Something was poking her. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes and lifted her head. She rolled to her feet, shook herself, and then lay down again. As she began to lower her head, movement in the tall rushes caught her eyes. Game? She fixed her gaze. No. Nothing more than two of the keepers leaving the beach and heading into the forest. She recognized them. One was a female, Jerd, keeper to Veras. The green dragon’s keeper was tall for a human female, with a brush of blond hair cresting her head. Thymara didn’t like her. Sintara knew that without precisely knowing why. With her was Greft. She blew out softly through her nostrils. She had little use for Kalo’s keeper. Greft might tend the huge blue-black dragon and keep him gleaming, but not even Kalo trusted him. All of the dragons had misgivings about him. Thymara regarded him with both interest and fear. He fascinated her, and Thymara resented that fascination.
Sintara snuffed the wind, caught the scents of the retreating keepers, and half closed her eyes. She knew where they were bound.
An intriguing thought came to her. She suddenly glimpsed a way to measure her keeper, but would it be worth the effort? Perhaps. Perhaps not. She stretched out on the warmed rocks again, vainly wishing they were sun-scorched banks of sand. She waited.
About the Author
ROBIN HOBB is the author of the Farseer, Liveship Traders, Tawny Man, and Soldier Son trilogies. She has also written as Megan Lindholm. She currently resides in Tacoma, Washington.
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ALSO BY ROBIN HOBB
THE SOLDIER SON TRILOGY
Shaman’s Crossing
Forest Mage
Renegade’s Magic
THE FARSEER TRILOGY
Assassin’s Apprentice
Royal Assassin
Assassin’s Quest
THE LIVESHIP TRADERS TRILOGY
Ship of Magic
Mad Ship
Ship of Destiny
THE TAWNY MAN TRILOGY
Fool’s Errand
Golden Fool
Fool’s Fate
WRITING AS MEGAN LINDHOLM
Harpy’s Flight
The Limbreth Gate
The Windsingers
Luck of the Wheels
Wizard of the Pigeons
Reindeer People
Wolf’s Brother
Alien Earth
Cloven Hooves
The Gypsy (with Steven Brust)
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DRAGON KEEPER. Copyright © 2010 by Robin Hobb. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
Eos is a federally registered trademark of HarperCollins Publishers.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dragon keeper / Robin Hobb. — 1st ed.
p. cm — (The rain wilds chronicles; v. 1)
ISBN 978-0-06-156162-7
1. Dragons—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3558.O33636D73 2010
813´.54—dc22
2009027318
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10 11 12 13 14 OV/RRD 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
EPub Edition © 2010 ISBN: 9780062018182
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