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 Hey, Akki whispered back,  that s my line!
: Then we ll choose together.
 All right, Akki said.  We ll go&  Her mouth shut but her mind spiraled down
and down and down into the unknown dark.
chapter 14
WITH THEIR MINDS made up, Akki and Jakkin began to plan, and their voices
criss-crossed the echoing cave.
 We need to wake up baby here, said Akki.
 I don t like calling her baby here, Jakkin said.  She should have a name.
 I thought I was the one who named things, Akki said, smiling.  You re
always teasing me about it.
 Maybe I m changing, Jakkin said.
 Maybe you re growing up, Akki retorted.
: Maybe you re not.
 Maybe the dragon already has a name, Akki said.
: Maybe you ve changed the subject.
 Maybe she has.
 Akki, think. If a dragon has a name, it announces it in the first sending.
 How can she be this old and not have a name? Akki asked.
 Question number eleven, Jakkin said.
 Well, she had a gray rainbow in her first sending. How about Rainbow Gray?
 I hate it.
,:Ssstep-sister.
Don t be stupid.
 Then you name her, Akki said.  It was your idea, after all.
 All right, I will. What s the big vein that carries blood to the heart called
again?
 Anatomy lessons, Jakkin?
 Yes. Sure. What s it called?
 You mean the aorta?
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 Aorta? No, that s awful. You can t name a dragon Aorta.
 That s what it s called, Akki said.
 You told me something else.
 You mean&  Akki paused and added,  during one of my anatomy lessons?
 Enough, Jakkin said.  I give up. So they weren t lessons, exactly. Only I
did listen. You know a lot and
I learned a lot.
Akki sighed.  You couldn t have teamed much if you can t remember.
 Wait, I do remember. It s not the big vein, it s part of the heart. It s
called&  He stopped, shrugging.  I
can t remember.
 Right and left auricles? asked Akki.
 That s it. Auricle. That s what I mean. There was excitement in his voice.
 We ll call her Auricle, which sounds like oracle, which is a kind of omen.
 A good one, I hope, Akki said.  We could use some good luck.
 Auricle. I like that. Because she reminds me of Heart s Blood, Jakkin said.
 Get it? Part of a heart is an auricle.
Akki put her hand out and touched Jakkin s arm.  She is no relation to Heart s
Blood, Jakkin. Don t keep hurting yourself that way.
 How do you know? Remember Blood s A Rover, one of the nursery dragons who
went feral? He could have flown to these mountains. They re not far from the
nursery. And if he did, and bred with other mountain dragons-well, Auricle and
Heart s Blood could be related. Distant cousins. All of Sarkkhan s nursery
dragons went back to a single breeding pair. So it s possible. No, even more
than possible. It s probable. They re cousins.
Akki didn t answer, but her sending was dim and crackled around the edges.
 Anyway, we need to wake Auricle, Jakkin said.
As if on cue, the dragon began to grunt and snort, the usual sounds of a
dragon rousing.
 Hello, Auricle, Jakkin said, stretching out the name itself and sending her
a rainbow of grayish hearts.
The dragon ignored him and began grooming herself.
  Hey, worm waste, that s you! Jakkin said. Then, switching to the more
formal language of the dragon master, he added,  Auricle is thy name, little
one. He punctuated it with a stronger sending.
The dragon looked up, its sending puzzled, fragmented.  Name?
No-name? Name? No-name?
 This one is either stupid, brain-damaged, or things are weirder down here
than we imagined, Jakkin said.
Akki agreed, but put her hand on the dragon s neck and whispered into its ear,
 Thy name is Auricle,
little one. Auricle. For thou art part of Heart s Blood in that thou art part
of something that belongs to the two of us, Jakkin and me.
At that the dragon s head snapped up, and in the not quite complete dark they
could see the dark shrouds of her eyes.
 No-name,  came the sending.  Dragons no-name. It bent its neck almost in
two and waited, a gesture of such submission that Jakkin was shocked.
 Well, No-name,  he said at last in exasperation,  get yourself up. We are
going to search for your bubbles and your manlno-man. Now. Up. He said the
last angrily and the sending was laced with a different kind of fire.
Akki added,  Go!
The dragon leaped to its feet, its sending a mumble of grays and blacks.  Up.
Go. Man says. Man says.
Man says. Up. Go. It turned carefully around in the cave and with a slow,
lumbering, shambling walk began to go back the way it had come.
Jakkin grabbed Akki s hand and squeezed it once.  Up and go, us, too, he
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whispered directly into her ear, so there was no echo.
chapter 15
AS THEY WALKED down the spiraling tunnel, following the dragon, they expected
things to become even darker, but instead the way seemed lighter. A fuzzy
phosphorescence spattered the cave walls, spotty at first, and then in larger
and larger patches. By the time they had gone around four or five deep bends,
the tunnel was bathed in a gray-white glow that made the shadows they cast
only darker.
Akki pulled on Jakkin s shirt and he turned, then gasped, for her face was
gray and her mouth and eyes dark holes.
 You look strange, Akki said.
 You look like& a skull, Jakkin answered.
They didn t speak after that or look at each other, preferring to send little
bits of comforting color back and forth between their bridged minds, reminders
of the world outside, where gray was only a minor tint.
But color was difficult to remember underground, and soon their sendings
shaded off into the gray of the stone and shadow around them.
The walls grew damper to the touch, then progressively slimier. They could
hear things dripping just out of sight. Twice Akki bumped into long fanglike
pieces of rock that hung down from the ceiling, and once
Jakkin tripped over a tooth of rock that protruded up from the floor. And
still the tunnel spiraled down and down as they followed the large moving [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]