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Back Sanctuary Save as PDF
Chapters (25)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication
  4. ONE
  5. TWO
  6. THREE
  7. FOUR
  8. FIVE
  9. SIX
  10. SEVEN
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. EPILOGUE

More servants brought them meat, onions, and soured milk wrapped up in flatbread, and jars of beer, that they ate and drank while pallets were spread beside their dragons. Then, like their dragons, they dropped down to sleep, and did not awaken until their dragons’ hunger roused everyone.

SIXTEEN

SIXTEEN

HE had thought they had slept like the dead yesterday. That was nothing, compared with today. Even an earthshake didn’t wake them, for they did get a minor rumble, and neither he nor any of the others was aware there had been one until they clawed their way up out of slumber. He didn’t even remember stumbling his way to a couch in the shade when the sun grew too hot; he only knew he had gone to sleep beside Avatre and woke, once again on the couch, and not even the same one as the last time.

But when he woke, it was with a rush, and he woke all at once, out of a dream of flying Winged Ones off the roof of the temple, burning with a desire to get more of them away before the Magi understood what was happening.

He didn’t sit up with a yell, though he might as well have. He startled the servant who was sitting beside him. But the boy recovered quickly.

“It is not yet time, master,” he said, before Kiron could say anything. “You have time to see to your dragon, to bathe and eat. There was another small shake after dawn. Did you feel it?”

He shook his head, but his attention was caught by a single word. Bathe! At the sound of that word, Kiron itched all over; not that there wasn’t water enough to bathe at Sanctuary, but it seemed wrong to use so precious a thing for bathing. They all did, of course, but it seemed wrong. Now, the hot spring at Coresan’s nest was another matter entirely—but he hadn’t had a bath there since two days before this journey.

But this was Alta, where water was abundant, so after he saw Avatre fed, he allowed the servant to take him off to the baths, both hot and cold. And once re-clothed in a common tunic of the sort Aunt Re gave her upper servants, which was enough like what the Jousters wore these days that it made no difference, he helped himself from the food left out for all of them and made a hasty meal. Aket-ten was the last of the riders to wake, and he didn’t blame her for sleeping so long; she had been doing two jobs at once—guiding her own dragon, and keeping track of all of the rest of them.