In the most polite tone I asked: "Where are my dragons now, if I may?"
"Liwei, one of my men, parked your car outside here", answered Dao. "We made sure that your two dragons are well".
"Thanks...but..um, I still don't understand why you and your men are here".
For the first time I had the general's full attention. Dao took out a pad from an inside pocket of his uniform and turned it on. He went through a couple of images and then he showed me a middle-aged Asian man, short, with big eyebrows and salt and pepper hair combed back. He wore dark glasses and an elegant suit.
"This man", he said to me, "do you know him?"
I looked at the photo carefully. I had never seen that man before.
"No", I answered. "Is he important?"
"It's Ryo Tajihara", Dao explained to me. "I have reason to believe that he's behind my brother's death".
When his brother had disappeared, in May, general Dao understood something had gone wrong with the egg deal and started looking for him. But LeBon had vanished in thin air, and Finlay & Pern pretended not to know who Liu Dao was.
"I searched for my brother for a long time, with no success", he confessed. "In the end, I understood that he was dead. It was his friend LeBon who found me, and told me how things went. You were there, that night, right?"
"Yes. I'm sorry about your brother. For the little I knew him, he seemed like a good person".
Dao bowed his head in a sign of thanks.
"It was my fault. I knew how dangerous Tajihara was, I should have protected him".
Good, I see that Jean and I aren't the only ones to be tormented by guilt.
"I don't think it would have helped", I said in an awkward attempt to comfort him. "It was a full out ambush. Herbert, your brother's bodyguard, didn't even have the time to take his gun out. What I don't understand", I continued pointing to Tajihara's picture, "is why he went through all this, if his intention was to use my...I mean, the dragon for fights". I shook my head. "It's absurd".
General Dao crossed his hands in his lap, a gesture I had seen his brother do as well.
"Tajihara is obsessed with the venerable Longs", Dao told me. "For him, a dragon isn't a source of wisdom or spirituality. It's a symbol of power and conquest. My brother knew this, that's why he refused to sell him the Shenglong. If you want my opinion, mister Ports, Tajihara is punishing the dragon because he wouldn't let himself be tamed".
It made sense. Tajihara wanted the egg, not the adult dragon. Unlucky for him though, I had been the one to see Whiskey hatch, and give him his imprinting. This made every attempt to control him useless.
That's why they're making him fight. To break his spirit. Punish him for his bond with me.
I went back to thinking of Monstron inside the metal cage as he cut up Whiskey and my hands started shaking. I couldn't wait any longer, I had to take action right away.
"Listen", I said to Dao. "I understand your desire for vengeance, but I really need to get to my car".
I moved my hand to open the door, but the general blocked me with an arm before I could get out.
"No", his tone allowed for no answers. "You have to stay here".
The man in the passenger seat turned to Dao and said something in Chinese, to which the general answered with a single dry word.
"Jìxù" he ordered. "It's time Mr. Ports. Stay in the car".
The Land Rover sped up, flanked by another black SUV. We turned around a cement column, directed toward the back of the parking lot. A dozen people were already coming down the stairs. The match had ended. Three men were carrying a steel trunk toward a canary yellow van. From that angle I could see the writing on the left side: it was Xander Hobb's van, the owner of "Pets and Dragons". And that son of a bitch in person was hauling Whiskey's trunk!
Next to him were Raminskij and the blonde guy who had the bazooka at the farm.
"There they are", I said pointing to the group. "It's them".
"Who is it?" Dao asked me. "Which of the three killed my brother?"
I pointed to Raminskij and he said something to his men. The Land Rover and SUV tires squealed on the rubber floor of the parking lot. We slammed the brakes in front of the three men, surrounding them. I moved on the seat to get out but once again Dao blocked me, grabbing my right shoulder in a tight lock.
His men got out of the cars with guns in their hand. The blonde man tried to take out a gun, but he died before he even got to it, hit twice in the chest. Hobb dropped the trunk in a hurry and fled. He ran for fifteen feet, before one of Dao's men shot him in the back.
Raminskij was the only one to surrender.
"Who are you?" he yelled with his hands up. "What do you want?"
Dao's four men pushed him to the ground and immobilized him. Then, after bagging his head, they dumped him into the SUV's trunk. Only then did Dao let go of me. I got out of the Land Rover and ran to the steel trunk.
"Whiskey!" I screamed, "Whiskey!"
I took the locks off and opened the metal door.
"Oh, no. No, no. What did they do to you?"
The inside of the trunk was full of blood. Whiskey was laying there still, with his eyes half open. His wings were in shreds, and there were deep tears in his scales. As if he had gotten into a fight with a monster with circular saws.
I checked his neck and for a moment I feared he was dead. But he had a pulse.
He's alive, damn it. He's still alive!
I took him out of the trunk and held him in my arms, as if he were a child. His tail, now a foot and a half long, fell lifeless against my jeans.
"I'll bring you home now", I murmured holding him tight. "I'll heal you".
The Land Rover drove up next to me and stopped. Dao rolled the window down and stuck his head out.
"Goodbye, mister Ports. Take care of the Shenglong. For my brother".
I nodded in silence. I held Whiskey tighter and went toward the exit ramp, as the two cars passed me. It was a stupid mistake, I admit it. I should have stayed with Dao, at least until they brought me to my car.
But I wasn't thinking of anything but Whiskey, at that time, and how to heal him. I started running toward the exit without looking at who was coming up on my right. I had almost reached the ramp, another thirty feet and I would be out in the open air.
"Hey, you", said a voice. "Stop!"
I knew that voice, I had already heard it at the farm. It belonged to the man that had almost killed Sheela. The same man that had broken my rib and knocked me out: Andersen. With a firm body, I turned to face him. For some reason, he hadn't come out with the other three men, and now he was there, just a few feet away from me. And he was pointing a gun at me.
"Son of a bitch...you again?" He yelled recognizing me. "Come on, give me the dragon".
In the distance, I heard the police sirens. How probable was it that they were headed toward us?
Not much, I thought. I was in dragon poop up to my neck.
"Fuck off", I said anyways, in a sudden burst of courage. "You'll have to shoot me to take him".
Andersen smiled.
"Oh, you can bet on it - "
He wasn't able to finish the sentence. A big white van came out of nowhere and ran him over, sending him against the windshield of a Ford parked behind him. The gun bounced on the roofs of the other cars and fell far away.
What the hell...,
Instead of running away I stood there staring at the Ram ProMaster with wide eyes, until I recognized it.
Hey, that's my van!
Andersen, stunned, got out of the hole in the windshield and a girl came out of my van.
"Raleigh?!", I yelled.
I couldn't believe my eyes. Raleigh Thompson jumped over the Ford's hood and went up toward the brute like a rock crusher with boobs. Andersen tried to punch her, but she was quicker. She grabbed his right arm and used it as a pivot to throw him to the ground. Then, keeping his arm still, she used her legs as a lever to twist him. A horrible CRACK! was heard and Anderse
n screamed in pain. He tried to free himself but Raleigh hit him in the temple with her boot's hard heel, knocking him out.
Then, without a blink, she got up, dusted off her pants and walked over to me.
"Jack, are you okay?"
"I...my van, you...", I stuttered.
The surprise wouldn't let me put together two words that made sense. The police sirens were getting closer. They had to be less than five blocks away. Raleigh took me by the arm.
"Come on, let's go. They're coming!"
She took us to my Ram and got in the driver's seat. I opened the back door and hopped on with Whiskey in my arms.
That movement woke up my dragon for a moment. Whiskey started moving his claws, he spread his wounded wings a couple of times and tried to move around. He hissed, as if he were crazy, his eyes wide with terror.
He hadn't recognized me, he thought he was still in the cage fighting. I laid him on the floor of the van and put an arm on his chest to keep him still.
Raleigh started up toward the ramp with a squeal of tires and I lost my balance. Whiskey quickly moved his neck toward me and to protect myself I pulled my arm up. His teeth went through my shirt's cotton and dug into my flesh. I screamed in pain.
"Jack, what's going on?" Raleigh asked me.
"Don't stop!" I said clenching my teeth. "It's nothing".
Behind the passenger seat there was a first aid kit. I opened it with my free hand, loaded the gun and pushed it between the scales at the base of Whiskey's neck. With a dry hiss, the tranquilizer went into circulation.
"Good boy, Whiskey, good boy", I said petting him.
After a few seconds the dragon fell asleep, letting go of his grip on my arm. I held onto the seats, sweating, just in time to see the parade of police cars on the road.
Raleigh had gone onto the driveway of a house on the other side of the road. She turned the van's engine off and slumped down on the seat.
"How the hell did they get here so quick?" I said in a low voice.
"I called them", Raleigh answered looking up at me. "I saw you at the match, I thought you were going to get Whiskey back".
"But how did you know where to find me?"
"Your French friend. LeBon".
"Oh".
Right. The message. Don't be surprised if I realized it only then. I already told you I was an idiot.
Three police cars drove past us with their sirens on, lighting the street with blue and red flashes. And from the streets that led downtown others were arriving. The first three slammed their brakes in front of the construction site gate, forming a road block with the cars.
The fight spectators, in a panic, divided into two groups: the fastest left the parking lot running, hoping to be able to climb onto the metal fence before the police stopped them. The dumber ones tried to get out with their car along the ramp, creating a small traffic jam. The Clark County police ordered everyone to stop. Two of them fired some shots into the air. While they were busy arresting those bastards, I touched Raleigh's shoulder with a hand.
"Okay, turn it on and go".
We started off again, unseen. After about twenty yards, I squeezed her shoulder again.
"Wait, wait. Turn right!" I had recognized my father's car on a side road. "Stop here".
I got off the van and got Deirdre and Fireball from the car, along with my laptop and documents. As soon as I got back in the van with the boxes in my hands, the two dragons smelled Whiskey and blood. They hissed and whined in fear. Fireball curled up in the back of his box and started shaking. Deirdre, instead, bit the caging. I didn't have time to calm them down.
Raleigh started driving again and I got a spray can with repairing resin and all the bandages I could find from the fist aid kit. I concentrated on Whiskey's body.
Ok, Jack. You saved Sheela, I told myself. You can save him too. You have to save him.
Seeing what conditions Whiskey was in I felt like punching the sides of the van. I took a deep breath and went back to looking at him not with Jack's eyes, Whiskey's owner, but with the eyes of a veterinarian.
My dragon was really hot, it was almost difficult to handle him, but I still couldn't understand why. One wing, the right one, was almost cut in half; the left wing had a big jagged hole in the middle. Those were the minor wounds, and for the moment, with the little I had, I couldn't take care of them. He had a deep bite on his right leg, that had ripped away about a dozen scales, and another two large bites on his back.
On his chest was perhaps the worst wound. One of Monstron's claws had dug deep into him, close to his throat, and blood kept on coming out from the opening. I immediately stopped the hemorrhage with the resin and several rounds of bandages. Then, I disinfected the bites on his back and covered them with other bandages. Lastly, I took care of the wings. I disinfected the wounds and wrapped them up.
What was still to be understood was the cause of that unusual fever. Dragons release excess heat through their breath, that's why they always smell like bitter almonds. They breathe out small quantities of methane and hydrogen from their abdominal sacs.
I opened his jaws and checked his mouth.
"Christ", I murmured.
"How is Whiskey?" Raleigh asked me from the front.
I moved my dragon's tongue and felt with my finger the spot where the exhale ducts should have been. Instead of feeling the usual holes, I grazed a thin knot.
"Sons of bitches, they sewed them up".
Probably before the fight, so he couldn't spit fire.
That's why he's hot.
I took the scalpel from the kit and cut the threads where he was sewn, freeing the ducts. A puff of gas came out from Whiskey's open mouth. Then, with a slow hiss, his abdomen deflated, and a strong smell of almonds filled the inside of the van.
"There, Whiskey. All done".
I petted my sleeping dragon on the head. I wasn't stupid. I knew the chances of saving him were slim. He had lost lots of blood from the wound on his neck, perhaps too much.
Deirdre wouldn't calm down: she kept on biting and scratching the box's door, almost unhinging it. I took the locks off and let her free. The Mustang roared and, ignoring me, went up to Whiskey. She moved her snout up to his, whining. She licked him on his forehead and neck, then she curled up next to him.
Seeing them next to one another, I realized how much Whiskey had grown. In those two months he had put on another twenty inches. Next to him, Deirdre was half as big. I sat there petting the dragons a little while longer, then I climbed to the front seats and sank into the one next to Raleigh.
We had just left Las Vegas. Raleigh had turned onto the Great Basin Highway, and now the van was cruising in the middle of the desert at sixty-five miles an hour, on a road as straight as an arrow.
I stared at Raleigh in silence. She didn't turn toward me, but she noticed. She moved a piece of hair from her forehead and pressed her lips together, as she did when she was angry, or embarrassed.
"Thank you, Raleigh", I said to her. "You saved our life".
She nodded but still didn't turn to look at me. Her cheeks were red, though.
"How did you find us?"
"It was LeBon who called me", she answered. "He told me what you wanted to do and that you needed help".
Crazy French man. Even from a wheelchair, Jean was able to help me.
"Didn't he tell you I was coming?"
"Um, no", I lied. "Not really".
Raleigh frowned.
"When I arrived, I saw you in there, among the crowd. I even tried calling your name but you..."
Without thinking about it I took her right hand.
"I'm sorry, that I said those words to you. I didn't really mean them. You're a wonderful girl, and I'm an idiot".
There, I had done it. After so much time I was able to tell her I was sorry. This time Raleigh looked at me. She smiled. That smile that took your heart from the deepest abyss and lifted it to the sky, up to the ethereal gates of heaven. Empires had crumbled and masterpieces
had been created, thanks to such smiles. I still had my hand on hers, but instead of moving it, she held mine.
"I made my share of mistakes too", she said.
She lowered her eyes onto our hands and her smile disappeared.
"Jack...your arm. Are you hurt?"
I looked at my left forearm. The shirt was hanging in shreds, ruined. On my skin were the signs of Whiskey's jaw. He had bitten me real good. I was still getting rid of the ton of adrenaline from the escape, and I only felt an itch. But even if I had wanted to take care of the wound, I had used all the disinfectant for Whiskey. I couldn't do anything except wait until I got home.
"Hey, now that I think of it", I said to change the subject. "You're the last person I expected to see. Weren't you supposed to be in Iran?"
Raleigh nodded and curled her lips again.
"Yes, but they denied me".
"What? What does that mean?"
"They considered me "non-suitable" to participate in the Fisher-Tahbaz, and they substituted me with another person".
I couldn't understand what idiot would replace someone like Raleigh, and she told me what had happened. You remember the video with the Pitahaya I had sent to her through Ben Dameshek? Well, when Raleigh saw it, she decided to come see me. But she had made a mistake: she trusted Langley and Abrams and showed it to them. Even dear old Steve Langley remembered the Pitahaya, seeing as he had tried to step on them.
Without saying a word, the two of them prepared their attack, and when Raleigh saw me being taken away in a police car, she lost it. She didn't want to tell me what she had done to Langley when she went into my store, but I saw how she had handled Andersen, in the parking lot.
It must have been a show. I almost regretted destroying all the video surveillance files.
But professor Abrams had decided to take revenge, and through his contacts he had the board change ideas on the Fisher-Tahbaz.
"But...so who went?" I asked her.
Raleigh made a vague gesture with her hand.
"Oh, a girl from Stanford. Laura something, I don't remember".
"And...Stephen Langley?"
I was almost afraid to ask, but I had to. Raleigh took a deep breath and looked at me.
The Dragon Seller: A Tale of Love and Dragons Page 17
