Robin McKinley - Fire - Tales of Elemental Spirits

Eled still just looked like Eled, but I thought it was costing him. And Fistagh was looking rather too well, as if he was under a small glamour, which I think he was. He had a funny half smell about him that I recognised from Ralas. I did wonder if it was legal, which I doubted, but even if I’d ratted him out it wouldn’t have given Hereyta a third eye.

Fistagh had a girl with him. She was extremely pretty, and they both knew it. One other First Flighter, Vorl, had someone who had to be his brother with him, they looked so much alike, but Vorl’s brother wasn’t small and scrawny except for his ears and feet, nor was he accompanied by a demented foogit.

When Dag stood up with the others I grabbed Sippy’s topknot and looked uncertainly at Dag.

ʺYou don’t have to come if you don’t want to,ʺ Dag said in this awful flat voice that didn’t sound anything like him. ʺIt’s okay.ʺ

I shook my head violently. ʺIt’s not that—you must know it’s not that. It’s okay with me if you want Sippy and me to stay out of the way and not, you know, not embarrass you. I can go back up to the room and sit—sit on Sippy—till—till—ʺ

ʺTill it’s all over?ʺ said Dag. ʺYes. Well, if it’s really all the same to you, I’d actually rather you came.ʺ He turned away, not checking to see if we were following. Of course we were. I let go of Sippy’s topknot but he stayed right beside me, nearly as glued to my leg as Fistagh’s girl was to his side.

The First Flighters drew lots for the order they filed out of the hsa. We were near the last. It gave us plenty of extra time to adjust, readjust, de-adjust, and super-adjust every scrap of Hereyta’s harness six times. Maybe sixteen. I say ʺusʺ but it was mostly Dag. He knew where the bits went and I still only sort of knew. The tip of Hereyta’s nose followed Dag’s every tiny motion, back and forth, up and down, round and round. She did this a lot anyway but this morning the nose-tip was about a hand’s-breadth away from the back of his neck.

I was watching Dag and didn’t really think about what I was doing so I started petting one of Hereyta’s ankles. I was reassuring me, not her, but when I stopped Hereyta’s nose left the nape of Dag’s neck just long enough to point at me. I started petting again. The nose went back to Dag. Sippy, like we were a pair of bad comedians, was licking the side of her other foot. He couldn’t reach her ankle.

It was our turn—Hereyta and Dag’s turn—finally. I wondered how many times Hereyta had made a First Flight. Maybe never, because I think she hadn’t been an Academy training dragon till after she lost her eye. Why had she been waiting for us last night after curfew? I trotted behind Dag and Sippy trotted behind me.

I’d never counted the First Flighters. There were probably about twenty; Academy classes are small. But twenty dragons look like they go on forever. I couldn’t even recognise the dragons at the far end of the queue. Unfortunately Fistagh was about halfway along and I could recognise him and his yellow-gold dragon. She was beautiful too; I might as well get used to it that all dragons are beautiful. I couldn’t see Eled or Doara. Setyep and Arac were two behind Fistagh, so like only the distance between one end of my village and the other from us. There were only three more dragons and riders after us.

I was just noticing that Fistagh’s girl was in the saddle with him when Dag said, ʺUp you go.ʺ He’d unrolled the double belt that the dragonrider uses to tie himself in place in case of unexpected acrobatics or vertigo (also the Firespace is just so strange, Eled had told me, that you can get numb or breathless as well as dizzy: lots of ways to lose it and fall off), which doubles as a mounting ladder, since it has rungs between the two long bands. It’s an awkward climb because the rungs are made of the same soft tough cloth that the belts are and you worry about grinding your toes into your dragon’s side, but on formal occasions you use the ladder.

I gaped at Dag.

ʺTuck Sippy under your arm; I’ll be right behind you and I’ll give him or you a shove if he looks like he’s slipping.ʺ I’d only been up and down the mounting ladder once—and unhindered by a foogit passenger—most of the time you either climb the dragon as you can, or ask for the head to come down and lift you up somewhere. Dimly I was thinking, Dag let me climb the ladder that once just because he knew I was interested in anything to do with dragons.

ʺCome on,ʺ Dag said impatiently. ʺStad is halfway up already.ʺ Stad was next behind us in the queue. I climbed.

Sippy, who was really not himself this morning, hung like a package over my arm, and while my shoulder was coming out of its socket—and my other arm and side were fiery from strain—by the time I got to Hereyta’s saddle, we did both get there. ʺPush up forward,ʺ Dag said, ʺI’m coming in behind you.ʺ Hereyta’s saddle was bigger than usual because she was bigger than usual, so there was plenty of space, and I now noticed that Dag must have been doing some secret alterations because the bumps and bulges for both padding and helping keep the rider in place had been rearranged for two. Or three. I had thought Dag had been spending a lot of time ripping out bits of the saddle and sewing them back together, but I’d thought it was general reflex obsessiveness. But Dag had been planning for us to come with him. Why? When had he decided? Why? Ralas had only said take us back to the Academy with him.

I settled Sippy in front of me so he could look out over the pommel. Dag dropped a loop of the ladder-belt over me. I stuck my arms through a couple of the rungs and snugged Sippy down with another.

ʺComfy?ʺ said Dag.

I would have liked to say no but I wasn’t sure if truth disguised as humour was a good idea right now so I said thanks instead. I was feeling so stunned and flabbergasted and appalled I wasn’t feeling anything really. Dag grunted. Maybe he thought that truth disguised as humour wouldn’t be a good idea either.

The three dragons after us were all mounted and their riders tied in too. I couldn’t see Vorl so I couldn’t see if his brother was riding with him. Fistagh’s girl was behind him.

My heart was beating so hard I thought I was going to throw up. The Academy officers were making a long queue in front of the dragon queue. Dag had told me they read out a lot of historical stuff that probably nobody ever heard except maybe some of the onlookers. Onlookers. I’d forgotten. Some First Flighters’ families, the ones who either lived nearby or were wealthy enough to make journeys that weren’t about buying or selling anything, came to watch. I looked around. There was a rope fence that wasn’t usually there at the edge of the field. There were probably a hundred people behind it, but they were scattered in little clumps behind the dragon they were interested in. The officers were now bellowing something at us. There was one almost right in front of us and one more near the end of the queue and then five or six stretched out along in the other direction, and they were reading just not in unison enough that it made it impossible to hear what they were saying. I could hear words like honour and heroic and stalwart flying over my head.

I couldn’t think of anywhere I belonged less. Sippy was actually shivering. I put my arms around him. We’d heat up in the Firespace, I thought.

Except we weren’t going to the Firespace. How could I have forgotten? Hereyta had only two eyes. I still didn’t know why Dag wanted us to come with him, but he must have thought it would make it easier somehow, in spite of our extra weight for Hereyta’s weak wing. I had a really ignoble moment when I thought that Dag might have brought us because we were foolish and ridiculous and maybe that would make it our fault somehow when Hereyta couldn’t Fly with the other dragons. But I realised immediately what a really rotten thing that was to think, and I knew it wasn’t true. Maybe it was because Hereyta liked us. She played with Sippy and when I’d stopped petting her ankle she’d noticed. Maybe Dag thought it would be better for her to have three friends with her rather than only one. I wasn’t sure he was right. Dragons are very proud.