The Dragon Circle

by Irene Radford

  But Pettigrew had to get past Loki and his warriors first.

  The Marines all wore helmets and battle armor that hid hair color, complexion, and gender. At this distance he could distinguish few features other than relative height.

  Where was Kat?

  Raaskan popped up behind the last private in line. A knotted vine twisted about the throat left the hapless Marine choking. A quick snap of Raaskan’s powerful arms and his victim’s head lolled limply on his neck.

  Unbearable pressure built within Loki’s chest, robbing him of breath. The cords along his nape burned and ached. He had to close his eyes and concentrate upon Pettigrew. If he watched the grisly work of his warriors, he’d share the deaths. His orders to render the IMPs unconscious whenever possible had not registered with the locals.

  Tribal warfare had been their way of life for generations.

  Fifty meters farther along the path Hestiia took out a straggler with a well-placed arrow—again to the vulnerable throat.

  Loki was prepared for this death. With his feet braced and his hands locked behind his neck, he kept his focus on Pettigrew and Taneeo. The slight priest seemed to know the path better than Loki’s own warriors.

  About every one hundred heartbeats Loki scanned the area for signs of his sister and a squad of specialized bush troops. Nothing.

  Surely he should be able to find her. If not with his eyes, then he must seek her with his mind and his heart.

  Three deep breaths. His mind cleared of the confusion of dying men. Consciously, he blocked out his awareness of each of his own troops. He filtered through the company of determined soldiers. Seeking, always seeking, something familiar.

  A whisper of thought brushed against him. He honed in on the pattern of logic that could only be Kat. Behind him. Close. Getting closer.

  “Freeze, Loki, or I blast you from here to kingdom come.” Kat stood at his feet, braced against a tree with ten men behind her. All of them held stunner rifles, fully charged and aimed at his heart.

  Large rocks crashed down hills and through brush. Their fall echoed around the clearing. A cloud of dust drifted through the trees.

  (Trouble,) Irythros called.

  Konner peered through the brush toward the path. Niveean and the two blacksmith’s apprentices jumped up and down in triumph. The rockfall continued beneath their feet. They had fulfilled their part of the ambush and levered a boulder into the path of the approaching IMPs.

  Konner bowed his head a moment, praying that no person stood in the path of that rock and the others it released as it plummeted downward.

  He caught a flash of bright light on the periphery of his senses. Quickly he rolled to his right.

  Fighters whizzed past the clearing. An energy bolt singed the saber fern to his left. The next blast fired across the top of the clearing as if engaging more fighters rather than enemies on the ground.

  Then Konner caught a flash of a dragon wing and a wild chuckle from Irythros.

  (They waste their ammunition on what they cannot see and will never catch.)

  Konner shook his head. The dragon did not take this battle seriously.

  He should.

  The clearing was a mess. Piles of loose dirt littered the place along with uprooted ferns, shrubs, and grasses. Konner had to expand the open area by nearly five acres to accommodate his measurements. One crystal lay within feet of the edge of the pool. The hot spring there fed extra energy to the crystal. The stone, in turn added heat to the water. All of the crystals drew power from the iron and nitrogen in the soil, shooting energy back and forth among themselves and the king stone.

  At last the stones had stopped singing their unharmonious wail in the back of his mind. They waited now in tense silence for the connections that would make them a family again.

  At their urging he’d finished the hard work of placement and connection twelve hours ahead of schedule.

  Now he just had to establish the programming of the confusion field and bury a small handheld computer within a force field beside the king stone. This would be easier if he had access to the database aboard the shuttle. But Kat had stolen that.

  (You must leave the clearing. The fighters leave. They have no more ammunition or fuel. But the Others come. Quickly,) Irythros said. His tone sounded very insistent.

  “Not yet,” Konner replied. “Dalleena, can you see anything?”

  “Just dust.” She stood on the opposite side of the clearing, keeping acres of land between them.

  He did not understand her coolness. Or her silence. He did not have time to wonder.

  “Just a few more moments and I can engage the field.” He ran back to the center and the king stone. He dropped into the deep hole.

  “Konner!” Dalleena called. “Konner, help me!”

  He could not ignore the plea.

  (Stay hidden.)

  “St. Bridget help me, I can’t.” Before Irythros could counter the argument, Konner nearly flew up the crude ladder from the depths of the hole.

  Taneeo held Dalleena from behind, a knife at her throat. Fifteen armed IMPs ranged behind them, Pettigrew at the fore.

  Konner still had the unconnected handheld in his pocket. No time to finish the last few commands. No time to keep the IMPs out of their hiding place.

  No time to save anyone.

  Konner’s gaze was drawn to the strange object suspended upon a thong and hanging around the priest’s neck.

  The second distress beacon. How had he gotten it from the freelance merchant with the good teeth?

  A feral grin spread over the traitor’s face. “Any move from you or the dragon and I kill her where she stands,” he snarled.

  “I see you have returned from the dead to terrorize innocents again, Hanassa.”

  CHAPTER 45

  “PSST!” KIM signaled Loki. From his vantage point on a ledge below his brother, he could not see if Loki heard him or not. Or if Kat heard and would send her shock troops after him.

  He counted one hundred heartbeats. He heard only the muffled sounds of strident conversation above him.

  “I can do this,” he told himself.

  Slowly, he breathed in and out three times, clearing his mind. When he felt disembodied, he pictured in his mind exactly where Loki should drop off the top of the rock outcropping. Dangle here, drop there. Avoid this rotten foothold. Take this less obvious one. Then he sent the images to his brother.

  Behind him, he heard the confused thrashing of the IMPs freeing themselves from the rockfall. He had to leave the mop-up to his people. Hestiia and Raaskan would dispose of as many as they could.

  Best if Kim did not know how many or where. He forced himself to think in terms of obstacles removed rather than people.

  He was just about to give up on Loki and concentrate on diverting Kat, when his brother rolled down the rock face. He slipped dangerous meters, then grabbed a tree growing horizontally out from the cliff. He swung there for many long moments until he balanced and added his other hand to firm his grasp.

  Shots buzzed in Loki’s wake. Kat’s red head appeared above them. “I’m not finished with you yet!” she shouted and fired her stunner blindly.

  Kim ducked back into the shrubbery to avoid the shot.

  Loki laughed. The landscape picked up his mocking and reverberated it up and down, back and forth until it lost meaning and direction.

  More shots followed. Kat let loose a string of curses and epithets that would have earned her one of Mum’s frowns of disappointment.

  At last, Kat and her squad retreated from the edge of the rocks.

  Now, Kim urged Loki with his mind. Before she finds a way around. He sent mental images of a likely route of descent rather than exact words.

  You sure about this?

  Kim felt Loki’s uncertainty.

  As certain as I am that your sister will be upon us before you get down here if you do not hurry.

  Loki let go of his branch and dropped one and a half meters to a narrow ledge. H
e teetered on the edge.

  Kim braced himself to break his brother’s fall.

  Loki found his balance and dropped to all fours. Clinging to the ledge by his fingertips, he proceeded downward.

  Kim kept urging speed. Loki took his time, testing each hand and foothold before committing his full weight to any of them.

  Kim heard the clatter of ten armed and armored people winding downward by a circuitous path.

  Then he saw Kat drop over the top and grab the same tree Loki had.

  Kim inhaled sharply, willing Kat to use both hands to climb down and leave her weapon holstered.

  She did. But she moved faster than her older brother, showing more recklessness than Loki ever had.

  At last Loki dropped the last few meters. Kim braced his feet against a tree trunk and grabbed Loki to keep him from tripping and rolling on the rough ground.

  “Where?” Loki asked, panting. He glanced over his shoulder at the uniformed figure still working her way down the cliff face.

  Kim pointed out their path. “Shuttle,” he mouthed. The hair on his nape tingled. Kat was very near.

  Loki’s eyes brightened and he grinned without mirth. “Comeuppance,” he mouthed.

  At least Kim thought that was his word. A few obscenities would fit the same syllables.

  A shot burned above their heads. It severed a tree limb and dropped it in their path. Wild shouts and more fluent curses from Kat followed the bolt of energy.

  Kim pelted through ferns and bracken, slid on mud and tripped across a roaring creek. Loki followed close on his heels.

  Scratched, bruised, and filthy, they emerged from the tree line onto the flatter surface of a fertile plateau. Before them waited their own shuttle Rover, its cerama/metal hull dulled by a layer of green. Beyond it rested three landers.

  More shots.

  No time to disable the landers.

  They ran faster, diving into Rover’s open hatch. Kim slapped it closed while Loki scrambled for the cockpit. “Break out the weapons, Kim,” he called over the roar of the engines.

  Before Kim could belt in and take command of his screens, they rolled toward the sea.

  The cliff edge came too soon. Not enough lift beneath the wings. Below them treacherous rocks played peek a boo with the crashing waves. Gravity pulled them down into the teeth of the broken shore.

  At the last minute, Loki fired the VTOL jets and lifted. A cannon pulse blast rocked them. They dipped lower, losing the little bit of altitude they had gained.

  “She’s got a lander up already,” Loki cursed under his breath.

  “And she’s shooting to kill.” Kim locked his own tiny blaster onto the looming target of the military vessel. It gained on them by the millisecond. The next shot would be at point-blank range.

  He fired.

  The energy burst in front of the cockpit windscreen. The pilot did not falter. The lander kept coming.

  “I’ve got nothing to match that thing.”

  “I’m not sure I can outrun it,” Loki admitted. “She’s one hell of a pilot, matching me move for move in a bigger and clumsier craft.”

  They skimmed the surface of the waves and bounced up again. The lander could not match the maneuvers. It did not need to. Kat bullied forward.

  (You need a bath,) Irythros reminded them.

  “So we do.” Loki slowed abruptly and plunged Rover into the waves.

  Hanassa! Dalleena swallowed. Felt the knife scrape her throat. The priest’s muscles shifted. The tip of the knife pricked her skin. She winced and started. Warm liquid trickled down her neck.

  “I will not be a sacrifice to your perversion,” she whispered. Anger fueled by fear sent jolts of energy through her veins.

  Silently, she contracted her abdomen and shoulders, testing the level of pain lingering from her injuries.

  “Irythros warned me against you, Hanassa.”

  “Irythros!” the man spat. “A child among dragons. A meddler who breaks the law and reveals secrets!” He pressed the knife a little closer against Dalleena’s neck. She winced and prepared herself for pain.

  “What will you gain by taking a life?” Konner asked the IMP casually. His attention seemed to focus upon the man beside the priest rather than the man with the knife.

  “I do not take a life,” the IMP replied, equally casual.

  “You employ the assassin. By your own laws, that makes you an accessory before the fact. Punishable by five years imprisoned rehabilitation after a mind-wipe.”

  “What about the twenty men you and your brothers killed?” Heat rose in the man’s voice. “You are as guilty as the men who unleashed an avalanche of boulders.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, Dalleena saw the man lift a black box of a weapon. A stunner, Konner had called it. At the same time, he moved forward.

  The priest did not like that. He shoved Dalleena forward, elbowing the IMP aside. He stumbled and fought for balance. A blast of red light shot from the stunner into the shrubbery. Well away from Konner.

  Konner lunged.

  Dalleena rammed her elbow into the priest’s gut. Then she stomped upon his bare foot. As he doubled over, she whirled and slammed the heel of her hand against his jaw and her knee into his groin.

  Her ribs protested. She clenched her jaw against the pain.

  Hanassa thudded upon the ground, rolled to his knees, and bounced upward.

  “It will take more than your puny efforts to fell me,” Hanassa snarled. Gone were all traces of the priest’s mild tenor voice, replaced by a deeper, harsher baritone. His body was bulkier than the man she had found suffering from a severe beating. Had he done that to himself?

  She did not wait for an answer. Her foot swept across the back of his knees, and she turned and ran for the creek.

  Heavy footsteps pounded after her. Booted feet that crashed through the underbrush.

  “Stop or we shoot!” the IMP called.

  “Shoot her and you die!” Konner replied. Sounds of a struggle.

  The pool came into view. Dalleena angled southward and uphill. A tangle of calubra ferns slowed her down. She pushed them aside, vaulting over them. Pain lashed her ribs with each harsh breath. She tripped and rolled upon landing. The ferns loosed their pungent perfume. A sedating aphrodisiac.

  Holding her breath, she jumped up and climbed the hill. A new, sharper pain began in her side. Breathing came hard. Her legs grew heavy.

  Then miraculously, Konner was beside her. He braced her with an arm about her waist. Running became easier. His strength guided her back toward the sound of the cascade of water. After a long, dry summer, boulders formed a damp ford across the upper creek.

  Konner leaped to the top of the first boulder. She grabbed his wrist with both hands. She clambered up beside him.

  “We have to get outside the field,” he said when she faltered. “I’ll activate it with them in and us out. They shouldn’t be able to follow.” He bounded across a gap to the next boulder.

  She followed more cautiously, afraid to imitate his leap and jar her abused bones upon landing. She slipped at the edge. He held her hand tightly, keeping her from falling over the cascade and landing upon a pile of broken rocks below.

  “Stop,” the IMP leader yelled. He managed to shinny up the first boulder on his own.

  Someone behind him fired one of the stunners.

  Moss sizzled at their feet.

  Konner halted and raised his hands. Dalleena did the same. They turned slowly to face their pursuers.

  “I have no quarrel with you, Lieutenant Pettigrew,” Konner said.

  “But I have a very large one with you,” the IMP replied. He rose from his crouch upon the first boulder. “You have broken the law many times and resisted lawful arrest. You have sabotaged an Imperial vessel. And now you flee again. Judge Balinakas will dish out many long sentences to you and your brothers.”

  “We do not have to live with this animosity. We can share this planet in peace,” Dalleena offered.


  “I have no intention of allowing you to strand me in this godforsaken wilderness, O’Hara. Where is the king stone?”

  “Practically under your nose.”

  Pettigrew looked down. So did the IMPs behind him.

  A cold wind blasted Dalleena in the face. A thunderous beating of wings. She brought her right palm up and jerked her head right and left.

  Irythros burst from the cloud cover. He screeched. The IMPs grasped their ears in pain.

  Dalleena wanted to hunker down and cover her head. Konner remained standing. So she did, too.

  A stream of flame ejected from the dragon’s mouth. It brushed the top of Pettigrew’s head, singeing his hair.

  The lieutenant screeched to match the dragon. He bent so far over he fell into the creek, deep here near the cascade. How deep?

  The IMPs let loose a volley of shots.

  Konner jumped into the water. He flailed about, dove. Surfaced. Gasped. Dove again.

  Dalleena peered into the churning water, scanning with her palm as well as her eyes. She couldn’t sense anything.

  The IMPs stood, rooted in place, exchanging worried glances. Hanassa danced around them in glee.

  “Help him!” Dalleena screamed.

  Konner surfaced again, flung water out of his eyes. Then once more he kicked up and back and plunged back into the water.

  Favoring her ribs with one arm clutched across her midriff, Dalleena slipped into the water. Only a little deeper than Konner was tall. She felt about with toes and hands and senses.

  Nothing but more water, sand, and a few slippery green things.

  The current gently wove around her.

  She dropped below the surface, caught a glimpse of a white foot to her right. She grabbed. It kicked. She came up with a firm grasp of Konner’s ankle.

  “They can’t swim in armor with field kits on their backs.” he choked out. “No time to undress.” The agony on his face mimicked what she had seen when she shared his vision.

  Two IMPs struggled out of their heavy packs while their comrades unfastened shin guards and breast-plates. They still had arm, back, and thigh armor to remove. They’d never get into the water in time to help their lieutenant.