Age of Dragons

by Olivia Ash

  Something big.

  Something I'm going to have to stop her from doing.

  “Do you think Zurie is staying at a nearby safehouse?” Irena asks, clearly changing the subject.

  I tilt my head and groan in annoyance, barely able to mask my irritation at the transparent sleight of hand. I’m tempted to dig in and argue with her until she gives away whatever she was planning, but I decide to just catch her in the act later.

  It’s the only way I’m going to snap her out of whatever suicidal bullshit she’s trying to get herself into.

  “No,” I begrudgingly admit. “A nearby safehouse is too easy. Zurie will be in a new location and expect us to check all the safehouses we know of.”

  “Or expect us not to,” Irena says, her gaze shifting toward me.

  I frown as I consider the idea, but I just don't think it's even remotely plausible. Zurie never stays in the same safehouse twice. It was one of the first things she taught us—to keep moving. To be unpredictable. To never let anyone guess what you're about to do.

  It keeps our enemies guessing—which works in our favor.

  “We can check,” I say with a halfhearted shrug. “I just don't want us to waste our manpower or resources on a goose chase.”

  “What about the Omega-3?” Irena asks.

  It’s the bunker in the hills of Montana. I shake my head. “That was destroyed on a mission shortly before, well, this,” I say with a gesture to the embassy around us. “Some Palarne dragons found it.”

  “Huh.” Irena rubs her jaw, thinking. “Beta-7?”

  “Maybe,” I admit. “I guess it's worth checking. Alpha-10?”

  She nods. “Could be. What about Omega-4?”

  I shake my head. “Zurie always hated that one. It's nothing but a swamp.”

  “She might go there just to throw us off,” Irena points out.

  I groan, and it takes everything in me not to shake her. She’s just trying to make me forget about whatever she’s planning, and it won’t work.

  This is all a waste of time.

  I briefly scan the room, only to find my four men watching me with various versions of the same astounded expression. I figure they're probably surprised at the sheer volume of data Irena and I are sifting through, but this is our normal.

  Although she's being a bit of an ass, I have to admit it's nice to have my sister back.

  “Give me those locations,” Jace says, looking at me with a barely veiled hint of awe. “All of them. Anything you have. We’ll run simultaneous scans and send squads to sweep them. At a minimum, we can bug them. Best case, we find a Spectre and have a little talk,” he adds with a grin, and I figure I know the kind of talk he wants to have.

  It probably involves bloody knuckles and a lot of pain—for them.

  “Just keep in mind they're probably vacant,” I remind him. “But yeah, I suppose it can’t hurt to check. Still, Zurie never stayed in the same place twice so I'm pretty sure this is all a waste of time, Jace. You won't get anything from it.”

  “We may as well try,” the dojo master says with a shrug.

  “Fair enough,” I admit.

  “If we’re done, I have something to share,” Drew interjects impatiently, lifting his phone. “This little nugget just came through my network.” He taps the screen, and a recording pipes through the speaker.

  “I didn't ask for excuses,” a familiar man's voice barks.

  The General.

  Impulsively, I look at Tucker. The weapons expert freezes in place at the harsh grate of his father's voice, his features twisted and tortured as he stares at the floor. His ear twitches slightly as he strains to listen.

  After Zurie and the General tried to kill us all, and after Zurie destroyed the Knights’ base and blamed it on me, a small part of me had hoped he was dead. A small part of me had hoped the General was simply buried in the rubble somewhere, broken and no longer breathing, out of our hair.

  But the man's a survivor, much to my disappointment.

  “They can't keep me out of commission for much longer,” the General barks again. There's a soft beeping in the background, something that sounds vaguely like a heart rate monitor, and I figure he's probably confined to a hospital bed somewhere.

  “Sorry, sir, but you have three months left,” a man says, his tone exasperated and pleading. “Please just stay in the bed. You’ve—”

  “You've got one month,” the General interjects. “Get me walking again, damn it. I don't care if I limp. Just get me on my feet!”

  The doctor groans, exasperated. “Sir, you need to heal.”

  “No, I need to kill that bitch who brainwashed my son!” the General shouts.

  “Classy,” I mutter dryly.

  The asshole can try to kill me—it would be nice to punch the man in the face. Besides, I would hardly call giving Tucker a way out of that hellhole an act of brainwashing.

  “Is Brett in position yet? Get—” The General coughs furiously, the sound raspy and jarring. “Get him on the phone, damn it. I need to plan the joint-force assault. There’s—”

  “Sir, this isn’t a secured line—”

  “Shut up, damn you,” the General interjects, coughing again. “Get… get… what did you…”

  There’s a moment of silence before the soft sound of snoring filters through the phone. A nurse breathes a sigh of relief as someone jostles the phone.

  “He keeps fighting his meds, Doctor,” she says, her voice getting louder as she speaks, as if she picked it up.

  “Keep him unconscious as often as possible,” the doctor orders. “If he keeps working himself up, he will never get better.”

  “Yes, Doctor,” the nurse says, sighing. Seconds later, the connection cuts out.

  I rub my eyes, frustrated and disappointed that we have to deal with this on top of Zurie. On top of everything else.

  “I really hoped he was dead,” Jace admits. He pauses for a second, glancing at Tucker as he realizes the reality of what he just said. “No offense.”

  Tucker shakes his head. “The feeling’s mutual.”

  “Who’s Brett?” I ask, watching Tucker’s face as the grief slowly takes him.

  Tucker sighs, rubbing his jaw as he tries to find the words. “Brett Clarke is one of my father's favorites. He's been slowly climbing up the ranks, and when Carter was…” Tucker trails off, glancing at me. “Promoted,” he continues, referring to Zurie recruiting the man from the Knights’ ranks, “I heard that Brett took his place. As far as I'm aware, he's the General’s Second-in-Command now. It’s what Father was priming me for, but he never felt I was ready—because I wasn’t. Because I didn’t want the job at all. Now, I guess he’s giving Brett the chance to prove himself, even though he's young.”

  “How old?” I press.

  Tucker shrugs. “About my age. Sometimes I wondered if my dad thought of Brett and Carter as the sons he never really had.” Tucker's jaw tenses, and he glares out the window, lost in thought once again.

  “What else?” Drew presses.

  I glare at the Darrington dragon, annoyed at his lack of compassion given everything that's happening right now.

  Drew tilts his head in exasperation, frowning as I silently chide him.

  I have to admit, he's probably right. We need to know who we’re up against, and we need to know everything we can get our hands on. If these people are coming after us, we need all the information we can get.

  “He's a sniper,” Tucker says, staring at his hands. “Master of hand-to-hand combat and wickedly clever with war strategy, but he could never handle weapons the way I did. He was never as good with a pistol or rifle—all he could handle were the sniper missions. That's why he didn't progress as fast as me or Carter.” Tucker pauses, his eyes glazed over as he sifts through his memories. “But what he lacked in skill, he made up for in sheer fire and grit. He's hated dragons his whole life, guys. He even killed one in front of a human, his old girlfriend. She was horrified, but he found purpose. He
said God spoke to him in that moment.” Tucker rolls his eyes—hard—and shakes his head in disgust. “A few days later, he shows up at the nearest Knights compound. He’s been kissing my father's ass ever since.”

  “So, he wasn't raised in the Knights,” I say, starting to piece it together. “He came to you guys later.”

  Tucker nods. “Unlike me and Carter, yeah. He was sixteen when he joined.”

  I pace quietly back and forth, briefly looking at Levi as he quietly leans against the wall, watching and listening to all of us. His clear, sharp eyes narrow slightly as he takes in all this information.

  Our gazes meet, and I wonder what he's thinking. What concerns him most—and what he thinks is coming for us. But Levi only speaks when he wants to, and I learned a while ago that I can't press him to share until he’s ready.

  Jace absently rubs the stubble on his jaw. “So, they're sending Brett on an assault. Where? Toward what? It’s clearly joint force, so it probably includes the Spectres.”

  “Zurie’s call was probably a diversion,” I say, starting to piece it all together. “Maybe to throw us off.”

  “Or maybe to keep us in place,” Levi says, his voice dark and deep.

  We all pause to stare blankly at him, baffled by the mere suggestion of an onslaught against the dojo. For a moment, I can't quite process what he said.

  “She wouldn't attack here,” Jace says, almost laughing at the idea. “It's suicide, even with two forces.”

  Levi shrugs, not fazed in the least. “Zurie’s desperate. Rory said so herself. A desperate Spectre with nothing to lose? Jace, don’t be blind.”

  I pause, debating the option even though I’m not quite willing to believe it.

  Zurie's running out of choices, but she's not stupid. There's no way humans could attack a dragon embassy and survive, much less win.

  “Unless…” My voice is almost inaudible as I trail off. My ear begins to ring as I lose myself in my thoughts. A painful realization dawns on me, too big and too terrible to fully imagine.

  Unless there were more than two forces.

  Unless they found allies—dangerous ones with massive weapons and a big budget.

  We have to face the facts. The General is alive, though badly injured. He has someone taking over for him in the meantime, someone green but anxious to prove himself. The Knights aren't losing any ground, even with the General out of commission.

  More important than the General, however, is Zurie. Arguably the world’s greatest assassin, but one has nothing to live for.

  Whatever she does next, it'll be an all-or-nothing, last-ditch effort to destroy everything I love. So, yes, between the two of them, there’s a chance they found more allies.

  After all, a lot of powerful people want me dead.

  Zurie is dedicated. Focused. Clear and utterly undeterrable. That's bad news for her enemies.

  That's bad news for us.

  Chapter Eleven

  I lean against the wall in the stairwell leading down from the suites where Levi, Tucker, Irena, and I are staying.

  With my leg propped against the wall, I simply wait.

  I'm about to catch Irena doing something she's not supposed to do. As annoyed as I am, I have to confess that I'm actually kind of looking forward to the look on her face when she realizes she won’t get away with whatever she’s concocting.

  My big sister isn't used to getting caught.

  Whatever decision Irena made up there in Tucker's room, it's not good. I may have changed since coming here, but Irena hasn't.

  Irena is still very much the same person she was before she went into the coma. The heir to the Spectre throne. A woman who's used to doing things on her own—and getting her way.

  What doesn't make sense to me is that Irena knows Zurie is trying to goad her into leaving. It’ll weaken us if she goes before she has better control over her new abilities, but I know in my heart that her decision was to leave.

  My question is why.

  What choice could she have made that she didn't want to share in the room?

  With me?

  As the night wears on, I don't move. I'm alone in the stairwell, and that's the way I want it right now.

  Tucker needed to be by himself, and no matter what I tried, nothing could make him smile. It's strange to see him so somber. So quiet. But I know what it is.

  His father's alive, and I think a part of him had hoped the man would have just died in the rubble. A part of Tucker wished that he would never have to face his father again because then he could simply let the man fade away. If they never had to face each other, his only enemy would be the things that were left unsaid between them.

  Since his father is alive, however, it means they will meet again. And when that day comes, Tucker may have to kill the man himself.

  I know firsthand what Tucker’s going through right now. Up until Zurie tried to kill my men and the dragon within me, I wasn't even sure I wanted her to die. I was trying to save her. Trying to make her see reason.

  In the end, I failed. Not because I could have done more for her, but because I saw the woman I wanted her to be, rather than the woman she was. The woman I was trying to save never even existed in the first place.

  As difficult as it will be to kill the woman who raised me, I know in my heart it's the right thing to do.

  Tucker's going through the same thing, and all I can do for him is give him space and compassion.

  The General is awful, but he's still Tucker's father. I suspect there’s still a sense of obligation and duty buried deep within Tucker, same as I felt for Zurie. However awful the man might be, they’re still blood.

  All Tucker can do, for now, is to grieve—he has to relinquish any hope of the man redeeming himself.

  Because he never, ever will.

  The General and Zurie are too much alike for redemption.

  With Tucker needing space to himself, everyone else quickly left. Jace is briefing his surveillance team as I stand here in the stariwell, while Drew is contacting his spy network to wring more information out of them.

  Levi needed to go burn off some steam, so I suspect he's destroying a tree somewhere with a sword. I really wanted to go with him, but I knew I needed to be here.

  To stop Irena.

  The soft patter of footsteps—almost as silent as breath and just as easily overlooked by anyone else—slink toward me from the top of the stairwell.

  Finally.

  I relax my shoulders and lean my head against the wall, looking for all the world as if I'm comfortable even though I'm absolutely, positively not.

  Irena rounds the bend, and the moment her gaze lands on me, she tenses. There's a brief and subtle widening to her eyes, like she can't believe I could have figured this out. Like it's impossible that I'm here.

  But a moment later, she simply groans in exasperation.

  I've been toying with what I wanted to say when I caught her. It was a tough battle, deciding how to start this conversation, and I couldn't settle on anything that really felt right.

  So, I wing it.

  “What are you afraid of?” I ask, narrowing my eyes as I study her face for signs of a lie. “Why wouldn't you tell me what your plan is? Why you're going to leave?”

  Irena frowns, leaning against the opposite wall as she gives me a once-over. “A Spectre’s never afraid, remember?”

  “You're not a Spectre,” I remind her. “Not anymore.”

  Irena's eye twitches slightly, and she simply looks away, down into the shadows of the stairwell below us.

  I let out a small sigh. “You don't have to tell me, Irena, but I'm going with you unless you do.”

  My big sister rolls her eyes. “You really would, wouldn't you?”

  I grin. She knows me.

  Irena runs an impatient hand through her hair, shaking her head slightly, and it's clear she's given in.

  Good. Maybe I'll finally get some answers.

  “My only mission in life was to carry on
Zurie's legacy,” Irena says quietly, not looking at me as she confesses. “To make the Spectres even better than they were. Wealthier. More powerful. To spread our influence and network. To recruit. To do everything I could to ensure we lived forever. That we survived in a world that was actively trying to kill us all.”

  She leans her head back against the wall, pinching her eyes closed in frustration. “When Zurie was convinced of my loyalty, she gave me access to the secure files. She had to, after all—since one day, I would lead in her stead. I had to know everything. Everyone. Every lead. Every safehouse. Every weak link in the organization.”

  Irena gently massages her temples as she falls silent, and I wonder what she’s remembering. What horrible things she read in those files—and the terrible confessions buried within Zurie’s archives.

  “I saw everything Zurie had,” Irena continues, crossing her arms as she leans back once again. “Honestly, I read some files I don't think she realized she had. I connected dots she never even saw. I had everything at my fingertips, everything I would ever need to make the Spectres a permanent force in the world—and maybe more.” She gently sets a hand on the gun at her waist, one Tucker provided her not too long ago just so she wouldn't feel naked in a dragon's den. “I had purpose, Rory. I had something to drive me. Something to do. People like you and me—we need that.”

  “I know,” I say quietly.

  And I do. I absolutely understand. Mine is to protect my men.

  “When I discovered Zurie's plans for you, all of my purpose dissolved instantly,” Irena continues. “I had nothing left but hate. Nothing to do but destroy the organization I had been raised to protect. But I didn't really care,” she confessed. “As long as you and I got away, I didn't care what happened to the Spectres. As I was giving Mason everything he needed to take them down, I realized I was completely content with simply walking away. As long as you and I escaped, I'd be happy.”

  “No, you wouldn't have,” I say, calling her out on the lie she was telling herself.

  Her eyes dart to me, intense and a bit surprised that I would dare say such a thing. “What?”

  “People like us…” I trail off, not quite sure how to phrase this. “We need something to drive us forward. We need direction. We need something to do, something to sink our teeth into. What were you and I going to do? Ride off into the sunset and live in a cabin?”