Playing With Fire

by C. J. Hill

  “Our enemies keep growing more powerful,” he went on, “while we get weaker. You can’t deny it; the system is flawed.”

  “And your father—a rich, violent dictator—would be better how?”

  Dirk didn’t grow defensive. His voice remained matter of fact. “Democracy has always been a blip in history. Eventually, people get too lazy and hedonistic to rule themselves, and society implodes. It happened in Rome, and it’s happening now. The ultimate law in politics is this: If you’re weak, someone will conquer you. That’s how the world has been for five thousand years, since the first Pharaoh seized control of Egypt and declared himself a living god.”

  How was Tori supposed to argue with five thousand years of history? She knew far more about past wars than most teenagers, because Dirk liked to tell her stories while he tended the dragons.

  She knew all about Hitler’s invasions. When Germany rolled across Poland with tanks, Poland sent out the cavalry to fight them. Horses versus tanks. It wasn’t much of a battle. The moral of the story: even small forces could run rough shod over Europe if they had superior technology. Ditto for the story of the Mongols sweeping through China because they’d mastered what no one else had—fighting while riding horses.

  According to Dirk, fighting from dragons would be revolutionary in the same way.

  Khan rose higher into the sky. The city lights below seemed like distant sparkles.

  “A representative democracy isn’t perfect,” Tori said, “but it’s the best form of government available.”

  “Really? Our representative democracy sanctioned slavery, took land from Native Americans, and sent Japanese-American citizens to internment camps. Politicians have always thought of people as expendable tools. Why are you willing to lay down your life to keep those people in power?”

  “Because I know my father isn’t that way, and I also know that innocent people will die when your father attacks. Why are you willing to lay down your life to put him in power?”

  Khan’s wings struck against the air, beating a rhythm to Dirk’s words. “I’m not planning to lay down my life for him; I’m trying to temper him. He listens to me. Remember, I’m the reason the Slayers are still alive, the reason your family is safe. And I’ll be the reason that the revolution won’t be more brutal than it has to be.”

  For all of his talk about the faults of democracy, she knew his last statement was the real reason he hadn’t left his father. Dirk thought he could rein in the man’s darker side. Tori doubted he really could.

  “Rulers become dynasties,” Dirk continued. “Eventually my father will turn the nation over to me.” His posture relaxed, and he leaned in to Tori, resting his chin against her hair. “I want you by my side through all of it. Say you’ll help me rule.”

  Dirk obviously felt certain of victory. Could he be right? Could the country fall so easily? She wanted to believe it couldn’t, but all of Dirk’s history lessons were beginning to have an effect on her. Nations fell all of the time. Hitler conquered Denmark in a day, Poland in eighteen, and Norway, Belgium, France, and the Netherlands in a few weeks.

  “Your proposition is tempting . . .” she said.

  Dirk laughed, clearly glad she was considering his offer. “We’ll put your dad’s talents to good use. He can rule Florida. Maybe we’ll throw in Louisiana and Georgia if he agrees to support my father.”

  She shifted away from Dirk. “You aren’t the only one who’s been studying history. Dynasties always end up with bad rulers. George the Third went crazy. Cleopatra had her brother and sister killed so she could rule. Richard the Third killed off his nephews for the same reason. You can’t skim through a history book without seeing war after war fought to decide who should rule. Democracy is the only way to avoid that fate. We wage our battles at the polls.”

  “When you studied history, you obviously skipped the Civil War.”

  It irked her that he was right. The South hadn’t accepted Lincoln, so they’d elected their own president and seceded. No blood at the polls, but plenty after.

  “Okay, but that only happened once in America.”

  Dirk laughed again. “If you want, when we’re too old to rule, instead of passing on the country to our children, we can reinstate a democracy. The system probably won’t last any longer than our dynasty would have, and our kids will be ticked at us, but whatever.”

  Their kids? He was already planning on having children? She found the assumption simultaneously irritating and sweet. Irritating because the two of them were still enemies and she hadn’t agreed to join him, let alone marry him. Plus, she was dating Jesse. Granted, she hadn’t acted like Jesse’s girlfriend back on the island when she kissed Dirk, but still. A guy shouldn’t assume anything until he’d bought a ring and she’d agreed to wear it.

  On the other hand, it was sweet that Dirk cared enough about her that he wanted a future with her—that he wanted it enough to offer concessions about how they’d rule together. And he was ready to give her father Florida. As romantic gestures went, that completely beat out flowers.

  Dirk leaned against the back rail again. “So what policies do you want to make? The first thing I’m going to do is bring back togas as official business dress. Men shouldn’t be expected to wear ties.”

  He was urging her to join the fantasy, to imagine herself changing things for the better. But thoughts of Bianca returned. She’d probably had similar conversations with Overdrake. Now she was hiding from her ex-husband and she’d lost her oldest son.

  “You wouldn’t want any of this if your father wasn’t making you.” Tori turned on the seat so they faced one another. “You can leave him. We can fly Khan somewhere safe.”

  Dirk shook his head. “What place is safe for a dragon?”

  “Are you kidding? People love dragons. The zoos would fight over him.”

  “A zoo couldn’t let him out of his enclosure to fly unless a dragon lord controlled him. I don’t want to live my life out in a zoo, do you?”

  No. And it seemed cruel to lock dragons up completely when they enjoyed flying so much. Tori was still in Khan’s mind, and he was happily scanning the landscape below, enjoying his uncontested rule of sky. No other dragon had confronted him to fight over this territory, so by default, it was all his.

  “We could work something out for Khan,” Tori said. “The point is, you need to leave your father. If we have you on our side, he won’t stand a chance.”

  Dirk’s eyes stayed on hers, asking her to understand. “Even without my help, my father will still take over this country. He has the manpower, the weapons, and the dragons. And he has another son coming. All my defection would do is make him so angry he’d be twice as ruthless. And if I left, I wouldn’t have a say in how the government is run.”

  So that was how it was. Dirk couldn’t be convinced.

  Tori sagged under the weight of his refusal. “You’ll feel horrible when you have to kill people.”

  “I know,” he said. “I suppose soldiers always do.”

  And there they were, back in the same, circular argument. She would tell him that his war wasn’t just one, and then he’d bring up every unjust fight the government had ever forced men to fight in.

  How did he make things that should be black and white seem so clouded with shifting gray?

  Dirk put his hand on top of hers. “Help me make sure I don’t have to kill our friends.”

  She shook her head. “You know I can’t.” She pivoted around on the seat, done with the conversation. “You should take me back to my car. It’s late.”

  He didn’t turn the dragon.

  Was he kidnapping her after all? The fear of that possibility made a deep, instinctual part of Tori splinter. Her attention had already been broken in two—half of her seeing and feeling what happened in her own body, the other half what happened in Khan’s. And now the part of her in the dragon’s mind broke again, splitting her attention into thirds. She could not only see out of her own eyes and Khan’s, but she
could also see inside the dragon’s brain without being connected to its thoughts. This third part of her seemed like an avatar. She was able to feel around Khan’s mind with phantom hands as if wandering around a half-darkened room looking for a light switch.

  Everywhere her fingers touched, she found strings of memories. Rows and rows of them dangled in front of her, each one tied to impulses, desires, tangles of sensation She pushed the strings away, and more swung down in front of her. She willed the room to grow lighter and saw that the strings had different colors and tints to them, messy patterns like the underside of a tapestry.

  Where is your control center? she asked Khan.

  She hadn’t expected the dragon to know the answer any more than she knew where things were sorted in her brain. But a section of green and black strings parted, and she felt herself moving through the pathway.

  Don’t show her anything, Dirk’s words sounded in Khan’s mind with an echoing quality; she heard them twice.

  The instruction was too late. The strings had already parted, revealing an image of Dirk—a perfect replica—standing in the dragon’s mind, staring back at her.

  He held something in his right hand. Tori couldn’t see it clearly, and what she did see made no sense. A hand, maybe, although it wasn’t connected to anything.

  Now that Tori had seen the place, now that she’d felt it, she’d be able to find it again. She just needed to find the green and black strings and push through them.

  In the dragon’s control center, Dirk narrowed his eyes. It doesn’t matter, he said through Khan’s mind. You can’t push me out of here. He held up his free hand. Go ahead and try.

  Was it that easy? With a running start, she could push him off his spot, make him drop whatever he was holding.

  She smiled, hoping she looked confident, and said, Don’t take this personally.

  Then she sprinted toward him. Right before she reached him, she felt herself being picked up. Not the part of her that was in the dragon’s mind—her real body.

  In that instant, she snapped out of the dragon’s mind. She wasn’t splintered in three, or two, she was herself again, riding on the dragon’s back. And Dirk had picked her up as though she was a rag doll. He held her over the rail and seemed ready to drop her.

  She blinked at him, getting her bearings. “Throwing me won’t matter. I can fly, you know.”

  Dirk set her gently back on the bench so that she was facing him. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I was trying to get your attention.” He sat down across from her. “I figured dangling you a thousand feet off the ground would do the trick.”

  Tori rubbed her temple. She felt like she’d just run a marathon. Her head ached and her senses felt dull now that she no longer shared them with Khan.

  “I told you that you wouldn’t be able to push me out,” Dirk said calmly, then added. “Don’t take it personally.”

  She reached out for Khan’s mind again.

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Dirk said. “The point of that demonstration was to show you that if you focus on fighting inside a dragon’s mind, you’ll leave your body vulnerable. That’s dangerous. If you tried hijacking one while my father is barreling down on you with a dragon, he could kill you.”

  She wiped some stray strands of hair from her face and thought over what Dirk said. “When you pushed your father out of Tamerlane’s mind . . . did you leave your body vulnerable . . . to save me?”

  He’d been captain of A-team at the time, directing the other Slayers. She didn’t remember him even pausing in his duties let alone acting strangely. Of course, she’d been busy fleeing from a dragon at the time, so she might have missed something.

  “I’ve had a lot more practice than you have,” he said. “I can split my consciousness into three without losing focus.”

  Tori wasn’t likely to have the chance to practice the split again; still, she was already calculating a new attack defense. If the other Slayers protected her body while she split, she could try to take control of the dragon from Overdrake.

  She surveyed the scenery around her. The Potomac River was in sight again, a horizontal line meandering across the landscape. Last she’d checked they’d been flying over a city. “Wait, when did you turn the dragon? Where are we?”

  “We’re heading back to your car. I told you I wasn’t kidnapping you.” He gestured to her, emphasizing that she was free. “If you want, you can fly to your car from here. You’ll reach it before your powers wear off.”

  “Well, I could if I knew where it was.” She leaned over the railing to get a better look at the scenery. “You know I have no sense of direction.” It was true, at least compared to the other Slayers, who all seemed to have built-in compasses, but she also needed a few more minutes to talk with Dirk. She hadn’t told him about Aaron yet.

  Part of her still didn’t want to say anything about him. Aaron’s plan to be a mole could go wrong in so many ways.

  Khan was passing over the Potomac. They couldn’t be far from the parking lot. If she didn’t say something now, she’d have to type it in a message, and then Dirk wouldn’t be able to use his counterpart sense to gauge that she was telling the truth. He would most likely think it was some sort of trap.

  She was supposed to leave Bianca out of the story, but Tori wanted Dirk to know that his mother had loved him, that she’d tried to come back for him, and that when she’d seen his picture she’d cried.

  Dirk looked at her questioningly, sensing her inner struggle. Fine. She could use that. “Would you consider switching sides if you had another dragon lord as an ally? You could teach him and me, and then it would be the three of us against your father.”

  “Tori,” Dirk said patiently. “Dragon lords are like Slayers. They have to be exposed to dragon’s signal in utero. Your father can’t be a dragon lord, even though he comes from the right genetic line.”

  Tori cocked her head, taken off guard. “Why are you so sure I got my dragon lord genes from my dad?”

  “He’s running for president. He wants power. Seems like dragon lord genes to me.”

  “My father’s not—well, never mind. I wasn’t referring to him.”

  Dirk’s gaze shot to hers, finally understanding what she was implying. “Dr. B found someone else?” He sounded hopeful, or at least intrigued.

  “In a manner of speaking.” Tori spent the next few minutes telling him about Dr. B’s tip about the dragon scales and their trip to the Renaissance fair. “We thought we’d find one of your father’s men, and we hoped he could lead us to the dragons. Instead we found a twelve-year-old boy named Aaron who looks a lot like you.”

  “How did he get dragon scales?” Dirk asked, missing the important detail.

  “Your mother took them with her when she left your father. Aaron knew they were worth a lot of money, so he’s been selling them at fairs.”

  Dirk didn’t miss what Tori was saying that time. Even in the dim light, she could see the effect her words had on him. Shock and then pain flashed through his expression. “You’re saying I have a half-brother?”

  “I’m saying you have a full brother. Aaron told us that Overdrake is his father.”

  Dirk shook his head. “Not if he’s twelve. I would remember having a brother, even if I was only five when he was born.”

  There was no way to keep Bianca out of this part of the story.

  “Your mom left your dad while she was pregnant with him. She didn’t want your dad to use Aaron the way he was planning to use you. She came back for a while when you were six and tried to take you with her, but your father wouldn’t let her. She had to leave without you.”

  Dirk silently stared out at the sky, processing the information. “How do you know all of this?”

  “Your mom told Aaron about you. She never stopped loving you. You need to know that.”

  Dirk clenched his jaw, seemed to be chewing on his words. “That’s a nice sentiment, but it’s not like she would have admitted anything different. The pro
of is in her actions. She left me behind, and she didn’t come back.” He made a low rumbling sound in the back of his throat. “How convenient that she got a replacement son out of the bargain.”

  Tori ached to tell him that no, that wasn’t it at all. I saw your mother. I heard the pain in her voice when she talked about leaving you. But if Tori admitted to seeing Bianca, Dirk would ask for her address. Tori couldn’t give it to him and she couldn’t explain why she couldn’t. She couldn’t endanger Bianca’s youngest son that way.

  “Whatever you think of your mother, Aaron is your brother. Dr. B isn’t going to train him, and none of the Slayers trust him because he’s a dragon lord. Frankly, they hardly trust me. But if you were to teach Aaron and me how to control dragons—”

  “He’s twelve,” Dirk cut her off. “Do you really want to drag a twelve-year-old into a revolution and put him on the front lines? No.” He said it with disapproval that she’d even suggested the idea. Which reminded Tori why she’d cared about Dirk in the first place. He could act cynically calculating about war, but his softer side didn’t want a twelve-year-old kid to get hurt.

  “Will he still be twelve when your father attacks?” she asked. “I thought the attack was years away.”

  Dirk didn’t answer. His silence wasn’t comforting. They were nearing the parking lot, where her car sat on the pavement, looking like a Hot Wheels toy from this distance.

  “I don’t know the date of the attack,” Dirk said at last. “Whenever it is, Aaron will be too young.”

  Still not comforting.

  Khan flew over the parking lot, making slow circles while Tori and Dirk finished their conversation.

  “Think you can find your car now?” Dirk asked.

  “Yeah. I guess so.” She took hold of the rail, ready to heft herself over it and fly away.

  Dirk took hold of her hand to keep her from going. “Next time I invite you to go for a dragon ride, will you believe that I’m not going to kidnap you?”

  She let go of the rail and settled back onto the bench. “You want to do this again?” She’d supposed that after she refused to join his side, he wouldn’t ask to meet again.