Dragonsblood by Todd McCaffrey

Author:Todd McCaffrey
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science fiction
Published: 2010-11-06T00:00:00+00:00

“Come down and join the celebration,” Emorra called to the drummers on the tower.

“We can’t, we’re on duty.”

“Suit yourselves, then,” she called back to them. She was drunk and she knew it. She hadn’t been drunk in—she couldn’t remember how long. She must have been drunk once before, or she wouldn’t have recognized it now.

She turned back to the College, watching her feet to keep from stumbling. Then she glanced over her shoulder at the tower behind her, realizing that the voice that had answered her wasn’t Tieran’s. Where was he? She hadn’t seen him for a while. Emorra pursed her lips, wondering exactly why she cared.

The celebrants in the courtyard of the College had dispersed, some going back to their rooms and others settling down for quieter revelries right there. Emorra startled when her ears picked out Tieran’s voice. He was in one of the classrooms. She headed toward it.

Partway there, Emorra paused. She heard a woman’s voice talking to him. Well, maybe I should leave them alone, she thought sadly to herself. The voice spoke again, passionately, and Emorra recognized it.

She charged into the room, yelling, “Just what do you think you’re doing? You’re old enough to be his grandmother!”

Her agitation took her all the way into the room. Tieran was seated at one of the tables. No one was seated in his lap. No one was muttering sweet nothings into his ear.

Instead, Wind Blossom was in front of the chalkboard, scribbling genetic coding sequences on it. Of course, Emorra thought to herself with slowly dawning comprehension, I’ve never heard her use that tone unless she was talking genetics.

Tieran and Wind Blossom were startled by her bold entrance. Wind Blossom recovered more quickly, giving her daughter an inscrutable—even to Emorra—look. Tieran just looked puzzled. The brown fire-lizard had leapt into the air, but did not go between.

“I was explaining the sequencing differences between the dragons and the fire-lizards,” Wind Blossom told her daughter calmly. After a pause, she added with only the slightest hint of a purr in her voice, “Were you enjoying the end of Pass festivities?”

Emorra thought that over before responding. “I’m drunk,” she declared.

“So I had gathered,” Wind Blossom said frostily.

“What’s it like?” Tieran asked, eyes wide with interest. “I’ve never been drunk,” he admitted. Hastily, he added, “Yet.”

“I think it’ll hurt in the morning,” Emorra admitted, her face still red. Why in the world would I ever have thought that my mother and Tieran were . . . ardent about anything, Emorra berated herself. “Why worry about the sequencing?” she asked, trying to sound normal.

“We’re looking for common immune system limitations,” Tieran explained.

Emorra blinked, thinking. “The infection?”

“I was hoping we could prove that it couldn’t cross to dragons,” Tieran said.

Emorra cocked her head, questioningly.

“We are still working on it,” Wind Blossom added pointedly.

“It’s the end of the Pass—haven’t you got anything better to do?” Emorra blurted. “Alcohol blunts inhibitions and slows reasoning,” she remembered as her brain processed the words her mouth had just uttered.

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