The culling-pens stink of salt and rust. In the smallest pool, a sea-dragon hatchling shivers behind the bars, no bigger than Nerai herself. Its wings are dull gray, and one fin is notched from birth. The breed-masters have chalked a white cross on its side: runt, unfit, to be drowned at dawn. Nerai grips the cold bars. She has until sunrise.

Nerai runs instead to wake the head breed-master, Ortham. She pounds on his door and begs him to spare the hatchling. He opens it, half asleep and frowning. 'A runt is a runt,' he says. 'But say your piece, girl.'

Ortham shakes his head. 'Rules are rules.' But Nerai blocks the door. 'Then let me buy it,' she says, and dumps out everything she owns: three coins, a knife, and her mother's old keeper's whistle. The old man stares at the whistle for a long moment.

Ortham pushes the coins back at her. 'Keep your money.' For a second she thinks she's lost. Then he adds, 'A runt that's wanted that badly might surprise us all. Take it. Train it. Prove me wrong.' Nerai is already running for the pool.