Page 48 of Consorting with Dragons

I began to call out to Talon in my mind, hoping that he might somehow hear me if we got close enough. And of course, I obsessively called Rylan on his communicator, trying to will him to answer my calls. When I found him, I wasn’t going to go easy on him this time, I promised myself. I’d been far too lenient with him. I imagined myself dragging Rylan to his feet, my hands fastened in his shirt because I wanted to shake some sense into him. I imagined myself leaning over him, shouting down at him. “Just so we’re clear,” I’d say, “If you ever run away from me like this again, I’ll lock you in your room.” It didn’t sound like much of a threat, come to think of it. 7

Then the next moment I was imagining myself taking him in my arms to kiss him and hold him close and never let him go. I’d locate him soon, because I had to. Did he really imagine there was any corner of the galaxy he could travel to where I couldn’t find him?

He’d told me once that his omak had taught him to always look up at the stars and if he were ever lucky enough to see a “shooting star” then he should make a wish on it, because it might come true. I’d laughed and told him it was a silly idea and only for children.His so-called shooting stars were meteoroids, merely chunks of rock or metal from space that burned upas they entered an atmosphere. But I looked up in the sky now, hoping to see one, like it was some kind of talisman or sign that I’d find him, and he’d be all right. All the stars remained stubbornly still in the night sky, however, looking down at me without sympathy or movement, as Sulamon and I sailed through the night, all alone and growing more and more desperate.

****

Rylan

It had been about mid-afternoon the day before, when we started back home, but almost at once, Talon started complaining about being hungry.

“I think I may actually be starving, Rylie,” he told me, trying his best to sound weak and pitiful. “It’s been sooo long since I had my first meal this morning.”

“All that fish you ate at the lake should have filled you up!”

“Maybe so, but it didn’t. There must be something you can feed me. I’ll land so you can look in your packs.”

Before I could stop him, he’d swooped under a large tree and landed on the ground. It was shady there and beginning to get a little cool. Right away, I started to worry about how late it must be getting.

“Talon, I told you I didn’t have any extra food in my packs, and I’ve already given you all I had. There isn’t anything until we make it back home. Are you sure we even came this way? Because I don’t remember passing that big canyon with the river at the bottom a little while ago.”

“I don’t know. I can’t remember because I’m so hungry. I think I’m getting too weak to fly. Maybe I have a brain fog.”

“Talon!” I shouted at him. “Don’t you dare try to pretend. You ate a ton of fish. And I don’t know where we could find youany extra food, so if we stop now, then it will be even longer before you eat again. It’s better to just keep flying and find our way home. Then when we get back, I’ll get the handlers to give you a sheep.”

“Tell them to give me a big one, then! Not what they usually give me. Sulamon gets all the big ones. Every time.”

“Sulamon’s not home, so you can have the biggest one they have.”

“Very well, but Rylie, I have a question.”

“Okay, what is it?”

“What would happen—not saying I am—but what would happen if I said I was lost and have no idea how to get back home?”

“What? You don’t know the way home?”

“Don’t get excited. I just asked what would happen.IfI didn’t know.”

“Talon, you tell me the truth right now.Doyou know the way home?”

“Let’s say I don’t…”

“Talon!”

“I wasn’t paying much attention on the way out to the new lake. You know, Rylie, I’m still a baby. Maybe you shouldn’t trust me so much.”

“I did trust you though, Talon. And you’re not a baby anymore. Now what are we going to do?”

“I can’t think straight. Maybe it’s because I’m so hungry. Let’s find me something to eat and then I can think about finding the way home again.”

“Are you trying to blackmail me?”

“I don’t think so, because I don’t know what that is.”

“Are you trying to make me do something for you so you can get your way?”

“Oh. I don’t think I would do that.”

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