Of course he does, Tai said, almost glad that pain was slowing him down, making him cautious. Then, she could hear the faint click: he wasn’t being entirely reckless, he was propping himself on a cane—hers, no doubt, since none had been offered him yet.

He was concentrating so hard on his goal, reaching his dragon, that he was unaware of being observed. He had ten more meters to move, painfully, slowly.

Golanth knows Tai comes. He does not move. Someone might hear that.

But I can hear the tap of the cane.

They may think it is you, Tai, checking on Golanth.

He managed another painful step in the moonlight, wobbling for a moment, uncertainly balanced.

If he falls. Oh, shards, Zaranth, just move him, as you did the trundlebugs. Move him to Golanth.

I—I. He’s nearly there.

Not near enough. Just move him, Zaranth. Do it! You know how you moved trundlebugs!

Tai felt Zaranth gulp. If F’lessan made a sound, it was muffled against Golanth’s neck as Zaranth complied.

Put me beside him.

And Tai—more abruptly than she had ever moved without Zaranth beneath her—was standing beside F’lessan who clung to the loose skin on Golanth’s neck for balance. Tai put her hand under his left arm for support.

“How the shard did I get here?” F’lessan demanded in a low tense voice. “Where did you come from? There was no one else awake!”

“Zaranth!” Tai murmured by way of explanation.

F’lessan buried his head against his dragon’s neck, gasping for breath.

“You could have opened stitches! You could have fallen and hurt yourself more,” she scolded him, speaking low, her lips to his ear.

“Why didn’t you get Zaranth to bring me to Golly before?” He turned his head, his low fierce whisper conveying his fury, his pain, and his desperate need to be in physical contact with his dragon.

Tai grimaced. “Three reasons: one, because you’ve been badly wounded and needed to heal a bit. Two,” and she allowed her irritation to color her voice, “because I just thought of it when I saw you trying to undo all the good done while you were forcefully kept in bed. Three, Zaranth doesn’t really know how to control herself.”

“Trundlebugs, my dear green, trundlebugs.”

He took a deep breath and pushed upright, steadied himself on the cane before raising his arm. She saw the knife in his hand—one of the sharp ones that Crivellan used for surgical procedures.

“What are you doing?”

He gave her a shove. She stumbled and hissed as the imbalance sent a jab of pain through her half-healed leg. How had he managed to walk this far with his more serious wounds?

“I want to see his eye, Tai. I want to see it.”

“Why?” No one had lied to him about Golanth’s condition. Didn’t F’lessan trust her to tell the truth?