As evening deepened, the temple seemed to shine brighter, a fallen star in the center of our city. Their city. I was an exile.
It seemed like forever before the flow of people on this side of the market field stopped. Their voices toward the industrial quarter were a low roar, and I could just hear someone speaking above the crowd.
“Janan, who gave us life!” The voice sounded like Deborl. “Janan, who gave us souls!”
A cheer rose up at his lies. They’d all been living and soul-filled long before Janan began reincarnating them. I wanted to believe there was something out there giving life and souls, but I knew it wasn’t Janan.
“Let’s go,” I muttered to Sam, and together, we trotted across the market field. I strained my ears for any sounds besides ours, but I heard only the steady thump, thump of our boots hitting the cobblestones.
I checked over my shoulder, hyperaware and paranoid that someone was watching us, but I didn’t see anyone in the gloaming, only shadows. The temple lit our path, too brilliant to look at directly. I kept my eyes down as we approached and veered toward the Councilhouse, which was fused to the temple.
Half an hour until sundown.
At the base of the Councilhouse, Sam and I pulled off our backpacks and removed Stef’s last gift: gloves and boot covers.
We were going to scale the exterior wall of the Councilhouse.
The gloves and boot covers were inside out to keep the adhesive fresh, and to keep them from sticking to everything else we owned. As quickly as we could, we stepped into the boot covers and pulled on the gloves, carefully tightening all the straps so they wouldn’t slip off.
“Ready?” I glanced at Sam.
He looked grim, but determined. “Yes.”
I shouldered my backpack—awkwardly, thanks to the gloves—and pressed my palm against the white stone wall. It stuck.
Giving it a little tug, the adhesive held, and I reached with my other hand, higher. I tugged, and it didn’t come loose.
“It’s working?” Sam balanced with his elbow on the wall, peeling his feet off the ground slowly. With only his toes on the cobbles, he jumped with his hands splayed out, smacked the wall, and hung like that until he pulled up his legs and pushed upward.
“It’s working.” I did the same as he had. It’d be the only boost we got. The adhesive held if jerked on, but would peel off quite readily. That meant we had to crawl up the side of the Councilhouse, as there were no outside stairs, and no roof access points from inside the building.
So we crawled, reaching and pushing and stretching ourselves higher until we came to the rooftop. White spread out ahead of us, and over the far edge I could just see the gathered crowd, all trying to get a peek at the cage. Was the cloth off the phoenix yet? Was the poor creature still alive?
The sun moved below the wall, making the sky look brilliant blue.
Ten minutes until sunset.
I tore off my sticky gloves and pulled my boots from the slip-ons. “Where are the dragons?” They should have been here by now. Already we wouldn’t have the distractions that Stef and Sarit had put together, since they had to be remotely activated and said remotes were still in the mill. Whatever was left of the mill . . .
“Maybe Acid Breath lied,” Sam said. “Maybe they aren’t coming.”
Just then, a tremendous thunder burst through the sky. The crowd below was silenced. I held my breath and looked north.
From among the broken black obelisks, a hundred dragons took to the sky. Their wings shone brilliantly in the setting sun as they surged toward the temple.
Chaos erupted and screams sounded from below, but my heart lifted. The dragons had arrived.
Acid Breath landed, delivering the first canister of poison. He swung his head around to face Sam and me. <As promised, we will rip the tower from the earth.>
“Thanks.” Such a small word, considering my heart felt ready to burst. I hadn’t really believed that we could work with dragons, but we had. They’d come through.
Acid Breath roared and took off, his wings creating a wave of air that made me gasp for breath.
As the next dragon landed, I glanced at Sam. He was pale and sweating, and his knuckles were white where he gripped his laser pistol, but he was still functioning.
More of the dragon army dove toward the temple, delivering canisters of poison. Fifteen were here. Five to go.
Seven minutes until sunset.
I fumbled through my coat pocket for the key. I would create a door and open the canisters from the inside. Then—ideally—I would escape before the door shut and I was trapped as the dragons ripped the tower from the earth, as Acid Breath had said.
It was a simple plan. It had to work. But just as my fingers closed around the silver box, heat seared through my skin. I screamed and dropped the key. It skidded across the roof.