Again, fair point. “Right,” she said, scrambling to regather the thoughts Julius had just scattered. “The first thing we need to do is get back to the Heart of the World.” She paused, frowning. “Um, how do we get back to the Heart of the World?”
“I usually just follow my spirit,” Myron said with a shrug. “The DFZ seems to be able to travel freely between both sides. For you, though, I have no idea.”
That made two of them. “Stay right here,” Marci said, backing up toward the house. “I have to have a quick meeting.”
“Make sure it’s very quick,” Myron said, raising his voice in warning. “You put yourself at the center of this, Novalli. If you can’t pull it off, we’re in trouble.”
They were in a lot more than that if she couldn’t figure this out, but Marci wasn’t afraid. She wasn’t entirely sure of the details yet, but after everything else she’d been through, Marci was positive she could pull this off too. She didn’t have a choice. Failure was not an option, so she shoved the nagging doubts out of her mind and ran up the broken porch steps toward her spirit, who was still valiantly holding up the barrier that kept the rampant magic from cooking them all.
Chapter 6
Chelsie stood at the edge of the wreckage that had been Julius’s front porch, holding her daughter close as the two of them observed the chaos. Fredrick had already left, cutting his way to DC, where Justin, Conrad, and most of the other Heartstrikers were gathered. She’d offered to go with him as backup, but Fredrick had refused. This was his job now, not hers, and he wasn’t going to make her do it even one more time.
If it hadn’t been such a sweet sentiment, she would have told him what a stupid idea it was to go alone into a bunch of nervous, prideful dragons who still thought he was a servant and rally them for war. But while he’d framed it as something he was doing for her sake, Chelsie knew her eldest son, and the hard set of his jaw had told her the refusal wasn’t actually about her at all. Showing up with a Fang and a declaration of war was Fredrick’s first big chance to prove himself among the Heartstrikers as a dragon, not a servant. That wasn’t something she dared to mess with, so she’d just let him go, staying by the Qilin’s side as everyone else scrambled to do their part. She was about to suggest they move closer to Amelia and Svena in case a fight broke out—with those two, it was always a possibility—when she spotted Bob walking toward them
As always, seeing her eldest brother put her on high alert. Even when they’d worked together under Bethesda, she’d long considered the Seer of the Heartstrikers to be her most dangerous enemy. For all Julius’s assurances, Chelsie still wasn’t sure that was no longer the case as Brohomir stopped in front of her.
“I hope I’m not interrupting family time,” he said brightly, giving them both a dazzling smile before turning to the Qilin. “You have a phone call.”
Xian looked rightfully suspicious. “But I don’t have a phone.”
“That’s all right,” Bob said. “I do, and it should be ringing right… about… now.”
Sure enough, something in his pocket began to jangle, and Chelsie rolled her eyes as he pulled out his ancient, battered, brick-shaped Nokia. Bob’s phone was so old, it didn’t even have augmented reality. It didn’t even have a touch screen. He texted using the buttons like a savage. But for all its shortcomings, the antique apparently still worked as a phone, because when Bob hit the button to accept the call, the male dragon voice on the other end came through clear, loud, and angry.
“One moment,” Bob said into the speaker before holding out the phone to the Qilin. “It’s for you. A very pleasant fellow named Lao.”
The emperor’s golden eyes went wide, and then he grabbed the phone from Bob, clutching it to his ear as he began speaking rapidly in Chinese. His cousin replied in kind, his angry voice rapidly transforming into one of great relief as he finally talked to his emperor again.
“How did Lao get your number?” Chelsie asked as Xian stepped away to conduct his call in private.
“I gave it to the Empress Mother,” Bob said flippantly, as though that were a perfectly normal thing to do. “He probably got it from her.”
Chelsie clenched her fists. For a moment, the urge to gut her brother was back strong as ever. But then, as if he could feel her anger building, Julius shot her a worried look from where he was standing beside Amelia on the other side of the dirt yard, and Chelsie forced herself to let it go.
“For the sake of family harmony, I’m not even going to ask what kind of treason you and Fenghuang were cooking up together.”
Bob shrugged. “It was a mutual sort. She was as much my pawn as I was hers. But that’s water under the bridge now, and you know I never look at the past.”
“Because you can’t stomach it?” Chelsie asked, giving him a cold look. “I couldn’t either, if I’d done what you’ve done.”
“If I spent as much time wallowing in the past as you do, my tolerance would be low too,” Bob shot back, and then he sighed. “Let’s not quarrel, Chelsie. Julius wants us to be friends.”
“Julius wants everyone to be friends,” she snapped, getting a tighter hold on her daughter, who was desperately trying to get to Bob. “He should get used to disappointment.”
“He’s very used to disappointment,” Bob said, grinning at the baby dragon. “He just refuses to expect it. That’s what makes him stronger than the rest of us.”
He held out his arms, and Chelsie sighed, releasing her grip on the whelp, who immediately leaped at her uncle.
“There’s my favorite girl!” Bob said, throwing the child high into the air before catching her one handed. “You really should name her.”
“She’s had a name for years,” Chelsie said as Bob tossed her again.
“Really?” He looked genuinely surprised. “I never saw that.” He smiled at the little girl. “I hope it’s something grand. Seers need grand names, or we just end up labeled by our epithets. Look at poor Estella. She had a perfectly lovely name, but it was too normal, so everyone just called her ‘The Northern Star,’ including her. Do you know how awkward it is to get clandestine invitations from ‘The Northern Star?’ Not that I got many of those once she realized I’d never be her pawn.”
Chelsie rolled her eyes, “And Brohomir is better?”
“Much,” Bob assured her. “No one ever calls me by common nouns and verbs. I am always myself, which is a lovely thing to be.” He grinned at the little dragon, who was already snapping at him to make him hurry up with the next throw. “So what’s her name?”
Chelsie reached out to shut her daughter’s snapping mouth. The bad habit had to be trained out early, before her jaws got big enough to do real damage. “Felicity,” she said as Bob tossed the little girl up again.