Dragon Spear by Jessica Day George Read Free Book Online Page A

Prince.”
    He bobbed up and down, displaying that strange tic we had noticed before. There was a bulky canvas sack hanging from his neck.
    “I didn’t think you had herding duty today,” Shardas said.
    “Oh, yes, I, er, volunteered. Miral was not feeling, er, well.” More bobbing.
    “Sorry to have made your charges faint,” Shardas told him.
    Darrym looked around in surprise, just now seeing the goats all lying about stiff. His tail came around and prodded one, which rolled over and began to snore, apparently over its initial terror.
    “Do they do this often?” Darrym appeared mystified.
    “Have you never had this duty before?” Shardas’s voice had a slight edge to it now.
    “I don’t believe so.” Darrym took off the sack and stashed it behind some rocks. With distaste he began to poke at more of the goats. Some of them leaped up and ran off, while others made themselves more comfortable and went to sleep.
    “We shall leave you to it, then,” Shardas said.
    Luka and I scrambled back onto his neck, and the king of the dragons leaped into the air without so much as a goodbye for Darrym and his herd of strange charges. I thought this just a bit rude of Shardas, even considering Darrym’s odd behavior. I said so as diplomatically as I could once we had returned to the gardens where we had left Hagen.
    “He is rather grating on my nerves,” Shardas admitted. “He seems to think himself above work of any kind, and I often catch him standing on the path near my cave for no reason.”
    “I wonder what was in that bag?” Luka said.
    “I’m sure he was sitting on one of the cliff ledges, eating or reading and ignoring the goats,” Shardas said, his voice dismissive. “And didn’t want us to know.”
    “I suppose,” Luka said, but he sounded doubtful.
    I was doubtful as well. Darrym hadn’t seen us until after he’d come up over the cliff lip, and there was no reason why someone assigned to sit and watch the goats all day couldn’t be reading or eating while they did so. I wanted very much to know what was in that bag.
    “You have to try some of this,” Hagen said, running up to us with Roginet at his heels. Hagen thrust a bizarre, spiky fruit into my hands. “It grows wild here, and I’ve never tasted anything like it.”
    We all cut off sections of the fruit, which was shockingly tart but delicious, and then it was time to join Velika on the beach for supper. Soon, gorged on roasted pork and honey melons, I forgot all about Darrym.

The Palace of the Dragon King
    A nd I will take Creel to our cave and show her some of your glass,” Velika said.
    “And then you should rest,” Shardas reminded her.
    “I will rest,” she agreed.
    We had been down at the beach most of the day, watching Shardas blow glass. Feniul and Ria had joined us, along with their hatchlings and various dogs, and we had watched the dragonlets and their pets run races and play in the water until they were all exhausted and lying in a heap in the shade of a giant palm tree.
    The rest of us talked about the different animals that lived on the islands and how often the dragons could hope to export some of them—like the noisy birds—in exchange for the things they couldn’t get here. Luka liked Shardas’s story of having found the birds in the water after a storm had blown them from wherever their home might be, but Velika and I argued that there were only so many times that story could be used before people grew suspicious.
    But now we were all feeling drowsy, and Shardas was urging his mate to return to their cave and have a nap. I had chimed in that I still hadn’t seen their home, and would accompany her.
    “I need to work on my gown anyway,” I said. “I’ll run by the hut and get it, and meet you farther up the path.”
    Velika moved so slowly that I didn’t have to run at all to reach my little stone hut, gather up the basket with my wedding gown and sewing things, and meet her halfway to their home. She looked