Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
T hey debated where they should talk to Howard.
In theory, as he was the client, they could go to his office in one of the expensive towering office blocks in the City of London.
But Hyax had thought Howard might not want to be in a public place when he was told the news that a massive fuck-off dragon was sleeping under his multi-million pound shop.
So Gwil had asked Howard to come to his consulting rooms at his earliest convenience, saying they had a breakthrough.
Hyax hadn’t expected him to arrive so soon, but Howard had arrived in less than half an hour and was now sitting opposite them in the swivel chair by Gwil’s desk.
“I came as fast as I could,” Howard said, accepting a cup of tea. “I can’t wait to hear what you found out.”
Hyax suspected he might change his mind in a matter of minutes, once they’d broken the news to him. “I was surprised you managed to get here so quickly. London’s traffic can be a nightmare.”
“I have ways and means in an emergency, and I was thinking this warranted my immediate attention. What have you got for me?”
Hyax had debated the best way to tell Howard about the situation. He’d been in favour of a gentle approach, a soft soap, whereas Gwil had said Howard was the type to prefer the direct approach, and given how quickly he’d got here and his comment, Hyax accepted Gwil was right.
“We deployed a specialist agent to support the reconnaissance. And it paid off, but I do need to warn you, this might seem a somewhat fantastical conclusion.”
“Trust me, Prince Hyax, I would have been more surprised if you were to tell me it was something mundane causing everything strange going on. Any answer is welcome.”
“Before we go on,” Gwil said, “there’s a personal question we’d like to ask. It is relevant, and I swear we’re not being impertinent.”
Howard frowned. “Okay, but I reserve the right not to answer.”
“Fair enough. Are you a wyvern?”
“I don’t think my species is important.” His top lip curled. “Why do you ask?”
Some species could tell if there were others of their kind within a certain radius, and Hyax wasn’t sure if wyverns were one of them. If so, they would have an added mystery of why he hadn’t realised there was a close cousin of his under his store.
“There’s a school of thought that wyverns are able to sense other species,” Gwil said. It was a bit of a fib. “And we need to rule something out.”
“I don’t advertise my species, but let’s say hypothetically, if I were at least partly on the scaly side when in a shifted form, then I would be able to tell you that proximity identification is not one of their traits.”
Hyax thought they should get on with it.
“Then I can tell you that under Dante’s is a massive dragon.
It’s asleep. Might have been so for millennia.
Its natural magic is protecting itself by creating a neutral zone, which is why magic is deadened throughout the store.
Our current working theory is that the incidents are being caused by bubbles of its magic rising and popping as it slowly comes out of long-term hibernation. ”
Howard’s jaw was hanging, then he snapped it shut and spent several moments figuring out what to say. “I must have misheard. Dragon ?”
Hyax took out his phone and showed Howard the photos they’d taken. “Yes, and bloody big one. I don’t know a lot about dragons, but I thought ones this size had died out.”
Howard peered at the screen. “If that’s real, it has to be a Rex.”
“It’s several meters underground, and while I’m no expert, there had to be innate magic relating to hibernation that helped keep it hidden, but it’s definitely a dragon. I picked up several scales from the floor. Like the one we found in Dante’s.”
He held out one of the filmy gold scales for Howard to take. “But how did they get inside the store if the dragon is asleep underneath?”
“Manifested after the magic bubble pops, or at least that’s my best guess. There’s no way it’s been inside; otherwise, you’d have been missing a few walls. Magic usually leaves a trace, which is why this has been so baffling, and the trace is the scale.”
All things being said, Howard was taking the news well. “What do we do about it? I own the store, not the dragon under it. But no one’s going to care about that little technicality if a dragon erupts out from underneath Dante’s.”
Howard couldn’t legally be held responsible, and Hyax doubted his insurance would cover complete destruction by a dragon. But Howard was right about the reputational damage he was facing.
“I’ve no idea when it will wake up,” Hyax warned. “Could be centuries or next week.”
“As far as I know, only Rexes hibernate,” Howard said. “Once dragons and wyverns evolved to shift, they lost the need to.”
“So we have an extinct Rex with an unknown sleeping habit,” Gwil said. “We think we’ll need to find a way to move it, but how and to where is still being worked out.”
“They’re not extinct. Just not here,” Howard said.
Hyax wasn’t expecting that, and Howard had spoken as if this was general knowledge. “What do you mean?”
“The story goes they left this realm because the humans were spreading and were getting annoying, so they went to live in another place beyond the elf meadowlands.”
“There’s no such place as the elf meadowlands,” Hyax said. “Is that what they tell little wyverns and dragons so not to have to explain death to their young?”
Howard scowled. “The elf meadowlands don’t exist as a distinct place today. I believe the fae and elves had a long, bloodthirsty feud, which changed a lot of things. But according to our lore, the dragons took the meadowlands from the elves to use as hunting grounds.”
He chose not to point out that Howard had used the possessive in referring to the lore.
“We have had the odd skirmish over the years,” Hyax admitted, but he wouldn’t be drawn into ancient history. He saw Gwil smirk. Fucker.
“The point being, is there is a place you could move it to, but we’d need to find out where its exact location would be today.”
Hyax had been toying with the idea of using a specially constructed portal, which would need a fuck-ton of magic. He couldn’t do it on his own and had been thinking he’d need Simon’s help, but whether he would know more about a secret dragon world was debatable.
“I will be using my contacts throughout the magical community,” Hyax said, not wanting to sound as if he hadn’t a clue where to start.
Howard was on his feet. “I don’t want this to get out. This is meant to be a discreet operation.”
“It will be,” Gwil said. “Prince Hyax’s contacts aren’t the sort to tell the world their business. But there is the matter of informing the police.”
“Do you have to?” Howard asked. “Goya is aware of there being an investigation. He thought we were all crazy and abandoned me to fend for myself.”
“Unfortunately so.” Gwil didn’t look any happier than Howard at the prospect of talking to Goya. “If we don’t inform the authorities about the potential risk, we’ll all be in serious trouble.”
“I want it made clear I can’t be held responsible because my property, that I bought and didn’t build, has a dragon asleep under it that I didn’t know about.”
“Not reporting the threat would be the issue,” Gwil said. “None of us can be blamed for where a dragon decides to have a kip, but not informing the police we know would be considered a crime.”
“I want copies of anything you provide to Goya.”
“Of course. Everything we have, you will have too.”
Gwil showed Howard out. Hyax got the distinct impression Howard would distance himself from this as much as he could.
He didn’t blame him; he couldn’t be held responsible for the situation and wouldn’t want anything leaking and ruining the reputation of his store, but it did mean Hyax and Gwil were once again stuck clearing up the shit they hadn’t caused.
“That went better than I thought,” Gwil said as he returned. “Howard said he’d cooperate in whatever way was needed.”
“Not like he has a choice.”
“I got the feeling you weren’t exactly sold on his mystical dragon reserve idea,” Gwil said, throwing himself onto the sofa.
“Not so much the premise of it existing. Having read about the Rexes, their not all being dead is feasible, but more where he’s describing where they relocated to.”
“Beyond the elf meadowlands? I have to admit, it does sound a bit like a concept album from a prog rock group.”
“I’ve no idea what that is, although I’m assuming you’re trying to be funny.”
Gwil rolled his eyes. “I was trying to lighten the mood, but I forgot about the stick you keep up your arse. Now, instead of bitching at each other, how about you tell me why the location sounds out of whack?”
“The meadowlands don’t belong to the elves, and even if they did, beyond them are coastal areas, not dragon playgrounds.”
“That’s a pure geographical answer, and Howard was alluding to something more pan-dimensional.”
“Did it hurt using such big words?” Hyax wasn’t used to Gwil calling him out on matters of the fae realm, and it irked him that he might be right.
“I’m onto something, aren’t I? Or you wouldn’t be so arseholish.”
“You might have alluded to a possibility, but it’s purely theoretical, and I’d have no idea how to access the in-between realm space.”
“Sounds like you might need the help of a certain vampire-fae. I’m sure you tried to explain to me that his magic worked due to dimensional dibdabs.”
Gwil was deliberately trying to irk him by using his ridiculous vernacular, and he wasn’t going to rise to it.
“We had already discussed bringing Simon into our confidence; this just confirms the need to do so.” Simon might also have information on the elf meadowlands.
“Let me contact him. While I do that, make yourself useful and skim through our special magic books on my bedside for portal and transportation-related spells.”
“I’m still waiting for another magical blowjob. I’m beginning to think you drew me into this arrangement with promises you aren’t able to keep.”
“Not all dark magic is sexual, Gwil.”
“I’m sure you could find more examples.” Gwil laughed. “Maybe if I look, I’ll find them.”
“Don’t make it your main requirement, we need to move a dragon, not make your balls tingle.”
“All I’m saying is there’s no reason why we can’t combine the two.”
Gwil left giggling, and Hyax supposed it wouldn’t hurt for them to have a happy ending of their own from the spells.
He stood in front of the mirror over the fireplace.
He’d warned Simon he’d be in touch, but that didn’t mean Simon would be available at his beck and call, and he might have to leave a message.
He distorted the mirror’s surface, sending the call out to Simon, and he was relieved to see his face appear.
“Hyax, I’ve been expecting to hear from you.”
“What do you know about dragons?”
“Specific ones or one in general? There’s a dragon I’d like to gut, but I doubt he’s who you’ve called about.”
Dorian wasn’t the problem dragon. Or rather, he wasn’t Hyax’s problem dragon. “We’ve discovered something a bit bigger than an annoying Hollywood actor hibernating under a department store in London. If it wakes, it’d take a large chunk of the city with it.”
Simon wrinkled his nose. “Sounds like you’re describing a Rex. Have you really found one that escaped extinction?”
Hyax was amazed at how matter-of-fact Simon sounded. “Most probably a Rex, but we’ve been given information that the Rexes aren’t extinct, just relocated. To a place beyond the elf meadowlands.”
Simon scoffed. “I think we might have noticed. There are myths that the dragons stole lands from the elves, but those have never been substantiated.”
“There’s a fairy tale for every eventuality, but in this case in the intel is from a wyvern, and I’m inclined to believe them. Or at least believe they think it’s real. Perhaps it’s a space between the realms.”
“Ah, now I know why you contacted me. But I shift magic between the realms, balancing their streams. I don’t linger and have no real presence in that junction.”
“I wasn’t thinking we’d be going for a long weekend, more depositing the scaly beast via a portal and closing it behind us.”
“I think Gwil’s sense of humour is rubbing off on you.” Simon raised an eyebrow. “But you do realise moving a dragon will need an enormous amount of energy, and we’d need to have a location to send it to. Can’t just drop it into a portal and hope for the best.”
“I’m not an idiot. Why do you think I’m contacting you? Although I’m not sure even we have enough power reserves to deal with this on our own, and as loathed as I am to admit it, we might need to involve the Warlocks.”
Simon snorted. “Good gods, no. While I know a couple of warlocks who I like, even respect, most of them are excitable spell slingers who cause more harm than help.”
Hyax’s opinion wasn’t much different, but it didn’t change the fact that a king dragon was a big fuck-off creature and he would need help to shift it to somewhere safe. “Who else could I approach for assistance?”
“Actually, I’ve someone in mind who could potentially help with the removal and the location. Give me a day or two and I’ll see if I can arrange a meeting.”
“Who?”
Simon tapped the side of his nose. “If I get their agreement to help, you’ll know soon enough.”
“Twat!”
Simon laughed and blew him a kiss. “I’ll be in touch, Hyax. Dragon or no dragon, you picked up the tab the last time we went out, I want to return the favour.”