Dragonback 02 Dragon and Soldier (13 page)

They boarded their transport, a Lynx Personnel Carrier, in the
courtyard of the HQ compound. Along with Tango Five Zulu, two squads of
regular Edgemen would also be traveling to November Six. Sergeant
Grisko was along, too, at least long enough to help them set up.

The Lynx was a good-sized transport, designed to haul at least
three times the number of people they had on this trip. That meant some
elbow room for a change, and Jack took quick advantage of the situation
by staking out a pair of seats in the back next to one of the small
windows. Setting his pack down on one of the seats, he strapped himself
into the other. If he kept his eyes glued to the scenery, maybe he
could pretend he was heading out on some sort of vacation.

On a vacation, and not into a war zone.

It turned out to be a futile hope. Unlike the other Edge
transports Jack had traveled on so far, the Lynx actually looked like a
military vehicle. Intruding constantly on his view of the landscape
were the muzzles of two large-caliber machine guns poking out from
under one of the stubby wings. The wing itself was painted in a
camouflage pattern designed to help it blend in while on the ground.

The landscape itself wasn't all that exciting, either. The hilly
ground around Mer'seb soon gave way to a short stretch of plains and
small lakes, then began to turn hilly again. Grisko had said the trip
to November Six would take two hours, and Jack found himself wondering
just how big the territory was that this handful of Edgemen was
supposed to be protecting.

With such cheery thoughts dancing around his brain, he huddled
over with his forehead against the cold plastic of the window and
drifted to sleep.

He awoke suddenly, startled by a light jab on his wrist. He
snapped his eyes open and looked around.

No one was leaning intently over him. For that matter, no one was
paying any attention to him at all. The nearest other person, Rogan
Mbusu, was sprawled limply two seats over, snoring quietly to himself.
Outside the window, the afternoon sunlight was throwing long shadows
across the ground.

The light jab came again; and this time, Jack recognized it as the
touch of a dragon's claw. The signal of a dragon's nagging. "What?" he
muttered toward his shoulder.

"I must speak with you," Draycos murmured back.

"Now?"

"Now."

Jack glared down at his shoulder, a wasted effect with his shirt
and jacket mostly in the way. Draycos had a real gift for rotten timing.

But there was nothing to do but go along. Unstrapping, he headed
past the equipment storage area to one of the tiny restrooms in the far
rear of the transport. He closed the door, sealed it, and did a quick
check for monitors. There weren't any. "This had better be good," he
warned as he closed the toilet lid and sat down.

With the usual sudden surge of weight, Draycos popped out of
Jack's collar. He landed on the area around the sink and turned around,
balancing himself there with apparent ease. "It is important," he
promised. "Do you remember the map we were shown of the area around
November Six?"

Jack frowned. "You woke me from a good nap for
this? A
geography quiz?"

"Please," Draycos said earnestly. "The Gray Hills flow from
northeast to southwest, with Bear Mountain to the north of the base.
Correct?"

"Right," Jack said. "Then the Gray Hills continue down toward
Octrani Lake, with the Partanra River flowing out mostly west from
there."

"While a tributary of that same river is the water that flows
through Mer'seb," Draycos said. "The Parprin town we have just left.
Correct?"

"Sounds right," Jack confirmed, stifling a yawn. "So what?"

"So this," Draycos said. "The place we were shown on the map is
not the place we are going."

Jack sat up straight, his tiredness suddenly gone. "How do you
know?"

"I am a poet-warrior of the K'da," Draycos reminded him. "The
reading of maps is part of my profession. I have been watching the
ground through the window."

Jack's stomach was trying to do somersaults. "How far off are we?"

"Our course from Mer'seb should have taken us at an angle slightly
north of east," Draycos said. "We did indeed set out in that direction.
But approximately one hour ago we changed gradually to a more northerly
direction."

Jack glanced at his watch. They'd been in the air about an hour
and a half. Thirty more minutes until landing.

Or at least, that was what Grisko had told them. Maybe the
sergeant didn't know something had gone weird, either.

Then again, maybe he did. "So where
are
we headed?"

"If we are still to land in one half hour, I believe we will
arrive near the western edge of the Gray Hills," Draycos said. "Perhaps
three hundred miles north of November Six.

"And if we
don't
stop in half an hour?"

"All regions beyond that are either neutral or considered
enemy-controlled."

Jack chewed at his lip. Terrific. "So what do we do?"

"There are two squads of fully armed soldiers aboard," Draycos
reminded him. "They could be made aware of the situation."

The dragon had a point. If the pilot was an enemy agent trying to
take them to the wrong place, two squads of Edge-men ought to be able
to argue the point with him. Surely none of
them
wanted to end
their trip in enemy territory, either.

On the other hand, having a gun battle in the middle of a flying
transport didn't sound like a very smart idea. "I'd better talk to
Grisko," he decided. "Come on, get aboard."

Obediently, the dragon stepped onto Jack's outstretched hand and
slithered up his sleeve. Sealing the neck of his shirt again, Jack
headed out.

Grisko was sitting alone in the back, on the opposite side of the
Lynx from Jack's seat. He'd probably picked that spot so he could watch
the rest of the group.

Though at the moment he wasn't watching anything at all. His eyes
were closed, his head sagging slightly against the headrest.

Jack pursed his lips. The sergeant was probably not going to like
this. "Sergeant Grisko?" he said quietly.

Grisko's eyes remained closed. "What is it, Montana?"

"I think we're off course, sir."

Grisko pried one eye open and squinted up at him. "Excuse me?"

"We're not headed for November Six," Jack told him. "We seem to be
going somewhere north of there."

Grisko pried the other eye open, and for a long moment he seemed
to be studying Jack's face. "Good observation," he said at last. "As it
happens, our orders have been changed. The Shamshir moved their
transmitter yesterday to point Kilo Seven. We're moving with it."

"Oh," Jack said. So that was it. All nice and simple and
reasonable. Certainly a lot less threatening than a daring midair
hijacking.

Which left only one little problem. Uncle Virge was still heading
for the area around November Six, which meant that Jack's plan for
getting the Djinn-90 information was no longer going to work. Worse,
when it came time to wrap this up and make a run for the tall grass,
his primary escape route was going to be sitting on the ground three
hundred miles away.

Grisko was still gazing up at him. "Is this a problem for you?" he
asked.

"No, sir," Jack said, trying to sound as unconcerned as possible.
"Sorry to have wakened you."

"Half an hour to the base," Grisko said, closing his eyes again.
"Better get some rest. I've got a strange feeling you're going to be on
sentry duty tonight."

Jack grimaced. "Yes, sir."

He returned to his seat and curled up again beside the window.
Even in the few minutes he'd been away the shadows of the trees had
visibly lengthened along the ground. Sunset couldn't be too far away.

"I do not like it," Draycos murmured from his shoulder as he slid
open the neck of Jack's shirt again.

"Me, neither," Jack agreed. He pulled his shirt open a little more
and shifted in his seat so that the dragon would have a better view out
the window. "You first."

"I am not familiar with your transmission science," the dragon
said. "But with the K'da and Shontine, a device that can reach between
stars is large and not easily moved. Certainly not in a single day."

"That's mostly true here, too," Jack agreed. "The
Essenay
's
got a compact InterWorld transmitter built into it, but Uncle Virgil
was always setting up deals and scams across the Orion Arm. He couldn't
risk having them traced back to him through a commercial InterWorld
site."

"Even our largest ships cannot carry such a transmitter," Draycos
said. "Are such common here?"

"Not really," Jack said, frowning. "Actually, not at all. The
biggest StarForce ships have them, I know, and I'm pretty sure a few
starliners do, too. But now that I think about it, I can't remember
anyone else in Uncle Virgil's circle having one aboard their ships.
Whatever he paid for ours, the price must have been astronomical." He
snorted. "Either that, or he stole it."

"Then let us assume the Shamshir transmitter is not easily
portable," Draycos said. "Moving it would cost them considerable time
and effort. It would not be an operation they could hide."

Jack nodded. He and Draycos were definitely thinking along the
same lines. "In other words, it should have taken a couple of weeks to
get a new site prepared, break down the transmitter, and then move it.
Which means we should have heard about this before we left Carrion."

"Correct," Draycos said. "And if they only began moving it
yesterday, there would be no need for us to travel there tonight."

"We could have hung around Mer'seb for a few days while they got
it set up."

"Correct," Draycos said. "That may imply the Shamshir are aware of
our interest and are trying to keep us from succeeding. But it may also
imply there is something else about this mission that we are not being
told."

"Could be." Jack scratched his cheek. "Though I suppose there
could be a simpler explanation."

"Which is?"

"That the Shamshir simply changed their minds about where to put
their transmitter," Jack said. "And no one bothered to tell any of us
about it until now."

"But timely information is vital to a warrior's job," the dragon
objected. "Surely they would not hold it back from us."

"Hey, I'm just a raw recruit," Jack said. "Remember? Nobody has to
tell
me
anything."

"Talking to the window?" a familiar voice asked pleasantly from
behind his shoulder.

Jack clamped down on his tongue as he felt Draycos slide quickly
back to his usual position. "Hello, Alison," he said, turning to face
her. "Sure. Doesn't everybody?"

"Don't tell me," she said. She plucked his pack from the seat
beside him, dropped it unceremoniously onto the floor, and sat down.
"Let me guess. You were staring at the window because you needed a
moment to reflect."

Jack made a face. "That was pathetic. I hope you didn't come all
the way over here just for that."

"No, mostly I wanted to see what the view was like out there," she
said, craning her neck to look past him. "And to find out what you and
Grisko were talking about."

Jack felt his eyes narrowing. "What do you mean?"

She gave him a patient look. "You. Grisko. Talk. Two minutes ago.
You need me to spell any of the words for you?"

"No, I've got it, thank you," Jack growled. "Not that it's any of
your immediate business, but we were discussing the fact that we're not
going to November Six. We're going to Kilo Seven instead."

It was Alison's turn for narrowed eyes. "Why?"

"According to Grisko, the Shamshir moved their transmitter."

For a brief moment he thought he could see an echo of the
emotional swirl in her eyes that he'd noticed once before. But then she
just nodded. "Oh," she said.

" 'Oh'?" he repeated. "That's all? Just 'oh'?"

"What more is there?" she countered reasonably. "If the
transmitter's been moved, we move with it."

He shrugged. "I suppose."

She tilted her head, her eyes shifting down from his face to his
chest. "So that's what they're all talking about, huh?"

Jack frowned. "What?"

She nodded toward his chest. "Your dragon tattoo. Nice."

Jack looked down. Sure enough, part of Draycos's jaw was visible
through the partially open shirt. "Oh, it's lots nicer than that," he
assured her, putting a little boasting into his tone. "It goes all the
way around, and then some. See?"

He pulled the collar a little to the side to reveal more of the
dragon's face. The last thing he really wanted to do was advertise
Draycos's presence this way, and he was pretty sure Draycos felt the
same way. But he'd met enough men with tattoos to know you didn't get
one with the idea of hiding it. Alison was pretty sharp, and if he
didn't brag about his dragon, she might wonder why. "Here—the head's
the best part," he went on, reaching for the shirt's sealing seam. "Let
me get this open a little more—"

"No, that's all right," Alison said hastily. "Really. I was just
wondering if it was like the one the Dragonbacks wore."

"I already told you I never heard of the Dragonbacks until a month
ago."

"Maybe
you
didn't," she pointed out. "But your tattoo
artist might have."

"Oh." That angle hadn't occurred to him. "Is it?"

"Is it what? Oh." Alison shook her head. "Not even close. The
Dragonbacks had their tattoos between their shoulder-blades, just below
the neck. A little dragon, coiled around itself into a circle. Nowhere
near as big as yours."

"You seem to know a lot about them."

She shrugged. "Like I said, I do my research. Always terrific to
talk to you."

She got up and headed back forward to her own seat. "Interesting,"
Draycos murmured.