“We can make it,” Julius said forcefully. “All the spirits and mages have assured me that the magical fallout is dropping, and there’s a lot of Algonquin left to drink. It doesn’t matter if we only stop him from getting one bucket’s worth of her water. So long as we keep that last gallon safe, the Nameless End can’t fully take over Algonquin, and we still have a shot.”
He hoped, anyway. This was Marci’s plan, and he trusted her with his life, but even as he sold her strategy to the others, something about it still didn’t sit right with Julius. No matter which way you cut the problem, Algonquin was always the one at the heart of it, and yet she was the one factor everyone seemed happy to ignore. Even Marci’s solution was only to banish her magic. It didn’t touch on the spirit herself. Considering Algonquin’s despair was the cause of this entire crisis, that felt like a mistake. But while Julius was torn, none of the other dragons suffered his misgivings.
“Well, I’m looking forward to it,” Svena said with a proud lift of her chin. “Algonquin shot my mothers out of the sky. Vengeance is overdue.”
“Please,” Bethesda said, rolling her green eyes. “You’ve been praying for your mothers to die for centuries so you could take over.”
“That doesn’t mean I can leave their deaths unanswered,” Svena snapped. “Some of us still have honor.”
Bethesda rolled her eyes again, and Julius reached up to rub his temples. “Whatever our reasons, the goal is clear. If Leviathan gets full control of the Great Lakes, everything is done for. We must protect Algonquin’s remaining water at any cost, but the area we have to cover is huge, so communication will be key. We don’t want to accidentally hit any of the UN forces that will be coming to help us.”
“I think you mean getting hit by the UN,” Arkniss said. “I’ve tangled with Emily Jackson before. The UN’s Phoenix is a dragon slayer to her core. How can we be sure she won’t shoot us down the moment our backs are turned?”
Considering that was exactly what she’d done to Marci, Julius had a hard time answering. But if he’d learned anything about Raven’s construct, it was her steadfast dedication to results over personal feelings. She’d happily kill every dragon in the world to save one human life, but she’d just as happily work with them if that was what was needed to secure humanity’s survival.
“So long as we’re fighting together, I don’t think we have to worry about betrayal from the UN side,” he said. “General Jackson doesn’t like or trust us, but she knows we’re necessary to achieving her goal of protecting humanity. So long as that’s true, I think she’ll be a good ally.”
“What about after?” the black dragon pressed. “The Phoenix can overlook, but she does not forget, nor forgive. She will tolerate our help while she needs us, but the moment the operation is done, those jets she’s sending will turn on us, mark my words.”
“We’ll deal with that when the time comes,” Julius said grimly. “But right now, we can’t afford to be picky. We don’t even know if we’ve got enough dragons to do our part properly. If we start mistrusting our human allies as well, this fight will be over before it begins.”
No one seemed to like that, but no one argued with him, either. “We’ll just have to hope for the best,” Amelia said at last, shoulders slumping as she looked at Julius. “I’m glad you’re taking point on the UN thing, Baby-J. You’re the only one of us who knows how to play nice.”
“He doesn’t ‘play’ nice,” Bethesda said, her voice disgusted. “He is nice.”
“But that’s to our advantage right now,” Marlin Drake pointed out. “He’s the right tool for the job.”
“That doesn’t make him any less embarrassing,” Bethesda snapped, pressing a dramatic hand to her temple. “How did I end up with such a son?”
Julius knew better than to bother with that one. He was about to move the conversation on when Raven—who was normal bird-sized again—swooped out of the shadows to land on Amelia’s shoulder.
“Finally,” she said, grinning at her fellow spirit. “Are you here to clear us for takeoff?”
“Alas, I am not,” Raven replied. “The ground convoys are moving thanks to absurd amounts of shielding, but flight is still too dangerous.”
“Then why are you butting your beak in?” Amelia asked. “This is dragon business.”
“Because you and I need to go,” Raven replied, his voice dropping. “It’s started.”
Amelia’s face turned deathly pale, and a heavy lump formed in Julius’s stomach. “What does that mean?” he demanded. “What’s started?”
“Nothing you can help with,” Raven said, flapping into the air. “This isn’t a matter for mortals. We’ll handle it. You just focus on killing the bits you can reach.”
Every dragon in the circle looked dangerously offended at being lumped in with mortals, but the bird spirit had already vanished, winking out of existence in front of Julius’s eyes. Amelia followed suit, vanishing in a lick of flame.
With the Spirit of Dragons gone and everything on hold until they could fly, the rest of the circle broke up as well, the clan heads walking back to inform their dragons of the plan. Since Bethesda and Ian were already explaining the situation to the Heartstrikers, Julius took the opportunity to head for General Jackson so they could discuss how the UN and dragon forces were going to fight together, hopefully without anyone shooting anyone else in the back. This left Bob sitting forgotten and alone on the front porch step—the only part of the house that was still standing now that Bethesda had flattened it—slowly chewing his apple with his eyes closed and his pigeon on his shoulder, keeping him company as he searched and searched through the ocean of the future for the one drop where they lived.
Chapter 9
Marci clung to Ghost’s freezing back, looking nervously over her shoulder at the debris-scattered spiral of on-ramps that had once hidden their house, and now hid every dragon in the world. “Are you sure they’ll be okay? We’ve never tried anything like this before. What if your shield goes down because you got too far away?”
“It will be fine,” the Empty Wind said, sweeping them through the dark city on a gust of grave-cold wind. “The only reason I never did this before was because I didn’t have the power. With the magic I have now, maintaining a barrier is so simple, I don’t even have to think about it.”
“Please think about it a little,” Marci begged. “We’re playing fast and loose enough as it is. The last thing we need is for our entire army to get crushed because we weren’t paying attention.”
Her spirit harrumphed, but she felt his magic shift through their connection, pushing more power behind them. “Satisfied?”
She nodded, grabbing Ghost’s shoulders to pull herself up taller. She was riding on his back like a monkey with her feet planted on his hips and her hands gripping the freezing, ropey muscles on either side of his neck below his helmet. It was extremely undignified, but Marci far preferred it to being carried around in his arms like a fainting damsel. If nothing else, it was easier to see where they were going this way, not that she liked what she saw.