Cast in Peril

by Michelle Sagara

  “Kaylin.”

  It opened its mouth, revealing translucent teeth, translucent tongue, and some hint of translucent upper palate. “I think—I think it’s yawning.”

  “I think you’re crazy,” Bellusdeo snapped in Elantran. In Barrani, she added, “Is that the right word? It means insane.”

  “Yes.” But when it stretched its neck, its tongue flickering like a snake’s tongue might, she saw the last little bit of its body as it slowly unfurled wings. For something that fit more or less in the palm of her hand—well, a little less—it had long wings. Long wings; eyes like opals.

  “Kaylin—”

  Kaylin shook herself. “I’m sorry,” she said, looking at the spot where the floor wasn’t anymore. It happened to be far beneath her feet, but she hadn’t yet fallen. Neither had the weightier Bellusdeo. “What about the marks?”

  “If you can manage to divert your gaze by a few degrees, you’ll see for yourself.”

  Kaylin looked slightly over the small creature’s head. “Oh.”

  “Oh, you say.”

  One of the marks from Kaylin’s arm was floating in the air above the small creature’s head, hovering, in miniature, the way the spoken True Words did. “Bellusdeo, can you read it? Can you tell me what it means?”

  Bellusdeo shook her head. “I was taught very little of the ancient tongue.”

  “But you’re as old as the Arkon—”

  “Yes. I was not, however, considered adult in my Aerie, because I wasn’t. What I learned, I learned by subterfuge and charm. Mostly charm.”

  “It wouldn’t kill you to try that on Diarmat. It might, at this point, kill him.”

  The rune began to thin as Kaylin watched it. No, not thin—compress. Three horizontal strokes began to shift their position, making a jumble of a pattern that had, for a moment, looked tantalizingly familiar. There was a short, fat dot in the center of the pattern, and slender, vertical squiggles to the left; those were pulled in as well, until there was something the shape of a very odd funnel just above the hatchling’s delicate head.

  It flicked its tongue and then roared. Which came out as a pretty pathetic squawk. As it inhaled to try again, the funnel above its head began to descend; the creature opened its mouth and…began to eat it. Or drink from it.

  “Bellusdeo, pinch me. Oh, never mind—you already are.”

  Bellusdeo, however, was staring at the creature. “Do you understand what you have in your hands?” she finally asked in a hushed voice.

  “A baby Dragon?”

  “Remind me to speak to the Emperor about the standards of your biological education,” was the scathing reply. “Anything that small and delicate that hatched in the Aerie would be crushed or suffocated before it got out of its shell.”

  “Well, it looks like a Dragon, except for the color.”

  “It looks nothing like a Dragon!”

  Kaylin decided not to press the point.

  “And if it were, we’d both be dead.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s a familiar,” Bellusdeo replied. “They’re almost legendary creatures. No, let me rephrase that: they are legendary creatures. I’ve never seen one before.”

  “Then how do you know what it is?”

  “Familiars, according to legend, are born in magical conflagration.”

  “From eggs?”

  “Funnily enough, the legends didn’t specify. This one, though, was.”

  “What can you tell me about familiars? From legend, I mean,” she added hastily.

  “Very little. They were the creatures of sorcerers, and in one particular story, the sorcerer who sought to summon a familiar destroyed half a world in the attempt.”

  “Half a world?” Kaylin looked around the wreckage. “This doesn’t even qualify, if that’s the level of magic you’re talking about.”

  Bellusdeo shrugged. “Legends are neither scientific nor historical. Arcane bomb? Is that what you called it?”

  “Yes.” She frowned. “I didn’t see it; I could feel it. But I can see the sphere that absorbed most of the impact. On us,” she hastily added, looking at the debris.

  The Dragon looked around the ruins of what had once been Kaylin’s apartment. Or rather, her building, since the one above and the one below weren’t going to be suitable living quarters for anything but desperate mice.

  “Is this,” Kaylin nodded at the small dragon, “the source of the sphere?”

  “Pardon?”

  “The sphere. The one surrounding us.”

  Bellusdeo closed her eyes. When she opened them again, Kaylin was happy to see that they were orange. “You are correct,” she said softly in Barrani. “There is a sphere surrounding us. You can see that without casting?”

  Kaylin nodded. “It doesn’t seem like a strong spell.”

  Bellusdeo’s eyes rounded fully. Apparently this was idiocy beyond even her expectations of mortals. “In what way?”

  Kaylin was now looking, eyes narrowed, at every standing surface in the surrounding apartment. “No signature,” she replied, still examining the walls.

  The small dragon turned its head toward the large one; its tongue flicked air, and Kaylin saw that its tongue was now the same color as its eyes. The rune was gone.

  * * *

  Kaylin was almost afraid to move, but she did—slowly—the small dragon cupped in her hands, the large Dragon attached to her shoulders. She didn’t tell Bellusdeo to let go, because she had a hunch that the sphere was generated somehow by the creature Bellusdeo had called a familiar, and it was the sphere that seemed to be allowing her the slow, timid steps she was taking through what was essentially air with splinters thrown in. She didn’t want Bellusdeo to fall.

  But she looked at what remained of the floor where the Arcane bomb had exploded, and she could see the harsh illumination of a sigil against the broken floorboards; it was huge and splashed up against what remained of the walls.

  “What are you looking for? The device?”

  “No, that’s gone. I’m looking for the signature of the mage who created it. Arcane bombs are usually designed to have up to three different magical signatures, and none of those signatures is guaranteed to correspond to an actual criminal.” She frowned.

  Bellusdeo looked shocked. Outraged. It instantly made Kaylin feel better. “What do you mean, an actual criminal? Isn’t the creation of a magical item of that nature criminal enough?”

  Since it was more or less an annual rant on Kaylin’s part—if she was being generous—Kaylin had no arguments to offer in response. “This one’s different.”

  “How?”

  “I can only see two, and frankly, they seem a bit on the small size.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t what you thought it was?”

  “Or maybe the whole egg-hatching-in-conflagration thing did something with most of the magic the item contained.” She glanced at the creature, who had curled up so that his head was practically under one of his wings. He appeared to be sleeping. “He’s really, really cute,” she whispered.

  “Kaylin, please. Focus.”

  “Yes, Bellusdeo,” she said in exactly the same meek tone she sometimes used to ward off Marcus-level irritation.

  * * *

  Kaylin was wondering how in the hells they were supposed to leave the apartment and make their way down to the presumed safety of the street below, because the floors between here and the door—which had incidentally been blown clear off its admittedly flimsy hinges and probably lay in pieces on the stairs below—were nonexistent.

  Bellusdeo, however, didn’t appear concerned. Enough of the wall was missing that she could probably go Dragon for a few minutes and jump out; the fall wasn’t likely to harm her in her Dragon form. Going Dragon was technically illegal, and even if Kaylin was certain there would be dispensation granted for the act—and she was—Bellusdeo hesitated.

  They were saved by the beat of frantic—and familiar—wings. “Kaylin!”

  Clint had
come. And if Clint was here, so were other Aerians. He shouted her name again, the tenor of the two syllables laced with fear so visceral it was painful. Kaylin shouted back, “We’re here, Clint. We’re alive. We’re all right. There’s no floor, though, so we’re not sure how to get out.”

  “You’re alive?”

  She rolled her eyes and lifted her voice again. “No, I was lying. I’m dead and I’m here to haunt you and pull at your flight feathers for the rest of your natural existence!”

  There was a pause and then a harsh bark of laughter; not just Clint’s, either.

  “Glad you think it’s funny, Clint. Now can you fly your butt in here and carry us out?”

  * * *

  Kaylin Neya, Private, and a Hawk of long standing even if she hadn’t technically been on the payroll as a Hawk for much of that tenure, loved her job. It was a defining responsibility, and it actually helped people. Or at least hindered frauds like the ones on Elani street. But at the end of a long day at work, what she usually wanted was to go home, eat—when there was food in the house—and curl up in bed.

  The workday had ended, and she’d gone home for the last time. She just hadn’t realized it.

  From the cobbled stones of the street, she looked up at the very impressive hole in the wall of the building that had previously contained that home. She also looked at the debris on the streets and at the radius of its scatter. Clint was breathing heavily by the time he’d landed with Kaylin, because she’d insisted he take Bellusdeo out first.

  “Kaylin?”

  She glanced up at Clint. His wings were high; they weren’t extended, but they made clear he was ready to fight if necessary. The skies were alive with Hawks. At this time of night, the Halls weren’t exactly fully staffed; someone had sent out almost everyone they could get their hands on with short notice. She’d always loved to watch Aerians fly.

  “Kaylin.”

  She looked at Clint again. “Sorry,” she said. “I’m a little distracted.” She lifted the small creature cupped in her palms. He was warm, and he was the only thing, at the moment, that seemed to be providing any heat. Her clothing, or the clothing she’d been wearing—and at least she hadn’t stripped it off and settled into bed before the bomb had come sailing through the damn window—was covered in small shards of silvered glass and splinters. It was now the only clothing she had. That and whatever she’d shoved into the bottom of her locker in the Halls.

  “Kaylin,” Clint said again. This time, he accompanied the words with action: he lifted her in his arms. She wanted to tell him she was fine, she really did—but she was cold, and she was trying very hard to think like a Hawk and not like an upset civilian. Clint turned to Bellusdeo. “There’s an escort just above your head. The two to your left and right in the sky will be flying at window height; the third will fly down to shield you if there’s any perceived danger. We’re under orders to get you both back to the Halls of Law immediately.”

  “Whose orders?” Bellusdeo asked. If she was shaken at all by what had happened, it didn’t show; Kaylin envied her the composure. She also felt more ashamed of her own lack.

  “The Lord of Hawks,” Clint replied. “But expect there to be an Imperial Dragon or two at the Halls by the time you get there.”

  * * *

  Clint had been slightly optimistic—or pessimistic, depending on your viewpoint; there were no Imperial Dragons waiting for them at the office. The office, however, was fully staffed, mostly by Barrani Hawks. Caitlin was still at her desk, because Caitlin had been working long hours for the past several weeks; the Exchequer investigation had caused a second shift replete with its attendant paperwork and bureaucracy.

  Marcus, eyes pretty much red, fur standing up everywhere it was visible, and claws fully extended, was at his desk. His lips were drawn up over his teeth; all he needed was foam or spittle and he’d look entirely rabid. Teela and Tain intercepted Kaylin as she made her way to said desk, her hands still cupping the only thing, besides Bellusdeo and the clothing on their backs, that she’d managed to save.

  Marcus, however, didn’t appear to notice what she held in her hands. Given his fury, she was hoping he’d at least recognize her. The good thing about the Barrani—and good was entirely subjective—was that when they were seething in fury, their eyes shifted color. To blue. To midnight-blue, which in this light looked suspiciously like black. She knew this because Teela’s and Tain’s eyes were that color. But they hadn’t suddenly sprouted claws and they weren’t bristling with weapons; they looked decidedly less friendly, that was all.

  Of course, she could only think something as inane as this because they weren’t angry at her. Even furious, however, Teela noted that she was carrying something small in her hands. “What is that? A glass dragon?”

  Bellusdeo snorted smoke.

  Kaylin, however, understood the question. “No,” she said quietly. “It’s alive.”

  Teela’s eyes lightened to a more familiar blue; Tain’s, however, didn’t budge. “What is it, and where did you find it at a time like this?”

  “It hatched from a very large egg.”

  “An egg? The one in your apartment?”

  Remembering that Teela had not only seen the egg but by all reports burned her hand when trying to touch it, Kaylin chose a nod as the safest bet. When Teela’s stare wandered into glare territory, she added more words.

  “It’s a— I don’t know what it is. Bellusdeo thinks it’s a familiar.”

  The silence was like a knife: long and sharp.

  Tain turned to Teela. “Please tell me I did not hear what she just said.”

  Teela was staring at Kaylin’s hands. “I think,” Teela told her, “we’ll need to hear the longer version of that answer.” She glanced at Marcus’s desk. “It will, unfortunately, have to wait.”

  * * *

  Taking a deep breath, Kaylin headed to Marcus’s desk. She couldn’t really stand at attention, and the usual at-ease posture wasn’t going to work, either, unless she wanted to drop the sleeping dragon on the ground. Marcus actually looked at her hands. He didn’t, however, ask her what she was carrying. More important, he didn’t tell her to get rid of it. He left his chair and she saw deep scores in both the armrests. She winced. Marcus had to replace his desk on a relatively frequent basis. He seldom had to replace his chair.

  He walked around the desk toward Kaylin, who instantly lifted her chin to expose her throat. His mood was bad enough that he even reached for it, although he lowered his hands before he touched skin. “Did you destroy your apartment?” he asked in a rumbling growl of a voice.

  “No, sir.”

  “Then why are you exposing your throat?”

  Because you’re in the worst mood I think I’ve ever seen you in? She thought it massively unfair that she was the one who’d almost been killed and everyone was more than happy to vent their rage and fury at that fact on her. Kaylin, still aware that no one had yet denied her the promotion she desperately wanted, kept that one on the right side of her mouth. He was in a bad enough mood that he didn’t wait for an answer, which was good, because she was too tired to come up with one. She was also still very cold—except for her hands.

  As if she could hear the thought from across the office, Caitlin appeared with a blanket. She wrapped it around Kaylin’s shoulders and knotted two corners just under her chin. She also paused to look at the small, translucent creature in Kaylin’s hands. “He is adorable, dear,” she said.

  Bellusdeo, silent and unassailed by Marcus in a fury, snorted.

  “I’ll get you something warm to drink. The Hawklord should be down— Ah, there he is.”

  * * *

  The entire office was like a living catalog of racial foul moods. The Hawklord’s eyes were as dark as Teela’s, and his wings were high, the arches poised as if to strike. “Private,” he said in a much friendlier voice than the Sergeant had used. “You’re alive.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He looked at her hands. “If
the item you are carrying is not essential, I suggest you set it down somewhere safe.”

  She swallowed. “It’s essential.”

  “I see. Perhaps, at a later point in time, you can tell me where, in the regulations, carrying glass is considered essential for performance of your duties.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What happened?”

  “We went home to change for the etiquette lessons. While we were there—” She took a deep breath, held it, and continued. “While we were there, something was thrown or shot into the apartment through the window.”

  “The window was open?”

  “No, sir. The shutters were closed, but they’re really warped, so they’re only tied shut. Sometimes they pop loose—”

  He lifted a hand. “Continue.”

  “I think an Arcane bomb landed in the room.”

  His brows rose. “Impossible.”

  She swallowed. “Sir—”

  Clint cleared his throat; she’d forgotten he was even there. “It’s not impossible, sir.”

  “You have a damage report?”

  “We have Hawks working with a portable mirror now, but I did see the building.”

  “And?”

  “It’s sustained severe structural damage. Very little remains of the walls, floor, or ceiling in the room in which the suspected bomb exploded.”

  “And you, Private, were somehow not in the room when it did explode?”

  “I was.”

  He looked over her head to Bellusdeo, who was standing and looking vaguely regal. Although Dragons were not Barrani, and therefore lacked some of their innate grace and cold beauty, they certainly weren’t mortal. They could, on the other hand, hide it better when they chose to do so. “We were both in the room.”

  “You are unharmed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you shield yourself?”

  Bellusdeo’s brow rose a fraction. “I did not.”

  “Can you explain how you are both alive?”

  “Not definitively, but I have some suspicion.”

  “And that?”