Under the drawing, there was only one sentence: Does it really exist?
Silver rubbed her thumb over her sketch. According to Jaspatonians, a desert girl obsessed with water dragons also couldn’t exist. But as Silver closed her eyes, she could feel a spray of seawater on the back of her neck, the warmth of water dragon skin beneath her palms, the thrill of crossing a finish line in first place. She could even feel the weightless sensation that would come when she and her Aquinder lifted off into the sapphire-blue sky. Tears prickled her eyes. They were impossible creatures, she and the Aquinder.
“You’re supposed to be getting ready for my party.” Brajon had come into Silver’s room so quietly that she hadn’t heard him part the curtains that hung between her room and the hallway. His words pulled her out of her dreams and back onto solid ground.
“Don’t you know how to announce yourself?” It was good manners in Jaspaton to clear one’s throat or speak to let others know you were coming. Silver quickly turned away from her cousin and wiped her sleeve across her face. She knew the muslin would leave a muddy streak on her cheeks, but she didn’t care. “Besides, you should be back at your house waiting for all your adoring fans to arrive.”
Brajon ran his hand through his hair, a shimmering gold wrist cuff catching the light. Silver recognized her father’s fine handiwork. An early birthday gift.
“I came to apologize about Nebekker’s. Uncle Rami kept asking where you were, and I couldn’t lie to him. If you’re not careful, your father will pull you out of school.”
“I was careful. Until someone spilled my secret.” Silver frowned. Brajon finally had the decency to turn pink and look away. “It would help if he did take me out of jewelers’ classes so I could finish the suit. Ele-jeweler,” she said bitterly.
Brajon shrugged. “Have it your way. You’d be such a pretty ele-yarnslady, and you and Nebekker could sit around being weird together all day long.”
“Nebekker’s more interesting than anyone else in boring Jaspaton.” Silver grabbed a scarf from her floor and hurled it at Brajon’s head. Her cousin laughed and ducked into the hallway.
Silver knew her father would never banish her from his trade. After her grandfather nearly drove the family business to ruin, Rami had worked tirelessly to make the Batal name once again synonymous with the best jewelers in all the desert. His final hurdle was to impress Queen Imea. Both Silver and her father had been eagerly awaiting her arrival, although for very different reasons. Her father, to secure his family legacy, and Silver, to escape it.
Brajon poked his head back in and sighed. His long black hair fell across his eyes. “Come on, Silver. You can’t be all sulky in here. There’s going to be an epic feast.”
On cue, Silver’s belly rumbled. Both cousins laughed.
“I’m coming,” she said to Brajon’s retreating back.
She picked up her favorite scarf and draped it across her neck, then changed her mind and tucked it into the bag she had hidden under a pile of cushions. She grinned, and what felt like desert hawks soared in her belly as she raced to catch up with her cousin.
In two days, she would take that bag with her as she departed Jaspaton with the great Sagittaria Wonder.
FOUR
Silver dragged her feet behind her parents as the Batals escorted Brajon back to his home for the party. Her mother peeked back a few times to make sure Silver was keeping up, but her father surged forward, his hand on Brajon’s shoulder.
“Thirteen years old,” he said. “Your path is chosen. Your future is secure. Comfort. Certainty. It’s a nice way to be.”
“Sure is, Uncle Rami.” Brajon peered over his shoulder and winked at Silver.
Silver stayed silent as they descended the staircases carved into the face of the Jaspaton cliffs toward Brajon’s house.
“Ah, there’s my missing birthday boy,” Aunt Yidla exclaimed, greeting them at the front door. She was swathed in her usual apron, but her dark hair was tucked under a festive, glittering wrap. She pulled Brajon into a hug, squishing his face into her neck. In the past year, he’d grown taller than her, too. “Come in, come in. Everyone’s here. Oh, aren’t those pretty!”
Their grandparents were there, aunts and uncles and cousins, some of Brajon’s friends from school, and some old family friends. Even Nebekker had come, silently tucked into a shadowy corner. Brajon held up his new gold cuffs for everyone in the house to see. They all fawned over the impeccable design and execution. Rami nodded modestly, but his face flushed with pride. He glanced at Silver as if to say, See the admiration that is waiting for you?
Silver bit back a groan and melted into the crowd.
Aunt Yidla had pulled her finest crystal goblets out and filled them with a syrupy berry cordial, ruby red in the slowly fading afternoon light. Silver took a glass. The cordial was from Calidia, but it had been made in lands whose names she had seen only on maps. She loved studying maps, imagining where she might live someday. Settlements in the mountains to the north and south of the desert … cities in the Island Nations. Places where the landscapes were green and lush, and where rain and water were plenty. Places where, she imagined, there were hundreds of happy water dragons. She was determined to see them all.
“Silver,” her grandfather said, interrupting her thoughts. “Tell me about your studies. Are you also presenting a piece to Queen Imea, like your father?”
“I don’t think so,” Silver said quietly. “My skills need a lot of work.”
Last year, she and Brajon and everyone their age had graduated from the standard curriculum: reading and writing and math, but also useful desert skills like basic wool working, cooking, herding, and sky watching. Now, students studied their family trades alongside their other studies. Considering Rami’s reputation, Silver should have been excelling in jewelry making and metalwork. Instead, the other ele-jewelers outclassed her. And laughed at her. She had no friends among them.
“So humble!” her grandfather said.
“No, she’s not,” Brajon said, teasing. “She’s just as daft as a desert fox.”
“And you’re as useful as a jelly pickax,” Silver shot back. Their grandfather chuckled at the cousins’ banter.
“Ah, desert foxes are incredibly clever!” Nebekker called from across the room. “To survive the desert requires great intelligence and capability.”
The buzzing activity in the room quieted for a moment, but when Nebekker sipped from her glass again and said no more, the fun continued. Aunt Yidla brought over Brajon’s birthday gift from her and Uncle Saad.
The present was large and heavy, bundled in a big piece of emerald-green fabric. Silver moved closer to her cousin as he took the gift in his lap and pulled the wrapping away. The dune board was deep brown, inlaid with a smooth white-shell border. As Brajon ran his hand over the waxed surface, Silver’s own fingers itched to touch the wood. Painted in the center was a Decodro, the ten-armed water dragon. In a different world—one in which Silver had her own dune board—she would make a joke about how the Decodro represented Brajon’s ten fingers, always getting into the treats in his mother’s kitchen.
Instead, a knot formed in her chest and pulled itself taut.
“It’s nice,” she croaked. It was better than nice. It was the best dune board she’d ever seen.
Brajon’s smile faded. He looked at the board for a long time. Then he looked up at his cousin. “You want to take the first ride?”