Chapter 15 Axel #2
We didn’t know what would be the same, or what might have changed.
Many of the blessed who fled Earth were upset about our departure.
That’s why Odin kept most of the blessed who had lived here out of the return.
He didn’t want to make Prince Azar’s job more difficult by bringing past biases into the search.
“I think he did the opposite. He didn’t even tell Azar what the heart was.”
Euphrasia tilts her head. And do you know what it is, earth child?
“It’s a stone. He couldn’t have told Azar that?”
Euphrasia’s smile’s sad. It began as a stone that could not be moved, and our enemies grew in strength with its control.
But that changed—it came to us for a time.
In our departure, it was retaken by the vanir.
That was more than a thousand years gone.
We didn’t know where it might have been or what form it may have taken.
The heart always called to the earth and sky born alike—it was only a matter of time before the earth children found it.
“I will never understand the blessed insistence on withholding information that might be helpful.” Liz frowns. “But Euphrasia, you don’t look like you feel so great. Maybe you should find one of the humans we just met. . .”
It takes her half an hour, but Liz finds good matches for Euphrasia and all the other blessed who came with us—all thirty-two of them.
We gather the others into one place, and we travel to the second stop for the day.
There are another forty-six brights, and at the third location, we find eighty-eight more.
“It’s not enough.” Liz’s face is drawn, and she’s clearly stressed out. “I mean, I think it’s good. I’m really pleased that we’ve been able to find so many bondable humans who are sympathetic to the dragons, even with the government blasting that they’re our enemy on every channel.”
And yet, if we can’t find more, my people will all die, I say. It’s not nearly enough.
“I think we need to find another renaissance festival,” Liz says. “The military will definitely be expecting that, but. . .” She groans. “I don’t know what else to do. Why are they so stupid that they won’t see that we’re trying to do this the right way?”
Euphrasia’s new human, a woman who had almost white hair before it turned silver with the bonding asks, “Have you thought about Comic-Cons?”
Liz turns slowly. “No.”
Silver hair asks, “No, you don’t want to try that? Or no, you haven’t considered it?”
“I hadn’t really considered it,” Liz says.
“After the dragons came to the last one, the government canceled all renaissance festivals,” the woman says. “They said they were too dangerous, but the last I heard, they weren’t canceling Comic-Cons.”
“In the United States. . .” Liz slaps her own forehead. “But what about other countries? What are they saying?”
“So far, you’ve only picked up humans in the US,” the woman says. “Is there a reason for that?”
“I’ve mainly focused on friends of friends,” Liz says. “I don’t know anyone in other places.”
“But the news said that you simply showed up at the renaissance festival.” She shrugs. “If you wanted to try that again, maybe a Comic-Con in another country?”
Liz calls for any functioning technology and starts frantically tapping at screens. “Melbourne,” she says. “There’s a Supernova Comicon and Gaming Convention.” She beams at me. “This is perfect, but it’ll be much larger.”
Are you worried the humans will attack?
“I’m less worried about it in Australia. They won’t be expecting us to show up either, I don’t think.”
Shall we go?
Liz laughs. “I need to do some preparing first.” Her preparing involved poking around and tapping on a bunch of little screens, but eventually she calls me over. “Can you portal above a big building?” She holds up the screen to show me some images.
I can, yes.
She’s showing me from another angle when a video pops up. The barely legible text says ‘related to your search,’ and Liz starts to click a tiny x to make it disappear—I’m learning about this internet humans love—but then she freezes. “Oh, no.”
What?
She doesn’t respond. She taps on the video and it expands.
“After several weeks of experiments, scientists in Iceland are finally caving to the public pressure. They’ll be executing the remaining dragons who have been held in captivity on Friday, using all the newest technology they have developed for our ongoing counter-measures in the war against the invading dragons. ”
The screen flashes images one by one of almost a dozen blessed that are being held captive and tortured by the humans.
I’m frustrated, but not surprised. We had assumed those blessed were already dead.
Liz only told us about one other water blessed who was yet alive when they escaped, but it’s hardly a surprise that they had another location.
Still, Liz looks shell-shocked. “We have to go back and save them,” she says. “I promised Plumeria.”
That sounds an awful lot like the beginning of the war you’re trying so hard to prevent.
Her hands clench into fists. “But they—it’s—”
The tinny voice from the small square screen starts blaring again. The video she selected ended, and it rolled right into another one. “So far, there hasn’t been much consensus on what to do with the war criminal, the mother of the most famous war criminal of all, Elizabeth Chadwick.”
Another voice comes on now, and I believe it corresponds with the brown man who’s now talking.
He’s holding a microphone in his hand, which Liz told me is to amplify tiny human voices.
“As you’ve already heard, the members of congress are split on whether Harriet Chadwick, wife to Ronald Chadwick, has committed crimes punishable by death.
She doesn’t even deny freeing her daughter, the former bonded to the strongest of all the invading dragons.
She insists that her daughter’s bonded dragon has died, but she agrees that Elizabeth Chadwick’s potentially dangerous—and most of the military leadership agrees that with her departure, the humans lost their single strongest weapon against the dragons.
The military recovered two swords crafted by the dragons themselves for their fiercest human warrior, Chadwick herself.
Now civilians are reporting that Elizabeth Chadwick has indeed rejoined the dragons, and not only that, she’s also somehow reported to have wings, along with the swords she took upon her departure. ”
The video cuts to a fuzzy clip of Liz flying beside me at the renaissance festival.
“While the military’s doing everything in their power to regain the weapons she stole, the one thing we do have control over is the execution of her criminal mother.
” The man with brown skin sounds downright furious.
“Elizabeth Chadwick must pay for her heavy debt to humanity, and if the only way we can punish her is by killing her mother, then so be it.”
Liz is frozen in place. She looks completely shocked.
Are you alright?
She shakes her head. “I’m fine. I think we should go to Brisbane. It’s nine in the morning there.” She swallows and stands, handing the square screen off to one of the other humans. “It’s—we have other things to worry about right now.”
It’s clear that she’s worried about her mother, though.
Even when our trip to Brisbane is a huge success, when we manage to find almost five hundred new brights, she’s still dazed.
“It’s not enough,” she says. “We have to find another. . .” She’s poking at the screen again, frustrated and shaking.
“We need at least a few hundred more or Hyperion. . .” She freezes.
“If they learn we hit a con, the government will shut those down next.”
She stands. “We need to hit Florida Supercon today. It’s huge.”
It’s too risky, then, I say. With that many people, the military will be there.
“Not if they’re focused on renaissance festivals or tracking down people connected to the people we’ve taken already.” She shakes her head. “If we could go back with almost two thousand brights, Hyperion would have to give us more time.” She steps closer. “Come on, Axel. We can do it.”
We have to drop these humans off first, I say. I won’t risk all of them, and Hyperion will insist that we take more blessed. Thirty won’t be enough.
“Fine.” Liz truly looks like a warrior in that moment.
She may be upset that her mother’s being executed, or maybe she’s angry about the blessed.
Perhaps it’s that her people consider her public enemy number one, in spite of her tireless efforts to save their lives.
Either way, for the first time, I truly see what I might have liked before I lost my memories.
She’s fierce.
She’s brave.
And she’s unyielding.
She’s doing it, just as the humans said, to help my people, but she’s also trying to help her own.
Unlike most of them, she looks at the whole picture.
It’s a slow process, taking all the humans we’ve found back to Hyperion, and he’s not keen on the plan.
It’s too dangerous. It could lead to a war we’re not ready for—the war Liz doesn’t want.
We might suffer heavy casualties if we go against them this way, petitioning.
It takes a while, but Liz convinces him to allow us to go—if we take a hundred strike blessed.
They’re the most capable of fighting, Hyperion says. And I need to stay here to make sure if the humans attack while we’re distracted and weak, we’re protected.
“I notice you haven’t bonded a human yet,” Liz says. “You need to do it immediately.”
I’m waiting.
On what? I ask.
Hyperion’s smile is tight. If you don’t bond Liz, I plan to do it. She’s a handful, but I find that I like her more and more.
Something inside me snaps—and fire floods my entire body. You will not.
Hyperion’s smug smile infuriates me further. You couldn’t stop me. You’re too weak.
I lunge at him, already blasting flame and fire.
He leaps into the sky, and we both rocket upward, my wings beating faster than they have in quite a while. It feels good, releasing some of my fury. Hyperion blows his anger right back, and for the next few moments, we take turns melting the side of several different mountains.
Do you feel better now? Hyperion’s smiling.
Were you picking a fight? It makes the fire rise back up inside of me. You didn’t really want to bond her?
I do like her, Hyperion says. I would bond her, but mostly I wanted to see whether you’d let me. I find it fascinating that you haven’t bonded her yet, but you won’t allow anyone else to even contemplate it.
I hate it. And I hate that he knows it. We’ll go to Florida and find you a human now. The brightest one we see, that’s your new bonded.
Hyperion doesn’t argue, but he’s still smiling when we get back to Liz and the others.
When I finally open the portal into Miami, I’m braced for hostilities.
Instead, when we explode into the sky over Pride Park, the open area beside the convention center, there are hundreds of humans holding signs.
We Dragons!
Take me, Liz!
I’m ready to bond a dragon!
Water > electricity.
Bond me, baby, one more time!!
Liz stares at them, gape-mouthed, beside me. When they finally process that we’re there, the humans begin to cheer.
Loudly.
Others race toward us from the edge of the convention center parking lot.
“They came!”
“They’re here!”
“Take me!!”
The humans below us are frantic. Liz flies closer to them, beginning her explanation of why we’re here, but she barely gets through the first twenty seconds of it when there’s a loud crack.
The humans all look around frantically.
And Liz plummets toward the ground, a large hole in her right shoulder, and an even larger hole blown in her right wing. The feathers near the wound are painted scarlet.
Without even meaning to, I explode into my flame blessed form and snap my wings out to their fullest point.
Then I scream.