A Sending of Dragons by Jane Yolen Read Free Book Online Page A

nursery wisdom focused him. He nodded. “
At my signal,
” he reminded the dragons. “
Breathe fire and then at the next, drop down to me. All at once.
”
    He repeated the instructions twice. He felt sure that the drakk, with their wordless, dark minds, couldn’t understand the plan.
    Above them, dipping and rising against the first pale moon, the two circles continued their deadly dance. Thrust, retreat, thrust,
retreat. Below them, at the ridge, the second moon’s aura was just beginning to show. The drakk ring tightened like a noose. Guided by the dragon smell and the constant piping of the wounded Tri, the nearsighted monsters closed in.
    â€œWhen I count to three,” Jakkin said to Akki, “think about the hottest flames you can. It will help them concentrate, and flame is something they know instinctively. The moment the drakk move back, think—
drop!”
He handed Akki his knife and picked up the femur spear, which he’d left lying against the spikka.
    Akki held the knife before her and bit her lip.
    â€œOne . . .” Jakkin whispered aloud.
    Akki nodded.
    â€œTwo . . .” He could feel her tension.
    â€œThree. Fire!” Jakkin roared aloud and Akki screamed with him. They sent picture after picture of blazing firebombs and roaring flames, shouting and waving their arms about as an added distraction.
    In response, Sssargon trickled some smoke from his nose, enough to make the sky
around them hazy. But it was Sssasha, placid Sssasha, who suddenly flared out with a tongue of flame as long as a mature fighter’s. It licked at the face of the nearest drakk, which banked out of the circle, hissing wildly, and crashed onto the rocks below.
    Sssargon tried again. His smoke forced the nearest drakk to blink its near-dead white eyes and back away. Sssasha managed another fire flash. It raked the side of a drakk that had not been pushed back by the smoke. The drakk turned and the circle was broken.
    â€œNow drop!”
Akki and Jakkin screamed, their minds linking as one.
    The ring of dragons plummeted to the ground, frantically back-winging at the last moment so as not to crash and further injure the wounded Tri.
    No sooner had they dropped than Jakkin instructed them, “
Form a ring on the ground. Now—hindfoot rise.
” He sent the kind of controlled messages he’d used when guiding a fighting dragon in the pit. Only this was not for gold, but for life, so there was an added edge of fright in his sending.
    Sssargon understood at once and Sssasha
was not far behind. Even little Tri-ssskkette, the wounded one, tried to stand, front claws raised and waiting.
    For a moment Jakkin closed his eyes, remembering Heart’s Blood. He felt tears beginning in the comers of his eyes. Blinking them back, he forced himself to look, but his grip on the spear tightened.
    The lead drakk and the flame-racked second dived.
    Jakkin flashed out with the sharpened spear, catching the front drakk in the head above the eye. He did not pierce its hide, but he jarred it enough to disrupt its perfect dive and Sssasha ripped its neck open with her claws. Then she grabbed the drakk in her mouth and flung it with such force, it tumbled to the edge of the cliff.
    The second drakk banked sharply and winged away.
    The fallen drakk lay on its side, still except for the pulsing sensor organs on the underside of its wings. Its malevolent, blind snake eyes shuttered and unshuttered rapidly. Viscous blood oozed from its neck.
    Akki ran over to the cliff’s edge and
picked up an enormous rock. Holding it over her head, she walked purposefully to the drakk, ready to drop the stone on the dying beast. She bent over it and Jakkin ran up behind her and yanked her back.
    At that moment the drakk’s hind claws razored through the air just where Akki’s legs had been seconds before.
    â€œIt’s not dead!” she cried out in horror.
    â€œIt’s dead,”