League of Dragons (29 page)

She had been sending couriers everywhere, and dragons began to arrive early the next morning. They came hungry: Temeraire had a deal of work to do trying to keep them off the meat until dinner-time, particularly the Scottish ferals. A great number of those had come, including Ricarlee, who was rude enough to begin talking up Napoleon's Concord to them all. “I ought to run him off,” Temeraire said, fuming. “He should hold his
own
dinner, if he likes to promote Napoleon's plans.”

“I would not advise it,” Ning remarked, from behind half-slitted drowsy eyes. “You ought to have quietly disposed of him before he came—” this sounded rather ominous, and Temeraire eyed her sidelong, “—but now it is too late: you will only give more credence and force to his arguments, if you establish him as worthy of being chased away. Allow him to speak, with a tolerant air, and do not permit anyone to see you think there is anything of sense in what he says.”

“So you
do
want us to beat the French now?” Temeraire said, skeptical. “Or why are you offering advice?”

“You are very suspicious,” Ning said. “You are my progenitor; I am not ungrateful.” Temeraire did not swallow this, and stared at her until she flipped a dismissive point of her wing. “Are you proposing to destroy the French entirely? To annihilate every one of them?”

“Of course not,” Temeraire said, aghast. “We must only beat Napoleon properly, so he will stop having wars everywhere.”

“Very well,” Ning said. “So far we are agreed.”

Temeraire remained doubtful, but he could not stay to pry a better answer out of her: a Winchester and a couple of the Scots dragons were creeping up on the beautifully roasted mutton that Perscitia's men had just finished turning.

He was more than a little exasperated by the time the dinner-hour at last arrived, and grew even more so when Ricarlee—who had the advantage of being smaller, and less nice in his manners—finished his own portion quickly and seized the floor to say, “Well, this is a handsome dinner indeed! I wouldn't mind eating so more often than once in ten years, I will say,” and began again to rhapsodize about the Concord, and how it would ensure them an endless supply of delights.

More than one dragon made supportive noises, including, Temeraire was sorry to see, some of his old comrades from the invasion. Annoyed, Temeraire swallowed down his own side of beef more quickly than he liked—he privately could admit there was a great deal to say for the flavor of a nice piece of beef, properly spit-roasted, with only a little salt, and he would have preferred to savor it.

“That,” he said loudly, “is nonsense. I do not deny that the Concord talks a great deal of sense, where it proposes rules for governing among ourselves, but there is no use imagining that Napoleon can give us rights to cows and sheep that have been raised by men who do not owe him allegiance. You must all see that Napoleon cannot really give you any land in Britain, as it is not his. He only means to set us quarreling with the Government here because they are his enemies; he wants us to fight them for
his
benefit, and bear all the cost, while he gives us nothing.”

“There's something to what you say,” Ricarlee said thoughtfully now, but before Temeraire could congratulate himself on swaying the Concord's most fervent supporter, he went on, “I don't see why we ought to do all the work, and Napoleon get the good of it all alone. We should make him pay us, in gold, if he wants us to fight.”

This dreadful suggestion attracted many murmurs of enthusiasm, to Temeraire's horror, until he sat up as tall as he could and said loudly, “That is treasonous!” to interrupt them. “And it will only end in the most dreadful way you can imagine. When
I
committed treason—and not for any selfish reason, but only to share the cure—they took Laurence's entire fortune away—ten thousand pounds, lost!” This silenced the audience, except for several faint hisses of dismay. Temeraire, relieved to have headed off the worst, added, “If you did get any gold from Napoleon, the men here will only confiscate it, when he has been beat, and he is sure to be beaten; Laurence and I are going to the Continent this coming week, to finish him off. And even if he
did
win, it would only be after the British had killed any number of you, and then you may be sure he would sail in and snatch it all for himself, and give all your territories to French dragons, instead.”

“Well, what else are
you
proposing, then?” Ricarlee said. “You are brim-full of doom, indeed, and reasons why we oughtn't listen to Napoleon, but I ha'nt heard any better notions from you, other than we shouldn't say boo to a lieutenant of horse. It's all very well for those who have wagons full of gold and admirals in their pockets to tell the rest of us we may put up with nine shillings threepence a day, which don't add up to a sheep in a sennight if it is ever paid, which it isn't.”

Temeraire flattened back his ruff. “It is true my situation at present is an enviable one,” he said coolly. “But my gold was won fairly on the field of battle, by doing my duty, and I do not think anyone can disagree I have acted in a most disinterested fashion where the welfare of my fellow dragons was at stake.”

He might have added that there was no wagon full of gold anymore. Ferris, back in Vilna, had arranged the sale of all the treasure they had been obliged to leave behind when going to the Alps. Through mysterious but—Laurence had assured him—reliable means, the value thereof had appeared in a bank account of his very own in Britain, and was now invested in the Funds and producing that very delightful thing, interest. But this was not a point on which he felt he ought to enlarge when talking with those who did not have so much as five pounds to their credit, and could not have gotten it out of a bank again, if they wished.

“Wagons of gold are not commonly found
save
upon the field of battle, I find,” Ning put in unexpectedly, in a thoughtful voice, loud enough to carry.

Temeraire eyed her warily, but she made no further remark. “In any case,” he went on, “there is a considerable difference between my saying you oughtn't simply swallow this plan Napoleon has held out to you, when anyone can see he has only made it up for his own ends, and my saying you must put up with our Government behaving in a scaly manner, which I do not say at all. Indeed,” sudden inspiration striking, “we should make our
own
concord—and it needn't be one that is so unreasonable as to force a quarrel.”

“Yes, indeed!” Perscitia said, sitting up sharp. “We must propose a bill, to Parliament, with our requirements.”

“Now
that,
” Minnow said, to Temeraire's satisfaction, “is the most sensible thing I have heard. It stands to reason we are better off not fighting with the people here: they have plenty of guns in this country, after all, and anyway we most of us have friends among the harnessed dragons, and don't care to put them in an awkward position. Now then, what do we want to ask their Lordships for?”

Fortunately, Perscitia's secretary Mrs. Elsinore was on hand to take notes. Her hand was excellent, although she had some difficulty in keeping up with the lengthening list of demands and requests: higher pay, more frequently and more honestly paid, and even for those dragons who did not choose to fight—“But then you ought to do
some
work for it,” Temeraire said, to which Ricarlee a little disgruntledly said, “Oh, aye,
some
work; if they give us aught we can do without breaking our backs,” but at least he and the ferals agreed to that much—and a host of improvements which Perscitia suggested, to make casting one's vote easier.

“And we must have more seats in Parliament for dragons,” she added firmly. “We must ask for thirty, and allow ourselves to be bargained down to twenty; we must not accept less than twenty,” which provoked some protests on the part of other dragons, who said they were happy to sit on stone, and would rather have more money.

“I do not mean chairs!” Perscitia said. “I mean
members:
there must be more dragons who have a share in making the law. Oh! And we ought to insist that they make some dragons officers, too. It is nonsense, only having humans as officers in the Aerial Corps.”

“Yes, be sure and put that on the list,” Temeraire told Mrs. Elsinore, and so forth and so on, until they all finished and looked at the list with some satisfaction—everyone pleased, and agreeing that they would all pledge themselves to enforce it, and then Perscitia announced, “I will take it to Parliament on Monday, then, and read it to the other members—perhaps I can arrange for them to hear Bonaparte's Concord, too,” she added thoughtfully, “so that they have the contrast before them—I think it will be highly instructive—”

Temeraire suddenly woke to the realization that he had averted one disaster only to produce another. For the Concord to come to the Admiralty's attention would have been bad enough, but no-one would ever be persuaded that he had not had a hand in this new document—as indeed he had, but the point was that Laurence was sure to be blamed for it with even more violence. “You cannot read it!” he said hurriedly.

Perscitia scowled. “It is not
my
fault I was not taught early enough,” she said, injured. “Besides, Mrs. Elsinore will read it to me until I have it by heart. You may be sure I will not make any mistakes.”

“No, I meant,” Temeraire said, but fell silent; he could not say,
Do not read it, for Laurence's sake.
That would be unfair, and worse than unfair; it was just what the Admiralty wanted of him and of every harnessed dragon, that they should betray their own interests and those of their fellow-dragons just to please their captains—and Laurence would not even be pleased; Laurence would never wish it of him.

“I only meant,” he said, struggling, “that we must proceed with more delicacy. After all, if you should spring it upon the Parliament without warning, I dare say they will all refuse to listen. Laurence has told me how often the question of the slave trade has been argued, and how much difficulty there has been in getting the ban through.”

“One cannot
spring
anything upon Parliament without warning,” Perscitia said, with a lecturing air. “I shall announce tomorrow that I will make a motion to read in a bill, so everyone will know that it is coming. Of course I must first marshal support for the measure, but I have already thought of that. There are several gentlemen of the Opposition who will be glad of a chance to embarrass the Government by putting a question to the Speaker about Napoleon's Concord, which shall furnish me with an excellent opportunity of warning of all the dire consequences should it be adopted by England's dragons, and be the best introduction for
our
bill—which, by the bye,” she added, “must be properly named—and I shall argue that the Government ought to adopt it, and thereby present an example of enlightened leadership to the nations of the Continent, and their dragons—”

“Laurence,” Temeraire said, feeling rather desperate, “I must have a word with you.”

“I am at your service,” Laurence said immediately, turning away from the pair of wide-eyed young runners who had been delivered by courier that morning from Kinloch Laggan, along with four ensigns, seven riflemen, three lieutenants, and a ground crew of twenty men, all of whom had already been pressed into varying forms of service to prepare for the party.

“Oh—to-night will do,” Temeraire said cravenly. “Or tomorrow; tomorrow will certainly be good enough, I am sure.” The pavilion looked so splendid—lanterns hung everywhere, and silk hangings, and even if braziers and hot bricks were the source of warmth, there were so many of them as to make a really comfortable glow. The smell of the roasting cows rose marvelously over the fresh sea-air crashing on the cliffs below, and the pavilion's prospect could not be improved upon: the wide expanse of the Channel was already dark, as the sun sank westward, the boats with their lanterns bobbing jewel-like. The tables were laid with great magnificence: porcelain and crystal and silver all ablaze upon the inner, large platters of brass for the dragons set behind every captain's place, and liveried footmen already arranging themselves at intervals around the table. “How grand everything looks!”

“Yes, I mean to dine in proper state,” Laurence said. “If only captains might be impressed so certainly by such things as their dragons, I would be content. But at least they will have no cause to feel I slight them, and I admit that I hope the formality of the table may encourage a like formality in the behavior of the guests; I can rely on no amiable feeling among them.”

Laurence knew this was a polite understatement, but he had no intention of letting Temeraire know that Captain Poole had five years ago loudly expressed to Laurence's face the opinion that he ought to have been drawn, quartered, and thrown to dogs, in the good old fashion; nor that Captain Windle had on the same occasion struck him—in the midst of a general melee broken out in camp, where Laurence had been able to return the blow in kind rather than take insult—and still less that Windle's first lieutenant had tried, drunken and ineffectual though the attempt had been, to stab him with a table knife.

Temeraire, if he knew, would certainly have objections of his own to express to all of these gentlemen; violent objections. But Laurence himself could not blame them for their feelings, nor the honesty of their open avowal. The Admiralty had been brutal indeed in spreading the blame of his treason across all aviators, then compounding that injustice by postponing their own sentence and keeping him alive. Since then they had transported him, restored him, and now, to crown all, promoted him. Their actions implied too plainly that better was not to be expected, from aviators; that they were to be regarded much as were their beasts, as unreliable, half-controlled, and lacking in all discipline—a bitter swallow for officers who loved the Corps, and aspired only to perform their loyal duty to the Crown. Laurence would have gladly counted himself among their number, once; only extremity had driven him out of their ranks. The men who objected to his pardon were guilty only of loving their service, and resenting the insult to its honor.