Dragon Keeper: Volume One of the Rain Wilds Chronicles Anthology by Robin Hobb & Hobb Robin

Author:Robin Hobb & Hobb, Robin
Format: epub

Rain Wild 2 - Dragon Haven

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Mud and Wings

Towards midmorning, Tarman wedged and could go no farther. Leftrin was not surprised. He'd been expecting it to happen for some time. All of yesterday, Tarman's feet had been firmly planted on the bed of the slough. A few of the keepers had become seasick from the rocking motion that Tarman's walk contributed to his movement. As the day had progressed and the water grew ever shallower, Leftrin's concern had increased. He'd sounded the horn to call all of the small boats back to the barge, and then sent them out again in varying directions, in search of deeper water.

When they'd returned that evening, no one had good tidings to report. No detectible current, and the water seemed uniformly shallow in all directions. A straw dropped into the open water beside the boat did float away, but almost immediately got lost in the beds of standing reeds that had encroached ever closer, even as the bluish foothills remained ever distant against a grey backdrop of thick clouds.

The barge stopped of his own accord. For a time, Leftrin sensed the ship standing and thinking. Tarman groped towards him, perhaps seeking an idea that Leftrin didn't have. Then,

with a very small lurch, Tarman folded his legs and settled in the mud. The barge he had carried on his back floated slightly now. A wave of sadness and resignation flowed up Leftrin's chest and settled around his heart. They'd come to their stopping place. It wasn't Kelsingra.

'Cap?' This from Swarge at the tiller. It had been weeks since anyone had kept up the illusion that Tarman needed to be poled through the water. Tarman usually appreciated the humans' efforts to speed him along, but in water this shallow, the poling only threw him off stride.

'Take a break, Swarge,' Leftrin confirmed. He made a sound like a low growl in the back of his throat and gripped the bow rail tighter. He more felt than saw Alise coming down the deck to join him. When she reached his side, she halted and put her hands alongside his on the railing. Her eyes swept the scene before them.

There was no channel. Reeds, rushes and those plants that loved swamps surrounded them. The dragons were bright-scaled giants that moved through the wrong landscape. Even yesterday, the dragons had still ostensibly led the way. For most of this morning, they had moved more slowly and uncertainly. No one was comfortable about venturing deeper into this borderless wetland. Yet there was nowhere else to go. Except...

'Do we go back?' Alise asked softly.

Leftrin didn't reply. Two scarlet darning needles flew past them, their wings making a tiny whickering sound. They danced around a nearby bed of reeds before settling, one upon the other, on a seedhead. In the distance, he heard very faintly the cry of a hawk. He glanced up, but the overcast blocked even a glimpse of the sky. The dragons wandered disconsolately around the barge. He wondered what they were hunting.

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