“When the dragons revolted, we didn’t really have a good idea of what had happened,” said Haraket. “We knew the dragons had been getting restive and hard to control, but you know, none of us ever really thought that there was anything wrong with the tala; not even Baken or me. My guess was that your sea witches were to blame somehow, but it never really occurred to any of us, I don’t think, that we’d actually lose the dragons until it happened.”

“No one knew the dragons actually had been lost for days,” one of the priests put in. “It wasn’t until messengers came back from the battlefield with the report that we knew why no Jousters had returned from the battle.”

“And until then,” Haraket continued, “we actually thought your sea witches had found some way to make lightning strike them out of the air—or something. About half the riders came back afoot, though most of the ones that didn’t were not actually killed by their dragons or by falls. Or so I’m told. They generally managed to get their dragons to land, but it was the soldiers on the ground that got them.”

Kiron nodded. There was some relief in that. Not that he had any great love for most of the Tian Jousters, but—well, he wouldn’t wish the kind of terror and death (or the terrible life-in-death of a paralyzing injury) that came from plummeting out of a dragon’s saddle on anyone. Well, anyone except, perhaps, the Magi. . . .

“So, without dragons, and with no means to control captured dragonets, there was no need for the Courts of the Jousters,” Haraket said glumly. “It wasn’t long before orders came that took most of the servants and slaves away; only a few of the dragon boys, me, and a couple of slaves remained. The Jousters that survived generally went into the King’s army, and most of the dragon boys dispersed as did most of the servants. Baken decided he’d try either to pay one or more of the trappers to try to get an unfledged young dragonet right out of the nest, or else he’d get one himself, but right about the time I was going to attempt to persuade the Great King’s advisers that this was worth trying, the Great King—got new advisers.”