In the silence that fell among them, Harcourt’s drawn breath was almost a sob, but she made no protest, and her voice remained admirably steady as she merely asked, “Have you decided what you will do with Praecursoris?”

“We will send him to Newfoundland if he will go; they need another breeding sire there to fill out their complement, and it is not as though he were vicious,” Lenton said. “The fault is with Choiseul, not him.” He shook his head. “It is a damned pity, of course, and all our beasts will be creeping about miserable for days, but there is nothing else for it. Best to get it done with quickly; tomorrow morning.”

Choiseul was given a few moments with Praecursoris, the big dragon nearly draped with chains and watched closely by Maximus and Temeraire on either side. Laurence felt the shudders go through Temeraire’s body as they stood their unpleasant guard, forced to observe while Praecursoris swung his head from side to side in denial, and Choiseul made a desperate attempt to persuade him to accept the shelter Lenton had offered. At last the great head drooped in the barest hint of a nod, and Choiseul stepped close to lay his cheek against the smooth nose.

Then the guards stepped forward; Praecursoris tried to lash at them, but the entangling chains pulled him back, and as they led Choiseul away the dragon screamed: a dreadful sound. Temeraire hunched himself away from it, his wings flaring, and moaned softly; Laurence leaned forward and stretched himself fully against his neck, stroking over and over. “Do not look, my dear,” he said, the words struggling to come through the thickening of his throat. “It will be over in a moment.”

Praecursoris screamed once more, at the end; then he fell to the ground heavily, as if all vital force had gone from his body. Lenton signaled that they might go, and Laurence touched Temeraire’s side. “Away, away,” he said, and Temeraire launched himself far from the scaffold at once, striking out over the clean, empty sea.

“Laurence, may I bring Maximus over here, and Lily?” Berkley asked, in his usual abrupt way, having come upon him without warning. “Your clearing is big enough, I think.”

Laurence raised his head and stared at him dully. Temeraire was still huddled in misery, head hidden beneath his wings, inconsolable: they had flown for hours, just the two of them and the ocean below, until Laurence had at last begged him to turn back to land, out of fear that he would become exhausted. He himself felt almost bruised and ill, as if feverish. He had attended at hangings before, a grim reality of naval life, and Choiseul had been far more deserving of the fate than many a man Laurence had seen at the end of a rope; he could not say why he felt such anguish now.

“If you like,” he said, without enthusiasm, letting his head sink again. He did not look up at the rush of wings and shadows as Maximus came over the clearing, his enormous bulk blotting out the sun until he landed heavily beside Temeraire; Lily followed after him. They huddled at once around each other and Temeraire; after a few moments, Temeraire unwound himself enough to entwine more thoroughly with them both, and Lily spread her great wings over them all.

Berkley led Harcourt over to where Laurence sat leaning against Temeraire’s side, and pushed her unresisting to sit beside him; he lowered his stout frame awkwardly to the ground opposite them and handed about a dark bottle. Laurence took it and drank without curiosity: strong, unwatered rum, and he had not eaten anything all day; it went to his head very quickly, and he was glad for the muffling of all sensation.

Harcourt began to weep after a little while, and Laurence was horrified to find his own face wet even as he reached to grip her shoulder. “He was a traitor, nothing but a lying traitor,” Harcourt said, scrubbing tears away with the back of her hand. “I am not sorry in the least; I am not sorry at all.” She spoke with an effort, as though she were trying to convince herself.

Berkley handed her the bottle again. “It is not him; damned rotter, deserved it,” he said. “You are sorry on account of the dragon, and so are they. They don’t think much of King and country, you know; Praecursoris never knew a damned thing about it but where Choiseul told him to go.”

“Tell me,” Laurence said abruptly, “would Bonaparte have really executed the dragon for treason?”

“Likely enough; the Continentals do, once in a great while. More to scare the riders off the notion than because they blame the beasts,” Berkley said.

Laurence was sorry to have asked; sorry to know that Choiseul had been telling the truth so far at least. “Surely the Corps would have granted him shelter in the colonies, if he had asked,” he said angrily. “There is still no possible excuse. He desired his place in France restored; he was willing to risk Praecursoris to have it back, for we might just as easily have chosen to put his dragon to death.”

Berkley shook his head. “Knew we are too hard up for breeders to do as much,” he said. “Not to excuse the fellow; I dare say you are right. He thought Bonaparte was going to roll us up, and he did not like to go and live in the colonies.” Berkley shrugged. “Still damned hard on the dragon, and he has not done anything wrong.”

“That is not true; he has,” Temeraire put in unexpectedly, and they looked up at him; Maximus and Lily raised their heads as well to listen. “Choiseul could not have forced him to fly away from France, nor to come here bent on hurting us. It does not seem to me that he is any less guilty at all.”

“I suppose it is likely he did not understand what was being asked of him,” Harcourt said tentatively to this challenge.

Temeraire said, “Then he ought to have refused until he did understand: he is not simple, like Volly. He might have saved his rider’s life, then, and his honor too. I would be ashamed to let my rider be executed, and not me too, if I had done as much.” He added venomously, his tail lashing the air, “And I would not let anyone execute Laurence anyway; I should like to see them try.”

Maximus and Lily both rumbled in agreement. “I will never let Berkley commit treason, ever,” Maximus said, “but if he did, I would step on anyone who tried to hang him.”

“I would just take Catherine and go away, I think,” Lily said. “But perhaps Praecursoris would have liked to do the same. I suppose he could not break all those chains, for he is smaller than either of you, and he cannot spray. Also, there was only one of him, and he was being guarded. I do not know what I would do, if I could not have escaped.”

She finished softly, and they all began to slump down in fresh misery, huddling together again, until Temeraire stopped and said with sudden decision, “I will tell you what we shall do: if ever you need to rescue Catherine, or you Berkley, Maximus, I will help you, and you will do as much for me. Then we do not need to worry; I do not suppose anyone could stop all three of us, at least not before we could escape.”

All three of them appeared immeasurably cheered by this excellent scheme; Laurence was now regretting the amount of rum he had consumed, for he could not properly form the protest he felt had to be made, and urgently.

“Enough of that, you damned conspirators; you will have us hanged a great deal sooner than we will,” Berkley said, thankfully, on his behalf. “Will you have something to eat, now? We are not going to eat until you do, and if you are so busy to protect us, you may as well begin by saving us from starvation.”

“I do not think you are in any danger of starving,” Maximus said. “The surgeon said only two weeks ago that you are too fat.”

“The devil!” Berkley said indignantly, sitting up, and Maximus snorted in amusement at having provoked him; but shortly the three dragons did allow themselves to be persuaded to take some food, and Maximus and Lily returned to their own clearings to be fed.