Black Frost (25 page)

“There has not been a Speaker for close to a
thousand years!” Greer said incredulously.

“What is a Speaker?” I asked him.

“They speak to dragons,” he answered with a
shrug. “No one else can. Dragons are not native to our world, their
biology is very different, yet we have lived with them for all of
our recorded history. Occasionally, there comes among us one who
can communicate with them, mind to mind. Those individuals allowed
us to work out the treaties that kept dragons and elves from
fighting. But we have lacked a Speaker for most of Mother’s and
Aunt Zinna’s reigns. Relations have degraded to the point where we
avoid each other to prevent any unfortunate incidents.”

“And Ashley is a Speaker?”

“Apparently,” he said, nodding at the immense
carnivorous bulk above us.

“Gargax heard me when the red and black elves
had me and started this way. He called others of his kind and they
will be here shortly,” Ashley said, her expression equal parts
wonder, exhaustion, and defiance. “He is very angry with all of you
for hurting me and my ..sire,” she said to the queens before
looking back at me puzzled. “Sire?”

“That’s me. Another, older term for father,”
I explained. “So, I’m gonna assume that this changes things.”

Greer nodded, eyes still locked on the
dragon, “Oh yes, Ian, this, as you say, changes everything.”

Chapter 24

The dragons kept arriving for the next three
days. First there were tens of them but by day three there was well
over a hundred, all immense, all anxious to meet and speak with
Ashley. They came in different shades of black, grey, green, brown
and bronze. Some were all one color, others a mix of shades, but
all were enormous. The smallest was about the size of Ashley’s
school bus, the biggest approached a hundred feet in length. They
all had a similar body shape. A long flat head, like a crocodile
mixed with a barracuda, connected to a sinuous snaky neck. A deep
chest supported the front bat-winged forelegs and powered their
impossible flight. Bat-like also described their ground locomotion,
at least for the front half of their bodies, the rear portion was
very dinosaurian in construction. Huge, powerful back legs, like a
Spinosaurus or T-rex, and a long spine tipped tail.

Their heads had horns and a boney crest and
they all had the same gleaming yellow eyes.

Our treatment had changed the moment Gargax
touched down. The elves of both courts treated us with a very
differential VIP status, Ashley in particular. My impression was
that the elves really, really did not want any part of a conflict
with the dragons. Watching Gargax send a gout of fire a hundred and
fifty feet into the air helped me grasp their concern. The dragon
biology allowed them to separate and store volatile chemicals from
minerals they regularly chowed down on. Sacs, like a rattlesnake’s
venom glands, stored the chemicals apart until the dragon sprayed
them. When the chemicals mixed, they ignited in a napalm stream
that burned with tremendous heat and vigor.

The elves treated our wounds (mostly mine)
with salves and ointments that would be worth a fortune to the
pharmacy companies on earth. My worst cuts and punctures healed
completely in less than twenty-four hours, leaving a spidery web of
silver scars. In addition, they fed us a compound that allowed us
to process the excess oxygen in Fairie’s atmosphere. I hadn’t
noticed it in the short time before Gargax’s arrival, but Greer
assured me the oxygen content was too high for me to breathe for
any longer period of time without treatment.

Greer had been assigned to be our liaison,
due to his
dettis onach
. His mother was not particularly
pleased with his actions to help me, yet his culture demanded he do
nothing less than he had. I had a feeling that we would be meeting
with the queens and their advisors a lot, but the initial days were
spent with Ashley meeting each dragon, escorted by a small group
that consisted of myself, Charm and Greer, as well as one of each
queen’s advisors. We did meet Caillach, who was mother to the
queens. She had known the last Speaker as he’d been a cousin of
hers and lived during
her
reign as Winter Queen. The ancient
elf had known Ashley was a Speaker and had even felt
my
thoughts when I watched the events in the field. But she had long
removed herself from the machinations of the Elven Courts, except
those times when she was called to mediate, so she had kept her
silence.

So the stream of aircraft sized dragons
continued. Each dragon had a long unpronounceable name that Ashley
would shorten to something she could use out loud. She told me that
her conversations occurred completely inside her head, which I
believed as my own head felt a buzzing sensation, like bees in my
skull, whenever she was speaking with them. The dragons, for their
part, could sense my mind from some distance, but that was it. I
was deaf and mute in their world, yet we each could get the others
attention mentally. The elves were
very
interested in this
non-ability of mine and felt that it was the origin of Ashley’s
Speaker Talent.

Once the dragon introductions were complete,
we got down to brass tacks. The order of business, though, was the
status of the children still being kept as prisoners near the
portals. The elves pled racial extinction, the right for survival
as a people and every other card they had. But we were adamant that
the children of earth be returned home. The queens were very old
and very crafty, but they met their match in Ashley’s stubborn
will, which was like iron once she’s made up her mind. It was fun
to watch these ancient aliens bash their heads against the granite
of my daughter’s will, which was backed by hundreds of tons of fire
breathing dragons.

So it was that six days after our violent
arrival on Fairie, I stepped back through the portal on Bear
Mountain, immediately raising both hands as I faced a forest of
rifle barrels. My little part of earth had changed drastically. The
cleft granite of the summit was now the focus of several machine
gun nests and about thirty or so soldiers. Even as I tensely waited
with my hands in the air, I could hear many heavy vehicles down
around my GrandFather’s house and barn.

The extremely serious looking soldiers in
front of me held me at gunpoint for several minutes till a six
wheeled Polaris ATV came bouncing up the hill and discharged an
elderly looking gentleman in a black suit complete with black cane.
He was white haired and white mustached, with extremely sharp eyes
and the slightest limp in his left leg. Accompanying him was an
extremely fit looking young woman with brown hair and dark serious
eyes wearing black military battledress. She didn’t carry a weapon,
but I
knew
immediately that she was really dangerous, didn’t
need a weapon, and would kill me dead if I threatened her boss.
Just an intuitive hunch, the kind I get watching fighters and
simply understanding their strengths and weaknesses. What I
understood was that she could kick serious ass.

The older gent walked up to where I waited, a
smile on his face.

“Mr. Ian Moore, I presume?” he asked.

I nodded, hands still up, but arms trembling
from the effort.

“Relax Mr. Moore. Master Sergeant Cooper, I
think you can have your men stand down. I don’t think Mr. Moore is
going to raid his own property, besides, we have lots of questions
and I’ve never been a fan of answers made under duress,” the gent
said, waving his hand absently at the blocky sergeant.

The troops lowered their weapons but none of
them took their eyes off me either.

“Mr. Moore, my name is Nathan Stewart and
this is my assistant Adine Benally,” he continued with a nod at his
assistant, who was watching me with cold eyes. “The President
employs me to handle odd situations like this one.”

“If you would be so kind as to ride down the
hill with us, maybe we could get a cup of coffee in your
comfortable little home? I feel that you have much to tell us,” he
suggested.

I cleared me throat, belatedly dropping my
hands. “That would be fine, Mr. Stewart, but before we do that I’m
gonna need help with the children,” I said.

He looked at me with raised white eyebrows
for a moment. “Children?”

I nodded, then spoke. “Yes, the children that
were taken when the Fairies came through.”

“Fairies?” he asked.

“It’s a long story Mr. Stewart, one I will be
glad to tell, along with a whole slew of information on their
world, culture and what they want from us and what they have to
offer. You see, I’m back as something of an ambassador, although
that’s not an exact fit for my situation. But before we delve into
that, I have all of the children that were taken waiting to come
through,” I explained.

“I see,” he said thoughtfully. “How many
children were taken here in Groton’s Falls?” he asked, although I
suspected he knew the number as well as I did.

“Seven, but I have two hundred and seventy-
four children waiting to come through. That’s the total that was
taken
everywhere.
”

He looked at me blankly for a moment and even
his poker faced assistant showed a glimmer of surprise.

“Taken everywhere?” he echoed.

“I think you know that the incursions
occurred in many locations around the world at the same time. The
children taken were specifically targeted and even though they were
selected from all over Earth, there is only a few of them. I would
like to bring them back here and then maybe we could get them to
their home countries?” I asked.

Nathan Stewart stared at me for a full
fifteen seconds, the persona of affable old gent gone, replaced by
one of an analytical government agent. Then he came to some
decision, nodded once and the good old guy was back, a big smile on
his face.

“I think we can take good care of the
children. How do we begin?” he asked, curious. His badass assistant
was still giving me the cold stare.

“Like this. Pancho!” I said. The puck leader
loyal to my daughter, let go of the webbing on the back of my
assault vest where he had remained hidden from view, dropped into
the air and immediately backwinged through the Portal.

“What was that?” Nathan exclaimed, real
interest in his eyes. I was raising my hands again, as the puck’s
exit had startled the combat troops who brought up their rifles
again.

“That was a messenger,” I replied, not taking
my eyes off the rifle barrels.

Agent Stewart waved his hands in a down
motion at the soldiers and they lowered their weapons.

“Mr. Stewart, can I ask if your troops are
carrying M855 ammo in their M4’s or the newer heavy bullets?”

Stewart turned and looked at the Master
Sergeant, eyebrows raised in question.

“77 grain ammo Sir,” the tough looking
soldier replied.

Stewart looked back at me, eyebrows still
raised.

“The old 855 ammo will be more effective
against elves and their allies. Most of the species of their world
are allergic to iron and steel,” I explained.

“So that old myth was true?” Stewart
asked.

“Yes sir. Those claymore mines set up there
will be extremely effective with their load of ball bearings, and
fragmentation grenades work wonderfully,” I said, now having
everyone’s interest.

“You would appear to have even more
information than I hoped for,” Stewart said.

“Sir, you have no idea. And I’m fully
prepared to disclose it all, when the children are taken care of,”
I said, just as the first of the kids, a Groton Falls child,
stepped through the Portal.

“I would have thought your daughter would be
first through?” Stewart asked, obviously aware that the girl coming
through was not Ashley.

“She won’t be coming over Mr. Stewart,” I
replied to his astounded expression. “But that tale is part of what
we’ll talk about.”

“I look forward to it,” he replied, eyes
watching the steady stream of children that were now coming through
the interplanetary gateway behind me.

Final Thoughts

So there you have it, as promised. I spent
three days debriefing with Mr. Stewart and an ever increasing
number of government types, sending a steady stream of messages
back to Ashley through Pancho. I met with a ton of federal people;
State Department, Department of Defense, FBI, CIA, NSA, SEALs,
Marine Recon troops, biologists, physicists, astronomers, hell even
IRS. There was a lot to tell. These pages were copied from my
written statement, but I doubt the government will take long to
find it.

It doesn’t matter. They won’t be able to
cover this up for long. It’s too big of a story, the biggest in
fact. First contact with aliens. Well not really first, but rather
first
official
contact. They’re already part of our
folklore.

But you need to prepare. Because the
governments of this world will be wheeling and dealing, fast and
furious with Fairie. The biological knowledge they possess will
change our world. Cancer will be cured, damaged organs regrown in
place, Alzheimer’s, dementia, autism, diabetes, and even old age is
as good as gone, or will be in the next five years. But to get this
knowledge, we’ll have to trade. And what
they
want are
children. So don’t deceive yourselves into thinking our government
or any other government won’t empty its orphanages in exchange for
knowledge. Oh, they’ll call it exchange programs, or
inter-dimensional training, cross cultural learning or some other
happy horseshit. But in the end it’ll be legalized trade in
children of Talent. And the good, kindly folks of Fairie will be
here in large numbers as well (please note for those of you who
aren’t following, that was sarcasm). They will have their own
agendas, seeking power and knowledge from us. They’re faster than
we are, very savage and have been trained for decades if not
centuries in fighting skills. Tackling them one-on-one is a bad
idea. Instead, you need to prepare, arm yourselves, seek out
training, accumulate ammunition (steel tipped) and supplies, and
above all, keep your children close. Read to them from this story
if you like, maybe it will scare them into behaving safely. After
all, that’s what our original folktales were for, too bad we forgot
to pay attention.