A stunned, angry silence followed his announcement. Many of the soldiers were staring at Martin like he had gone insane, and the others were glaring at me with undisguised loathing. “Sebastian is here for a reason,” Martin went on, taking advantage of the shock, or choosing to ignore it. “Because he has been among the enemy, he has information that you all need to hear. I suggest you listen to what he has to say and reserve judgment until you’ve heard the entire story. Sebastian?” He half turned to me, nodding. “It’s all yours.”
I stepped forward, meeting the angry glares head-on. “Talon is coming,” I said over the angry murmurs of the crowd. “They have an army, and they intend to use it to destroy the Order once and for all. Their plan is to attack every St. George chapterhouse in a single night and strike a crippling blow against the Order. One that we’ll never recover from.”
“You’re full of shit, Sebastian,” called a soldier, perhaps the same one who’d shouted at us earlier. “All the chapterhouses in a single night? Talon doesn’t have those kinds of numbers.”
“Yes, they do,” I insisted. “I’ve seen them myself. They have an army of dragons, hundreds of them, maybe thousands, enough to attack every St. George base around the world and burn it to the ground.” A disbelieving, horrified silence fell as I let those words sink in. “They’re coming for you,” I went on quietly. “And if you’re not ready for them when they get here, everyone in St. George will be slaughtered.”
“Lieutenant Martin, sir!” another soldier called, and waited for Martin to acknowledge him before he went on. “Sir, how do we know Sebastian isn’t lying? He’s been in contact with the lizards themselves. How do we know Talon didn’t send him here to set us up?”
“We don’t,” Martin said calmly. “I have no idea what Sebastian has been doing in the time he has been gone. But I find it hard to believe that Talon would send him to warn us of an imminent attack. Even if he is lying, is that really something you want to risk?”
“I’m not lying,” I said, facing my former brothers again. “Talon is coming for you. There is an army of dragons on its way to massacre the Order. And with the chapterhouses so isolated and fractured right now, the rest of St. George won’t be able to help. You can’t survive this alone.” I paused, taking a furtive breath, then added, “But I have friends who can help.”
“Friends,” a soldier said scornfully, his voice pulsing with hate. “You mean dragons, don’t you, Sebastian? Lizards.”
“Yes,” I replied simply as the room began to erupt again. Soldiers were swearing at me, protesting, sneering at the very idea of accepting help from dragons. Tristan stood in the corner, watching all of this, but his expression was unreadable. “Listen to me,” I urged the rest of them. “I know this goes against everything we’ve been taught, but there are dragons out there who are not affiliated with Talon. Who have broken away and are in hiding from the organization, from their own kind.”
“So what?” someone demanded. “One evil soulless lizard is just like another. What does it matter if they’re not part of Talon anymore?”
“It matters,” I said firmly, “because they don’t want Talon to succeed any more than you do. Because Talon is trying to kill them off, as well, and any dragon who is not part of the organization. But they can’t stand against Talon alone.” I looked over the sea of angry, disgusted faces and hardened my voice. “And neither can you. To have a chance at surviving this attack, we have to work together.”
“Fuck that, dragonlover!” came a voice from the crowd. “I sure as hell ain’t letting a bunch of lizards share space with me. I see a dragon, any dragon, I’ll do what I’ve always done—put a bullet through its skull.”
“No, you will not.” Lieutenant Martin stepped forward again, his expression dangerous. “If Sebastian speaks the truth,” he said into the stunned silence, “and an attack from Talon is imminent, then we must do whatever it takes to ensure we survive. Including ally with the dragons.”
“Sir.” A soldier stepped from the crowd, gazing up at Martin with an almost-pleading expression. “That’s...that’s against the Code. The Order doesn’t accept help from lizards, for any reason. If the rest of St. George finds out about this, you...all of us...” He gestured to the crowd behind him. “We could be tried for treason, sir. They might execute the lot of us for consorting with the enemy.”
“I know, Roberts,” Martin said in a quieter voice. “And under normal circumstances, I would never question protocol. But in this, I feel we have no choice. The Order of St. George is dangerously unstable. If an army attacks and cripples the Order or, worse, shatters it entirely, think of what that will mean for the rest of the world. Talon would have no opposition. There would be no one left to stand against the dragons. Besides...” His gaze rose, sweeping over the crowd. “It is my duty to protect this base and the soldiers under my command, no matter the cost. I will not let this chapterhouse fall, even if I must consort with demons. Afterward, if the Order demands punishment, I will accept full responsibility for accepting help from dragons. But we must survive whatever is coming first.
“We will be forming a temporary truce with a group of outside dragons,” Martin went on, his tone becoming hard and matter-of-fact again. “Any who cannot accept that may leave. You can pack your things right now and go, and there will be no repercussions.” He paused, as if giving the soldiers a chance to take the offer, to leave the Order of St. George and not look back. Surprisingly, no one moved. “But if you choose to stay,” Martin went on, “know that for the first time in history, we will be letting dragons onto the premises. These dragons will be under the full protection of St. George, and no one is allowed to harm, insult, hassle or cause them grief of any kind. You will all be the polite, well-trained soldiers I know you are capable of being, and you will represent the Order to the best of your ability.”
“And if the lizards attack us, sir?” a soldier asked, almost defiantly.
“They won’t,” I answered. “They’re not monsters. They’re going to be just as scared and nervous and wary of you as you are of them. But they know what’s at stake. They have just as much reason to hate Talon, and they’ll want to make this alliance work.” If any of them even decide to come.
“One more thing, sir.” Another soldier stepped up, deliberately addressing Martin and not myself. “If Sebastian’s dragons show up, how will we tell them apart from the dragons that will be attacking the base? I mean...” He shot a sneer at me. “One lizard is pretty much like another. How will I know what dragon I’m supposed to shoot?”
“You’ll know,” I replied, addressing them all. “There will be a difference. The dragons arriving to help us will look like every other dragon you’ve faced—bright scales, different colors, all hatchlings. Talon’s dragons are metallic gray with white horns and eyes. They’ll all look the same, so you should be able to tell the difference between them and the rogue dragons.”
“What do you mean, they all look the same?” the soldier wanted to know. “What, like they’re the same color?”
“I mean they’re clones,” I said flatly. “Exact replicas of each other. Talon has been cloning dragons for several years, and now they have an army of them. These dragons have no fear and no self-preservation instinct. They will keep coming at you until they’re dead.”
“Mother of God,” someone muttered, though I couldn’t tell who, and a soldier near the front of the stage crossed himself.
Martin nodded briskly, addressing the soldiers. “We only have a few hours,” he said, making several of them jerk up. “Forty-eight at the most, and probably less than that. This attack is happening—we need to prepare so that when this dragon army does come for us, we’ll be waiting for them. We are St. George,” he added in a louder voice. “Killing dragons is our specialty. Let Talon send their army after us. The Order will not submit. We will not break. If this dragon army shows up on our doors
tep, we will do what we’ve always done and send them back to hell where they belong.”
I hoped he was right.
RILEY
I didn’t have a word for what I was feeling.
Angry didn’t quite cover it. Horrified seemed a bit too tame. Appalled and incredulous sort of fit, but even they didn’t compare.
“So let me get this straight,” I rasped at Ember. The five of us—me, Ember, Mist, Jade and a very disgruntled Wes—were standing in the kitchen around a long wooden table. The rest of the hatchlings had assembled in the living room and were sitting or lounging in loose groups, watching sleepily. Ember had insisted on waking up the entire house, saying that everyone needed to hear what she had to say, that it was important.
Absolutely hysterical was more like it.
“You want us—” I gestured to the dragons surrounding me “—and the hatchlings, who have never seen a battle before in their lives, to go help the Order of St. George fight an army of soulless killer dragons? Are you insane? That’s...” I shook my head, unable to think of a proper word for it. “No, Firebrand. Absolutely not. I’m not risking this underground to go and die for the Order, that’s out of the question.”
“Um, yeah, I’m going to go with Riley on this one and say that you’re off your rocker,” Wes added. “Completely, utterly, barking mad.”
Ember’s eyes flashed green, but she answered in a calm, far too reasonable voice. “We can’t hide forever, Riley.”
“We sure as hell can,” I snapped back. “We stay here, keep our heads down and stay the fuck out of the way. That’s how it has always worked. That’s how we’ve been able to survive.”
“And what happens when there are no more hiding places? What happens when Talon destroys the Order and comes after us full scale?” Ember shook her head. “If we keep running from Talon, eventually they’re going to catch up.”
“So your plan is to charge at them head-on.”
“My plan is that we stop running,” Ember said firmly. “And start fighting back.”
“With what?” I snarled at her, and gestured to the group watching in the living room. “A handful of untrained hatchlings? Alone? How long do you think they’re going to last against an army?”
“Not alone,” Ember agreed. “None of us can stand against Talon alone. That’s why we need to ally with the Order, and anyone else that we can find. Ex-Talon servants, other rogues, Eastern dragons, everyone.” She glanced at Jade and Mist, on opposite ends of the table. “If we put out the call to oppose Talon, more will join us. There have to be those within the organization who don’t agree with the Elder Wyrm, who would be willing to fight if they knew there were others doing the same. But we have to start this war ourselves—we have to start actively resisting, instead of running away. If we join with the Order of St. George, we have a chance.”
I could sense a stunned, nervous silence coming from the living room. Most of the hatchlings were still half-asleep, but Ember’s words were waking them up quick. It would probably be only a few seconds longer before some of them started to chime in.
“Join with the Order,” Jade mused, and her normally placid expression twisted into an expression of anger and loathing. “Ally with the humans who destroyed my temple and slaughtered my friends. The thought is...sickening.
“But,” she added, “I do see your point. Talon is not going to stop. They were the ones who gave the Order the location of my temple. They are the ones responsible for the destruction of my home and the murder of my friends. St. George might have done the killing, but Talon was the hand wielding the weapon. All because I refused to conform to their ways. They will do the same to every dragon they find, until we are all dead or enslaved to the organization.” She drummed her fingers on her arm, her expression pensive. “Change must come,” she mused. “That much is certain. Perhaps allying with the Order is the way to bring it about.”
“Join the Order?” On the other side of the table, Mist shook her head. “Well, if that’s your plan, I can tell you one thing—Talon certainly wouldn’t expect it.”
I slammed my fist on the table, making Wes and several of the hatchlings jump. “Just like that, huh?” I said as they all looked at me. “Join the Order and go fight Talon’s army with them? March merrily off to war with my underground and all my hatchlings—that’s what you’re suggesting?”
“Not all of them,” Ember said. “Only the ones who agree to come.” She turned from me then, taking a step forward to face the group of hatchlings. “I’m not going to force anyone to fight,” she told the room. “But you should have the choice. You should know what we’re up against, and what we can try to do to fight. We can’t keep running and hiding. We have to take a stand.”
“Stop it, Ember.” I stepped forward, as well, furious. “Why don’t you tell them the truth?” I looked past her into the living room, at the sea of tense faces, and narrowed my eyes. “If you fight Talon and St. George, you’re going to die,” I said, and saw several of them stiffen. “This is a war. It’s not like television or the movies. There’s nothing romantic or honorable about it. It’s bullets and blood and chaos and death, and neither side has any qualms about gunning you down or tearing you apart. You’ve all seen St. George. You know what they’re like. And Talon is even worse. If we go charging into a war zone, we’re going to be killed.”
“We’re going to be killed, anyway, Riley.” Ember’s voice, though remorseful, was unyielding. “Sooner or later, whether you like it or not, the war is going to catch up. Talon isn’t going to stop. Whatever they’re planning, it’s happening now.” She faced the group of hatchlings once more, raising her voice. “We can either go out and face it head-on, or we can wait for it to come and kill us. Once Talon destroys St. George, none of us will ever be safe again. We can’t run from this any longer. It’s time to start fighting back.”
“No,” I said firmly, and stepped away from her. “I’m sorry, Firebrand. But I can’t. I’ve spent the past decade trying to protect this underground, to take the risks so they wouldn’t have to. I’ve already lost too many, to both Talon and St. George. I can’t in good conscience send them out to fight, knowing that they’re probably going to die.” She gazed at me, the look on her face devastatingly blank. “I’m sorry,” I said again. “But there are some lines I won’t cross. This is one of them. Hate me if you want, Ember, but we’re not going to fight a battle we can’t win. We’re not going anywhere. St. George will have to get by without us.”
“I’ll go.”
I turned in amazement as a girl rose from the back and faced us with grim determination. “I’ll go,” Nettle said again, stepping forward. “I’m not afraid.”
“Nettle,” I growled as fear and anger surged up, making my voice sharp, “you don’t know what you’re saying. If you try to fight this army, you’re going to die.”
“Maybe,” Nettle replied. “Or maybe Talon will come for us tonight while we’re all asleep, and I’ll die, anyway.” I started to argue with her, but she raised her voice. “I’m tired, Cobalt,” she said. “I’m tired of constantly hiding and being afraid. Always watching my back, being scared to go anywhere alone, waking up to evacuate in the middle of the night. It never ends. It’s always something, either Talon or St. George wanting to kick down our door and slaughter us all.” She slumped, rubbing her arm self-consciously. “She’s right. If we don’t start fighting back, we’ll be running away for the rest of our lives.”
Raising her chin, she met Ember’s gaze. “So, yeah. I’m done with this. If St. George needs us to save them from Talon, I guess we’ll just have to show them what we can do. Count me in.”
“Me, too,” echoed Remy, standing up. “I’m coming, too.”
“Yeah. Me, too.”
I stood there, dazed, as one by one all my hatchlings slowly rose to their feet, announcing their consent. Only
Kain and two of his friends remained seated until the very end, but when the final hatchling stood up, he muttered a curse and climbed to his feet, as well, crossing his arms.
I shook my head at them all. “You stubborn idiot hatchlings,” I almost-whispered. They set their jaws or crossed their arms, staring back at me, and I hardened my voice. “You realize what this means, don’t you? Take a good look around. Count how many of you are standing here right now, because some of you aren’t coming back. If you do this, there are going to be casualties. Some of you are going to die, that’s just how it is in war. How do you think that makes me feel, trying to keep the lot of you alive all this time, only to have you charging off into the middle of a war zone?” They didn’t answer, and I fought back the helpless anger threatening to smother me. At my side, Ember was quiet, watching us all. She had won. She had put out the call to fight, and the hatchlings, tired of running and living in fear, had responded. I hadn’t realized how much they wanted to do something, anything, until now.
Deep down, even though I hated it, a part of me knew she was right. But still, this was my underground; for the past decade, I’d fought to keep it safe. I’d watched these kids from the beginning, watched them live and struggle and grow up...but that was the problem, wasn’t it? They had grown up. They knew the stakes, knew what they were getting into, and I couldn’t protect them any longer.
I sighed and looked at the ceiling. “All right,” I muttered. “Go on, then. I can’t stop you. If this is your choice, I won’t stand in your way. It’s not like I can ground every single one of you and expect you to not go out the window the second my back is turned.” That coaxed a smile from a few of them, though the rest remained unnaturally solemn. They did understand what was happening, I realized. They understood all too well.
Nettle stepped forward, seeking my gaze. “You’ll come with us, right, Cobalt?”
“I...yeah.” Slumping, I raked a hand over my scalp. “I think this is a mistake, but I’ll be damned if I stay here while the rest of you go out to fight with St. George.” Shaking my head, I glared at them all. “I’m probably going to get myself shot full of holes trying to save you ingrates, but...I’ll be there. And I’ll fight the bastards for as long as I can, I promise.”