‘You may keep working here until it is done,’ Temeraire said to Iskierka, rather smugly, ‘since it was all your notion,’ and carried Laurence over to the clearings, where Ballista was already improving their comfort by smashing up shrubs and thornbrake with her barbed tail. Perscitia had managed to establish a remarkably lively bonfire, by setting several of the fallen trees into a tent-pole shape, and using the crushed and pounded wreckage for tinder. She was now, however, eyeing the towering blaze a little nervously. It had grown a good deal higher than her head.

‘A handsome signal,’ Wellesley said sarcastically, when he came. ‘It is kind of you to spare Bonaparte the trouble of having to find us in the dark.’

‘You have a dozen fires lit just over the hill in the other part of camp, so I do not think it makes much difference that this one is a little bigger,’ Perscitia said, defensively. ‘And,’ she added with sudden inspiration, ‘this is so bright the Fleur-de-Nuits cannot come near us. And it will hurt their eyes too much to see anything else around.’

Wellesley only snorted at this justification, and turned to Laurence. ‘And I suppose you have another clever explanation you would like to feed me—’

‘Sir,’ Granby said, breaking in, ‘the fault was mine, for letting Iskierka run away with me—’

‘I imagine there is no shortage of blame to parcel out among you,’ Wellesley said cuttingly.

‘It is not Granby's fault at all!’ Iskierka said, overhearing. ‘He did not like to go, and I am sorry now to have disobeyed him, but I do not see why we must flap along after you like chickens, with no one to fight all day. If we are supposed to protect you, we would do much better if we were to find someone who meant to attack you, and simply kill them before they did. What I did was perfectly sensible, really, and it was just bad luck we got captured. And since it has all come right in the end, you haven't any cause to yell.’

‘Yes, I begin to see that your captain might be wholly innocent,’ Wellesley said, eyeing her. ‘Granby, is it?’

‘Yes, sir,’ Granby said, miserably.

‘The next time this creature disobeys you, you will cut her loose,’ Wellesley said. ‘You and your crew will be reassigned. As for her, I do not care if she goes in the breeding grounds or flies across the sea; if she won't follow orders, she is useless, and worse than useless when she induces others to risk good beasts after bad.’

‘Oh!’ Iskierka said, jetting a hissing cloud of steam. ‘Oh, I am not useless! I have taken more prizes than anybody. I can beat anyone who tries to fight me—’