There was a meeting in a huge chamber Serali had never seen before. Drevass had sent Sleeah to invite Serali and Kethro to it. As Serali entered, she saw the whole chamber filled with dragons. There seemed to be hundreds of them, though Drevass told her there was hardly three score gathered there. There were in the process of arguing as Serali entered. A vivid dark blue dragon, very nearly as massive as Drevass and showing the worn horns of age, was standing in the center of the bowl shaped room. He was gesturing wildly and speaking in a loud, offended tone to a smaller dragon, this one a pale amber-orange.

"I'm one of the finest fire mages in all of dragon stone, and I tell you that there is no such thing as a sure guarantee in magic! The spell will likely work, and I will do all I can, but I can never be sure. You will have to accept it."

The smaller dragon was nearly flattened to the floor by the psychological force of the other's shout, but he lifted his head into the mental hurricane and replied, "I will not go without the assurance that my eggs will survive the trip. This is my first clutch, and I am not likely to have another for many centuries, if at all."

"I can assure you that I will do all in my power to keep the spell constant, but again I say there are no guarantees! Magic is unpredictable, wild! There is no dragon mage on the face of the Earth that can guarantee a spell over such a period of time!"

Serali turned to Drevass, who was standing not too far from where she had entered. "What is all this?"

"Vulcnor, that's the orange fellow there being blown away by the force of argument, his mate clutched just a month or two ago. Autumn clutches are rare, most dragons lay in late winter or spring, and if the eggs will hatch after the migration the parents can merely stay behind in the south for a few weeks. The winter lands are hot in summer, but not unbearably so, and there is plenty of game for a few dragons. But to stay here through the winter is almost sure death for the eggs. Neither of them is a mage, so warming their chambers against the coming cold will be impossible. As the weather gets colder there will be less game. To stay alive both of them will need to hunt every day, but if they leave the eggs for more then a few minutes the cold will kill them.

"Thedrill, the large fellow who is blowing like a winter blizzard, is a fairly good mage. He has an overly high opinion of himself, but many mages do. He wants Vulcnor and his mate to move the eggs with the rest of us to the winter lands. But much of the travel will be through the cold, so the eggs will need a warming spell to protect them. Dragon magic is raw power controlled very closely. The warming spell will probably work just fine, but there's always a very small chance that Tehdrill will lose his concentration and let out too much power. If that happens, the eggs would probably be cooked."

"Why doesn't he just seal off his spell then?"

"Do what?"

"Seal the spell so that it maintains itself. It's easy to do, you just need a word or two in the formal language of magic."

"I have no idea what you are talking about. The language of magic?"

"Your mages don't use word spells?" Serali suddenly realized that in all her learning about dragons, she had never bothered to find out how dragon magic worked.

"No. I'm no mage, but I've been told it is entirely a matter of mind mastery." He looked speculatively at Serali. "Could you seal a heat spell that Thedrill had set?"

"Possibly. But why do that when I can set a heat spell of my own easily enough? I spent more than two years learning fire magic. I think I have some small mastery of it by now."

"And you are certain that it would neither grow colder not hotter after you had done this?"

"I have staked my life on such bindings while practicing dangerous spells before this. I am certain enough to stake the lives of any number of unborn dragons on it."

"In that case, I think it's time I put and end to this argument."