Dragon and Thief

CHAPTER 1 "Draycos? Come on, symby, shake a scale." Draycos looked up from the systems monitor he'd been watching, his ears swiveling upward toward the voice. Polphir, his Shontine host, was halfway up the ladder to theHaven-seeker'smain navigation bubble, looking quizzically down at him. "Come on where?" Draycos called back. "We're here. We've arrived. Our job is over." "Hardly, my good but lazy K'da," Polphir said dryly. "All the long-range navigation may be finished, but we still have to double-check the location of that planet down there. Come on, let's go." "Very well, my good but slave-driving Shontin," Draycos replied. Crouching low, gathering all four paws under him, he leaped over the bank of monitorsand, incidentally, the two Shontine working at themand landed precisely at the foot of the ladder. He would have preferred to jump directly to the navigation bubble and skip the climb entirely, but there was another K'da crouched at the monitor station on the lower bubble deck, and there wasn't enough room for Draycos to land there without bowling her over. Wrapping his paws around the ladder's side railsonly the Shontine used the ladder's rungshe started up. TheHavenseekerwas alive with activity and quiet commotion today. Small wonder: after nearly two years in space, the four bulky ships of the Shontine/K'da advance team had finally reached their goal, the world known as Iota Klestis, and everyone aboard was excited. Several times as Draycos made his way upward, one or the other of his pointed ears twitched around as an odd noise or fragment of conversation caught his attention. Polphir was already in his seat at the wraparound control board, working busily, when Draycos reached the bubble. For a moment he paused at the top of the ladder, gazing out at the blue-green planet turning slowly beneath them. An uninhabited world, or so their contacts in this region of space had assured them. Uninhabited, and unwanted. Exactly what they needed. 'Twas night and blackness all around: K'da and Shontine held their ground... "You just going to sit there and daydream?" Polphir called over his shoulder. "Or were you taking a moment to admire yourself?" "And why not?" Draycos countered, arching his long neck as he pretended to pose. "Have you ever seen a more handsome representative of the K'da people?" "If you think I'm going to answer a question like that in here, you're crazy," Polphir told him, his voice rippling with good humor. "Wait till we get down to the planet where I've got room to duck, then ask me again." "Never mind," Draycos said. In truth, he hadn't even noticed his reflection in the smoothly curved plastic of the bubble until Polphir made his comment. Now, though, he took a moment to focus on the image. It wasn't a bad face, really, he decided. The long, triangular head was mostly proportioned right, the glowing green eyes beneath the bony protective ridges properly spaced. The spiny crest extending from between the eyes over the top of his head and down his long back was just about right, though perhaps a bit too narrow. His long muzzle with its razor-sharp teeth was well shaped, though some of the teeth themselves were a little crooked and his forked tongue stuck out a little too far whenever he tasted the air. His scales were a decent enough color, bright gold with red edges, though as a child he&Zahn, Timothy is the author of 'Dragon and Thief ', published 2003 under ISBN 9780765301246 and ISBN 0765301245.