|32|
"The mithra—" Boarne caught his ba'tran sash and pulled Thane to a halt. "How did you—" his word cut short by Thane's handling the offensive tug.
"Next time you try to drown me, finish it," Thane said, Jahga pressing to the eyelids of Boarne as his fingers crushed the drell's palmar bones.
"Enough," someone said. "Release him."
Retracting the Jahga, Thane dropped the hand and learned whose voice had commanded him—"Nefen."
"Not yet," she said, descending the sand through the gates. Her eyes connected to the metal relief coating his vambriuch plate…."Who gave that to you."
"I found it," he lied—buccal folds of blue violet shivered in issuance of an order, three burrells outside Roun's dragons forming an isolating triangle around Thane.
"You're a liar—I know who owns that vambriuch and it was never to be found." The scintillating tebris snapped flush to her throat. "Take him."
Dismissed by the tilt of Pilar's crests, the human was lofted from stone floor to be carried down dais steps into the reverberating corridor of the antehall.
"That will be all?" Pilar asked of his burrells.
"Sered, Nefen Prausthina has gone to welcome the dragons into the city."
"She is accompanied by Benwick?"
"Benwick and several others."
"Good. I will be in planning." Pilar descended the dais steps, powerful arms brushing aside a deep navy cape and flowing out behind him. "Bring me Roun." Moving with brusqueness, he left the antehall to pass through a corridor containing gold apses, high mirrors, and pylons guilded in silver blue durril that bled to the floor of metal and stone.
Disarmed of his weapons, Thane clambered over the dune and into the city—manacles connected hand to wrist. A burrell led him at the order of the drellahna who had remained behind, attending to Boarne and the rest of Roun's dragons. Difficulty walking with links about his ankles forced Thane to shuffle at a humiliating pace through the city cottis permeating the central building anticipating him with its breathtaking size. He tried to look up, but couldn't.