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The dragon tilted her slender muzzle and voiced a trill, then raised herself on tiptoe to inspect the dog. Kel knelt politely so the two could look at each other.

‘Keladry, hello!’ the Wildmage said cheerfully as she came to the door. ‘Welcome back!’ She was just three inches taller than Kel and slender, with tumbling smoky curls and grave, blue-grey eyes. She was dressed for rough work in breeches and shirt. Feathers clung to her hair. Her shirt was speckled with bird droppings and a streak of green slime that had to have come from a horse or donkey.

Kel got to her feet and smiled at Daine. ‘It’s good to be back, my lady.’

‘Who’s this?’ Daine stretched out her hands.

As Kel handed the dog over, she explained how she had met him. ‘My maid gave him a bath and some more food, so he doesn’t look as bad as he did,’ she finished. ‘But I can’t keep him. Would you? He likes you already.’ It was true; the dog was gleefully licking Daine’s face. When she set him down, he offered Kitten the same attention. Kitten stepped back with a shrill whistle. Scolded, the dog looked up at Kel and panted, tongue lolling.

‘I can try to keep him,’ Daine said, a doubtful look in her eyes. ‘He needs patching up, and something for worms. He’s barely more than a pup.’ She crouched beside the dog, running her hands over his scrawny frame. ‘He says his name is Jump.’

Kel backed up. ‘Name him as you like, my lady,’ she said, clenching her hands behind her back. She was not going to get upset over a dog she’d known less than half a day, and that dog going to the best home in the palace. ‘Thank you for taking him. If there’s anything I can do for you …’

Daine looked up at Kel. ‘You came almost every day this summer to ride Peachblossom and groom him,’ the Wildmage said quietly. ‘You bring him treats, and go easy on the rein, when last year at this time he could look forward to another brutal master or death. And Crown and her flock say that you always stopped by, though you knew Salma was looking after them. It is I who thank you, Keladry, for them. You treat animals as well as you treat human beings.’ She smiled. ‘I will try to keep Jump. If you find other animals in need, come to me.’

She offered her hand. Kel gripped it gently, mumbled something about appreciation, and fled. She had to stop in the stairwell to collect herself. Daine the Wildmage thought well of her!

Suddenly she heard a boy snap, ‘I don’t understand why I have to.’

She stiffened, her senses alert. Down the steps she went, cat-silent, until she was just around the corner from the ground floor landing.

‘It’s a page’s duty to obey.’ The perfectly chill voice belonged to Joren.

‘You first-year squirts need lessoning.’ That was Vinson of Genlith, one of Joren’s cronies. Kel shook out her shoulders, loosening them up.

‘This is a waste of time.’ The new voice belonged to Joren’s closest friend, Zahir ibn Alhaz. Zahir had stopped helping the others to haze new pages late last winter. ‘We have better things to do.’

‘What?’ demanded Vinson. ‘Are you afraid of the Lump and her friends?’ The Lump, or the Yamani Lump, was their nickname for Kel.

‘When you’re done with children’s games, Joren, let me know,’ Zahir said. Kel heard steps fade into the distance.

After a moment Joren said tightly, ‘Get to work, boy.’

‘But cleaning spilled ink I can’t even see—’ protested the voice Kel had first heard.

There was a thud. ‘We see it,’ drawled a new voice belonging to Garvey of Runnerspring. He and Vinson were Joren’s chief companions in hazing first-years.

Kel flexed her hands. They knew we didn’t expect them to start up the first night of training, she thought angrily. They knew we’d think they were as tired as the rest of us, so they sneaked around and found a victim.

She looked at her clothes. Since she hadn’t expected to patrol the halls in search of bullies, she hadn’t changed into shirt and breeches after supper. Fighting in a dress would be tricky. Rolling up her skirt, she gathered it at one side and knotted it. I don’t care if Oranie thinks that sashes make me look thick-waisted, Kel told herself. Oranie was her sharp-tongued second oldest sister. From now on, that’s what I wear.

Kel walked down the last few steps and into the ground floor hall. Ten yards away one of the new first-years, Owen of Jesslaw, lay on the floor. Vinson, Garvey, and Joren stood around him, leaving him nowhere to run.

They turned when they heard Kel’s sigh. ‘I hoped you’d all realized how stupid this is,’ she remarked coolly.

Joren smiled. ‘My day is complete,’ he said. The three older boys moved apart, then closed in on Kel.

Owen struggled to his feet. He was short and chubby, with plump hands and big feet. His tumble of brown curls looked as if somebody had yanked them. His grey eyes were set under brows shaped like question marks laid flat. Confused, he looked from Kel to the fourth-years.

‘I’m sure you have classwork,’ Kel told him, shifting to put a wall at her back. ‘Get to it. These boys’ – she put a world of scorn into the word – ‘and I have a debate to continue.’

Owen stayed where he was.

Maybe he doesn’t understand, Kel thought. She backed up, to draw the fight away from him.

Garvey came at Kel from the right, punching at her head. She slid away from his punch, grabbed his arm, pushed her right foot forward, and twisted to the left. Garvey went over her hip into Vinson, who’d attacked on her left. Joren, at the centre, came in fast as his friends hit the wall. Kel blocked Joren’s punch to her middle, but his blow was a feint; his left fist caught her right eye squarely. Kel scissored a leg up and out, slamming her right foot into Joren’s knee. Joren hissed and grabbed her hair. Someone else – Vinson – tackled her. Kel let his force throw her into Joren. Down the three of them went in a tumble. Joren let go of her hair, fighting to get out from under her and Vinson. Kel elbowed him in the belly and turned to thrust her other hand into Vinson’s face, encouraging him to get off her by pressing his closed eyes with her fingers.

Garvey waded in and grabbed the front of her gown to haul her to her feet. Owen – forgotten until that moment – struck him from behind. Down Garvey went, face-first, chubby Owen clinging monkey-like to his back as Kel rolled out of the way. Owen beat Garvey wildly about the head and shoulders with one hand.

Not much technique, Kel thought as she got to her knees, but he’s got plenty of heart.

Joren’s arm wrapped around her neck, cutting off her air. Vinson attacked her, cursing, his blows nearly as wild as Owen’s. Kel’s vision was going dark when hands pulled Joren’s arm away. Kel gasped for air. Dark breeches and white shirts on her rescuers told her palace servants had put a halt to things.

Two hands wrapped around her arm and drew her to her feet. Kel looked down a couple of inches into Owen of Jesslaw’s shining grey eyes. ‘That was jolly!’ he said. Apparently a bloody nose and a cut that dripped blood into his ear were not important. ‘Did you learn to fight like that here?’

‘So.’ Lord Wyldon coldly eyed Kel and Owen. ‘Already you instruct the new boys in your brawling ways.’

‘We fell down,’ Kel replied steadily. She knew this play by heart; so did the training master. First he questioned the senior pages, who claimed they had fallen. Then he questioned her – and, for the first time, the boy who’d been the object of the hazing. No other first-years had stayed to help before.

‘Three footmen and a torch boy said you were fighting,’ Lord Wyldon pointed out.

‘They were mistaken, my lord,’ she replied.

Wyldon drummed his fingers on his desk. Finally he said, ‘Owen of Jesslaw, you have made a very poor start. Report to Osgar Woodrow at the forge outside the squires’ armoury for the first bell of time every night after supper for a week. You may cool your passions by sharpening swords.’ His brown eyes locked on Kel. ‘As for you, Mindelan – report to Stefan Groomsman at the same hour. He is to find you work pitching hay down from stable lofts.’

Clammy sweat broke out between Kel’s shoulder blades. ‘St-stable lofts, my lord. Of course.’ At training camp before the summer holiday, Lord Wyldon had made Kel climb every day to deal with her fear of heights. Kel bit her lip guiltily: while she had trained all summer, she had not tried to look down from anything higher than a few steps. I bet he knew, she thought queasily. I bet he knew I didn’t climb anything on holiday.

‘A final word, Page Keladry.’ Lord Wyldon stood, bracing his hands on his desk. ‘This will stop,’ he said tightly. ‘There was never so much fighting before you came. It will end now.’

Maybe you just never heard about all the fights, Kel thought wearily. Big boys picking on little ones just to be mean. Maybe no one made enough of a fuss to bring it to your notice.

From the corner of her eye she saw the red-faced Owen open his mouth. Kel bowed to Wyldon and managed to stumble, banging into the new boy. The training master waited for them to stand at attention once more, then dismissed them.

‘Why’d you do that?’ demanded Owen when they closed the door behind them. ‘Why’d you bump me?’

‘Because you were about to say something,’ she replied calmly. ‘You aren’t supposed to say anything except that you fell down. Whatever punishment he gives you, whatever he says, you take it in silence.’

‘But they started it,’ he argued. ‘You were helping out another noble, like we’re supposed to, and they waded into you.’

Kel sighed. ‘That’s not why I did it.’

Turning into their own hallway, Kel and Owen halted. The prince, Neal, Cleon, and Kel’s other friends stood there, waiting.

‘Good evening, your highness,’ Kel said.

Prince Roald nodded gravely.

Neal strode over to her. ‘What on earth did you think you were doing? I thought we solved all this last year!’