Free The War of the Ember by Kathryn Lasky Page A

actually generated thermals on which servants could often soar without stirring a wing. The empress tipped her head up. “Why the rush, dear Taya? Enjoy my thermal drafts.”
    “Yes, they are lovely, glorious. They wrap me in your eternal beauty and warmth.”
    It was part of court etiquette to answer almost any remark from one of the dragon owls with lavish praise. Taya knew that she must slow her flight or she would be in for yet another reprimand from the minister of protocol. Perhaps slowing down was good. It would give her time to think. Her emotions had gotten the better of her during the disastrous interview with the high steward. She would coast along for a bit and then discreetly leave the Empress Dowager’s thermal wake at the Amethyst Gate.
    Despite the spaciousness of the Panqua Palace’s hollows and the dazzling beauty of its jeweled walls andpillars, there was not a servant who did not welcome a break from its splendor when they could fly freely outside, encountering the real wind and the tumultuous drafts that blew off the snowy peaks of the Middle Kingdom. Each servant earned a leave of absence, usually once a moon cycle, when they would return and visit their families. And although it was an honor to serve in the Panqua Palace, it was an even greater one to serve as pikyus, the spiritual teachers who resided in the owlery at the Mountain of Time. But few were qualified and even fewer were chosen for the long arduous course of study.
    After leaving the dowager’s procession, Taya had been riding some crisp drafts not far from the opening split of the enormous geode that formed the structure of the Panqua Palace, when she spied a small blue cyclonic swirl rising up as if directly through the walls of the geode. She immediately went into a steep, banking turn to investigate closer. It must be from one of the vents, she thought. There were a series of natural vents penetrating the geode that brought in thin rivulets of fresh air to the outermost walls and chambers of the palace. These chambers were used mostly for storage of yak butter and as servants’ quarters. She alighted on a cornice just by the vent and poked her beak through.She blinked and felt a stab deep in her gizzard. There was an enormous pile of blue feathers in the chamber. Many of them had broken and bloodied shafts. These had not been naturally molted at all, but unnaturally plucked. This was precisely how Orlando had succeeded in arresting the extreme growth of his feathers before making his escape. Plucking the feathers when they were at the proper stage encouraged vigorous growth, and kept the vain dragon owls earthbound, but plucking when they were freen inhibited this growth, which was exactly what Orlando did to get himself flight-ready. How many Dragon Court owls are flight-ready right now? Taya wondered.
    She peered down at the pile of blood-streaked feathers. It seemed immense. Was a rebellion brewing? How many had already flown away, and where had they gone? She raged now when she thought of her curt dismissal by the high steward. He had nearly laughed at her when she had suggested a census. Then a maverick thought shot through her brain and she felt her gizzard freeze. Forget the dragon owl census. What about the sterile eggs that the dragon owls of the Panqua Palace routinely produced? Unlike most sterile eggs, these were not allowed to remain in a nest for five minutes but were immediately removed by servants and destroyed. Theywere smashed to bits for reasons never quite clear to Taya but in strict accordance with instructions explicitly laid down in the Theo Papers. Hadn’t she noticed that the mound of broken eggshells that she often flew over seemed smaller of late?
    Taya now flew to the far side of the cliffs, where the refuse heaps were. There were mounds of yarped pellets and knolls made from the smashed shells of the infertile eggs. She was about to fly closer to the eggshell mound when she noticed one of the