War of Dragons (18 page)

"John, Mark," he said with a broad smile and extending his hand. "Theodore. Very pleased to meet you. I'm the team's Blue Dragon expert. Ha, a good joke that. I've never claimed to be an expert, but in the absence of a real expert that's what they've decided I am. Other than you of course, John."

"What is your area of expertise?" John asked.

"What do I do when I'm not flying into the unknown?" Theo asked cheerfully. "I'm a government employee, working in the Department of Trade. I guess you probably aren't too familiar with us, having lived with the Red Dragons for so long, but our job is to encourage the opening of trade routes with our neighbours."

John nodded. "Is that going well?"

"Not really; most of our neighbours hate each other and only just tolerate us. It’s a bit of a thankless task, but we remain hopeful and can celebrate the occasional success. You know, like going a whole month without having a death threat."

"And the rest of the team?"

"Ah, well these two young men are from the government's mapping department and are keen to extend our knowledge of the region. I'm not totally sure they understand that this project is about finding prisoners rather than filling in gaps on their maps, but I'm hoping they'll stop us getting lost at least. This is Dinah, who also works for the government, for the Department of Health. She's some sort of counsellor. I guess someone thought that the prisoners might need someone sympathetic to talk to, although I did point out that it might be better to concentrate on getting them out first, but sadly, no one listens. And this is our seventh team member, a late addition, Reuben. He's a musician."

"Why do we have a musician?"

"Well, there is a lesson to be learnt there. I complained that six wasn't enough people, and when asked what sort of people I wanted, it turns out that saying I don't care, just get me anyone, was really the wrong thing to say."

John was a little stunned. "Sorry, I'm a little confused. Is there no one from the military here?"

Theo looked puzzled. "What do you mean? We don't have a military, John."

"My brother has been living with the Red Dragons for a long time, Theo," Mark added helpfully. "He's thinking of the Defence Force."

"Oh, no, just us I'm afraid. Of course, everyone is a reserve for the Defence Force—you knew that, didn't you, John?"

John frowned. "I had forgotten, to tell the truth. But there are specialists though, are there not? Full time members of the Defence Force? Wasn't Father doing that before we moved away?"

"There are plenty," Theo admitted. "But this isn't seen as a Defence project. Somehow this has been picked up by Trade—hence my involvement. It did surprise me when they asked me, although probably not as much as it surprised Reuben."

John turned to Mark. "Am I missing something? Like a punch line? I mean, do they want this mission to fail?"

Mark sighed. "Welcome home, little brother. This is how our government does things. This whole mission is aimed at dragging the Dark Browns into probably the biggest conflict this land has ever seen. All they originally approved was facilitating a meeting between the Reds and the Browns, not getting involved in the fight. Now, they don't want it to fail, but at the same time they aren't going to be enthusiastic about it either."

John sat on a log and put his head in his hands. "This is a disaster. I could just imagine Arthur's face if he were here now. How on earth are we ever going to succeed?"

Mark sat down beside him. "Don't worry. It's never as bad as it looks. Remember, these are all reserve members of the Defence Force with many more years of experience than you. You'd be surprised at how much training they have to do, even now."

"But if we fail here, you know what's at stake, don't you? It's not just the Reds; after destroying them and taking their lands the Blues would be unstoppable and they'd sweep away the Browns without any problem, and then in a few years it would be us. I don't think anyone realises how dangerous they are. We're vastly superior to them in the air, but they're resourceful and determined and they're already too large for comfort. We should never have let them destroy the Greens."

Mark shook his head. "You worry far too much. I'm not saying you're wrong about the Greens or how important this is, but you need to focus on this mission. After all, it's the only thing we can control right now and worrying never achieves anything."

"That would be easier if you told me the plan. You've told me nothing so far. I thought we were going to discuss it when we arrived."

"We will; I was just letting them finish their lunch. Anyway, it isn't my plan. Theo is the architect of this one."

"Great. That fills me with confidence."

Mark laughed and patted John on the back. "Don't let Theo fool you. I know him by reputation and he'll do a good job. He was a captain in the Defence Force, as was I. Come on, John; it's time to meet the team properly."

He led John over to where the others were finishing their food. "Hello, everyone. This is my brother, John, and I'm Mark. We've already met Theo, and you must be Dinah?"

"That's right, pleased to meet you both." Dinah looked about ten years older than Mark, and looked very relaxed—far too relaxed for John's liking.

"These two are Dave, and Dave," Theo said, introducing the last two. "Our mappers." The two Daves were of similar height and build and although clearly not related, there wasn't a lot to distinguish them from each other.

"Two Daves?" John asked. "How do you prefer to be addressed?"

"Dave, and Dave, of course," the first Dave replied with a wry smile. "Do you prefer to be called John?"

"Er, yes, I do. But how do you know which Dave people are referring to when they just call you Dave?"

"Never been a problem," the second Dave replied.

Theo laughed. "Come on, John, take a seat. I'm sure you have some questions for me."

"So, tell me the plan," John said, sighing as he sat down. "Where are we going to start looking?"

Theo smiled. "Oh, we don't plan to spend too long looking. We thought we'd get them to take us to the camp."

John raised his eyebrows. "What, just ask them where it is? Won't that seem a bit suspicious? Wouldn't they want to know who we were and why we want to know?"

Theo nodded. "John, tell me. What do you think they would do, if after we found their camp, they realised we knew where it was?"

John thought for a moment. "Probably increase their defences in case we attempted a rescue?"

Theo nodded. "They might do that, yes, but for how long would they want to do that? What else what might they do?"

John thought for a moment. "Perhaps relocate the camp?"

Theo clapped. "Exactly. According to the prisoner, in the last five years they've relocated the camp eight times and she is pretty sure that each time it was after a prisoner escaped."

"Doesn't this make our task much harder?" John asked. "Don't the Browns want us to bring back a prisoner as proof?"

Theo nodded. "They do, and that is a challenge. But it also gives us an opportunity. Can you see what it is?"

John was silent, and after trying to think of the answer, shook his head.

"Well, imagine what they'd do if they thought a prisoner had escaped today. What would they do?"

"Start planning the relocation of their prisoners?"

Theo shook his head. "They will have already done that. They'd execute the plan. Immediately. And they have hundreds, if not thousands of prisoners. We know from our escaped prisoner how many guards there are, or at least we have a good estimate, and there just isn't enough of them to relocate the prisoners quickly. It would be a massive operation in an area that isn't that heavily populated. Every Blue Dragon in the area would be required to lend a hand. We'd just offer to help and they'd take us to the camp. We probably wouldn't even need to offer—they'd conscript us as soon as they saw us."

John shook his head. "But how would you make them think a prisoner had escaped? And how do you know they wouldn't wait for a while before moving the camp, to check that a prisoner had really escaped?"

"None of those escaped prisoners made it, John," Dinah added. "All were recaptured except for the most recent one. They must have moved the camps straight away just in case they made it. They've probably moved again since she escaped. Of course, they needn't have bothered; she couldn't give us anything of use about the camp's location, but they wouldn't know that."

"So, how do we make them think a prisoner has escaped?" John asked.

Theo smiled. "Ah, now this is where it gets interesting and this is why we're very glad to have Dinah as part of the team..."

Theo explained the rest of the plan as they continued their journey, flying east along the border with the Dark Browns until they reached the sea, where they met their contact from the Dark Brown Dragons. Their contact was a little unhappy that they insisted on travelling disguised as Dark Browns rather than as Golden Dragons, but relented when they insisted that it reduced the risk of the Blues working out what they were up to.

Flying across the Dark Brown Kingdom was uneventful, meeting few of the countries inhabitants, sticking to the beautiful but deserted coastline. The two Daves had an amazing knowledge of the region—better even than their escort, which did nothing to allay his suspicion. Apparently the Dark Browns were fearful of an attack from the Sea Dragons, and avoided building settlements too close to the shore or even spending much time by the sea. This was based purely on paranoia, as it had been centuries since Sea Dragons had been anywhere near here.

They arrived at the border with the Blue Dragons late in the afternoon and after leaving their contact behind and performing a quick high altitude transformation, they entered the Blue Dragon territory as Blue Dragons, crossing the border high above the thin cloud cover. It was late in the day, so they spent the remaining hour of light flying above the region just to the north of the border. Unlike most borders, this one was without any defining features to demarcate the two countries. It was another frozen conflict, the two nations never really not at war, and this border was a particularly fluid one with the region just north of here having been held by the Dark Brown Dragons not that long ago.

 Informally, the border was indicated by a dotted line formed by large piles of stones. Informally, as there were no formal lines of communication between the two nations that could lead to an agreement on a border. The line was only in place to alert those in the air that they might be entering an area where their enemy would be patrolling, but of course, being on the right side of the line didn't guarantee your safety and skirmishes were common.

The two Daves insisted on gaining a more detailed understanding of the area and landed twice to record details, an activity fraught with risk in John's eyes. However, doing so did help familiarise them with the area and although there wasn't much to distinguish the border region from the land on each side, John noted that it was a little hillier than the area to the north and the trees were a little thinner.

When the sun began to set they returned as Dark Brown Dragons to the site they had agreed with their escort, where a campsite had been established for them by the Dark Browns. A lot of Brown Dragons were at the camp and were setting up more tents; evidently they were confident that the mission was going to be successful and were starting their preparations.

"A good day's work," Theo commented after they transformed. "I'm pleased with what we saw today. I would like to see that map when you're ready, but I think the terrain is perfect."

"We'll need a few hours," said one of the Daves.

"And it'll just be a first draft," the other Dave added. "Don't expect a finished map. We'd like to have another day for mapping the area in detail."

Theo shook his head. "Take no more than an hour. I'm not interested in a map that's ready for publishing. By tomorrow evening, I want a map which covers a much larger area than what we looked at today and if that means less detail, then so be it. The purpose of the mapping is not just to get your department a more complete set of maps, but to have something we can use to show the Dark Browns where to go to rescue the prisoners. I'm guessing the camp is not going to be near to the border."

"So they won't be with us tomorrow morning?" John asked.

Theo shook his head. "They'll be heading far into the Blues’ territory, in the area where we expect the camp to be. Once the alarm is sounded we expect they'll conscript every available Blue Dragon to help with the relocation. If they're already nearby they'll have a greater chance of being spotted and asked to help."

"We won't need them to help us?" Mark asked.

"No, five should be plenty—more than enough. Dinah will be doing the hard part."

"And taking the biggest risks," she added.

Theo shrugged. "Maybe. Although I'd be more worried about our part. How's your accent, John?"

"It should be fine. I've never spoken to a Blue Dragon but I've listened to their conversations many times. It's easier to mimic an accent when it's your mind rather than your voice."

Theo nodded. "Though it might be easier to spot a fake as well. We will see. Right, I have some report writing to do, believe it or not. Dealing with two governments doubles the bureaucracy. Daves, please bring me the map when it is ready. Everyone else, I'd suggest you all get some sleep, tomorrow will be a big day." 

They all set out early in the morning, the two Daves heading off first, eager to get started with mapping the region and taking off at first light. Reuben and Dinah left shortly afterwards, leaving just John, Mark and Theo.

We'll fly slowly,
Theo told the two brothers as they left the camp.
Dinah has plenty of running around to do, and we don't want to show up too early.

They glided effortlessly above the border region, looking out for signs of life. It was an underpopulated region on both sides of the border, each nation rightly fearing the other.

It always saddens me, seeing these borders,
Theo said.
Other than our own, they're always the same, every country. There's never anyone living near a border and the only times people cross them is to attack each other. I think we sometimes forget how unique our situation is, having established safe border communities. Seeing this place makes you realise how lucky we are.