Talker 25 (11 page)

The terrible noise that bursts forth is more shriek than roar. James threads his fingers through mine. We hold on tight, squeezing harder and harder as our cries escalate in a painful duet.

It’s ridiculous really, roaring your grief away, but there’s something about just letting go completely. There’s something even better when there’s somebody howling at your side. It comes nowhere close to making me happy, but it helps me feel less alone, keeps me from sinking into the depths, which is probably about the best I can hope for right now.

We quiet. Our hands slips free; we exchange embarrassed smiles, then look elsewhere.

The dragons lower their heads to Myra. Eight gouts of flame swallow her. They cut off abruptly, and for the briefest moment, the dead Red is bright again, brighter than them all. Then her body dissolves to fiery ash. Steam from the melted ice carries her embers skyward. Winking in and out like fireflies, they swirl higher and higher.

It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.

“May she fly forever into the next tomorrow,” Vestia intones as Myra disappears into the heavens.

When we return to the cave, Keith and Preston are waiting for us, the latter with a bandage wrapped around his head, the former with a sharp scowl, which he directs at James.

“I asked him to take me,” I say before Keith can explode, but my lie only makes him angrier.

He glowers at James. “You can’t go running off whenever you want. You are too valuable.”

“I didn’t go running off, Keith. The dragons had a funeral. It’s not like I’m doing anything useful here.”

Preston pulls at my arm. “Let’s go grab some grub and, uh, you can tell me how your crate got blasted in half.”

I follow him toward the supply crates but am in no mood for food or storytelling. “James mentioned that you guys have a theory about who set me up at Dragon Hill.”

“We’re probably wrong,” Preston says, but it’s obvious he doesn’t believe that. I wait. He chews at a fingernail. “I don’t want to freak you out.”

The Silver bounds over, drops a frozen basketball at my feet. I kick it. “My father’s paralyzed. My brother’s hurt. My home’s destroyed. My best friend’s mother is probably dead. And I’m stuck here playing fetch with a dragon. I’d like to know why.”

With reluctance, Preston admits he and James were part of a surveillance group that had taken up residence in Mason-Kline. Preston was sent into the school to befriend Konrad Kline in order to hack his father’s hard drive for intel.

“About a year ago, the army recollared the Blues—”

“They said it was for comfort or something,” I say. Dad applied many of the restrictors himself. “Never believed that.”

“Yeah, according to schematics we found, the new collars incorporate telepathy monitoring and control.”

It takes me a few seconds to put the puzzle together. “So you think the government was listening in on Old Man Blue?”

“It’s just a theory,” he says.

And there’s more to it, I realize as I recall the BoDA agents who came to arrest me. Those D-men arrived only an hour after the doctored pic appeared in the army system.

“You think the D-men did it,” I say.

“Them or the army. If they were monitoring Cartha, they could have coordinated her communication to the time stamp on the photo Trish took. Add in some decapitated toys, remove everybody else, and there you go. You’re a ‘person of interest’ who needs to be brought in.”

Last time. My hands are getting cold, I say to the Silver, and toss the ball. I look to Preston with an apprehensive
snort. “Then what? They make me disappear?”

Preston, ever-smiling Preston, gives me a frown. “You hear about that ‘quarry massacre’ in Wyoming a few months ago? That one along the drone zone they blamed on insurgents?”

I nod. Like the reporters, I found it odd a mining operation would be located that far from civilization. The drone zone, what most noninsurgents call the frontier, is a fifty-mile skirt of land that encircles the evac territories. Nothing illegal about living there, but most consider it an invitation to disaster via dragon. And that’s what the initial reports indicated. That the facility had been decimated by Red fire.

“It was an off-grid army base, heavily fortified,” Preston says. “We’re the ones who destroyed it. We didn’t know there were talkers there until afterward.” He blows out a long breath. “We knew a couple of them. They’d gone off our radar months ago without a trace. And they’re not the only talkers the army’s using. Three weeks back, somebody contacted one of our scout dragons with a distress call. When he showed up at the rendezvous point, he was ambushed by the military. A few days ago, Grackel received one. Yesterday, Vestia—”

“I get it,” I snap. If Preston’s right, it means the government’s rounding up talkers, enslaving them, means I might never be able to go home, might never see my family again.
Two choices. Neither one mine. All-Blacks and BoDA agents on one side, dragons and insurgents on the other.

James’s words from Dragon Hill leap to mind: “There’s another war coming, Melissa, and you must decide on which side of the fence you’ll stand.” I turn on my heel and make a beeline for Keith and the farmboy, who are sitting alone at a cafeteria table near the front of the cave.

“Where are you going?” Preston asks.

“When I first met James, he told me I’d have to choose sides.” I pick up my pace. “He knew what was going to happen, Preston. You all did. You should have warned us.”

“It’s not like that, Callahan.” Preston grabs my arm and I cringe. “Sorry, but you should wait for a better time.”

I shake free. “You mean when the war’s over?”

“It’s not that simple.”

The Silver returns with the ball, nudges me into a stumble. “Not now!” She dims and retreats.

“Keith should have told me. Somebody should have told—”

“Don’t tell me what to do, Keith. You may be a coward, but I am not!”

James’s shout rings through the cave. He shoves away from the table, heads for the dragons. Keith follows after him. Breaking into a quick jog, so do I. There’s a rapid exchange of words I can’t make out. Keith grabs him, pulls
him into a hug. James’s features soften as tears well in his eyes.

“. . . not easy, but it’s going to be all right,” I hear Keith say as I near. “Let it out.”

“You don’t understand,” James says, his voice breaking. “You can’t understand. You don’t know what . . .” His gaze meets mine. He flushes and flees to Vestia. She looks at him for a few seconds before scooping him up with a talon. She places him on her bare back, and they fly from the cave.

“You want me to go after him?” Preston asks.

“He needs time.” Keith glances up. Dark circles shadow his eyes; he’s got a dozen new wrinkles. It must be hard holding on to all those secrets, living a double life.

“You should have told me.” I chew my lip to calm myself. It’s all I can do not to yell, too. “About you and Mom, about Dragon Hole, about everything.”

He nods, touches the swords tattooed to his neck. “I’m sure I’ve told you what these represent.”

“Successful missions.” I try to bite my tongue, but can’t. “More deception?”

His finger somehow finds the last sword in the chain. “Your mother gave me this one. We’re not supposed to take them preemptively, but she insisted, and she was a hard woman to refuse.” He looks away from me, his eyes pinched. “She wanted me to protect you. I’m sorry things have turned
out so badly, Melissa.”

He sounds defeated. The little girl in me wants to stay mad at him forever. The not-so-little girl realizes he’s like the rest of us. Fallible. Trying to do what he thinks is right, sometimes making mistakes. And I wonder if there is a right path from this darkness. Regardless of the answer, I know I want him by my side for the journey, so I bury my anger and embrace him.

A knock awakens me. Two fourteen, according to the clock hung between two posters of leggy supermodels. The crate once belonged to a rider named Micah, one of Loki’s Grunts’ flight medics. It felt creepy taking some dead guy’s cot, but Preston assured me Micah would have been thrilled to have a pretty girl in his bed. It was either here or James’s crate, and I didn’t want to deal with that awkwardness.

A second knock brings me to full alertness. By the third, I realize it’s for me. “Melissa, you in there?” Keith whispers as I clamber from the cot.

I open the wall. Keith looks over my shoulder, squinting into the shadows.

For a moment I’m offended. In the next, I’m worried. “James hasn’t returned?”

“Neither him nor Vestia. I thought maybe she’d dropped him off and went out for a midnight snack. He turned his
radio off, and Vestia’s not responding to any of our other talkers.”

Vestia, I’m looking for James. . . . Can you hear me?

No response. I repeat my question aloud. Nothing. Am I doing this right? She’s pretty much initiated all our previous conversations. When I ask Keith if there’s a proper dragon-talking protocol, he suggests I make my request with more deference. “Vestia’s a prickly one.”

“Vestia, we’re worried about James. Please respond.”

I repeat the call twice more before she answers in a tone well beyond prickly. The boy does not wish to be disturbed. Neither do I.

He’s all right?

No, he is anything but right. He is human.

Why don’t you have him roar his grief away? I return with equal bite.

You are hopeless creatures. I am hungry. I am tired. He knows this, yet he sulks about things he cannot control.

Let me talk to him.

I do not understand.

Can you relay my words to him?

I am no messenger. A moment later, an image pops into my head of a stone watchtower in the woods.

“I think Vestia just sent me a . . . picture.” I describe what I saw to Keith.

“Shadow Mountain lookout,” he says. “Ask her to bring him back. Right now.”

“What’s wrong?” “It’s at the edge of the drone zone,” he says. His words invoke memories of news reports that show drone swarms taking down stray dragons who wandered out of the evacuated territories. And of Mom’s death.

Vestia, bring him back. Please.

You want me to pick him up and carry him like a little infant? she asks. I can’t tell if she’s amused or annoyed.

If you have to. Tell him he needs to come back.

You tell him, human. Definitely annoyed. He does not listen to me.

She ignores further attempts to communicate.

“We need to get him,” I say to Keith.

“Absolutely not. You stay here.”

I grab him by the wrist as he turns to leave. “Which one of us do you think he’ll listen to?”

“Okay, Melissa. Ask if Marrick will take us to Shadow Mountain lookout. Tell him I’ve got five pounds of chocolate for his troubles.”

“Chocolate?”

“He loves Hershey bars.”

Marrick ignores me until I mention the chocolate. Ten minutes later, we’re in the air. While Keith scans the sky for
drones, I chew on peppermint leaf and search for Vestia. We find her hidden in the woods, gnawing on a felled tree. Keith unfurls the rope ladder tethered to the saddle and we dismount.

The red light of the two dragons guides us to the watchtower, a dark column of stone that looms atop a hill. James appears little more than a shadow on the balcony that rings the tower.

“What do you want?” he calls down.

“I know you’re upset, but it’s not safe out here,” Keith whisper shouts, glancing skyward. Besides the rustle of trees, it’s silent. But unlike jets, drones don’t make much noise.

“Hard as it is for you to believe, I can actually take care of myself.”

“Please come down, James,” I say.

“Melissa? What are you doing here?”

I look at Keith. “I got this.” I brace for an argument, but none comes.

“Be quick. I’ll be with the dragons.”

I head up the tower. James ignores me, hands on the railing, gaze fixed on the stars. I join whatever vigil he’s on, content to listen to him breathe while I watch the sky for drones.

The far-off hum of insects, the vague scent of the trees,
and this tower in particular remind me of my family’s trips to the Shenandoah Mountains. A place without TVs, internet, or phone service, without a connection to the real world.

Upon arrival, Sam and I would race ahead of Mom and Dad to a prayer tower similar to this one, where I would imagine myself a damsel in distress while Sam played Saint George, stick in hand, protecting me from evil dragons (disguised as cows) that plodded within chasing range. But soon enough we grew tired of the bugs and strange smells. I can’t remember one trip where we didn’t spend the last several days holed up inside the rental cabin, listening to our iPods and trying not to kill each other.

Here, in the wide, dark middle of nowhere, I finally understand why Mom and Dad kept taking us back to that cabin. It was for them, so they could forget about dragons and war and death.

“You shouldn’t be here.” James looks at me, his eyes full of hurt. “I’m sorry this happened, Melissa.”

“You’re freezing.”

“I’m fine.”

“It’s peaceful.”

“Mom brought me here when I was younger. She wanted me to learn the stars.” He turns away. He wipes at his eyes, then chuckles. “Old-school navigation. I thought it was silly. Just use GPS, right? Eventually I learned some of
them. I can show you the major ones, and the oh-so-important North Star.” He pauses, collects himself. “Guess she just wanted to spend some time with me.”

“Did she have a favorite?”

“Deneb. The brightest star in Cygnus.” He looks up. “She liked swans. They mate for life.”

“Which one is it?” I ask, though I already know.

He gets behind me, reaches his arm over my shoulder. I can feel his breath on my neck, in my hair. “There. Next to Draco, my favorite,” he whispers.

I turn around. He caresses my cheek, and electric adrenaline courses through me. He leans closer. I shut my eyes and smile at him, at this farmboy whom I misjudged that day atop Dragon Hill.

Suddenly, dragon screams pierce the silence. Thousands and thousands. James grabs my hand, and we’re running, scrambling down the tower.

“Hurry!” Vestia implores. She and Marrick emerge from the forest at full glow, smoke billowing from their nostrils. Keith, at full sprint, struggles to keep up.