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The Copper sold down the hole He hurried toward it, following the smell, which seemed to have seized hold of his brain

The boulder caonoff toward the egg shelf

Chapter 3

The Gray Rat and heperches, keeping an eye out for slugs, and as long as the Copper avoided the usual spots they’d go long stretches without seeing each other Wistala, the chatterer, see to her mother or brother or sister, and was thethe best spots, so the Copper had to -whiskered cave rats in the offal pile while the others slept They were set on he had to be s bones and loose rocks in such a way that they loo them when he heard noises in the pile, but he found that the rats would worh the bones and hooves easier than if he tried to catch them on the hop

He found that if he s pools and then with dragon-waste, they couldn’t set within a ju lesson when he overhunted the garbage pile, for the rats quit cos ate soht back, for sometimes they missed a tail or an ear or a bit of marrow Then he hunted the pile with an appetite that would have taken many, many rats to fill, but took away only one or two for all the filth and bother

Of course, this necessitated a good deal of washing afterward

While scrubbing off after oneshelf above The words and tune war, splashing water devoured the words, so he cli shelf and peeked over

Farther down the egg shelf, alht, his mother slumbered, and he saw the tail of the Gray Rat wrapped around her tail-tip Wistala’s nose peeped froer and thinner of his two sisters lay across the trickle, arching her back in the water cascading down the side of the cave, warbling to herself:

Paint er in paradise,

Taketo soar…

"Oh," she squeaked, seeing hiainst the cave wall

"Why did you stop?" he asked

"Do you want to use the trickle?"

"Use it?"

"The cascade It’sunder the scales, especially that bit that falls all the way fro at how easily the word fors and such Zara rolls off the tongue so etmore?" He felt the clumsiness of his words

She uncoiled a little "You like ed up on the other side of the trickle

She turned a little deeper green as her scales rose and fell "You won’t…you won’t jump on me?"

"Why should I?"

"Auron does it all the ti if he wanted a song to interrupt "I’ll stay on this side of the trickle"

"What do you want to hear?" she finally asked

"What was that you were singing before?"

"A song of Silverhigh, the ancient Theythem when I’m alone"

"Why?"

"You sound just like Auron! Mother said it was a wicked place full of foolish dragons"

"But they "

She went on, and he found hi, joint by joint, claw by claw, lulled by the lorious warht around him, nose-tip to tail-point But then she had an extraordinarily long neck