Morthan Gorvaxis woke before dawn, as he had every morning for fifty-one years.
The routine was the same. Boots on. Belt with the Warden's tools — the feeding whistle, the scale-oil flask, the iron prod that he had never used and hoped he never would. Walk from the Warden's quarters on the eastern shore of Sovereign Lake to the observation platform built fifty yards from the water's edge. Check the weather. Check the water level. Check the creature.
The Hydra was where it always was — half-submerged in the shallows, three heads resting on the shore like dark boulders. It breathed in the slow rhythm of deep sleep, each exhale sending ripples across the still water. The creature was nearly three hundred years old. Its scales had darkened from iron-grey to a deep black that absorbed the pre-dawn light. Each head was the size of a horse cart. The body beneath the waterline was larger than the Grand Ordinator's residence.
