Читать книгу Legion - Julie Kagawa - Страница 12

EMBER

I watched Garret fall asleep, relaxing into the pillows, his breaths even and slow. It was a sound, peaceful sleep this time—no jerking, mumbling or fluttering eyelids. No thrashing around in nightmare. Hopefully, the fever had broken and he was on his way to recovery, though his skin remained disturbingly hot. Hotter than any human’s should have been.

But he was finally awake, and lucid, and that itself was a massive relief. Watching while he’d jerked and muttered nonsense in his sleep had been horrible. One night he’d thrashed about so violently we’d considered tying him down. I knew it was the dragon blood working its way through his system, causing fever and sickness as his body tried to adapt to or reject the infusion. I knew that without it Garret would most certainly be dead, and that Riley had saved his life with his quick thinking. But, watching him moan and thrash trying to ward away phantom enemies, hearing what was almost a snarl erupt from his throat one night, I couldn’t help but wonder what he would be like when he finally came out of it. If he came out of it at all.

Thankfully, he had. And it didn’t appear to have changed him. At least, not on the outside. What was happening inside him was anyone’s guess; as far as any of us knew, no human had ever received a transfusion of dragon blood, so there was nothing to compare it to. I doubted Garret would sprout wings and a tail, as cool and disturbing as that might be, but I also doubted any human could get injected with the blood of a dragon and not experience side effects.

Right now, watching him sleeping peacefully for the first time in over a week was all that seemed important. He was alive, not delirious, and now I could rejoin the rest of the world. Riley, I knew, would be relieved. I’d barely seen him and Wes since our arrival, and the only times I’d left this room were the instances when I’d fallen asleep at Garret’s side and Riley had carried me to my own bed. I knew he’d want to hear that Garret was awake, if for no other reason than I would stop worrying about him.

With one final look at the unconscious soldier, I tiptoed out of the room and slipped into the hallway beyond.

I nearly scraped my skull on the low, curved ceiling—again—and ducked my head with a stifled growl. The corridor was actually an enormous corrugated steel tube with rooms branching from it. A steel ladder at the far end of the tube led up to a tiny concrete hatch in the middle of nowhere, Wyoming. As fallout shelters went, it was pretty typical. Riley said he’d “stumbled onto it” many years ago and had modified it into an emergency fallback center. It was dark, it was claustrophobic, but it was, according to Riley and Wes, the most secure place we could hope for, a refuge where we could wait out the craziness up top and know that St. George wouldn’t come for us all in the night.

I didn’t know how much I liked the idea of waiting things out. Now that I knew Garret would be all right, sitting here doing nothing, just hoping Talon and the Order would forget about us, was sounding less like a plan and more like a stall tactic. Neither was going to forget about us. And we had worked so hard to strike a decisive blow against both organizations; breaking up the alliance between Talon and the Patriarch was a huge victory, even if it had almost cost one of us his life. To pull back and hide seemed the opposite of what we should do right now, but good luck convincing Riley of that.

The room beside Garret’s, where Riley and Wes shared a bunk, was empty. So I headed to the one other place they would be, the “command room” at the other end of the tube.

Like everything in this underground facility, the command room had low ceilings, concrete walls and just enough room to move around. A square table sat in the middle of the floor, with maps and files and other documents scattered over it, and a desk with an old computer was shoved into the corner with a couple shelves. Amazingly, Wes had been able to get power running to this place. The opposite corner held a very old, yet working, television, and it was on at the moment, an overly cheerful weather reporter announcing that we were in for a soggy weekend.

As I walked into the room, I blinked in shock. Wes, unsurprisingly, sat at the computer, both his laptop and the other screen open and active. Riley stood at one end of the table with both hands on the surface, gazing down at the map spread out beneath him. He was dressed in black—black jeans, boots and shirt—and his dark hair was unkempt. I felt a stirring of heat inside me, my dragon coming to life as she always did when he was around.

But it was the third person in the room that caught my attention. She stood on the other side of the table, arms crossed, straight black hair falling to the center of her back.

“Jade?”

The slight Chinese woman, in reality a forty-foot-long Adult Eastern dragon, turned and gave me a faint smile as I stepped into the room. “Hello, Ember,” she greeted me. “It’s good to see you again. From what Riley has told me, I was expecting not to catch a glimpse of you for days.”

“What are you doing here?”

One slender eyebrow arched. “I said I would return, did I not? When I made certain the monks were safe and had found a new temple, I promised to come back. And there is still a war to be fought.” She lifted her hands slightly. “So, here I am. Though it seems I have come at a, if not bad, rather uncertain time.”

“Ember.” Riley rose quickly, his gold gaze meeting mine across the table. For a moment, his expression was apprehensive; I hadn’t voluntarily left Garret’s room since the day we’d arrived. There were only two reasons I would leave it now. “St. George?” he asked cautiously.

“He’s awake,” I said, making him slump, but whether it was in relief or disappointment, I wasn’t sure. “The fever has broken—he was talking to me a few minutes ago. I think he’s going to be okay.”

“Well, that’s something at least.” Riley raked back his hair. “Nice to get some not horrible news for a change. If the bastard gets back on his feet soon, I could use his perspective on what the hell is going on out there with the Order.”

Mention of the Order brought the current situation rushing back. I’d been so distracted by Garret, I’d nearly forgotten about it, but now it rose up again, looming and ominous. “Why?” I asked, stepping to the edge of the table. What had I missed? “What’s going on? What’s the Order been doing?”

He shot me a frustrated look. “Nothing,” he growled, making me frown. “Not a damn thing. We haven’t heard a peep from them since we left Salt Lake City. There’ve been no raids, no strikes, no activity at all. The Order has gone completely AWOL.”

“I’m confused,” I said, cocking my head. “Isn’t that a good thing? We exposed the Patriarch to the rest of St. George, and Talon’s hold on them is broken. They’re not going after your safe houses anymore.”

“Not right now.” Riley crossed his arms. “But it’s still too quiet. I don’t trust this complete lack of response—it’s not like them at all. This is probably the calm before the shitstorm.”

“The Order is not the one we should be worrying about,” Jade insisted, as if I hadn’t said anything.

“So you keep telling me,” Riley said, glaring at the Eastern dragon. “But I don’t know what you expect me to do against Talon. If the organization is up to something, all the more reason to keep off their radar. We hide deep, and we hide hard. That’s the only way we’re going to survive.”

“It is not a plan to simply hide and do nothing.”

“I’m sorry—this from one of the Eastern dragons who, for hundreds of years, have done nothing but sit on their scaly butts in isolated temples while the rest of us fought the war?”

While they were talking, the news story changed to show a young reporter standing on a narrow stretch of pavement that snaked into a forest. A pair of orange and white barricades blocked the road behind her, warning lights flashing in the gray drizzle. “Authorities are still struggling to discover the reason behind the accident that caused a cargo plane full of fuel to crash into a small Arkansas town last week,” the woman was saying. “As you can see, the road to the town has been blocked, and authorities have closed off the area. Rescue crews are on the scene now and have been combing through the rubble nonstop, but so far no survivors have been found.”

“When did that happen?” I asked.

Riley gave the television a cursory glance. “Couple days ago,” he said in a brusque voice. “Apparently, a plane full of jet fuel took a nosedive into some hillbilly community in the mountains. Caused a spectacular explosion and wiped out the whole town, according to the news. It’s been on every station for days.” He shrugged. “Tragic, but not something we need to worry about.”

“Correct,” agreed Jade. “We should be worrying about Talon and what their plans are, now that the Order has been disrupted.”

“And what is it you think we can actually do against the organization?” Riley said, turning back to her. “For that matter, what makes you think Talon is up to anything at all?”

While they were arguing, I turned my attention to the TV. The scene had changed from a map of the United States to what looked like a news conference, with a man behind a podium speaking to a handful of reporters and flashing cameras. After a moment, he stepped down, and a woman took his place behind the podium. She was tall and attractive, with jet-black hair and striking blue eyes, and for some reason, my instincts prickled when I saw her.

“Oh, bloody hell,” Wes breathed from the corner.

Riley and Jade didn’t hear him, or the quiet horror in his voice. Puzzled, I turned, but he wasn’t looking at any of us, his attention riveted to the television in the corner. “Shit,” Wes swore again and glanced at Riley, still in a heated argument with Jade. “Riley, bloody shut up for a second. Look! Look who it is.”

Riley craned his neck toward the TV, and his eyebrows shot up. “Miranda?” he exclaimed. “What the hell? Why is she there...?” His eyes narrowed, jaw tightening as he shook his head. “Dammit,” he growled.

“What?” I asked. “What’s going on? Who’s Miranda?”

Riley swore again. “She an agent with the NTSB—the National Transportation Safety Board,” he answered. “They’re a federal agency that’s called in to investigate aviation accidents across the US.” He sighed, his gaze sharpening. “She’s also a Chameleon, and one of Talon’s best. Which means...”

“That whole story is a bloody cover-up,” Wes muttered darkly. “If Talon sent a Chameleon herself to the site, they’re neck-deep in whatever is going on down there.”

Jade’s cool gaze held Riley’s across the table, and there was a warning in those dark eyes. “Talon is on the move,” she said in an ominous tone. “How long can we remain ignorant? How long can we hide while they put their plans into motion, unopposed?”

“As long as it takes,” Riley growled back. “Breaking up the Order is one thing. Saving hatchlings from the organization is another. Dragons who go head-to-head with Talon die, that’s all there is to it. I’m the leader of this underground—it’s not just my hide on the line. I have an entire network of dragons and humans to worry about, and I will not bring them under Talon’s fire. No, we stay here, we hide, we let this blow over. I’m not going to put anyone in danger if I can help it.”

“And what if it doesn’t blow over?” I challenged. “What if it just gets worse?” I pointed at the screen. “Riley, if that’s a cover-up, then Talon might have destroyed an entire town. That’s not like them at all—they would never risk that kind of exposure unless they’re planning something huge to counter it.” Riley glared at me, making my dragon stir, but I held my ground. “Jade is right. Something is happening with the organization, something big. We need to know what Talon is up to before it’s too late.”

“Don’t you start, too, Firebrand.”

“They’re right, mate,” Wes said quietly, shocking us all speechless. We turned to him, but he was staring at the screen, his gaze dark. “Talon might’ve blown up a building or two in the past, but they’re always careful to make it seem like an accident. This...” He shook his head at the TV. “This is a whole different animal. I’ve never heard of them taking out an entire town for no reason. That place is in the middle of nowhere. Unless we’re missing something big, there’s nothing there that Talon would want.” His jaw tightened. “I don’t like it, Riley. They’re changing the game on us. We need to find out what the hell they’re doing before it bites us all in the ass.”

“Et tu, Wesley?” Riley growled, but before Wes could reply, he turned to me. “Hang on a second, Firebrand,” he ordered. “Before you go charging off again, I think you’re forgetting something.” He gestured at the door. “What about the soldier? He can’t come with us, not with that injury. He’ll slow us down or get himself killed. Hell, he can’t even stand now, much less hold a gun. How do you expect him to keep up?”

I bit my lip. He was right. Garret was in no condition to go running into yet another dangerous mission, but I also knew that we needed to find out what Talon was planning. “I... I’ll stay behind,” I told Riley. “I’ll keep an eye on Garret while you, Jade and Wes go see what Talon is up to.”

Riley snorted. “Very noble of you.”

“I would come with you, Riley, you know I would,” I said firmly. “I want to go, and I want to see for myself. But...” I started to rub my arms, then stopped myself. “I won’t leave him behind. Not alone. And we have to figure out what Talon is doing before they surprise us with their next horrible scheme. So, the three of you go ahead. I’ll stay here with Garret.”

“No, you won’t,” Wes sighed, shocking me again. “I will.” Riley turned to him, and he shrugged. “I can do just as much over the phone as in person,” he said in a reasonable voice, “and you’ll need someone watching the safe houses while you’re gone. Let’s face it, mate, she’s better in a fight, and if bugger all goes down, three dragons have a better chance of making it out alive than two dragons and a human. I’ll stay here, provide support and make sure St. George doesn’t bleed to death and the nests don’t explode. He’ll be safe with me—and don’t give me that look,” he added as Riley raised a brow at him. “The tosser is useful—I’m not too much of a bastard to admit it. If keeping him alive means he’ll kill more of St. George and Talon in the future, then by all means, I’ll give him whatever he needs.”

I smiled at his gruffness, seeing the flush that crept below his scruffy jawline. “Thanks, Wes.”

“Yes, thank you, Wesley,” Riley echoed in a mock sincere voice. “For dragging me into yet another insane scheme. I suppose if I refuse now, these two morons will go to this crash site without me.” He shook his head and raised a hand before I could protest. “Fine. Great. Into the jaws of death once more—must be a Tuesday. So, now that you mutineers have decided where we’re going next, why don’t you tell me how long it’s going to take to drive from Wyoming to Arkansas?”

Wes’s fingers flew over the keyboard. “Um...about eighteen hours,” he confirmed, squinting at the screen. “If you drive straight through.”

Riley exhaled and shook his head in exasperated defeat. “All right,” he muttered, “if we’re really going to do this, let’s get it over with.” Straightening, he became confident again, his tone brusque and commanding. “We’ll leave tomorrow. Wes, send a message to all the safe houses. Tell them—again—they are to stay put and not move unless they are one hundred percent certain Talon or St. George will kick down their door in the next twenty-four hours. I’ll get things together so we can leave as soon as we can.” He gave me an appraising, golden-eyed stare, and one corner of his mouth curled up. I swallowed, ignoring the slow flame coiling through my insides. “Get some rest, Firebrand,” he ordered. “You’ve gotten only a couple hours a night this whole time, and most of that has been slumped in a chair. I know you’re tired. Go to sleep.”

I smirked back, ready to tell him I was fine, but then I realized he was right. I was more than tired. Between the stress of nearly losing Garret, his sickness and the constant bedside vigil, I was completely exhausted. Sleep sounded wonderful right now.

“Yeah,” I agreed, drawing back. “I’ll do that. Don’t leave without me.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

I checked on Garret one last time before continuing to the room next door. He was still dead to the world, his breaths slow and deep. I tiptoed out to avoid waking him, walked into my own room and collapsed on my tiny cot in the corner. The lumpy, metal-framed mattress felt like heaven. I was unconscious almost before my head hit the pillow.

* * *

A knocking at my door pulled me out of a dead, dreamless sleep. Groping for my phone, I stared blearily at the glowing numbers: 6:42 a.m. Holy crap, it had been seven in the evening when I’d fallen into bed last night. I’d zonked out for nearly twelve hours.

The knocking came again, probably Riley or Jade, impatient to get on the road. Eighteen hours was a long drive down to Arkansas. I thought of Garret, and felt a stab of worry and guilt for leaving him, but he had been shot and nearly killed less than two weeks ago. He certainly couldn’t come with us.

“I’m up!” I called, scrambling off the mattress. Jeez, the floor was cold. “I’m coming, just gimme a couple seconds.”

I ran my fingers through my hair, smoothing it down as best I could. Yawning, I walked to the door and pulled it open.

It wasn’t Riley. Or Jade.

“Hey, dragon girl,” Garret said, smiling at me over the threshold. He wore jeans and a white T-shirt, and his short blond hair, clean and brushed back, glinted under the bare bulbs. His metallic-gray eyes were shining as they met mine. “You didn’t think you were going to leave me behind, did you?”