Dragons of the Watch - Donita K. Paul [64]
She took them and made a neat stack as she talked. “Now that the children know what daggarts taste like, they should be eager to please us and be rewarded with more of the same treat.”
Next Bealomondore handed over the daggarts, one package at a time. Out of ten dozen-count bundles, only four packets remained. He dreaded the trip to make more. Couldn’t they just abandon the effort to win the children and give these to Old One?
He crawled through the opening. No, he had to be truthful and admit that the daggarts had potential. “The ruffians were absorbed in gobbling them up as I passed. None of them put the daggarts down to chase me. Obviously your baking is a big hit.”
She sighed and looked woefully at the remaining packages. Without a word, Bealomondore helped her carry them to the rotunda. He nearly dropped his load when a loud voice thundered from above.
“I’ll have a word with you.”
Ellie regained her composure before he did. She whirled around and dropped a perfect curtsy toward the balcony.
“We’d be honored if you’d join us for tea, sir. We do have daggarts now.”
“Humph! I knew that. You sat there planning to go off and bake. You leave and come back with packages. Any fool could figure out you have daggarts. But that’s not why I command your audience.”
Bealomondore searched the shadows of the upper story and finally spotted a shadow that moved.
Ellie bobbed a simpler curtsy. “I’ll put the kettle on.”
After putting her armload of diaries down on one of the tables, she ran off toward the children’s section.
Bealomondore set his burden on the same table and bowed to the old man in the balcony.
“Will you be coming down, sir?”
“Yes, yes,” he grumbled. “Might as well get started. It takes a while.”
Something glimmered for a moment, and Bealomondore glimpsed long, straggly white hair draped over a black coat. The urohm had already turned away. A glow came from a lumpish figure on Old One’s shoulder. The urohm stepped farther into the shadows, and Bealomondore could no longer see him.
A light dragon. Bealomondore puzzled over the possibility. Old One had a light dragon? None of the dragons of the watch had mentioned another dragon in Rumbard. Not even Det and Laddin had revealed this one’s existence. Bealomondore concluded that either he was mistaken and the glow had not been a light dragon riding the old man’s shoulder, or the light dragon was as reclusive as his companion.
He knew minor dragons to be a very social group. On top of all the questions that had been stirring his thoughts for the months he’d been here, a whole new set strung out along this line of reasoning. He hoped Old One had suddenly become communicative.
“Bealomondore,” Ellie called.
He followed the sound of her voice. The kettle boiled. She’d put cups and saucers and the fancy china teapot on a tray and arranged six daggarts on a pretty plate. She held spoons in one hand and a sugar bowl in the other. Her face showed signs of a tearful eruption about to surface.
She pointed with the spoons to the tray. “It’s too heavy for me to carry it all.”
Bealomondore wondered if he should reassure her that everything would be all right. Somehow those words had never made him feel better. “I’m sorry. I should have offered to carry it.”
She clenched the spoons until her knuckles turned white. Leaning closer to Bealomondore, she whispered, “What do you think he’s upset about?”
“I have no idea.” He thought about the old man for a moment. “It might be he’s made up something to justify his accepting the opportunity to have tea and daggarts.”
She put the sugar bowl and spoons on the tray. “He did say he knew we had the daggarts. Do you suppose he was watching for us to return?”
“Perhaps. He was looking out the window when I came toward the library. However, he looked outraged and not the least bit glad.”
“Oh, I hope this wins his friendship. Everything would be so much more pleasant then.”
“We’ll give tea and daggarts a try.”
He lifted the tray, and Ellie, carrying the plate of daggarts, followed him to the rotunda. The gentleman