The Last Dragon Chronicles: The Fire Ascending (42 page)

And not all of them to do with this

timeline, Rosa imagined.

David staggered to the entrance andcarefully peered out. The grey sky wasstriated with flying darklings but therewas no sign yet of bears approaching. Most of Voss’s men had run to the

shoreline, hands cupped above their eyes, unsure of what was coming or what to do. A few brave parties were advancing out to sea, stamping their feet to test the surface, their swords raised high like candlesticks. Voss himself was nowhere

to be seen.

“We haven’t much time,” David said, drawing away. “If the bears reach the island, Voss’s men will retreat here, into the chamber.”

Rosa pointed at his arrow wound. He’dbeen feeling his shoulder ever since he’d

woken up. “Are you… ?”

“Infected? No. Just a bit tender.” He

pushed the jacket aside to reveal the punctured skin. “The scars will show for a while, but there wasn’t enough poison in Lucy’s arrow to invert me.”

“
Lucy
 
shot you?”

“She thought she was doing me a

favour.”

“Some favour. What is it with the

women in your life?”

“I don’t know. You tell me.”

When she couldn’t find an answer she

flapped a hand and said, “Put your jacket on. You’re making me nervous.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Not in a good way. What do we do about Goth girl here?”

He knelt down and rolled Zanna onto

her back. Brushing her dark hair away from her face, he carefully opened the lid of one eye. A glint of green was showing in her iris. Her natural eye colour, coming back. “It’s started,” he said, relief in his voice. He lifted her and carried her

towards the lava.

Rosa stayed rooted to the spot, arms

crossed. “What? What’s started?”

“I had enough of Gawain’s auma to begin a transformation of the Shadow. I passed it on to Zanna when we kissed.”

“
She
 
kissed. There wasn’t a ‘we’

involved.”

“It’s low-level,” David said, ignoring her. “They’ll crush it unless I get help from Gawain. He’ll still have the power

to multiply the antidote and spread it through the humans controlled by the Collective.”

Appropriately, the dragon rose from thepool. When he saw the state that Zannawas in, he hammered his front feet againstthe forcefield. Sparks flew around hischest and head. Still the barrier between

them held.

“Somehow, we have to get him out of there.” David laid Zanna down again, taking care not to knock her head against the rock. Something about the tender way he’d nursed her prompted Rosa to take a breath and say, “Can I ask a question?”

David stood up and pressed the force field again. Fluid. Movable. There had to be a way to get into it. Had to be. “Not

now, I’m thinking.”

She asked it anyway. “What happens if

Zanna returns to normal?”

“Sorry?”

“If you cure her, if you make her human again – what will happen once she’s rid of the Shadow?”

“Zanna is one of us,” he said, irritated by the need to state what he thought was obvious. “She’s strong. She’ll help us defeat—”

“That’s not what I meant.” Rosa turned

a knee inward. “If Zanna’s back in play,

what happens to us?”

“Us?”

“You and me.”

His gaze lingered over her.

“Will you be with her or will you come

back home to Co:pern:ica – with me?”

He watched her nervously picking her fingers. He hated to see her looking so vulnerable. All the same, he answered truthfully. “I don’t know what’s going to happen; I just know I have to save her.”

Her throat rippled.

David looked away. “Look, we can talk about this when—”

“I think I can help you.”

“Help me? How?”

“Gwilanna’s in my head. I’ve been

hearing her voice.”

“Gwilanna?”

“David, just shut up and listen. I had this seriously weird headache – then she broke through.”

It took him a second to figure this out.

Then he remembered Zanna’s words from

earlier and everything seemed to make perfect sense.
 
Her sibyl tendencies are still intact. Gwilanna obeys my greater will.
 
Which meant that Gawain did, too. “What did she say?”

“‘Help me.’”

“Is that all?”

“Isn’t  that   enough?   She   sounded

scared.”

“Have you tried to speak back?”

She shook her head.

He came over and gripped her arms. “Zanna’s been giving Gwilanna orders,which means that you can, too. If youconcentrate hard enough you should beable to strike up a conversation.”

“I’m not meeting her for morning

coffee, David! This is a dragon’s head you want me to enter. One that’s been twisted

by the Ix, remember.”

“I know,” he said, raising his hands to calm her. “But you wanted to help, and this might be our only—”

Before he could complete his sentence, a loud screech echoed off the walls of the

chamber and a darkling came hurtling in. It plummeted down at a long, sharp angle, skidding haphazardly across the floor before tipping over, onto one shoulder. A trail of black fluid marked its landing.

“It’s injured,” gasped Rosa. There were gouges in its side. A hanging wing. One limp foot.

“Not injured enough,” David said. And he was right. Hearing the sound of human

voices, the creature twisted its venomous head, rolled its berry-like eyes towards them and launched an immediate attack. It

flailed towards David, slashing and spitting. He went down, wrestling its prickly arms, the needle teeth all the while snapping at his face. “Now would be a good time to use the knife!” As he yelled this he managed to lift the creature, bring his feet up and kick it hard in the underbelly. The darkling was thrown against Gawain’s prison. Its spine gave a crack as it slid down, winded. When it looked up, Rosa was there with the knife.

She plunged the blade into an existing wound, leaving it embedded above the fraying wing. The darkling shrieked but barely winced. To her horror, Rosa

realised she hadn’t done enough. Instead of inflicting a mortal blow, she had stood off too far and barely caused the creature any more pain than it was already in. Instantly, it coiled up and sprang at her. Rosa raised her arms to protect herself, but the darkling’s leap only measured the length of its scrawny tail. Amazingly, Gwilanna had used Gawain’s weight to warp their prison wall and trap the darkling’s tail at its tip. The creature was pinned, but the danger wasn’t over. The darkling  looked  back,   assessed  the situation and bit clean through the tail at its base. Rosa screamed as it came for her

again. But the second lunge was even shorter than the first. David had found the

arrow that Zanna had extracted from his

shoulder. As the darkling opened its jaws to bite, David thrust the arrow into its mouth, breaking its central teeth in the process. The darkling clamped on the arrowhead and gulped. A trail of black fluid oozed from one ear. The creature

blinked, shuddered, and fell sideways,

dead.

Rosa took refuge in David’s arms.

“It’s all right,” he whispered, strokingher hair. “It’s done now. Gone. But there

are going to be others. You have to contact Gwilanna. I think that demonstrates whose

side she’s on.”

Rosa settled her nerves and stared at

the dragon, who was flipping his bemused gaze between the two women. “What do I say to her?”

“Make contact, then I’ll guide you. Commingling is just a form of advanced telepathy.”

“That easy?” She pulled a trying face. “Don’t know why I bothered reading the manual.”

“Just think of her, Rosa. She’ll come.”

She looked at the dragon again. “I’ve got a question.”

“You’ll be fine. Just concentrate your mind.”

“Do you love me, David?”

“Do I… ?” His chest deflated a little.

“Sorry,” she said. “Later, eh?”

“Yes. I… ” He glanced at Zanna, his face a model of pure confusion. “Yes… later.”

So Rosa closed her eyes and focused on

the voice. Within moments, she jerked her head and said, “Okay. I’ve got her.”

“Good. Tell her we want to free

Gawain. Ask her how the force field was

put together. Was it imagineered or is it magicks?”

Rosa put the question into her mind. “Magicks, she thinks. She’s not sure. Voss did it.”

David clicked his tongue in frustration. If Zanna had put the barrier in place, itwould have been easy enough to removeit. “Does she know a way out?”

The dragon shortened its gaze and blewa fireball at him. “No. She was hoping youknew a way in. By the way, she saysyou’re useless.”

David stared into the sad, jewelled

eyes.
 
Like this is my fault
, he thought. “You said she was scared. Why is she frightened?”

Rosa’s   face   screwed   up   in concentration. “She’s close to the core.

About to break through. She says there’ssomething on the other side.”

“Does she know what?”

“She says… ‘Trick or treat, boy?’”

In other words, she had no idea. To make matters worse, a light groan from the floor alerted him to the fact that Zanna

was coming round. Pri:magon. Sore head.

Lethal combination.

Rosa seemed unaware of it and was

still reporting back her conversation with Gwilanna. “She thinks whatever it is

won’t be keen on meeting a tainted

dragon. She agrees she needs to get out.

She says—”

“Forget it, Rosa. We have to go.”

“But—”

“Seriously, we have to run.”

She blinked in confusion. “As in

‘away’?”

“Far away. We should try to find Alexa. Zanna’s recovering. When she comes round she’ll overcome the change and go back to the Shadow. We’ve failed here.

There’s nothing else I can do. Come on.” He took her hand and yanked her towardsthe light.

Halfway there, she wrestled herselffree. “Wait. Why don’t you just kill her?”

“I can’t,” he said, looking back, pained. “She’s the mother of my child. I can’t do

it. Please, Rosa. We have to go. Now.”

“No,” she said, standing firm. “You can’t desert her. I won’t let you abandon her.”

“
 
What?
 
What are you talking about?”

“I hate what she is and I hate the fact

you want her more than me, but if she has a chance at humanity again we ought to try for her.
 
I
 
ought to try for her. Maybe there’s another way?”

“There isn’t,” he insisted, “and we’re wasting time.”

“Gwilanna had an idea.”

That stopped him dead. “When?”

“Just   now,   while   we   werecommingling.”

He threw up his hands. “Why didn’t yousay?”

“Because you stopped me.” She folded her arms. “It’s dangerous, anyway. You wouldn’t approve.”

“Tell me. Quickly.” Outside, voices were calling the alarm. The battle was closing in.

She swallowed and gave a tight-lipped nod. “All right. But there’s something I have to do first.”

He looked away, distracted by a polarbear’s roar. When he turned back, Rosawas right in front of him. “Do youremember when we sat by the well on Co:pern:ica and I made you a bracelet ofviolet-coloured daisies?”

David grimaced. There was no time forthis. All the same, he let his mind driftback. He’d been twelve years old, happy

and relaxed with her, taking time off from their work in the librarium. “Of course I

remember. It was… a beautiful day.”

“The best,” she said.

“Special,” he agreed. “Rosa, what’s the

matter?” Her eyes were glistening with

tears.

“I made the bracelet to tell you how much I loved you, because I wasn’t brave enough back then to do this… ” And she pulled him towards her and kissed him passionately. Then she stepped back, and kept on stepping back. “I’ll miss you, David.”

“Rosa, what are you
 
talking
 
about?”

“Gwilanna knows a way to speed up your cure. All it needs is a powerful burst of auma.”