“So Laurence is first, and by a great margin,” Temeraire said, with intense satisfaction, and Kulingile looked at once mulish and sullen: so matters had only been worsened, and over a mere triviality. Laurence had not troubled himself to inquire regarding his place on the Admiralty lists: even more meaningless than his polite fiction of a reinstatement.
“Regardless,” Laurence said, “Captain Demane, I do offer you my apologies; it is perfectly true that I spoke as I ought not, to a fellow captain: interference is not allowed in the Corps, and for good cause; I hope you will allow me to cry your pardon.”
“Oh,” Demane said, blankly: wind spilled out of his sails. “I don’t—yes, sir, of course?” he finished uncertainly, and then looked at Roland, who hastily averted her own gaze. Gong Su called them to dinner then, interrupting. But when they had eaten, Demane strode over with a determinedly casual air to sit with Kulingile after all; he slept between the dragon’s forelegs rather than going out with his sling to forage as had been his wont, the previous nights of their journey.
Laurence was prepared to find a handsome settlement at Lake Titicaca, from the quality and regularity of the roads and the general excellence of the construction, but his expectations were inadequate for the vista, when they at last saw the blue haze of the water: some distance from the shores, a great city was laid out before them, centered on a raised plaza dotted by immense carved figures, and surrounded by curious fields carved into rows flooded with water.
“Is that your home?” he asked Taruca, as they drew near. “There is a city of red stone—”
Taruca shook his head. “No, that is Tiwanaku; but there is no-one who lives there now,” and as they flew past, Laurence saw that the broad roads were deserted, and the great temple, for so it seemed to him, stood empty; the fields were fallow and dry.
They continued to the lake: or the inland sea, Laurence might as easily have called it, stretching enormously wide and cupped by mountains, and of a piercing and almost unnatural shade of blue. There were villages scattered about on the lake islands, and the largest of these supported more than one settlement and was nearly ringed round with the cultivated terraces.
Taruca directed them towards the island’s southern end, where a broad hillside cut with terraces rose up from a series of storehouses at its base, and at the summit a great courtyard where a truly immense dragon slept: longer than Kulingile even, and perhaps near him in weight, although that was difficult to tell beneath the feathery scales; she was burnt orange and violet in her markings, but the scales were faded along their length and nearly grey at the tips, and her eyes, opening as they landed before her, were filmy with age.
Four other dragons took to the air from other points around the lake directly they put down, and came winging over: all hatchlings of her get, Laurence gathered from the debate which followed between the dragons. “We are not here to steal anything, or anyone,” Temeraire said, exasperated at last, “indeed, if anything we are here to give you someone back: here is Taruca, who asked us to bring him to you.”
“Taruca was stolen eleven years and three months ago,” the ancient dragon said, “and none of my hatchlings could find him; what do you mean, you are here to bring him back?”
Taruca waved an arm from Temeraire’s back, and called, “I am here, curaca; I am here.”
The dragon’s enormous head swung around towards him, and she reared up her forequarters with an effort to lean forward and sniff at him. “It is Taruca,” she said, “it is—how dare you take him? I will call the law upon you at once, if you do not give him back.”
“We are giving him back!” Temeraire said. “That is why we are here; I have already told you so.”
The exchange was prolonged for several minutes more by mistrust before at last Curicuillor both understood and believed that they truly meant to give Taruca back, and without any recompense. The final resolution was indeed only achieved when he had been helped down from Temeraire’s back and guided over to her, and she had nosed him over thoroughly to make sure of him.
“Why, your nation has been unfairly maligned,” she said at last, settling slowly and painfully back onto her stone bed. “You must forgive an old beast her confusion: but indeed I cannot recall a more astonishing example of generosity to mind, from all my days. Taruca returned to us, after so long, and when we had quite given up! We must celebrate, and we must do you honor: we must feast all together, and give special thanks to Inti.”
“Yes!” Iskierka said, with enthusiasm, when Temeraire had translated the offer: they had flown the last three days with no sign of an untended herd, and they had been obliged to ration even the dried meat.