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AuRon had three choices, none attractive He could live in a remote place, like NooMoahk, and trust to distance and terrain to shield hih frohters to exist, after a fashion, so he iht even be convinced to follow him, as they once did NooMoahk

There was an attraction to that choice After all, why should he care what happened beyond his lifespan? He could mate and live out his existence, perhaps better but certainly no worse than ons But if he could find a mate, could he be sure of that isolation in twenty winters, or forty? The hominids knew the mountains existed, and eventually they would come And there was the proble scales were a testament to the lack of precious metals in the area

The second choice was to join with the ho him as a courier He and Djer were friends; for a time he knew he could have safety, food, and shelter But if he took a s to serve theined so The dwarves had any nu away

The third option was so remote, it hardly seeons, convince theether on a solution Dragons were an independent species, jealous of everything froourd with no ste it Male dragons wouldn’t listen to hiht, a chancy business, and feuide, were too concerned with s to see beyond their immediate horizon

AuRon watched the sun settle in the westernfrom the river’s swamped banks The dilemma was a hard bone to s Perhaps he would wait for one of NooMoahk’s lided into the cavern bearing another chunk of water buffalo in his rear claws Flying with the beast’s dead weight was a challenge, and his claws got caught in theon his front legs and chin He could alhter as he picked hion’s shriek

AuRon forgot the buffalo and raced to the sink in a series of hops, half-dash and half-flight He juh for hiht on his left front elbow, and he bit hi wide-eyed turned and fled frohters!

AuRon folded his wings in tight and dashed through the cave The sentry, if that hat it as faster than it atchful It wasn’t until they reached NooMoahk’s lair that AuRon could catch up to it with a leap It died shrieking under his claws, but AuRon hardly noticed

An assassination unfolded before his slit-pupiled eyes

Ar spears had NooMoahk surrounded on the dais, coiled about the crystal statue Dragonfire lit the rooe and black shadow; the flame’s oily smell hters sheltered behind colu with swords They placed spears into so stick, then jumped out from behind the rock to hurl theirfrom wounds in his sides that he looked like a blood-soaked porcupine

The blood scent, the screa spears striking NooMoahk’s flesh awakened sos wide and half-opened his wings and bellowed a challenge that brought pebbles down froht of AuRon: tall as a warhorse but

"You veron’s hall?" he bellowed in his father’s voice

NooMoahk rolled off his refuge, snapping spear shafts to lie, belly up, in the blood pooled on the floor

A blighter shouted so back, and spears arced toward AuRon He juht in a flash, and one spear punched a hole in his wing before clattering to the floor with its fellows The blighters took up hand axes and stabbing spears, and they followed their hulking leaders in a ragged line to surround AuRon as they had NooMoahk They were ht at first, and others popped out froht He couldn’t deal with a sixth of them with his flame, they would close and kill him like a deer surrounded by wolves

AuRon turned around, whipping his tail low along the ground A few blighters were quick enough to hop it, but the others went over like the wooden pins in the dwarves’ ga into his flank

A little lahter and dashed down the tunnel, wings folded again and tail waving behind to keep his pursuers off his haunches The closer space of the tunnel a cries

At the widening of the down-shaft, AuRon reared up and grasped the jagged stone of the tunnel roof first in his fore sii, then his rear ones He hung upside down, like a clinging lizard hunting insects The blighters pointed with their stabbing-spears and gabbled AuRon was just out of their weapons’ reach