Read Shadowed By Wings for Free Online

sun. Muddle-headed, I listened tensely to the very sounds of industry that had, the day previous, lulled me to sleep near the grain silo.
    The day was well on its way toward noon. The dragonmaster apprentices of Komikon Re were hard at work. I had slept, ignored and untouched by them, since dawn.
    I sat up carefully, conscious of the weals on my back. Of the ribbons of ruined flesh, only a crisscross of ridged skin remained. I ran my fingers cautiously over the snakes of scar tissue. No pain. Slowly, I climbed off my hammock and stretched. Healthy muscle pulled beneath feather-healed skin.
    Well.
    I stood there, sound in body but not in mind, and stared blankly at the day before me.
    What to do now?
    Attack the monumental task I’d set before myself, of not only surviving the wrath of Temple for joining the dragonmaster’s apprenticeship but also becoming a dragonmaster, with the aim of using the influence and power a Cinai Komikon commanded to alter the very fabric of an entire nation.
    Great Re. Is it any wonder that the prospect exhausted me, that I felt rooted to the spot with defeat?
    Once again, I had the brief, sharp realization that, had I followed my original intentions of killing Kratt at Mombe Taro, my head would have long been separated from my neck by an executioner’s blade. I shivered with brief longing for the escape death would have afforded me.
    Clutching my elbows to myself, I closed my eyes and took an unsteady breath to clear the dark thought from my mind.
    The seductive scent of venom lay as heavy as lead over the stables, and as I inhaled, the fragrance flowed down my nostrils and set my heart glowing like a live coal. The acrid yet honeyed scent danced on my tongue, pimpled the skin on my arms anew, sang through my veins, swelled my heart, soared through my soul.
    Yes. Oh, yes. That most desired scent, reminiscent of limes and licorice both: venom. I could not breathe enough of it, ached for it, trembled for it, was dizzy and aroused and consumed by need because of it. I could not help it; I opened my mouth wide and inhaled deeply, repeatedly, savoring the warm, malleable scent as a nebulous substitute for liquid venom.
    A feverish flood of memories surged over me: crumbling convent rotunda; ancient, infertile bull dragons. The rasp of scaled hide against my thighs; a dragon tongue leaching black venom upon my belly.
    This, then, was a reason to forge into the day: the possibility of imbibing venom. A despicable reason, yes, and a crutch I reached too readily to lean upon. But even as I realized that my fondness for the dragons’ poison provided a stronger impetus to confront the day than the mere desire to live had, I dismissed the dreadful revelation.
    I inhaled again and again through an open mouth, drunk on the odor of the dragons’ fire, and when my head reeled from too-quickly sucked-in air, I finally stopped and opened my eyes. Vision unsteady, pulse racing, I took stock of my surroundings.
    A massive courtyard sprawled before me, ringed by stalls made of granite blocks quarried from who-knew-where. Half the stalls stood empty save for youths who frantically shoveled manure, and the stalls that were occupied were occupied magnificently by Roshu-Lupini Re’s uncut dragons, yearlings and satons both, females either too young or too hard-worked to lay eggs.
    Lean and nervy, trained to spring into the air upon the slightest spur touch and lock talons with other dragons, these were fighting beasts. Unlike the dull hides of the wing-amputated brooders prevalent throughout Clutch Re, or the faded, flaking hides of the dying bulls I had cared for while in Convent Tieron, the scaled hides of the Roshu-Lupini’s destriers fairly shone with vitality and color.
    Whereas a brooder’s hide is dappled rust and moss, the hides of the Roshu-Lupini’s dragons shone chestnut and the green of wet jungle foliage. Whereas a brooder stands with head hanging, indifferent to all and sundry, the destriers snorted