6.0 - Raptor (6 page)

Angulus opened his mouth, but Tylie padded in after Ort and Sardelle, and he hesitated. Ridge didn’t know if it was because he was surprised to see her or if her presence made him want to curb an outpouring of profanity. If the latter, Ridge would have to remember to bring her to future meetings with the king.

“I need a dragon-hunting team, Zirkander,” Angulus said. “You’re in charge of it.”

“Because I have a couch vendetta to pursue?”

Angulus scowled at him.

So much for holding back on that irreverence.

“Because dragons fly. And nobody’s done more crazy flying than you.”

That was possibly true. As long as the adjective
crazy
was attached.

“General Ort will be your co-commander on this mission. Also, I’m hoping Sardelle will agree to help.” Angulus’s tone was civil and his scowl much lighter for her. “And then anyone else you want, I’ll arrange it. This problem is my fault. I’d appreciate it if you fixed it.”

You should ask him to buy you a new couch if you succeed
, Jaxi suggested.

I’m trying to keep my irreverence to a minimum.

Jaxi made a skeptical noise in his mind.

I also don’t think I should ask for favors when he’s clearly cranky.

“How
much
of a problem has he become, Sire?” Sardelle asked, her face and tone concerned. She couldn’t have been inappropriately irreverent if she had tried.

Not to a king, no.
Sardelle twitched an eyebrow in his direction.
They taught us not to do that in my century.

Angulus turned toward his desk, reaching for a rolled-up map.

He’s just a man. You know the saying—he puts his hand-tailored, calfskin breeches on one leg at a time, the same as the rest of us. Though I’m expecting he spends less time in them now.
While Angulus’s back was still turned, Ridge flashed her a wicked grin.

You’re tickled by that relationship, aren’t you?

I am. Angulus needs someone fun.

Ridge wondered what Angulus would think if he requested Captain Kaika for this dragon-hunting team. Would he feel protective toward her now and want to keep her safe? Ridge doubted
Kaika
would appreciate being kept safe. At least, he hoped not. She was the best demolitions person Ridge knew, and it was a forgone conclusion that pistols weren’t going to take out dragons.

“A lot of the attacks have been in the Ice Blades,” Angulus said, stepping aside so they could see the spread map. He had circled several towns and placed Xs next to others. They ranged throughout the foothills on the western side of the mountains, running about three hundred miles north and south along the bottom half of the range. “The Xs are sightings, and the circles are villages that he attacked. He swoops in and takes sheep and cows to eat, but he likes to burn buildings while he’s there, not worrying about whether anyone is inside. In Loon’s Lake, the villagers shot at him, and he killed them all.” Angulus clenched his teeth and stared hard at the map.

A soft knock sounded on the door, and Kaika walked in. She wore her usual uniform, with weapons and a sack of gear slung over her shoulder, and she saluted professionally when Angulus looked up. Only her lips expressed anything suggestive, quirking at the corners when their eyes met.

“Reporting for dragon-slaying duty, Sire,” she said.

“I thought I was picking my own team,” Ridge said dryly.

Kaika winked at him. “We knew you’d want me.”

Ridge resisted the urge to make a joke, especially since Angulus’s eyes narrowed slightly as he followed that wink. Ridge got that look from boyfriends and husbands often, so he recognized it well, though he wouldn’t have expected Angulus to feel threatened by Ridge’s reputation. Kings were greater prizes than pilots. Any girl would say so.

“Loon’s Lake isn’t far from your facility,” Sardelle said. “Your former facility.”

Angulus nodded, shifting his attention to her. “Yes, the dragon has been sighted near there a couple of times. I’m wondering if he’s making plans to free the rest of the dragons in that cavern. I’ve got people watching the mountain right now. You were there when I had Kaika set off those controlled explosives to bury the entrances, and we’ve since brought down the old research facility, too, in an attempt to make that cavern inaccessible, or at least not easily accessible. I didn’t want to try to destroy the statues outright, not until you’d finished your research. If some of them could be talked into alliances with Iskandia, it might be worth the risk of dealing with criminals. By all accounts, dragons are more deadly than an armored dirigible filled with soldiers and guns.”

“Very likely,” Sardelle said neutrally. She had told Ridge she didn’t think any of the dragons should be trusted or set free, but he didn’t know if she had expressed that sentiment to Angulus.

He knows
, Jaxi said.
But he’s worried about the empire, right now, and is willing to take risks to gain big advantages. Apparently, he was recently trying to negotiate a peace treaty with the emperor when the Cofah army blew up the dirigible carrying the envoy he’d sent.

Are you supposed to be cavorting in his thoughts and sharing them with me?

Yes.

Ridge snorted, drawing a couple of glances. He needed to learn not to respond aloud to Jaxi. “A couple of those towns are within seventy-five miles of the Magroth crystal mines too.” He pointed at spots farther north.

“I noticed that,” Angulus said, “but my understanding is that the crystals wouldn’t be of any interest to a dragon, that he could make anything magical that a human sorcerer could have made.”

“Technically, we made things that dragons never did, more because they didn’t have a need to, rather than because they didn’t have the power to,” Sardelle said. “You’re right, though, in that our lamps wouldn’t be of any interest. There are other tools up there, though, and books full of information.” She glanced at Ridge. “Some of those were taken out in the time I was there.”

“So it’s possible something there might interest a dragon?” Angulus asked.

“Possible. I’d have to think about what that might be, and of course, I wasn’t aware of all of the contents of the vaults and libraries, as I didn’t have a full-time teaching or government position there. Regardless, I agree that it seems likely that he might want his brethren back, to create a full squadron of dragons that would answer to him.”

A full squadron of dragons. Ridge hadn’t even seen the destructive capability of one firsthand yet, but he shuddered at the idea of encountering such an entity in the skies. The sorceress had incinerated fliers with a wave of her hand, and she was just a human.

Technically, she’s one-eighth dragon
, Jaxi said.
She claimed to be the great granddaughter of one. Of course, she could have been lying.

You didn’t cavort in her thoughts to check?

You can’t cavort with people who know how to shield their minds from intrusion. She could be a hermaphrodite with scales instead of body hair, and I’d never be able to pry the secret from her.

I’d like to think
I’d
be able to detect that secret.

“Perhaps…” Sardelle looked at Tylie, to whom Ridge hadn’t been paying any attention—she was kneeling in a corner and stroking the strings on a lute resting against the wall. “If we could get permission, Sire, we’d thought to return to the crystal mines to try and find a soulblade for Tylie.”

Angulus frowned. “Can’t that wait?”

“It would be a second weapon that would be useful in an attack against a dragon, and it would be useful for Tylie to have another
Iskandian
mentor.” She raised her eyebrows at Angulus.

Angulus nodded slightly, apparently understanding why she gave that word emphasis.

“Would Tylie fight against the dragon though?” he asked. “I don’t like the idea of sending a girl into battle.”

“Girls can do a lot of damage in battle.” Kaika had been standing quietly by the door, but she set her bag on the floor and ambled over to a chair and flopped down.

“Mature women can, I’ll agree.”

“I don’t know that they have to be
that
mature,” Kaika said, smirking.

Tylie was currently peering into the hollow behind the lute strings, seemingly unaware that everyone in the room was looking at her. She smiled brightly over her shoulder at Ridge. “There are spider eggs in here.”

“Pardon?” Angulus asked.

“You might want to ask the king before you release the ladybug into his lute,” Ridge said.

Angulus curled a lip, more at the thought of an infestation in his instrument than because of strong feelings about ladybugs, Ridge guessed.

“May I?” Tylie dipped into her pocket, then spread her hand, palm up. The ladybug hadn’t escaped on the walk over—or maybe it hadn’t
wanted
to escape. It strutted around on her palm.

“I suppose,” Angulus said, then grabbed a pen and scribbled on a notepad on the desk. “I’m going to have a talk with the cleaning staff about nooks and crannies.”

After the ladybug had been set on the rim of the lute, Tylie faced everyone. She curtsied for the king and smiled shyly at him. “I can fight if it’s to protect Phel.”

“Phel?”

“Phelistoth, Sire,” Ridge said. “The silver dragon.”

“I see.” Angulus rubbed his jaw. “Very well. Maybe I’ll send you two over to get the sword, while—”

Another knock sounded at the door.

“Send her in,” Angulus said without waiting for an announcement. “We’ve been expecting her.”

We? Ridge wasn’t expecting anyone, so he turned curiously toward the door.

His jaw dropped when Caslin Ahn walked in.

Chapter 3

W
hen Cas slipped past her escort and into the king’s office, she tensed as soon as she saw the collection of people waiting for her. Seeing General Zirkander flooded her with guilt, and at the same time, wariness crept in, causing her shoulders to bunch. Zirkander had tried hard not to let her resign, and her first thought was that this was some scheme to get her to come back. A part of her wanted to come back—she missed her job and her comrades more than she’d ever thought she would—but she couldn’t. Not after what she’d done. Couldn’t he understand that?

As soon as the king set down a map and turned to face her, she realized her thought had likely been wrong—and self-absorbed. Whatever was going on here, with Tylie, Sardelle, Zirkander, General Ort, Captain Kaika,
and
the king in the room, it had to be about more than her old job. Besides, she doubted Zirkander could have talked King Angulus into intervening in regard to her resignation.

“Tolie!” Tylie blurted and scampered across the room.

Cas stepped aside, lest she be bowled over. Tylie was only a few inches taller than she and lacked Tolemek’s sturdy, muscled build, but she wore a determined smile as she flung herself into her brother’s arms.

Tolemek returned the hug, but he wore a stern expression as he gazed around the room, a what-is-going-on-and-why-was-my-little-sister-involved expression.

“Ms. Ahn,” the king said, ignoring Tolemek’s sternness and the family reunion. His gaze locked onto Cas.

Ms. Ahn. That sounded strange after being Lieutenant Ahn for almost two years. But she did not have time to lament the loss, as she was soon busy worrying that she was in trouble. Had he decided to punish her for Apex’s death? Or her role in his wife’s death? Or something else? Even though she hadn’t gone, she had been invited to the dinner and awards ceremony for those pilots who had been pivotal in destroying the flying Cofah fortress, so she had assumed her sins had been forgiven—even if they shouldn’t have been. Maybe something had changed.

“Yes, Sire?” Since she wasn’t in uniform, she genuflected, the movement awkward since she’d rarely been in the king’s company and had the opportunity to practice it.

“We have a dragon problem.”

Startled, Cas spun toward Tolemek. Phelistoth?

“She’s not in the loop anymore, Sire,” Zirkander said. “She doesn’t know about the new one.”

A
new
dragon? How had they gone from dragons being extinct a couple of months ago to having two of them in the world?

“Oh? Tolemek knows.” Angulus looked toward Tolemek, frowning slightly.

“We haven’t… spoken of it, Sire,” Tolemek said. “I was given to understand the dragons were as secret as other matters.”

Cas caught that hesitation. They hadn’t spoken of it—or anything—because she had been avoiding him. A fresh wave of guilt washed over her for that. Tolemek did not deserve to be avoided, not without an explanation, but she was so poor at articulating her feelings. She just felt so uncomfortable around him now—around
all
of them. She couldn’t see them without thinking of her old life and of Apex—of the horrified and pained expression on his face as she had cut into him with that vile sword. She’d been crying out with rage inside, unable to control her own body, but she remembered everything she’d seen and done. And heard. His scream had been almost as bad as the horror of her betrayal in his eyes.

“Cofah agents infiltrated a secret research facility at the southern end of the Ice Blades,” Angulus explained. “When we went out to hunt for them, we found a nearby ancient cavern with ten dragon statues in it. Or so they first appeared. One of the statues had been half melted away, revealing the golden scales of a real dragon. We believe the same sorceress that we faced in the flying fortress found them and released this one partway in order to speak to it and try to recruit it to her cause—taking over Iskandia for the empire and for herself.” Angulus made a face, looking like he wanted to spit. “The evidence pointed to that, and the dragon corroborated that story, but the dragon also proved himself a liar in communicating with me.”

With
him
? Had the king gone out there personally? That seemed insanely dangerous, especially if that sorceress had been there. Nobody else in the room seemed surprised by this information. They’d all known, she realized. Maybe some of them had even been there.