Chapter 13 #2
Thunar shrugs. Then me and mine will locate our own humans, and the rest of you can act as you see fit.
“Wait,” I say. “Before you storm off and leave us to handle a hundred thousand vanir with half the available forces, let me at least try.”
I can already feel Azar’s resistance, but I wave him back.
“There must be some earth blessed nearby, no?”
Thunar’s smile is broad. Of course.
Before he’s even had time to summon them, two dozen or so earth blessed pop up from the ground, crawl over the edge of the cliffside, and descend from a nearby hill. As they gather closer, I realize there are closer to three dozen.
It’s too many. Azar steps between me and the dragons. I forbid it.
I sigh. “You already know how well it works to forbid me from doing things.” I walk slowly around him, keeping one hand on his body as I do. By the time I reach the front, his scowl’s a little less fierce. “Just let me try, and I promise to be careful.”
There’s a big difference between a few dozen and—
“Thousands?” I can’t help my smile. “Yes, I’m not excellent at math, but even I know that.”
With Azar still fuming at my back, which basically kills all the organic life forms below his mouth, I approach the earth blessed.
“The first time I upgraded the earth blessed, it was a fluke.” I shrug.
“Freya had the vanir trapped, and when I went into the volcano to try and retrieve the heart, I met her instead.” I tap my chest. “The heart was inside of her, the same as it’s inside of me.
She bargained with me, and told me that I couldn’t leave without making a decision. ”
A smallish brown earth blessed with a completely smooth, snake-like face, and large lizard-style legs asks, What kind of decision?
“I had to choose whether to allow the earth blessed to continue as they were—small, powerless, eaten by their companions, but able to reproduce—or make them like the other blessed, able to defend themselves. Like the strike and flame blessed, they would also be able to fly, but they would no longer be able to shift into a human form, and they’d lose their ability to procreate. Either way, there was a tradeoff.”
How did you decide? This time the dragon asking is large, quite large, and grassy green, with pitch-black eyes and massive scales the size of dinner plates that almost look like enormous oak leaves. Why didn’t you choose to keep them as they were?
“I’ve always been motivated by keeping the people I love safe. Today, the people I love and care about are begging me to encourage you to help them fight the vanir. In order to do that, I must do all I can to restore you earth blessed to the strength you should always have had.”
The earth blessed never had wings, Thunar says. They didn’t exist before we left this place.
I turn around then and face him. “It would have been helpful if you’d told Azar that before he left, you know. We had to find that out for ourselves.”
Thunar doesn’t look like he cares. My father shared what he wished.
I’ve learned not to contradict his will, at least, not very far and not very often.
His bizarre expression might even be a weird sort of wry smile.
It’s hard to tell with dragons, and the bigger and fiercer they are, the harder it is to read their toothy, scaly faces.
I spin back around. “Today, I plan to ask Jore for her help, and I plan to tell her that every single earth blessed she levels up today will help protect the earth children under attack in the USA, the land I come from. Would that be a true promise?”
The earth blessed murmur, their telepathic input flying back and forth so quickly that I can’t really understand it. I do make out a few things, however.
The vanir are frightening.
The earth blessed are the smallest and weakest. Why should we fight for the earth children?
Without waiting for their input, I go ahead and unsheathe both swords, and I plunge them into the ground, all the way down to the hilts. Then I call out as loudly as I can, speaking, but also using my telepathic blast power. It’s the closest thing to a loudspeaker I can get.
“Jore, your humble servant Gyta, Gullveig, Elizabeth Chadwick, custodian of the heart, wielder of the earth and sky blessed blades, asks you for a favor. Please use your magical power and strength to boost the power and abilities of the earth blessed dragons. Make them larger, stronger, and give them wings, so that they might help protect your children from the vanir who threaten their lives and their free will. Help us so that we can help your children and your earth to remain strong and flourish.”
I’m not at all sure it’ll work, and I’m worried even if it does, it’ll be slow, but it’s not.
It’s immediate. The sword hilts, clutched in my hands, light up with golden light.
Then my entire body starts to glow like a torch, and finally, the power explodes outward, flashing across the space between me and the gathered earth blessed.
As the light drenches them, they begin to swell and grow.
The small brown lizard-snake looking one expands, her feet more than double their former size, her scales darkening and becoming much more shiny, almost like polished mahogany.
Dark, striking wings unfurl from her back.
All around me, something similar happens to the earth dragons, most of them growling, shouting, or grunting as it does.
But the large green dragon who asked me how I decided as well as one other, a light, tannish brown one, both stay exactly as they were.
“It didn’t work for all of them,” I say, a little disappointed. “I wonder why.”
They didn’t want to fight, Azar says. They were both thinking they didn’t want to defend the earth children at peril of their own lives. He smiles. It appears Jore can sense their hearts.
From all sides, dragons begin to pop into view. Brown dragons, green dragons, goldish green ones, and even some so dark they’re nearly black wing their way toward us, and I realize that while Jore found some of them unworthy of her gift, it appears she offered it to nearly all the others.
I turn to face Thunar. “I’ve done it. Now you’ll help us fight the vanir.”
Your humans would still owe me quite a few brights, he says. But yes, you appear to be all-around much more useful than Gullveig, Elizabeth Chadwick. I’m beginning to see why my pitiful brother clings to you so dearly.
Azar’s become smarter. Even though I feel a surge of red along the bond at his brother’s jab, not a thing shows on Azar’s body or face. It’s time to go.
You work out the deal with them for the brights. I’ll stay here, because I don’t care about anything else.
I’m not going to lie and say I’m disappointed Thunar won’t be joining us.
I’m nervous enough about the prospect of facing my parents and Gideon without wanting to add a monstrous bully questioning our every word and step.
It would be nice to have a little extra fire power when we step through the portal to Sydney, Australia.
Because even though I know Gideon and my parents well, the last time I saw my father, I was being held in a tiny cell in Iceland.
The last time I saw Gideon and my mother, they were actively trying to capture me and kill Azar.
They succeeded in almost killing Hyperion by using my very own swords against him.
The trust between us isn’t strong.
Calling it razor thin might be a stretch.
So if I’m wearing my full regalia—golden and red dragonskin suit, swords holstered in a fancy scabbard, and my swirly golden visor—well, they caused me to need such a display. I’m a little impressed that Sammy, Coral, and Jade manage to find such impressive outfits on such short notice.
I believe George found them. Azar seems less nervous than me, but then again, he either wasn’t there for most of my family’s betrayals, or he doesn’t remember the experience himself.
It’s personal for me.
And therefore, it’s personal for me, too. Tell me who to eviscerate and how slowly, and I’ll gladly do it.
Massive diamonds are overrated. Girls should be looking for a guy willing to eviscerate their ex.
Girls like diamonds? Aren’t those just rocks?
We’re currently circling very slowly from a great height.
It was Hyperion’s idea to portal far, far above Sydney so we could all descend on them slowly, making sure they see who’s got the power in this situation.
The Americans who traveled here set up camp outside of town, and they’re easy to find, with their military-issue tents.
I don’t have happy memories of those tents, but I’m assuming these aren’t full of tortured dragons.
What I didn’t expect was the row upon row of humans.
I assume they’re soldiers at first, and I have a flashback to the time I landed, spoke to Gideon, and he betrayed me, using my death to kill Azar too.
But as we draw closer, I realize the people standing in lines aren’t soldiers.
They’re women. They’re men. They’re young and old.
They’re bald, red-headed, thin, fat, and everything in between.
“Who are all those people?” I ask as we land in front of Gideon—wearing a very decorated military uniform—and my mom and dad who are both dressed in suits.
My mom in a suit would be hilarious in any other circumstances, like a pig wearing lipstick, or a lion with a necktie.
But in this moment, I have other things to gawk at that are more demanding.
“We brought them as a show of goodwill,” Gideon says. “They’ve all opted in to bonding a dragon, and they’re all here of their own volition. Ten thousand and forty-eight brights, or at least, the dragons seem to believe they are. . .” He swallows, clearly uncomfortable.
The dragons they held and tortured must’ve told them they were bright. How lovely. “Well, that’s another demand to add to our list. You must release all prisoners of war with a formal apology and some kind of restitution.”
“Of course.” Gideon grimaces.