Chapter Seventeen. When the Hatchlings Need Names
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
WHEN THE HATCHLINGS NEED NAMES
JAMES
“I believe you,” Farren says. With those words, happiness warms my chest.
I didn’t think I would feel this much relief finally admitting the truth of my crash.
But I’m glad the whole story is out. With it, I want to tell her more.
For once in my life, I’m eager to talk, and even more surprisingly, it’s with Farren and I’m not getting tongue-tied.
We even hugged and it felt normal, perfect.
“Is this the real reason you asked my dad to intern here?” she asks. “I thought it was to steal the Revers scholarship from me, but now—”
“My mom wanted me out of the house, terrified things between my father and I would grow worse. But that’s not the only reason I asked your dad to intern.”
“So, you are trying to steal the scholarship from me. Figures I was right about something.”
I remember when Farren had found out I was competing with her for the Revers scholarship spot beginning of year ten. She’d stormed up to me early morning on the crafting fields.
“Did you really apply?” she had asked.
Her hair was in small braided pigtails with a copper headband, and I was so startled by her approach I dropped the silver I was shaping and didn’t say anything for a good minute.
My brain took way too long processing how pretty she was up close.
Up close and addressing me. She’d had to prompt me.
“Murphy. The Revers scholarship? Have you truly applied for the academic all-around?”
“Yes, I’ve entered.”
“Why?”
I’d told her the same lie I’d been telling my parents. “Because it’s a good opportunity.”
“Well, I have as well.”
“I know.” Of course I had known. She was my only real competition. Even then, we both knew it would come down to us.
That had upset her. “Don’t you dare think you’ve won on default. It’s more than crafting or riding. You’ll fail medical.”
“We’ll see.” I had said, ignorant to how that would sound.
How that one decision changed her opinion of me from annoyance to nemesis.
After that, if she ever caught me staring at her, she glared.
If I answered a question in class, she shot her hand up next.
She used every opportunity she could to prove she was better than me.
We had trained near one another on the crafting fields before school for years.
Me in the silver section, Farren in the copper.
But after our conversation, she arrived at the training fields earlier and earlier.
And I’d matched her every move, wrapped up in a dream that one day we’d relent and talk.
Really talk. I lost track of the times I’d try to seem nonchalant as I passed by and gave her advice.
It’s best to keep your wrist straight so you don’t hurt yourself.
I heard the test is on folding tin today.
Seems like you could actually hold more copper.
One time I just asked if she was thirsty and she scowled like I’d insulted her. Every time I opened my mouth, she seemed to hate me more. But I welcomed it. Any attention was better than left wondering if she knew I existed.
Then, in autumn of year eleven, she’d stopped practicing in the mornings before school, went silent in class, ceased being the Farren I knew. I could only get her back to normal if I was brave enough to provoke her.
Tonight, in this cave, Farren sounds resigned to losing the scholarship. I understand her now. She’s had to fight to seem normal while also pretending she couldn’t craft better than any other person in the room. No, the world.
Farren straightens like she has a new idea. “I just realized telling anyone about Nity and outing us means you won’t be the best crafter in school anymore. You’d lose the scholarship. Another reason to keep this quiet.”
My throat tightens. There she is. Thinking the worst of me. “I’m sorry you had to bear this alone,” is all I respond.
Farren’s head snaps in my direction. I feed off her full attention.
“Nity’s worth it.” She gestures toward the babies playing. “This is worth it.”
“I didn’t ask your dad to intern to win the Revers scholarship.”
“You didn’t?” She sounds so unconvinced.
“I asked him because I want to be a dragon vet.”
Farren’s face scrunches in confusion. Her mouth pops open. “Wait, what? Like my family?”
“If I can be half as good as your dad, I’ll be happy,” I answer simply, frankly.
“Did you … did you just admit we want the exact same thing? Have the exact same dream?” She starts to shake her head. I’m a little worried I’ve broken her. “But you’re a dragon rider,” she says. “A dragon rider set to inherit the largest and most profitable racing tracks in Forsen.”
“I am, and that’s the plan.” I pause, staring at her. “Doesn’t mean I want it.”
“So, you don’t want the fame, fortune, or prestige of racing dragons?”
“Correct. I need that scholarship so when I’m at Revers, I can go into the medical department without my dad taking everything away when he catches on.”
“He’d not let you major in medicine? You’d still be a huge help to his business. Cut my family out for one.”
I hate the way she says that, like that would be my first thought and thus my goal.
“My father doesn’t want the kind of help I’d offer.
He wants obedience. He wants the number-one rider in the country so he can show me off and promote his tracks.
The silver that comes from championship dragons doubles in price.
That’s where the real money lies.” Which is the main reason he urged Hort’s descaling a few weeks ago.
He didn’t care about dragon age and safety protocol, only customer demand and the bottom line.
“We’ve had enough conversations for me to know what he’ll find acceptable.
I’m expected to take over the business, but I don’t want it. If I never raced again, I’d be happy.”
“Never race again?” Farren repeats. “But there is something about racing that seems so … freeing.”
Freeing? I don’t think I heard her correctly. “Walsh, do you want to race?”
She presses her lips together. “If racing paid more attention to the ethics and regulations, didn’t make the dragons shift into metal, then yeah … I would. Not as a full-time career or anything, but sometimes when I spot I can’t help but want to be up there too, amidst the fray.”
“I can’t believe this.”
“No, that’s my line.” She gestures to me with a flap of her hand. “I can’t believe you. Since when have you wanted to be a vet?”
“Since I was twelve.”
“Twelve? And you’ve never spoken about this to your parents?
” She glances at my arm and winces like she just answered the question herself.
I haven’t trusted my parents with what I truly want since I was eight and announced I liked crafting tin best. Even certain opinions weren’t to be tolerated.
Better to avoid their permission altogether and when it comes time to ask for forgiveness, be independent enough to not need them.
Get a degree, get enough money to buy Hort. That’s the mission.
She pushes my shoulder, making me tip sideways, snapping me out of my thoughts.
“What was that for?”
“Now I feel bad.”
“If you feel so bad, teach me.” The words are out before I fully process them.
When I do, I freeze. The last time I cooked up the courage to ask Farren to study together it didn’t end well.
Beginning of year ten, Dragon Anatomy One, I tried to casually inquire if she wanted to be my lab partner for the year.
She’d looked at me, appalled, and then her friend, Cara Moore, interceded with a loud “You trying to slack off, Murphy?” That got the whole class’s attention, and a chorus of complaints about how Farren and me partnering together would break the grading curve erupted through the room.
But as Cara pulled Farren away, Farren still turned around to properly reject me so I couldn’t misconstrue her disdain. “No, thank you.”
This time, though, her eyebrows don’t furrow. Instead they pop upward. “Oh?” she says playfully. “And what do I get out of it?”
What could I offer? “I’ll teach you silver-crafting. Or, well, I’ll pretend to teach you so that you don’t have to keep pretending you don’t know.”
Her eyes widen and she grabs my forearm. The warmth of her hand sparks my nervous system into awareness. She’s touching me. “Will you teach me how to craft a silver tea?”
I laugh at her excitement. That was not a no. “Sure.”
Not a second later, she pulls back. “But why would you do that?”
“So, if you have to craft silver again like with Bex and I’m not there, you can use me as an excuse.” I nod toward Nity. “It’ll help protect them. Make you less suspicious.”
“But there would be consequences … Your parents…”
“They only had the one rule, remember?”
“Yeah, because teaching me silver-crafting is an implied rule. A very ‘do not do it under any circumstances’ kind of rule.”
“I don’t know. They only reiterated one rule, which means that’s the only one they care about.
Besides, if they knew the truth, that rule would disappear.
They’d want the opposite.” I freeze again realizing what I’ve said and how I’ve said it.
In a way, that was me suggesting we could date, that we could …
The cave suddenly feels too dark, too intimate. Heat rushes everywhere.
Sometimes I don’t understand how Farren doesn’t see through my feelings.
Doesn’t understand how much I want her. Because deep down where I don’t dare to cultivate too much hope, there’s a vital third part of my mission.
Get the degree, get Hort, and then ask Farren out properly, admit my feelings without society telling us the class divide is too wide.
It might have been less complicated when she was a copper-crafter though. It used to be one more string to cut to escape my parent’s puppeteering my life. Now, even if Farren gave me a chance, it’s Nity, her babies, and the future of an entire dragon species keeping us apart.