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The spikka trees lining the road seemed to bounce past them. By the time they
came to the main highway, the sun had already poked its head over the rim of
the mountains.
Jakkin had been on nine trips to Krakkow with Sarklchan and with Likkam. Each
time but one he d chosen to stay in the underpit stall with his dragon instead
of visiting the city. That one time he d been unnerved by the sour smells, the
loud noises, the constant edginess of the people in the streets. But The
Rokk was a masters city, unlike Krakkow, which had been built by convicts. He
was sure it would be grander and cleaner and quieter, built as it was with
offworld materials rather than just the sand and stone of Austar. Despite his
lingering worries about Akki, he was excited and eager to go.
The trip to Krakkow was relatively short. Jakkin knew that road intimately.
The raised pavement, always in danger of being buried by the drifting rosy
desert sands, was clear this time because of a strong northern wind. Along the
way there was only one major stand of trees, the Krakkow Copse, though smaller
forty-tree copses dotted the landscape. Occasionally the Narrakka River could
be glimpsed: a dark ribbon stretched parallel to the road and contained within
high, nearly vertical sand cliffs.
To the north Jakkin could see the mountains, spiky, brooding shadows that
seemed to be hunched over like mammoth drakk awaiting weary travelers. The
foothills, too, were forbidding and honeycombed with unexplored caves. Wild
dragons nested in the mountains, and drakk often patrolled the night skies.
Tame as the flatlands were after two hundred years of human habitation, the
mountain strongholds were not.
Jakkin s father had died at the foot of those same mountains, killed by a
gigantic feral dragon, an escapee from a nursery that had lived many years in
the wild. Jakkin gave an involuntary shudder as he looked at the near hills.
He closed his eyes. The jagged mountains formed dark impressions on his lids.
The truck rolled on, and Jakkin fought the urge to sleep. He had wanted to see
every inch of the road between Krakkow and The Rokk, but most of it was
depressingly the same. By mid-morning the sameness of the landscape had lulled
him into a half stupor. Evidently the road had the same effect on
Sarkkhan. He pulled the truck to the side of the road, stopped, and got out.
Jakkin woke abruptly.
Walk it off, boy, Sarkkhan called in to him.
Jakkin got out and walked over to the nursery owner. Sarkkhan opened a small
covered crock, lifted it to his lips, drank. Then he passed it to Jakkin.
The crock contained takk, and it was still hot. It burned down Jakkin s
throat. He opened his mouth and roared like a blooded dragon.
Roar again, hatchling! Sarkkhan said with a laugh. He clapped Jakkin on the
back, capped the crock, and gestured at the truck. Ah, boy, you remind me of
myself on my first trip to a Major-scared, happy, half-dreaming, half-awake.
In we go.
The walk and the takk had done their work. The soporific desert lost its claim
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on Jakkin, and he listened contentedly the rest of the morning as Sarkkhan
held forth on matters of the farm. By afternoon Jakkin had made it a
conversation, speaking of the hatching and the thrill of holding the
cream-colored dragons in his hand. But he kept the secret of the blood sharing
to himself.
I bet you ll have some special fighting material in those five, Sarkkhan
said. Maybe you ll get away with no culls at all. That would be rare, but it
does happen. Never happened to me, though. I always had some keepers, some
sales, some culls.
The culling. Jakkin had pushed that thought out of his mind. To buy off
Effikkin s bond he d have to choose one of Heart s Blood s hatchlings to sell.
He wondered if he could do it: forcibly separate the hatchling from its hen
and listen to it scream as it was carted off& : Have you ever come across one
of the dragons you sold?
Went up against two of them at Minors. Even lost to one once.
He laughed. You lose track after a while, though. But every now and then I
wonder what s become of them. Of course, when another owner says to you that
he just beat you with a worm you sold him&
well, it makes you mad. I nearly drowned myself in drink the night that
happened. Likkam had to wring me out and drag me back. He said I d torn up two
stewbars, claiming to be Fewmets Ferkkin! I told him
I could remember breaking up one. He laughed again and slapped his hand on
the wheel. I always wonder if I ve lost something good in the culling. Bad
days, culling. Especially when the stewmen come.
Jakkin shivered. He couldn t imagine sending any of Heart s Blood s hatchlings
to the Stews. Young as they were, sweet as the meat would be, they were
already individuals to him. He knew their minds. There was no way he could
ship any of them to their deaths. But maybe he could manage to sell one to
another owner to raise as a fighter or a stud or a hen. After all, a bonder s
life was surely worth a dragon.
How-how can you stand it? he asked at last.
For a moment Sarkkhan said nothing. Then he shrugged. You just do it, he
said. If you didn t, the farm would be overrun with bad bloodlines and weak
stock, and that wouldn t be good for business. But
I ll give you a hint.
A hint?
Something Likkam said to me when I was your age and tomantically inclined:
Don t listen in too much to hatchling sendings, and don t name any of them
until after culling day. It helps.
They rode a way in silence, and Jakkin thought about Sarkkhan s hint. It had
come too late for him. He already knew each hatchlings mind. And even if it
meant keeping Effikkin on or manumitting him instead, Jakkin realized he
couldn t sell any of the hatchlings. They didn t belong to him. They were
Heart s
Blood s children. You didn t sell a child.
chapter 21
As IF BY unspoken agreement, they changed the subject. They discussed the
fight to come and
S Blood s chances. Then they started rating the other dragons in the nursery.
Sarkkhan mentioned Heart
Breaker and Blood Spoor as dragons to watch, and Jakkin agreed. They talked of
the price of wort and where the best weed seeds could be bought. While
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