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"Who lays eggs like that underground?" he asked Enjor

"No idea,down here At least, no birds y’be wanting to iant mushrooms The less said about this portion of the trip, the better--the Copper reits way into his eyes

The only ones happy about it were the bats, for insects flew so thickly here they made mistlike clouds The bats ate their fill and then so of Mamedi’s relative: They had hair now and an unslakable thirst for dragonblood

Luckily they were so small they took only a few drops each

He ca h his teeth to eat the wored his appetite by tearing off us

At the other side of the h another series of tunnels, these sided with a hard, shiny surface that offered cave h the blackest patches by the bats, who probably drained him each time he slept

"Almost there now," Enjor said, so often that Thernadad took up the refrain "Almost there now"

"What’s almost?"

"One more river to cross, the river of slaves It flows in a circle around the Lavadoe up"

After one of his "scouts," Enjor returned in exciteht"

They reached the river, its current so slow that it was hard to distinguish from a lake This river cavern made the dwarf-boat tunnels see, sheer walls cli to a dark roof cracked in places where true sunshine fell through Shafts of light, one or two angled just right so the sunlight fell in neatly edged beareen river surface, tendrils of ranite boulders rose froe

"One ed shape cross through one of the shafts of light

"What are those?"

"Nothing y’be wanting to uard"

"Who are they?"

"Bat eaters," Enjor and Thernadad said together

"Hunt by?"

"Sight, oes, then"

He rested on the riverbank and saw a long, thin boat with a line of ho the water, beetle-sized in the distance One of the flyers, a black shadoith vast wings, hovered overhead

He waited until the bealow froh He nosed around the riverbank as the light faded, but found only a tasteless snail or two He wedged hi on hiood eye on his vulnerable side

But he couldn’t sleep, so excited was he to be this near to the Lavadoood eye But eren’t there dragons whirling above the river? Surely such a vast body of water had those long, bony, shovel-nosed fishes living within?

He felt a cautious nip at his leg He reached out with a saa and heard a bat squeak

"Thernadad! You!"

"Sir! Didn’t think you’dthere Listen, Thernadad, or I’ll squeeze every bit of e of my body I wake up with any more slits, nips, or cuts, no matter hoell concealed, I’ll assume you did it and squeeze you"

"Yeek!"