Heart's Blood

  "Thanks for explaining that to me," Jakkin said. He rubbed the scar on his wrist, thinking. That description could fit a dozen different men. Slakk wasn't the most observant person.

  "When did she go?" he asked.

  "This morning, right after we were in the stud barn." Slakk put his head to one side and stared at Jakkin. "At least that's what Errikkin said."

  "Why didn't you tell me then?" Jakkin's voice trembled. "I could have stopped her." Though he wondered if she would have listened.

  "I didn't know then, Jakkin." Slakk turned away toward the door. "Errikkin told me later, as if it was a huge joke. Which I thought it was, at first." He said over his shoulder, "And after, when I knew it wasn't a joke, I couldn't find you." He stopped, his brow furrowing like the sands by the oasis after a rush of wind. "Where were you?"

  Jakkin didn't bother answering, because his head was filled with Akki's name. He cried silently, the sending going farther than any he'd ever tried. Out the door, past the incubarns where several sleeping dragons answered him back with a wail of color. Past the weir, over the sands.

  He couldn't believe she'd leave without telling him, without discussing it, without asking him to go along.

  Akki... Maybe it was a last-minute decision, because the truck was here. Maybe she tried to find him. Maybe it was because he'd said they didn't need to do anything, just keep the secret, which he'd only said at the time because he was angry with her. Well, not angry, exactly, but hurt. And now he truly believed it was the right thing to do: say nothing, do nothing. But she'd gone, anyway, without a word. And all the time, he'd been playing with Heart's Blood's brood while Akki was leaving in a truck. He cursed himself for being away then, out of sight, out of hearing, out of sending range.

  Akki... Maybe she left because he'd gone off into the oasis without telling her. Or maybe she resented the fact that he loved being back at the nursery, working with the dragons, while she had the more important and harder job of finding out how to save them all. Well, he could tell her now she didn't have to worry, didn't have to go. Could come home.

  Akki... The sending was a red arrow, bound about with gold ribbons, a burst of red fire as bright as dragon's gout, a spray of hot dragon's blood bleeding out of his brain. It traveled along the roadway, north to Krakkow and on past to the great city of The Rokk, which was probably where she was going. Akkiiiiiiiiiiiii.

  Anyone with dragon's ears could have heard it, the pain of it so sharp and true. But wherever Akki was, she was too far away to hear. Too far away to know how hurt he felt.

  And how betrayed.

  13

  AKKI'S ROOM, which she had shared with Vonikka and Larkki, was at the rear of the bondhouse. The others who inhabited the women's area of the bondhouse were Nakkie and Lakkina, who tended the nursery gardens, and of course little Terakkina, who had her own small room. Kkarina's own suite of rooms was nestled near the kitchen. The rest of the women were paired with men and stayed in other corridors.

  When Jakkin got to Akki's room, its door was ajar. He ducked in, looking around for some sign that Slakk had been mistaken. Or had lied. It was not beyond Slakk to lie for effect, or to elaborate on something he'd only half seen or heard. He'd even played a cruel joke or two in his time.

  Though the room was a mess of girl stuff—brushes, flower sachets, baubles, rings—it was empty of anything he could identify as Akki's. Hair comb, color bands she put around her braid, even the brush—all were gone. Jakkin remembered that she'd been wearing a gold band at breakfast. And gold was her happy color.

  Happy because she was already planning to go? He felt a sudden heaviness in his belly, as if a stone lodged there. But when could she have made plans? We've been back less than a week. She said nothing to me about plans to leave.

  Jakkin left the room and went down the corridor, slipped through the door and into the men's wing of the bondhouse. He headed directly to the room he shared with the boys.

  As Slakk had said, Errikkin was in his bunk, face to the wall, under a blanket, pretending to sleep. But Jakkin could tell that his breathing was irregular, not slow and even, every third breath held, as if expecting a blow.

  "So you're not going to help out on the drakk hunt?" Jakkin tried to keep his voice calm, but failed.

  Errikkin didn't stir, though his breathing began to speed up.

  Still furious about Akki's betrayal, Jakkin grabbed the blanket and ripped it off Errikkin. "What's wrong with you? Why are you acting this way? I thought we were friends." The stone in his belly seemed to jump, and he felt a sharp pain in his chest as if the stone now lodged in his heart.

  With slow reluctance, Errikkin turned over. His usually handsome face was blanched and ugly with rage. He said with slow deliberation, "We were friends a year ago. A year. I thought you were dead. We had a funeral for you. I mourned. I missed you. I got over it."

  "You led the wardens right to us, Errikkin. You mourned because you felt guilty. That's hardly my fault. I forgave you long ago. I got over that!"

  But Errikkin refused to hear him, saying instead in a low, steady voice, "You chose Akki over me."

  "That's not fair..." Jakkin began. But true, he thought. And why would I ever have chosen you?

  Errikkin turned back, saying in a voice so low Jakkin almost missed it, "Besides, they don't need me for hunting drakks. Not right now, anyway. The hunt can't start till tomorrow."

  All right—act that way. Jakkin threw the bunched blanket back onto the bed at Errikkin's feet. We'll never speak of that old, dead friendship again. He kept his voice equally low and deliberate. "Some of us will be in the incubarn tonight. Keeping watch. Why not come out there?"

  Errikkin didn't move. He'd already turned his back on Jakkin, on the room, on the conversation. "I hope you get a good night's sleep out there among the fewmetty dragons and their stink. I'll make do with a real bed."

  Stunned by Errikkin's tone, Jakkin gathered up his own bedclothes in one great swoop and hung them around his neck. As he left the room, Errikkin's final words kept resounding in his head. What had he meant? Did he so hate dragons? Or the nursery folk?

  Or just me?

  ***

  THE DINING HALL was empty, so Jakkin grabbed a set of leathers and a stinger from the table. He walked quickly out the bondhouse door, and raced through the growing Dark-After. The night was already black, and the cold ran across his body in rivers. Though that didn't bother him, Jakkin didn't dare take his time getting to the incubarn. He had to act as if the cold were brutal and likely fatal if he didn't move fast enough.

  The door of the barn had stiffened in the cold, but at last he managed to open it a crack, and while it squalled its protest, he slipped inside. Once again, the heat of the place hit him like a fist.

  "Lucky you didn't freeze out there," young Arakk commented, closing the door after Jakkin with a shove of his shoulder.

  "Dark-After's only just starting," Jakkin pointed out. "And I had enough blankets and stuff around me to keep me warm for that short dash."

  "Yeah—that much cold would make me run fast, too," Arakk said, laughing.

  His sunny response made Jakkin smile. Then he walked down to the end of the incubarn, where he peered into Auricle's stall.

  "Hello, thou pretty girl," he whispered once he was inside, sending her a shower of gold circles. But halfway down, the shower turned blue, looking more like teardrops. The dragon looked up with her unreadable black eyes.

  Glancing around quickly, Jakkin noticed that something was wrong. It took him a moment to realize that the hatchling was gone. He dumped his bedding in the stall. Going over to Auricle, he put a hand on either side of her great head and looked into the black shrouds of her eyes.

  "Where is thy hatchling?" he asked, though the hatchling was only hers by adoption.

  She sent him a picture of a hand cradling the hatchling. A hand with a gold band around the wrist.

  Akki.

  "Akki has the hatchling?"

  Auricl
e crowded him, licking his cheek. Her rough tongue nearly took the skin off. She sent him the same picture: hand, gold band, hatchling.

  Why would she take the hatchling?

  Once again he felt cold. Not the cold of outside, but a different, duller, aching cold. As if the place that had been home was suddenly something else. And the person he'd loved more than anyone had turned into a stranger. She'd only take the hatchling if she's not planning to come back.

  "I'll stay here with thee tonight, girl," Jakkin told the dragon. "After I find out the men's plans. When I return, you and I will talk."

  As he left the stall, Auricle's sending answered him. It was a soft picture of Akki's face, her long dark hair wrapping her like a shawl. "Girl safe. Boy safe. Dragon safe."

  Safe? He didn't answer. He didn't know what to say.

  ***

  THE OTHERS were in the main room of the barn, where buyers were taken while awaiting a tour of the latest hatchlings. The visitors' room was the one comfortable place in the incubarn, with soft chairs and a three-person sofa covered in multicolored eggskin.

  A window overlooked the courtyard and Jakkin saw in one quick glance that Dark-After had settled in for the night, spreading itself into every niche and nook and cavity, like old Kkarina in a chair. Balakk was just closing the heavy wooden shutters to help keep out the cold.

  In front of the window, arms on his hips, staring out with anger at the blackness, stood Likkarn. Around him, sprawled on the chairs, sofas, floor, the boys and men of Sarkkhan's Nursery seemed uneasy as they awaited their instructions. No women—not even Vonikka and Larkki—had been allowed in the hunt. Too dangerous, Jakkin supposed, though no more dangerous than all that Akki has been through.

  Jakkin's entrance into the room stirred them all into action. Some got up, some simply stretched. Balakk began to speak to Arakk, who listened with quiet intensity.

  But Likkarn stopped them all simply by turning around and holding up his right hand. Sudden silence filled the overheated room.

  "How many have gone on a drakk hunt before?" Likkarn asked.

  Jakkin understood that Likkarn asked the question simply to focus everyone's attention on him. He already knew the answer, as they all did.

  Several hands went up. Jakkin slowly raised his own. He remembered that one drakk hunt all too well. How frightened he'd been, sweating out his fear into his leathers. But that fright was long over and what was left to him was an instinctive hatred of drakks.

  "Good," Likkarn said. "We will need you on the actual hunt. But tonight..."

  Tonight we have to guard the barn, with its new crop of hatchlings. All of the men would be needed for tonight. Jakkin thought angrily of Errikkin tucked up comfortably in his bed. Looking around, Jakkin realized that every other man and boy from the nursery was here. Surely Likkarn would note Errikkin's absence and say something in the morning. But tonight—tonight they were one guard short and that might make all the difference.

  Balakk gave out the masks first. "Snap these on to your jerkins. The smell of a drakk—especially a dead drakk—can be overpowering. Don't be embarrassed to use the masks. Trust me. Strong men have passed out from the stink, especially in an enclosed space."

  A small ripple of laughter ran around the room, and Kkitakk said, "You weren't all that strong, my friend."

  "I am now," Balakk answered.

  Laughter once again rippled around the room, only this time the men looked pointedly at Balakk, who began to blush.

  "I was a boy! A boy!" he protested.

  Likkarn raised his hand again. "Take the masks." It was the end of the laughter.

  Having already had a run-in with the stench of a dead drakk outdoors, Jakkin was not eager to be in a closed room with one, so he took the proffered mask eagerly.

  Then Balakk handed them each a long knife with a straight blade and bone handle. "We don't dare use extinguishers—that's sting-guns for you new boys—within the barn for fear of setting the straw bedding on fire.

  "Or hitting a hatchling—or a dragon," Balakk added.

  "Or each other," Kkitakk remarked.

  Frankkalin laughed. "There speaks the worst shot in the nursery."

  "Not any worse than you!"

  "How many times did you hit the tree instead of the drakk?"

  They were referring to drakk hunts long past, so Jakkin snuggled down on the floor, his back against the sofa.

  "More importantly," Balakk added, "we have to save the power packs as much as we can. With this fewmetty embargo, it may be years before we get any new ones." He paused. "If ever." His face was no longer blushing and almost seemed to light up with the thought. Like Slakk, he reveled in bad news.

  Nodding, Likkarn told them, "We're working on finding new ways to recharge the packs, as is every nursery crew on the planet. There is a building in The Rokk dedicated to the work. What scientists we still have get shipped there."

  Akki ... Jakkin felt cold. So he's sent Akki there. Without asking me. Without telling me. Without... But if true, it meant she hadn't gone on her own. It was all Likkarn's fault. He should have guessed.

  "But for now, we use the knives," Likkarn finished.

  Balakk added, "In small spaces they're best, anyway."

  Everyone agreed.

  But Jakkin was thinking, Extinguishers. Stingers. It would be a hardship indeed when they could no longer use them against the drakks. Maybe Likkarn was right to send Akki to The Rokk. Knives meant close work. With a stinger, a man would be outside the reach of a drakk's sharp talons. And if Akki is with other scientists, maybe it will be easier to... He wiped the thought from his head. Without Akki, nothing is easier.

  Slakk raised a hand. "Do we work in pairs?"

  "We do." Likkarn took a roster from his vest and showed it around. Though few of them could actually read, Jakkin could. He found his own name even before Likkarn said, "Slakk—you and Jakkin are in the back stalls, with the new dragon, Auricle, and her hatchling. Be especially watchful there. Things aren't as tight in the rear of the building. There might be some holes. Jakkin did well on our last drakk hunt. Slakk, follow his lead."

  Jakkin could hardly believe his ears. A compliment from Likkarn! And then he realized that Likkarn thought the hatchling was still in Auricle's stall. But if he sent Akki to The Rokk, he would know about the little dragon. Confused, he put it down to forgetfulness on Likkarn's part. After all, the old man was surely in his fifties already.

  He glanced over at Slakk who was steadily gazing at the floor. He wondered if Slakk considered being on guard with him a good thing, or a bad one. Slakk always managed to get out of the hard jobs, and his partners always had to do twice the work. Not like Akki, who always did more than her share.

  Not like Akki...

  He turned back. Likkarn was still speaking.

  "...do some work several months ago," Likkarn was saying, "where a dragon—it was that scamp, Bloody Mess—who had scraped away a hole, going after some wort growing outside. There may be areas we've missed." He handed out small leather bags to everyone. Jakkin recognized them—they were old bond bags. His hand went automatically to his chest.

  "Use the nails in these bags if you find any loose boards," Likkarn said. "Hammer them in with the handle of your knife.

  "Balakk," Likkarn continued, his voice tightly controlled, "you take Arakk and Frankkalin and Kkitakk, here, and the four of you patrol the new hatchling area, sleeping two on and two off."

  They nodded.

  "Atkkin, Tolekk, Trikko, you stay here with me. The rest of you will be with the broodless hens. In pairs." He read them off by twos.

  Likkarn probably ordered Akki into the truck with that same sharp tone. Jakkin gritted his teeth. Even though she wanted to find me to say good-bye. He stopped, ran his hand through his hair, thought again. But then he would have seen the hatchling in her arms. No, that didn't make any sense. Maybe he was wrong. Or partially wrong.

  Still, Akki could have sent him a farewell, with roses a
nd blue skies and balloons and ... She could have sent something and she hadn't. Why?

  His heart was thudding again. Why?

  Everyone stood, and Arakk was already at the door into the corridor when Likkarn growled, "Wait!"

  Everyone waited.

  "Remember to come at drakks from behind." He paused. "Never assume a drakk is dead." He put a finger to the side of his nose, his face grim.

  Balakk interrupted. "Knew a man once, who..."

  Laughing, Arakk finished for him, in a fair imitation of his drawl, "...had his leg nearly took off by a drakk he thought a goner." His hand smacked his leg above the knee. His moon face seemed to split in two as he grinned at everyone.

  They all laughed then, even Balakk, whose normally dour face was almost handsome when he smiled.

  Angry as he was at Likkarn, at Akki, at himself, Jakkin laughed, too. The laughter went a long way toward breaking the tension in the room. Then each man and boy trotted off to his appointed place.

  ***

  AURICLE WAS SNORING, a deep frothy sound, when Jakkin and Slakk reached her.

  "Maybe we should check the empty stalls first," Jakkin said.

  "There are five," Slakk pointed out.

  "Two for you, three for me." Jakkin spoke before Slakk could complain. "And I'll do Auricle's as well." Anything to keep his mind off Akki's desertion with the hatchling. And Likkarn's complicity in sending her off. And Errikkin's dismissal of their friendship. And the difficulty of working with Slakk. And most of all, the possibility of finding a drakk. "Then I'll take first watch. Of course, if Errikkin were here..."

  Without a change of expression, Slakk said, "We'd have had to babysit him. Best he stays away." Then he nodded at Jakkin and set off toward the two left-hand stalls.

  "Of course," Jakkin muttered to himself, "Slakk would take the smallest ones." He turned into the stall closest to Auricle's and started his search.

  Crawling along the base of the stall and looking especially at the outside wall, he tapped the boards with the handle of his big knife. The boards seemed solid and snugged right down into the ground. There was not even a whisper of air coming through them, nor the cold of Dark-After sneaking in.