Dragon and Phoenix by Joanne Bertin Page B

is, there’s nothing one lame Dragonlord can do to help five truedragons, do you hear? We’ll mindcall all the others—”
    Linden glowered at her, annoyed at the reminder of his injuries. It didn’t help that she was right, blast it all. But it irked him beyond belief to be helpless when—
    A distant flicker of motion beyond Maurynna’s shoulder caught his eye. For a moment he couldn’t believe what he saw; then, Idiot — who else would it be? he said to himself. He began laughing.
    Maurynna drew back a little as if she thought him mad and it was contagious. She did not, he noticed, let go of his tunic. “What,” she began, then looked over her shoulder.
    “Trust Lleld,” Linden said with a grin, “to be the first to get the news.”
     
    Maurynna watched, barely containing her burning anger as Linden awkwardly peeled off his tunic and presented his injured back for Lleld’s inspection. She should be the one doing this for him, not Lleld, not any other Dragonlord, not even any truedragon. Damn Kyrissaean for this latest insult.
    She winced in sympathy at the painful slowness of his movements. Gods, but he must have wrenched every muscle in his back and shoulders to be moving like that. And how did he do it? That he wouldn’t tell her did nothing to mend her ill temper or ease her throbbing head.
    Well and well, that must mean it was some pretty bit of idiocy he knew deserved a tongue-lashing. Or even a belaying pin to the side of the head, she thought sourly. Just as a reminder not to do whatever it was again.
    Whatever he did, he did it for you , part of her mind chided. She squirmed at the thought. Morlen must have mindcalled him .
    Lleld finished her inspection of the deep scrape down Linden’s back. That , she said, was stupid, Linden. You know better than to jump from there .
    So he’d told Lleld what he’d done and not her? Her sympathy took wings. Maurynna promised herself the pleasure of keelhauling Linden if she ever got him on board a ship.
    “Just get on with it, will you?” Linden growled over his shoulder.
    For the first time Maurynna heard a dragon laugh, a deep houf, houf, houf punctuated by tendrils of smoke from Lleld’s nostrils. Then Lleld opened her mouth; blue-green flames rushed over teeth like daggers and bathed Linden in their Healing fire.
    When she was done, Linden stretched. From his look of relief Maurynna
knew that the Healing had taken; there was not even a mark showing where the scrape had gouged the fair skin.
    I’m not a Dragonlord , Maurynna thought, blinking back sudden tears. Not really. All I have are the “little magics.” What good are heat spells and coldfire? So what if I can stick my hand in a roaring fire and not get burned? I can’t Change, I can’t fly, I can’t Heal my soultwin myself. If Lleld hadn’t come—
    She pushed to her feet. I’m nothing but a fraud.
    Morlen’s words came back to her; she shook her head in bitter disbelief. How could I, the least of the Dragonlords, the “little one,” be important to truedragons?
    Desperation overcame her. She bowed her head and willed herself to Change.
     
    Taren poured himself another goblet of the Pelnaran wine that Sirl had so thoughtfully left for him. If he’d known he’d have to face truedragons, he would have refused to leave Jehanglan! He gulped half the wine down.
    Yet it seemed his fears that they could “see” into a man’s soul were without cause. They had believed him just as the Dragonlords had, just as that fool boy had.
    Still, he’d best keep to his plan of isolating himself as much as possible. A blasted curse this illness might be, but exaggerating it gave him an excuse to play the hermit.
    A fit of shivering took him and he grimaced. Not that it was it all a sham; his blood was too thin now for these mountains. He took another sip and swore.
    What if the cursed truedragons did go to Jehanglan?
     
    Maurynna rode back down the mountain, sick and shaking. Instead of Changing,