‘Oh, I know that one, he was at the siege of Danzig,’ Temeraire said. ‘I do not think he was so very clever, he did not make a big push to have us out, not until Lien came and took charge of everything. Where is our army?’

‘All fallen back about London,’ Minnow said. ‘Everyone says there is going to be a big battle there, in a couple of weeks perhaps.’

‘Then there is not a moment to lose,’ Temeraire said.

They passed the word for a council meeting, and everyone came promptly: the other big dragons considerably more respectful now, even if Ballista still was patronizing, ‘You are upset, of course, and no wonder; but I am sure if you tell them you would like another captain—’

‘No,’ Temeraire said, the resonance making his whole body tremble, and looked away, while everyone fell quiet. After a moment he was able to continue. ‘I am not going to take another captain,’ he said, ‘and a stranger; I do not need a handler as if I were one of Lloyd's cows. I can fight on my own, and so can any of you.’

‘But what is there to fight for?’ Requiescat said. ‘If the French win, they aren't going to give us any bother, it will only mean someone else taking eggs; they'll be just as careful.’

There was a murmur of agreement, and Moncey added, a little plaintively, ‘And I thought you were always on about how unfair the Admiralty are, not letting us have any liberty.’

‘I do not mean to speak for the Government,’ Temeraire said. ‘But this country is our territory as much as it is any man's; it belongs to us all together, and if we simply sit here eating cows while Napoleon tries to take it away, we have no right to complain of anything.’

‘Well, what is there to complain of, then?’ Requiescat said. ‘We have everything as we like it.’

‘So you will quarrel over a wet unpleasant cave, but you will not fight to sleep in a pavilion, which is never wet or cold, even in winter?’ Temeraire said, scornfully. ‘You only think you have things as you like them to be, because you have never seen anything better, and that is because you have spent all of your lives penned up here or in coverts.’

When he had described pavilions for them a little more, and the dragon-city in Africa, he added, ‘And in Yutien, there were dragons who were employed as merchants. All of them had heaps of jewels – only tin and glass, Laurence said, but they were very pretty anyway; and in Africa they had gold enough to put it on all of their crew members.’ There were not many dragons present who did not sigh at least a little; those who wore their small treasures looked at them, and many of the unadorned looked at them, wistfully.

‘It all sounds a lot of gimcrackery to me,’ Requiescat said.