Gideon and Dr Seymour have no idea what they’re doing. And neither do I.
‘Do you remember when we were children and you’d make up those silly little languages for us?’ Sophie whispers. ‘We’d pretend to everyone at school that we understood what the other was saying.’
I smile. ‘We even had my dad convinced. He thought there was a new dragon tongue on the curriculum.’
Sophie laughs into my hair. ‘Didn’t he get really angry when he found out the truth?’
I nod. ‘He said it was a waste of time to be making up languages when I already had so many to learn. He made me stay up half the night just to prove that I knew all my French verbs.’
‘Do you think they were too hard on us?’ Sophie whispers. ‘Our parents?’
She reaches a hand to the inside of her arm and I know she’s feeling for the line of scars along the skin, identical to my own. The use of a birch rod is a common practice among Second Class families, and perhaps the only pain we suffer that the Third Class don’t.
‘I don’t think parents can afford to be soft when their children are only one class away from a life of poverty,’ I say.
We’re silent for a moment as memories surface. My family used to be supporters of the Class System. So what made them change their minds?
‘When you were demoted,’ I whisper, surprised at the words coming out of my mouth, ‘I didn’t think I’d ever be happy again.’
Sophie doesn’t say anything and for a minute I just listen to her soft breathing.
I want to say sorry. I want to beg her forgiveness for all of it – the bits she knows about and the bits she doesn’t. But I know it’s too late for that. She squeezes my hand and we lie in silence, enveloped in each other’s warmth. Everything about her is familiar – the mole on the back of her hand, the smell of her skin, the slight wheeze in her chest from a childhood illness. Eventually, Sophie falls asleep.
‘I’ll never hurt you again,’ I whisper into the dark. ‘I’ll make sure you go home, Soph. I promise you that.’
Very slowly, I climb out of bed. I slip my boots on and pull my coat over my nightdress, draping it round my shoulders because of the sling. Ralph told Ravensloe I tried to abandon my post, and that’s why Wyvernmire has taken Ursa. To make sure she has something I want. I can’t let her think I’m not taking this seriously. If I’m going to keep my promise to Sophie, if I’m going to be reunited with Ursa and save our family from execution, then I need to give the Prime Minister the dragon code.
I sneak downstairs and across the hallway. I know theway to the kitchen now and it’s only a few seconds before I’m through the back door once again. There’s no Guardian patrolling here, but that only means Ravensloe has extra dragons guarding the perimeter of Bletchley Park. I keep my eyes on the sky as I traipse through the moonlit garden, then take a dirt path into the fields. I don’t need a car to reach the spot where I translated for Borislav.
I remember the disgust he showed Muirgen and Rhydderch when he realised they couldn’t speak his tongue. They hadn’t been able to communicate by echolocation, either, meaning the patrol dragons had thought they were under attack. And no one, not even Dr Seymour, can tell me why that is.
I push through the long grass, my head full of questions Iknowthere are answers to. My eyes search the star-studded sky for the only way of obtaining those answers, no matter how forbidden it might be. I stop in my tracks when I spot what I’m looking for in the fields just beyond.
The dark silhouettes of two dragons.
THE DRAGONS ARE STANDING SIDE by side, watching me as I walk towards them. My body is already stiff with cold and I plunge my free hand into my pocket. The blue and purple scales of the dragons’ hides are difficult to see in the dark, and if it wasn’t for their size they would blend into the shadows.
‘I don’t recall summoning a translator,’ Rhydderch growls as I approach.
I stop a few feet away and wonder how to begin.
‘I don’t believe you should be out at this hour,’ Muirgen says, licking her lips. ‘Shouldn’t you be in the glasshouse? I’ve seen you run in and out so often during my patrols with Soresten and Addax that we’ve started to believe Ravensloe has you working on something that might actually help uswinthe war.’
Both dragons laugh – a low, guttural sound – and I fake a smile. So the dragon I saw with Soresten and Muirgen in the field the other day was Addax.
‘I’ve come to ask you a question.’ My voice comes out quieter than I intended.
The dragons’ huge yellow eyes stare at me and I see the movement of a tail in the dark.
‘Go on,’ Rhydderch says.
‘The Bulgarian dragon that landed here,’ I say. ‘Borislav.’
‘Yes?’
‘Why did you need a translator to understand him?’
‘You already know this,’ Muirgen says lazily. ‘We do not speak the dragon tongues of the East—’
