“I see,” Marci said, feeling suddenly insufficient. “But youdoknow there’s a chance I won’t be one, right?”
“Oh, you’ll do it,” the general said with absolute confidence. “We’ll make it happen.” She tapped the window, where the double-layer skyline of the DFZ’s Skyways was lighting up for the rainy night. “We’ll go down there and do whatever it takes to get your spirit back online. I don’t care if I have to bring you Algonquin herself in buckets, the first Merlin will be ours. Iwillmake you humanity’s shield, or I will die trying.”
There was conviction in those words far deeper and older than Marci’s involvement in this, and it made her feel decidedly like a pawn. Normally, Marci hated that, but it was hard to be angry at someone whose only wish seemed to be for you to protect humanity. The whole thing was enough to stir up old childhood dreams of heroism. Dreams Marci promptly squashed. Heroes did stupid things like get themselves killed selflessly. She was a mage pushing the boundaries of magic. If she was going to do something as dangerous and reckless as sneaking into the DFZ on a quest to become the power that could finally unseat Algonquin, then she was damn well going to get something out of it for herself and Ghost. She was also going to make sure she stayed in control. General Jackson seemed like a fine and noble soul, but she was still military, and the military had a bad habit of taking over when push came to shove. When that happened, Marci had to be ready to shove back harder. First, though, she had to get her cat back.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” she said, peering out the window as the plane finally set down. “Right now, we need to get back to the house where I first bound Ghost. That’s not going to be easy with Thunderbirds in the sky.”
“Actually,” Sir Myron said, joining them at last. “The Thunderbird is the least of our worries. Algonquin has her whole panoply out on patrol in the wake of her war declaration. The Thunderbird just watches the sky, probably because it’s the only patrol area straightforward enough for a storm spirit. The rest of Algonquin’s group are far sneakier and just as dangerous in their own ways. Vann Jeger was her best fighter, but there’s no such thing as a harmless spirit.”
“So what’s the plan, then?” Marci asked. “The Thunderbird already knows we’re here, which means we’re bound to get tailed when we leave. If the others are as dangerous as you say, it sounds like we’re screwed.”
“You would be if you were with anyone else,” Sir Myron said, running his fingers over his maze-inscribed rings. “But you’re with us, Miss Novalli, and we donotget screwed.”
From anyone else, that would have been some grade A hubris just asking to be put down, but this was Sir Myron Rollins. He was famous for a reason, which meant Marci was willing to spot him the benefit of the doubt. “If you say so,” she said nervously, running a sweaty hand through her hair. “Let me give you the address.”
Myron nodded impatiently, tapping his foot as Marci found a piece of paper and wrote out the address where she’d worked her first job in the DFZ, squinting in the fading light as the rain from the Thunderbird’s vigil in the sky poured down around them.
Chapter 14
By the time David closed the door, Julius’s hand was wrapped tight around the hilt of his Fang. Part of it was general principle: no dragon was comfortable being injured around a more-powerful opponent. Mostly, though, it was because David was Bethesda’s preferred candidate, and given what had just happened with their mother, Julius wouldn’t have trusted him to steal an unguarded bag of money right now. But for all of Julius’s nervousness, the Fang’s magic rolled right over David without making him so much as shudder, meaning whatever he was here for, he didn’t intend violence at the moment. That didn’t mean he couldn’t change his mind later, of course, but for right now at least, David was peaceful, and Julius decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“Can I help you?”
“No,” the senator said, stopping at the foot of his bed. “Believe it or not, I’m here to help you.”
Julius was firmly in the ‘or not’ side of that statement, but he was determined not to jump to conclusions. “Okay,” he said, loosening—but not removing—his grip on his sword. “What’s up?”
“This,” David said, tossing a formal-looking scroll on the bed beside Julius’s leg. “I’m officially resigning from the race for the open Council seat.”
There was no way Julius had heard that right. “I’m sorry,” he said, shaking his bandaged head. “Could you say that one more—”
“It’s all right there,” his older brother said, pointing at the scroll. “Read for yourself.”
Julius picked up the scroll, breaking the seal and spreading it open on the bed. Sure enough, it was exactly what David said: a statement revoking his candidacy for the Council race written in the flowery, archaic language usually reserved for formal surrenders. But while the meaning was clear, Julius still didn’t understand. “Why?”
“Because I’m not a fool,” David said with a shrug. “Continuing a campaign you have no hope of winning is a waste of time and resources. Ian was gaining modest ground thanks to your support, but your masterful handling of Gregory’s little stunt has turned a small shift into a clan-wide movement. I can’t even walk down the hallway now without hearing dragons claiming they always knew you were special, and since you’ve already thrown your weight behind Ian, I find myself at a terminal disadvantage.”
“It can’t be that bad,” Julius said, feeling unaccountably sad for his brother. David might be a snake, but he’d been legitimately trying to win a spot on the Council. If he quit, they’d be right back to only having one candidate again. “Everyone’s excited right now, but as soon as something else happens, they’ll forget and move on. You can’t just give up.”
David shook his head. “If we had longer, there might be a chance, but even if Ian fails to get the vote called early, I still have less than twenty-four hours to turn a landslide around. I’m good, but I’m notthatgood.”
“But—”
“Enough,” David said tiredly. “I’ve no interest in lost causes. They’d be deathly insulted to hear it, but when it comes to elections, dragons aren’t so different from humans. We all like to be on the winning team. If Gregory had killed you, as everyone was certain he would, your dreams of a Council would have died along with you. But that didn’t happen, and so everyone’s jumping ship.”
Julius swallowed. “Is that what you wanted? Me to die?”
“Of course,” David said with a careless shrug. “It’s not personal. I was on top under the old system. Why would I want that to change? When I saw my chance at greater power, I colluded with Bethesda to bring you down. We were planning to just scare you off with the traps and threats to your mortal, but you’re surprisingly difficult to corner. Gregory was supposed to fix that. He was the final solution, the last, great blow to finally knock you out of our feathers for good, but that didn’t work either. Not only did henotkill you, he lost spectacularly and gained you the public support of Conrad. That’s a sweep by anyone’s standards. Now the whole mountain’s falling over itself to save face by proclaiming how much they were secretly on your side the whole time, and I find myself unwilling to continue throwing good money after bad.” He sighed. “You’ve won, and since this was only ever about power for me, I see no reason to keep fighting a losing battle. Especially since, as you’re always so quick to point out, there will be another Council election for me to win in five years.”
It was completely out of place, but Julius almost laughed at that. “If you can’t beat us, join us?”
“A real dragon always finds his way to power,” David reminded him. “I lost this round, but five years should be plenty of time to let you and Ian make a proper mess of things before I come in to show you how a representative government should be run.”
He finished with a confident smile, and oddly, Julius found himself grinning back. Up until a few moments ago, he’d been sure this was all a ruse. David was a dragon’s dragon. “Surrender” wasn’t in his vocabulary. “Strategic retreat” was, though, and that was what David seemed to be doing. He wasn’t giving up, he was shifting strategies, and that gave Julius more hope for the future than anything else so far, because he was heretalkingabout it.
Under the old Heartstriker, the only answer to a defeat like this would have been to go down swinging, taking as many of his enemies out with him as possible. Now, though, thanks to the election cycle, David could simply wait for another chance. There was no need for violence, no logical reason for the death and blood and waste that had always been the hallmark of draconic power struggles. The fact that he’d come here with a letter instead of a knife for Julius’s throat was proof that Julius’s plans were already working.Yet again, he was seeing Heartstriker change right before his eyes, and Julius was so happy about that he couldn’t sit still.
“I can’t tell you how much this means to me,” he said, pushing himself up off the bed. Even with the new strength from his meal, standing probably wasn’t the best idea, but Julius was determined to shake his brother’s hand properly. “I’m sad you’re leaving the race, but I respect your decision, and we really do need the Council up and running as soon as possible. With your cooperation, we might be able to get this whole thing wrapped up by dinner.”
