Chapter 85
Eighty-Five
Ayla
When Holly and Pepper had begun lying down and sitting alternately, I'd known Tobias was out there, trying to signal us. That Lansin's dogs were doing the same proved it. The problem was where they were. Thankfully, we had more than enough dogs.
Demon was sent to the east. Steel went west, checking the camps on either side of us.
Within ten minutes, both dogs were back with notes saying their camps were experiencing the same, so Zasen picked a point and arranged for all of us to meet up.
The dogs kept looking, letting us know where the whistle was coming from - or so we hoped - and we needed to be ready for what could be coming.
But I hadn't expected this.
We'd come upon a group of hunters screaming at each other, unaware of how their voices carried out here. The group was so intent on their argument, all of us were able to sneak up, right on top of them, but as the eastern camp moved to close them in, one man spun.
That was Tobias. He'd yelled for his men to be silent, but the dogs were already excited. Too many were growling, and it carried. Like a thrumming in the chest, that was the sort of noise that should give these men nightmares.
"Do something!" I'd begged Zasen, so he'd stepped forward.
And now, Tobias was ordering these twenty-two men to lay down their weapons - and most were listening. Sadly, most was not all. Just behind Tobias, a scrawny, young-looking man tried to bolt instead of give up his gun.
"Holly, collapse!" I snapped.
She raced away, hitting the boy before he'd passed the first tree, but another dog was moving too. I didn't recognize it, but the second animal grabbed the boy's gun, shook, and rushed back to give the weapon to its owner.
Holly? She lay on the boy, snarling right in his face.
"Anyone else?" I yelled. "There are twenty of you now, and two incapacitated. There are twenty-seven of us, and nineteen dogs. Do you really want to see who'll win tonight?"
A younger hunter gasped. "They are called dogs!"
Tobias let his head drop. "Yes, Jeshiah, they are."
But beside me, Zasen was making gestures. I saw Reapers and Dragons look over, then he pointed at the group and said in Vestrian, "Have the dogs collect the guns."
"Pepper, disarm," I ordered, pointing.
She darted into the fray, and wasn't alone.
One man screamed, tensing up as if expecting an attack.
Another dropped to the ground, but the dogs went for the weapons.
One by one, they were carried away, and some of the animals had time to go back for a second.
That was when our group began to push in.
"Ayla," Zasen said, "tell them they will be detained. We will bind them, but if they don't fight us, they won't die. I don't care how you say it."
"Listen up!" I bellowed. "These men are going to secure all of you. Do not try to fight it. Hold your arms out to your sides and get down on your knees!"
"Do it!" Tobias ordered, but he looked up at me. "Ayla..." And something on his face looked worried.
I lifted a hand, knowing he had to keep his cover. "I am the Phoenix now. I speak your language, and I taught the Dragons and the Reapers."
"I know, but - "
"Knees!" I roared at him.
Tobias didn't kneel. "I have the code, Ayla, and Gideon is taking three times this many men to your town!"
The response to that wasn't the one I expected. "Demon, hold!" Xav snapped in Vestrian. "Holly, go to Ayla. Ayla, talk to him!"
My dog hesitated, unsure if she should obey him, but I patted my leg as soon as the man she was holding had Demon on him. I also picked up the gun Pepper had brought back, but Tobias had said too much. He'd just ruined his chances of going back.
I was pretty sure this was when the phrase "fuck it" applied.
"Tobias, come!" I ordered.
He sighed in relief and headed my way, but my brother called out, "Ayla, take me too!"
My head whipped to him. "Why, Elijah?"
"Because I know as much as him, maybe more." He held his hands out, watching the Reapers and Dragons moving closer. "I can help you, Ayla!"
"Fine. Come on."
Elijah hurried forward, but Pepper wasn't okay with that. Her lips curled. Holly braced. It was Tobias who grabbed his arm, stopping my brother from jogging straight toward me.
"Those are weapons, you idiot!"
Elijah stopped hard. "Oh."
"Slowly," I said, taking a step back. "Girls, guard."
"I'll help Zasen," Rymar promised, pointing at me in a meaningful way.
Kanik moved in from my other side. His bow was across his back, but he had his krael in his hands and his tail was up. When he saw me look over, he smiled.
"What?" he asked in English, "You think I'm leaving you outnumbered?" Then he looked over at Elijah. "Hello, Ayla's brother."
Elijah was whipping his head between us, yet Tobias dragged him closer. When we were far enough back to let the rest of this group be secured, Tobias dropped all pretenses.
"The code is 2063. Callah says that's the year the compound was closed. April 4th, 2063."
"Four-four-six-three." Kanik recited the code we'd used on the door which hadn't worked. "Is April your fourth month? So that would be day, month, then year?"
"Month, day, year," I corrected. "That's how we write it."
"There's more," Elijah said, daring to reach out and grab my arm.
Pepper lunged, clearly intending to bite him. I barely caught her collar, stopping her a hair away, but the clack of her teeth snapping together proved the bite would've been serious if I'd missed.
"Sit!" I told her. "Wait!"
Holly just whined, clearly not liking this at all.
"These," I told Elijah, "are guard dogs. Their job is to keep me safe, and they do not like Moles."
"Moles?" Elijah looked at Tobias.
"Us," Tobias said. "Things under the ground."
"So no touching," Elijah said. "Got it." And he looked at me again. "The elders want to take women from up here and burn the ones down there - "
"Witch trials?" Kanik said, shocked.
"What?" Elijah asked. "No, instead of banishing the women, they will banish them, then burn them. Their plan is to use the women in quarantine to replace them."
"Why?" I demanded.
Tobias opened his mouth, but paused. Glancing at Elijah quickly, he asked me, "What are the chances of us going back?"
"Poor," Kanik said. "Especially him."
"And you don't think I've figured out Tobias is up to something?" Elijah asked. "Every battle, he goes missing - but he's always wounded or dirty enough to make it look good. He's not with Gideon, so either he was hiding, or a coward, and this man isn't scared of much."
"What?" Tobias gasped.
Ignoring me, Elijah faced him. "You've been too intent on that promotion. Not the luxuries that come with it, but the title. I couldn't figure out why until Sylis died."
"You weren't in my squad then."
"Nope," Elijah said. "But Gideon asked me to keep an eye on you. He thinks I'm scared of the Wyvern so I'm desperate. And I was, but I think you're on to something bigger."
"And Gideon is going to Lorsa!" Tobias hissed.
Elijah's body stilled. "What? Where?"
"Lorsa," I said, trying my best to put a Dragon accent on it. "A place where the sun shines, the flowers grow, and children sing as they play. The houses are small, but bigger than our rooms, and the beds are so soft. Lorsa, where your tummy will never be empty again."
"Mom..." Elijah breathed. "That's what she told me."
"It's real," I said. "Lorsa is the name of the Dragon town." And I reached to my neck, grabbing the collection of things I kept there. "And this was her signet. She was the Serpent, Elijah. We're half Dragon, our father raped her, and we have a sister there."
"And Gideon is going there now," Tobias insisted.
"Ayla, I think we were supposed to be the distraction.
The idea was to hit the middle of this line you've all made.
These men? We're all the mistakes. The ones who aren't good enough, don't listen well enough, or have thoughts the elders don't like.
They want to burn the women to make sure no one becomes like you.
But us? They're using us to distract you so Gideon can get his team around to Lorsa. They have carts and shackles!"
"Zasen!" Kanik roared, switching to Vestrian. "Lorsa's about to get hit."
"Go!" Lansin said, stepping forward. "I speak English well enough to handle this. Leave me the big guy to help, and we'll haul them to our summer camp."
"Then what?" Rymar wanted to know.
It was a woman from another camp who answered. "We'll lock them up and see what they're willing to say. I just need someone who speaks English!"
"I do!" a Dragon woman called out.
"I do too," Lansin promised. "So go. Take a cart."
"Take all of them!" a Reaper called. "We need drivers! Any Dragon who needs to defend Lorsa? Go with Zasen!"
"Let's move, people!" Zasen roared.
And positions were traded. Reapers took over the captives.
Dogs were moved in to make up for the numbers they were losing, even though most of the men were already bound.
The carts that had been assigned to each camp were brought up, but all of that took time.
Just enough time for me to tell Tobias one last thing.
"They'll want to know everything. Tell them. Do not fight, because they already hate you for taking their women."
"I know," Tobias assured me. "Just know Callah's waiting for something yellow. That's how she'll know I'm alive - and that you got the code."
"I'll send something back." I told him before I looked over at Elijah. "And I'll deal with you when this is over."
"You, little sister," he said, "are just like our mother. Please don't die?"
"I won't, but don't think that makes up for admitting you were spying on Tobias." Then I pointed back to the group.
This was Tobias's real test. He had to go over there and let them detain him. He had to be tied up with men who likely hated him now. Most of all, he had to trust me a little longer.
"Let's go!" Chlo called out as she moved the cart close enough to be seen. "Xav!"
"They won't hit until sundown," I said. "We should have time to set up defenses."
"I'll alert the other camps!" a Reaper called out.
"We can tell them as we head east," someone agreed. "Send a dog west! Let's get them headed to Lorsa!"
There were suggestions being yelled in all directions, and people were moving. We knew it was coming. We had time. We could handle this! I kept telling myself that as the carts were filled, but once they started moving, I looked over at Zasen.
"They'll hit at sundown."
"Yeah," he agreed. "Or thereabouts."
"Tobias said Gideon has three teams of men. That's..." I quickly did the math. "Right about seventy-five hunters, all with guns. Can we handle that?"
"No," Kanik interrupted. "Ayla, we don't need to 'handle' it. We need to kill them all. If we wipe out their hunters? That's it. The compound will be done. They'll have no choice but to give up!"
"But do we have enough people to make it happen?" I asked.
"Paper," Zasen begged, looking at everyone in the cart.
It was Chlo, the driver, who passed him a small pad of it. "Will that do?"
"Yeah," Zasen said, digging in his pocket for a pen. "Ayla, I'm going to need your fastest dog."
"Holly!" I called. "Up!"
She leapt into the bed of the cart while it was still moving, then wobbled. The man at the back steadied her, earning a wag, but there were too many legs for her to come closer. Zasen didn't seem to care. He just kept writing, scrawling an entire letter on the half-sized paper he had.
Then, "Put this in her collar." He passed the paper to the man beside my dog. Then he looked at me. "Ayla, send her to Farin. She's the Reaper at the next camp up. Not the camp beside us, but the one after."
"But we're going to need her!" I hissed.
He nodded. "And I told Farin to send her back to you. She'll find us, I promise. But if Farin can bring an army?"
"Shit," Rymar breathed. "We might have enough people to stop the Moles."
"And just enough time to make it happen," I said, hoping it was true.