End Times in Dragon City (7 page)

At a new order from the captain, the guards standing over the Great Gate swapped out the clips in their rifles for ones that had been painted bright red. At his command, they fired a barrage of these new rounds all at once. 

The bullets exploded into flames wherever they struck, knocking back the zombies they hit and even igniting small fires along the wall. These were far smaller than they’d been before, though, and none of them caught and spread. 

The zombies were too wet now to catch fire from anything less than a direct hit. That might be enough to take them out one at a time, but even the Guard didn’t have enough enchanted bullets in its armory to account for every zombie in the Ruler of the Dead’s sprawling army. 

The Dragon might have been able to scorch the creatures from the wall by baking them whole with his fiery breath, but nothing short of that seemed like it could manage it. I wondered where Spark was and if his flames could try to cut through that wetness. 

On one hand, I didn’t want him to get close enough to that battle to find out. There were too many ways for him to get clipped by an errant bullet or spell, not to mention being torn to pieces if the zombies somehow managed to get their hands on him. On the other hand, the Guard was running out of options. If they didn’t come up with some way to stop the zombies’ march soon, I couldn’t see how the Great Circle would last through the night. 

More than anything, I wanted out of my cell so that I could help. I couldn’t stand to stand there and watch the tragedy play out below me. As much as I might have hated the Dragon, I loved his city — my city — and I couldn’t bear to see it torn to pieces and devoured by the dead of another age. 

I stuffed the crystal ball into my pocket and started for the door. I was about to call for the jailers when I heard the sound of heavy boots striding up and stopping nearby in the hallway outside. I hauled up short and waited. 

The door unlocked with a loud, heavy clunk and then creaked open. Yabair stood framed in the open doorway. He frowned and then spat on the ground between us. 

“You have a lot to answer for, Gibson.” 

C
HAPTER
T
EN

“What are you doing here?” I said to Yabair, astonished that he would bother with me right now. “Don’t they need you down at the ramparts with everyone else?” 

“My cousin Maurizzio has things well in hand at the moment,” the elf said with a sneer of unveiled disgust. “I’m here under his orders.” 

“The Ruler of the Dead’s army is knocking on the Great Gate, and he sent you up here to deal with me?” 

Yabair snorted. “You’ve always had an inflated opinion of your importance, Gibson. My business here is to gather the Garret’s resources for the battle. We can’t waste valuable people and weaponry here when they’re needed in the Village.” 

“Then what are you doing talking to — ?” I cut myself off, then headed for the door, trying to shoulder past him. “Let’s go!” 

He put up a hand and blocked my way. “That’s my business. My visit with you is purely for pleasure.” 

I stepped back and gave him a hard stare. “Hey, look, I know I date elves sometimes, but you’re really not my type.” 

He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. He stood that way for a moment, then relaxed and looked at me again. “Thank you,” he said. “For making this easy.” 

“What?” 

“We are letting all of the prisoners out of our precinct houses scattered about the city. In exchange for their freedom, they get the chance to die next to us in battle.” 

It struck me as odd that this was exactly what I was hoping for. When he put it that way, it didn’t seem like such a smart play. Still, it had to be better than waiting for the zombies to find me here after they’d already killed everyone else I’d ever cared about. 

“And for those of us in the Garrett?” I said. 

He shrugged. “They’ve been deemed too dangerous and unpredictable to be released. Maurizzio fears far more trouble from them than they would be worth.” 

I fought the urge to throw a punch at the elf. It might have made me feel better to try it, but that would have faded in an instant. As fast as Yabair was, he’d beat me senseless in seconds. 

“That’s insane,” I said. “You need all hands on this one, no exceptions. What’s the harm? If those people get killed in the process, that makes for that many fewer unpredictables you have to house here when it’s all over, right?” 

I saw that this line of argument wouldn’t move him. 

“All right, forget the rest of them. They’re twisted sickos. Murderers, thieves, and worse. You’ll spend every minute they’re out there checking your back, right?” I glared deep into his eyes. “But take me.” 

Yabair’s face showed no expression at all. I took that as permission to continue, whether he meant that or not. 

“You know me, Yabair. I’m good in a fight, and I’m reliable. I love Dragon City as much as anyone, and I’m willing to do whatever I can to put a stop to the Ruler of the Dead.” 

He grunted at that, so softly I almost didn’t hear him. “You are an excellent example of someone who talks far better than he acts. You claim to love this city of ours, to care about its people. But what you did to the Dragon put us all in mortal danger. It may well wind up costing every one of us our lives.” 

He strode toward me, expecting me to retreat until he backed me up against the opposite wall. I didn’t budge an inch. Instead, I held my ground and met him nose to nose. 

I never did intimidate easy. 

“All right then,” I said. “Then give me a chance to redeem myself.”

Yabair’s eyes grew wide, and he took a step back, standing on the cell’s threshold. “You honestly think there’s a way to make restitution for what you’ve done? You murdered the most irreplaceable person in the world, and you think you can somehow take his place, even for an instant? You couldn’t even stand in for his shadow.” 

“I’m not doing anyone any good in here.” 

“You’re staying put,” Yabair said. “You’ll remain here with all the rest of the scum of the city. You can root for us if you like. You’d better, as we’re your only hope.” 

He considered me for a moment before he continued. “If we succeed, we’ll manage it on our own. If we fall, there’s nothing you could have done that would have made a difference. Don’t flatter yourself by trying to convince me otherwise.” 

“What about the dragonet?” I said. I wasn’t quite ready to share Spark’s new name with Yabair yet. “Couldn’t he be some kind of help?” 

“He’s an infant. Were he a human, he’d still be in diapers. What good do you think he could be against that army out there? Honestly?” 

“So you’ll just let him die with the rest of us?” 

“If we can locate him, we’ll place him with the Wizards Council. They’re preparing an escape craft, and they’ve reserved a spot on it for him. Alone.” 

“I can help make that happen.” 

“Of course you can.” The elf gave me a pitying look. “But we’d require the actual heir, not your imaginary friend, wherever you might be hiding him in here.” 

I tapped the side of my forehead with my finger. “I can speak to him. Telepathically.” 

Yabair stifled a revolted gasp. “That’s not possible.” 

“Why not? He’s imprinted on me, right?” 

Yabair put a hand over his face and steadied himself for a moment. “Sometimes you’re so infuriating that I forget how impossibly ignorant you are. Each dragon has one voice — and only one — at a time. They communicate only with and through that person and no one else.” 

“So what’s the problem?” I said. “That’s me for him.” 

“A dragon’s voice is always an elf. Always. To choose a member of any other race — a person who would inevitably expire before the dragon — would mean risking being without a voice.” 

I had a hard time wrapping my head around that. “Couldn’t the dragon just pick another voice if the voice died?” 

“It’s never happened. Ever.” 

This wasn’t adding up. It took me a moment to realize why. “But I heard the Dragon’s voice in my head too.” 

“You heard the dragonet’s voice. Or so you claim.” He pronounced each word with great care and precision, as if he were speaking to a young and stubborn child. 

“I heard them both. Right before the Dragon died.” 

“Right before you assassinated him.” 

“It was self-defense.” 

“And we can see just how effective that’s been so far.” 

“I know what I heard.” 

“Did you hit your head during that fracas down there, Gibson? Or are you simply a pathological liar?” 

This wasn’t getting me anywhere I wanted to be. “All I’m saying is that I can speak with the dragonet. You should let me. For his sake, not mine.” 

Yabair scoffed at me. “Don’t start pretending that you care for the heir now, Gibson. Or is it only because you killed his father than you’re angling to make sure you’re in the dragonet’s good graces? Perhaps you see an exalted position for yourself in the new regime?” 

“What regime?” I said. “You just told me that Dragon City is done for.” 

“All is not yet lost,” Yabair said. “Maurizzio has rallied our forces at the Great Circle, and if that fails, we still have other options.” 

Something about the way he said it made me feel like someone had walked over my mother’s grave — or the Dragon’s stomach, which I suppose amounted to the same thing. “What’s going to stop those zombies from marching all the way up to the Elven Reaches once they breach that wall?” I said. 

Yabair pursed his lips as he considered me for a moment. “The land in the lower part of the city is riddled with tunnels, is it not? A network of subterranean passages that the people who live down there clamber through like rats. You should know it well. It’s where the Dragon found you.” 

“So? You’re going to hide out there and force the zombies to come after you in narrow, dark passages from which there’s no easy way out? They’ll bury you — in corpses.” 

Yabair shook his head. “Maurizzio has ordered those passages lined with enchanted explosives. If the Ruler of the Dead’s army breaches the wall and makes it into Goblintown, we will blow the entire neighborhood to the stars.” 

I goggled at the elf and staggered back a few steps before I caught myself. “Are you insane? You’d murder thousands of people.” 

“Only moments before the walking dead would devour them in any case. And it might give the rest of us a chance.” 

“And what happens when the Ruler of the Dead takes control of all those people you just slaughtered? Have you thought this through at all?” 

Yabair gave me a solemn nod. “The explosions won’t just kill. They’ll bury every moving thing in that section of the city. It’ll be over in seconds. It’ll leave a hole any creatures that follow after them will have to climb in and out of.” 

“A murder pit.” 

“If you wish. We won’t leave anything to chance.” 

I gaped at him until the hypocrisy of what he was telling me smacked me in the face. “So, to defend yourself, you’re willing to take part in the murder of thousands of innocents, but when I take a single life in self-defense —”

“You assassinated the Emperor!” 

“Let me out of here,” I said. “I didn’t do anything wrong.” 

“And that’s exactly the reason you’re going to die here.” He glared at me like he wanted to put a bullet through my head himself, right there. Then he leaned in close to me and spoke in a voice that was barely more than a whisper. 

“I’m not sure what I’d prefer take you in the end: being torn to pieces by the walking dead or a slow death by dehydration. They’re both too good for you.” 

He backed up then to sneer at me, and I just couldn’t take it any longer. 

I broke his damn nose. 

It happened before I could even think about it. If I’d tried to punch him, I’m sure he would have caught my arm by the wrist as if I’d been a child and then laughed at me as he threw me sprawling across the cell’s stone floor. 

Instead, I just slammed my forehead forward and butted him right across the bridge of his long, thin, perfect nose. I felt the bones in it give with a sickening crunch that I’m not ashamed to say would have plastered a smile on my face if I hadn’t been so furious right then. 

Yabair stumbled backward in pain and shock, and he landed on his butt in the hallway outside my cell. Blood spurted from his nostrils and cascaded down his face, coating his mouth and chin with the same crimson color as his Guard uniform. Some of the fluid stained the gold piping on his collar, but the rest just turned the fine fabric of his jacket darker. 

I could have tried to press my advantage then, but I’d gotten away with a lucky blow and knew it. If I’d have come at him, he’d have taken me apart, broken nose or not. Instead, I stood my ground and put my hands up before me. If he came at me, I hoped I might be able to grab him, although I don’t know how much good that would have done. 

That was one of the horrible things about elves: their inherent superiority. They didn’t just
act
like they were better than humans. 

They were faster, and they were stronger. They formed the ideals of physical beauty and perfection. And they could damn well live forever. 

At any point in any conversation with Yabair, I knew he could kill me before I had a chance to do anything about it. The only ways I had to even those odds were my wand and my gun and maybe a little bit of space between us. At that moment, I didn’t have any of those at hand. 

It wasn’t fair, but then what in Dragon City ever was? 

Yabair reached up and touched his nose with fingers shaking with rage. They came away wet and red, and his eyes — already turning black and blue — bulged with rage at the sight. 

I braced myself for his counterattack. I’d taken a cheap shot at him, sure, but it was all I had. Now I was going to pay for it. 

Instead, Yabair took his bloodied hand and waved it at my door, which shut with an echoing slam that sounded like the final sealing of a tomb. I threw myself at it as the lock slid home, and I pounded at the uncaring slab. 

“Don’t do this!” I shouted at him through the grating in the door. “Don’t leave me here!”