as a nest tender?”

“She’s already thinking about it,” said Aket-ten, with a nod toward the feeding dragon. “Or—well, not thinking about it, it’s just that she’s been on the nest herself for a long time without a break, and she’s starting to feel impatient. She wants to fly, she wants to stretch her wings, she wants to hunt for herself and the babies, and all of that is lying under the nest tending and getting stronger every time she looks at Nofret. So when the go feelings are stronger than the stay feelings, if Nofret is there, I think Coresan will just leave, as if Nofret was another female dragon or her mate.”

“Would that mean—” Nofret’s color was coming back. “—would I be able to get right in with the babies?”

“She just might push you in with them,” Kiron said thoughtfully. “It’s what she’d do with another dragon, Ari says. Younger siblings with no nest of their own, or older daughters are often used to tend the nests for mothers whose mates are inexperienced and don’t know to help tend the nest. It depends on how much like another dragon she thinks you are.”

“One step at a time!” Aket-ten interrupted. “It’s enough that Coresan is letting her bring the meat right up to the edge of the nest! And—oh, look!”

She pointed down at the nest, where another egg, this one slightly larger than the first, had begun the violent rocking that had signaled the beginning of real hatching for the first egg. Coresan abandoned her meal and, with a nudge to make sure her first offspring was properly positioned, went to aid the second.

“We’re going hunting,” Kiron told Aket-ten. “Unless you want to—”

“Oh, no, I’d much rather watch!” Aket-ten said, with undisguised enjoyment. “If Coresan finishes what Nofret brought her, I’ll fly her down with the next load myself.”

Satisfied that his partner had things well in hand, Kiron leaped into Avatre’s saddle, and gave her the signal to fly. Avatre was only too happy to oblige. He had the feeling she found all this baby tending and baby watching to be utterly boring and pointless.

“It’s all right, girl; this will be over before too long,” he called to her as they angled out over the desert in search of prey. “Then things—”

He stopped himself before he could finish that with