They did. Tané stepped forward with the others and pressed her forehead to the floor again.
“Rise,” one of the dragons said.
The voice made the ground quake. It was so deep, so low, that Tané hardly understood at first.
The four of them obeyed and straightened their backs. The largest Seiikinese dragon lowered his head until he was at eye level with them. A long tongue lashed from between his teeth.
With a great push of his legs, he suddenly took flight. The apprentices all threw themselves to the ground, leaving only the Sea General standing. He let out a booming laugh.
The milky-green Lacustrine dragon displayed her teeth in a grin. Tané found herself locked in those wild eddies of eyes.
The dragon rose with the rest of her kin over the rooftops of the city. Water made flesh. As a mist of divine rain streamed from their scales, soaking the humans below, a Seiikinese male reared up, gathered his breath, and expelled it in a mighty gust of wind.
Every bell in the temple rang out in answer.
Niclays woke with a dry mouth and a fearsome headache, as he had a thousand times before. He blinked and rubbed a knuckle in the corner of his eye.
Bells.
That was what had woken him. He had been on this island for years, but never heard a single bell. Niclays grasped his cane and stood, his arm trembling with the effort.
It must be an alarm. They were coming for Sulyard, coming to arrest them both.
Niclays turned on the spot, desperate. His only chance was to pretend the man had hidden in the house without his knowledge.
He peered past the screen. Sulyard was sound asleep, facing the wall. Well, at least he would die in peace.
The sun was sweating too much light. Close to the little house where Niclays lived, his assistant, Muste, was sitting under the plum tree with his Seiikinese companion, Panaya.
“Muste,” Niclays shouted. “What in the world is that sound?”
Muste just waved. Cursing, Niclays jammed on his sandals and picked his way toward Muste and Panaya, trying to ignore the sense that he was walking to his doom.
“Good day to you, honorable Panaya,” he said in Seiikinese, bowing.
“Learnèd Niclays.” The corners of her eyes crinkled. She wore a light robe, white flowers on blue, the sleeves and collar embroidered in silver. “Did the bells wake you?”
“Yes. May I ask what they mean?”
“They are ringing for Choosing Day,” she said. “The eldest apprentices at the Houses of Learning have completed their studies, and have been placed into the ranks of the scholars or the High Sea Guard.”
Nothing to do with intruders, then. Niclays took out his handkerchief and mopped at his face.
“Are you well, Roos?” Muste asked, shading his eyes.
“You know how I loathe the summer here.” Niclays stuffed the handkerchief back into his jerkin. “Choosing Day takes place once a year, does it not?” he said to Panaya. “I have never once heard bells.”
Not bells, but he had heard the drums. The inebriating sounds of joy and revelry.
“Ah,” Panaya said, her smile growing, “but this is a very special Choosing Day.”
“It is?”
“Do you not know, Roos?” Muste chuckled. “You have been here longer than I have.”
“This is not something Niclays would have been told,” Panaya said gently. “You see, Niclays, it was agreed after the Great Sorrow that every fifty years, a number of Seiikinese dragons would take human riders, so we might always be prepared to fight together once again. Those who were chosen for the High Sea Guard this morning have been given this chance, and will now endure the water trials to decide which of them will be dragonriders.”
“I see,” Niclays said, interested enough to forget his terror about Sulyard for a moment. “And then they fly their steeds off to fight off pirates and smugglers, I presume.”
“Not steeds, Niclays. Dragons are not horses.”
“Apologies, honorable lady. A poor choice of word.”
Panaya nodded. Her hand strayed to the pendant around her neck, carved into the shape of a dragon.
Such a thing would be destroyed in Virtudom, where there was no longer any distinction between the ancient dragons of the East and the younger, fire-breathing wyrms that had once terrorized the world. Both were deemed malevolent. The door to the East had been closed for so long that misunderstanding about its customs had flourished.
Niclays had believed it before he had arrived in Orisima. He had been half-convinced, on the eve of his departure from Mentendon, that he was being exiled to a land where people were in thrall to creatures just as wicked as the Nameless One.
How frightened he had been that day. All Mentish children knew the story of the Nameless One from the moment they could fathom language. His own dear mother had relished scaring him to tears with her descriptions of the father and overking of all fire-breathing creatures—he who had emerged from the Dreadmount bent on chaos and destruction, only to be grievously wounded by Sir Galian Berethnet before he could subjugate humankind. A thousand years later, the specter of him still lived in all nightmares.
Just then, hooves thundered across the bridge into Orisima, jolting Niclays from his musings.
Soldiers.
His bowels turned to water. They were coming for him—and now the moment was at hand, he found himself light-headed rather than afraid. If today was the day, so be it. It was either this, or death at the hands of the sentinels for his gambling debts.
Saint, he prayed, let me not piss myself at the end.
The soldiers wore green tunics beneath their coats. Leading them, of course, was the Chief Officer—handsome, ever-so-good-natured Chief Officer, who refused to tell anyone in Orisima his name. He was a foot taller than Niclays and always wore full armor.
The Chief Officer dismounted and strode toward the house where Niclays lived. He was surrounded by his sentinels, and one hand rested on the hilt of his sword.
“Roos!” A gauntlet-covered fist rapped on the door. “Roos, open this door, or I will break it down!”
“There is no need to break anything, honored Chief Officer,” Muste called. “The learnèd Doctor Roos is here.”
The Chief Officer turned on his heel. His dark eyes flashed, and he walked toward them.
“Roos.”
Niclays liked to pretend that nobody had ever addressed him with such contempt, but that would be a lie. “You’re very welcome to call me Niclays, honored Chief Officer,” he said, with all the false cheer he could muster. “We’ve known each other long en—”
“Be quiet,” the Chief Officer snapped. Niclays shut his mouth. “My sentinels found the door to the landing gate open last night. A pirate ship was seen nearby. If any of you are hiding trespassers or smuggled goods, speak now, and the dragon may show mercy.”
Panaya and Muste said nothing. Niclays, meanwhile, did brief and violent battle with himself. There was nowhere for Sulyard to hide. Was it better to declare what he had done?
Before he could decide, the Chief Officer motioned to his sentinels. “Search the houses.”
Niclays held his breath.
There was a certain bird in Seiiki with a call like a babe beginning to wail. To Niclays, it had become a torturous symbol of his life in Orisima. The whimper that never quite turned into a scream. The wait for a blow that never came. As the sentinels rummaged through his house, that wretched bird took up its cry, and it was all Niclays could hear.