"Do not do what?" Draycos asked, landing on the leaves beside him with a soft crunch.
"Never mind," Jack growled, feeling like an idiot. "You startled me, that's all."
The dragon cocked his head. "You do not like it out here," he declared.
Jack snorted. "No kidding, Sherlock."
"Pardon?"
"Skip it." Shaking away the introspective thoughts, Jack stepped over to the Argus monitors for a closer look. There were two filters on each, he saw, either of which could be slid over the image. Experimentally, he tried one.
The image didn't change much. He tried the other, and suddenly, the darkness was pockmarked with scattered bits of light. "Ah-ha," he said, feeling about as pleased as he could under the circumstances. "That's the infrared. The other one must be deep UV."
"Pardon?"
" 'UV' is short for ultraviolet," Jack explained, sliding the infrared filters over the rest of the monitors. "It's a kind of light we can't see directly, but there are some species and some kinds of equipment that show up real well with it."
"And infrared?"
"Infrared is heat," Jack told him, peering at each of the monitors in turn. Nothing but small animals and birds, at least as far as he could see. "Anything warm gives that off. Those thugs who were looking for us back on Vagran were using IR detectors. Back when we were hiding out on that Wistawki balcony, remember?"
"Yes," Draycos said. "I was somewhat surprised at the time that they did not locate us."
Jack shrugged. "You probably don't look like anything anyone's ever seen before. Matter of fact, you might not even look alive—we'd have to do a heat profile on you to know for sure. Either way, I guarantee you don't look like a human."
"That could be useful."
"It already has been," Jack pointed out.
"True." Draycos studied the monitors. "The images are not very clear."
"They sure aren't," Jack agreed. "I guess that's the best you can do without electronics and power sources."
The dragon hopped up onto a nearby stump and craned his neck. "Perhaps I should explore the perimeter."
"Oh, no," Jack said quickly. "Forget it. You just stay put, right here."
Draycos twisted his head around to look back at him. "You do not need to be afraid, Jack," he said, his voice low and soothing. "I am a poet-warrior of the K'da. I will protect you."
"I appreciate your confidence," Jack said. "But Good Intention Highway isn't one I want to travel just yet."
The tip of Draycos's tail twitched. "Do you refer to the saying, 'The road to hell is paved with good intentions'?"
Jack frowned. "Yeah. Where did you hear that?"
"Uncle Virge quoted it to me," the dragon said. From his stump he jumped up onto the side of one of the trees and clung there by his claws, gazing out into the night.
"During one of your late-night poetry sessions?"
"Yes. He has many such sayings with which to illustrate his points."
Jack felt his mouth twist. "Let me guess. His main point is that he wants you to go away and leave us alone."
"That is the core of it," Draycos confirmed. "He does not feel that the survival of my people should be any concern of yours."
Somewhere ahead, a twig suddenly snapped. Jack jerked, snatching up his Gompers and pointing it into the darkness. "Do not be afraid," Draycos assured him quickly. "It was merely a small animal obtaining a meal."
Jack lowered the flash rifle, letting his breath out silently. "Okay," he said.
Draycos pushed off the tree trunk and dropped back down to Jack's side. "I do not understand your fear," he said, looking up at Jack's face. "I would have thought that in your previous profession you must have faced danger many times."
"Not like this," Jack said, shaking his head. "I was always a kid before. Even when we were breaking into bank vaults, I knew the police weren't going to shoot unless I pointed a gun at them or tried to get away."
He plucked at a fold of his uniform jacket. "Here, it's all different. Here, I'm a target. Not because I'm breaking any laws, but because I'm wearing this uniform. Just because I'm wearing this uniform."
"That is the way of the soldier," Draycos reminded him. "Part of your task is to draw danger away from the weak and powerless."
Jack snorted. "Just what I always wanted."
Draycos cocked his head. "It is an honorable profession, Jack."
"Maybe where you come from it is," Jack retorted.
"It is not so here?"
"How would I know?" Jack sighed. "All right, yeah, I suppose it is," he conceded. "At least most of the time. But we sure don't seem very popular here on Sunright."
"I do not understand."
"You saw the people on the march through town today," Jack said. "Well, no, probably you didn't. The point is that they weren't exactly cheering us on."
"One does not usually cheer in the middle of an attack."
"This was before the attack," Jack told him. "They were just staring at us, watching us march. Like we were invaders instead of protectors." He snorted. "After the attack, it was even worse. Then, they were afraid to even get near us."
Draycos was silent a moment. "You are mercenaries, not regular soldiers," he pointed out. "Perhaps that is the difference."
"Maybe," Jack said. "I don't know. But according to Uncle Virge's history lessons, people sometimes treated regular soldiers the same way when they were in a war the people didn't like."
"That is wrong," Draycos said firmly. "The soldiers deserve the respect and honor of the people they defend. If the war is wrong or misguided, the people's objections should be directed at the leaders."
"Hey, I'm just telling you how it is," Jack said. "I don't write the history, I just report it."
"I understand," Draycos murmured.
He hopped up onto his stump again, peering off into the night. Jack found himself studying the dragon's silhouette, a black shadow against a slightly lighter background. "It was different for you, wasn't it?" he asked. "I mean, your people were fighting for their lives. That must make a difference."
"It does," Draycos agreed. "There were still objections at times, of course, but they were settled by the leaders."
"Pretty quickly, I'd guess," Jack said. "Did all of you have to become warriors?"
"All had to have soldiers' training," Draycos said. His voice was soft and oddly distant. "Those who did not serve directly were required to fill support positions. There was no other way."
"I suppose," Jack said. So when Draycos called himself a poet-warrior it wasn't really that big a deal? Or was it maybe the poet part he was so proud of? "So basically any K'da can do what you do?"
The dragon seemed to draw himself up. "Not at all," he said stiffly. "All indeed can become soldiers. But not all are warriors."
Jack frowned. "What's the difference?"
"A warrior of the K'da is a special person," Draycos explained, and there was no mistaking the pride in his voice. "He or she has certain inborn talents and abilities, plus the desire to turn those talents in the direction of protecting the K'da people. We are found at an early age, and offered this position."
The tip of his tail twitched. "No, Jack. One without poetic talent may be able to make two sentences rhyme on occasion. But you would not call him a poet, with the true gift of poetry. So is the difference between soldier and warrior."
Jack nodded. He'd tried writing a poem once, back when he was ten. The result had been pretty pitiful. "So how old were you when they started your training?" he asked. "You said once you were younger than I was when you had your first battle."
"That is true," Draycos acknowledged. "I was not yet a warrior at that time, though, but was still in training. My full training lasted nearly four years."
"Four years'?"
"Yes," the dragon said. "Though I was of course a soldier during much of that time. We could not afford for warriors-in-training to merely be students during a war for survival."
"Yeah,
" Jack murmured. Four years, compared to the ten days he'd just gone through. "I guess I must seem pretty pathetic to you. I'm barely even a soldier, let alone a warrior."
"You do as well as your abilities allow," Draycos said diplomatically. "Your talents lie in other areas."
"Right," Jack said with a sigh. "And I bet you'd trade three of me right now for a single good soldier."
"Perhaps that could be arranged," the dragon suggested dryly. "Shall I go get Alison?"
Jack glared at him, a waste of effort in the darkness. "Very funny."
From behind them came the faint sound of lifters. "There goes the Lynx," Jack commented, turning to look.
But nothing could be seen though the trees. The sound changed pitch as the transport shifted to horizontal motion and headed away from the camp. Jack looked up, trying to catch a glimpse of it through the trees. Again, nothing. "Could you tell which direction it was headed?"
"From the sound, it appeared to be traveling southwest," the dragon said.
"Back to Mer'seb," Jack said. Somehow, the sound of the departing shuttle made the darkness out here seem a little deeper. "Well, good luck to them. They're sure not going to find a welcome carpet spread out."
"Do you refer to the citizens?" Draycos asked. "Or do you expect another Shamshir attack?"
"I was talking about the people," Jack said. "But as long as you've brought it up, I did overhear Lieutenant Basht telling someone they'd found two Shamshir mercenaries in one of the buildings. They'd been knocked cold, but weren't hurt otherwise. Your handiwork?"
"Yes," Draycos said. "The tides of warfare flowed to my advantage."
"Whatever," Jack said. "How come you didn't kill them?"
The dragon's tail arched. "There was no need. I wished merely to halt their attack. That I did."
"Yeah, but they'd already killed about ten Edgemen," Jack pointed out. "I thought you didn't approve of killers."
"I do not approve of murderers," Draycos corrected. "There is a difference between murder and warfare."
"That's not what some of our people say," Jack told him.
This was, he realized dimly, a pretty stupid argument to be having at a time like this. Especially out here, with him wearing a soldier's uniform and carrying a soldier's gun.
But there was something about the darkness and the noises that was making him unusually talkative tonight.
Or maybe it was the silence between the noises that he was trying to fill. "There are people—a lot of people—who think warfare is just the government's way of—"
"Quiet!" Draycos cut him off. He twisted his head away from Jack, his pointed ears suddenly standing straight up.
For a second, Jack stared past him into the darkness. There was nothing out there he could see. Then, suddenly, his brain caught up with him, and he turned instead to the Argus monitors.
The dragon was right. Something had moved into view on one of the monitors. The image was fuzzy, but it definitely had the basic shape of a human being, and it was moving toward the camp.
Moving toward Jack.
He flipped up the schematic showing where the Argus eyes were positioned, his pulse thudding hard in his neck. Okay; this was Eye Number Three. That was there; which meant the figure coming toward him must be there . . .
He didn't realize Draycos had moved to his side until the dragon spoke. "They are approaching," he murmured, his breath warm on Jack's ear.
Jack's pulse picked up speed. "They?" he muttered back. "There's more than one?"
The dragon's tongue flicked out at one of the other monitors. "There," he said. "And there," he added, pointing to another.
Jack gripped his flash rifle like he was trying to squeeze it in half. There were two more figures, all right, half hidden behind rocks or trees. Even as he focused on one of them, it moved away from its hiding place and crossed quickly to another one. "How many are there?" he asked.
There was no answer. "Draycos?" he repeated, twisting around.
The dragon was gone.
"Draycos!" he called as loudly as he dared, his eyes darting around the darkness. The K'da had vanished, all right. Probably gone ahead to check on the intruders.
Jack hissed between his teeth. Suddenly, he felt very exposed out here, standing in the faint glow from the Argus monitors. He stepped away from them as quietly as he could, cringing every time his feet crunched into the leaves.
A few feet away was the tree stump Draycos had been perched on earlier. He dropped down behind it, clutching the flash rifle as if his life depended on it. Which it probably did.
All right, Jack, calm down, he told himself sternly. Three of them wasn't too bad, if that was all there were. It could be just a quiet scouting party, with none of them actually looking for a fight.
If that was all there were. He looked over his shoulder at the Argus monitors, but here at the stump he was too far away to see them clearly. What he needed was to be over there watching the monitors, with Draycos nearby to protect his back.
Except Draycos was off who knew where. Doing who knew what.
Blast the dragon, anyway. Of all the times for him to run off and play soldier.
And then, from somewhere ahead, somewhere very close ahead, came the soft sound of a footstep.
CHAPTER 16
Jack froze in place, hardly daring to breathe. Draycos? was his first, hopeful thought.
But no. The dragon was a lot quieter than that.
There was another footstep, and another pause. Jack stared into the darkness, straining so hard his eyeballs hurt. In the faint light from the stars overhead the forest was little more than a jumble of dark gray shadows crisscrossed by even darker black ones.
The sound came again.
He had it placed now. It was just behind a tall bush about ten feet directly ahead of his stump.
Had the intruder spotted him? That was the big question. It didn't seem likely to Jack that he would still be moving forward if he had. After all, he had no way of knowing that the sentry on duty was a scared fourteen-year-old with ten whole days of combat training under his belt.
Unless the one behind the bush was only a decoy. Unless his job was to deliberately make enough noise to draw Jack's attention while someone off to the side leisurely lined up a rifle on him.
Jack crouched a little lower behind the stump, trying hard to become part of the decaying wood. It was a useless attempt for someone shaking as badly as he was. Carefully, he eased his flash rifle around to point toward the bush.
Now what?
Sure, he could fire. But if this one was only a decoy, the shot would show them exactly where he was. In that case, Jack himself probably wouldn't live long enough to even see the first guy hit the ground.
But if he didn't shoot, and this one was out there alone . . .
Draycos! he thought desperately toward the woods. Where are you? I need you!
Where was the blasted dragon, anyway?
There was another footstep. Swallowing hard, Jack got his finger on the trigger.
And suddenly, an animal the size of a large frog came hopping out from behind the bush.
Jack's breath went out in a silent whoosh, every muscle in his body suddenly turning to jelly. The frog jumped again, its landing sounding exactly like a cautious human footstep.
He really, really didn't like the woods.
A flicker of motion caught the corner of his eye. He glanced up—
And twitched violently as Draycos dropped into a crouch at his side. "You're going to give me a heart attack yet," he growled at the dragon. "I swear—"
"Quiet," Draycos bit out. "They are coming. You must retreat."
Jack's muscles went tight again. "There are more than three of them?"
"There are eight," Draycos said. "All wear the shoulder emblem of the Shamshir. You must warn the others."
Jack felt cold all over as he stared frantically into the night. Three of them might have been a scouting party. Eight of them meant an attack.
br /> And attackers, he knew, always started by silencing the sentries.
He jerked as Draycos's snout jabbed impatiently into his ribs. "What?" he gasped.
"Did you not hear me?" Draycos demanded. "I said you must warn the others."
"I can't," Jack hissed. "They didn't give me a comm clip."
"I know that," Draycos said, his voice impatient. "You must leave here and go to them."
Jack shuddered. The thought of eight guns pointed at his back . . . "I can't," he said. "I'll never make it."
Draycos lifted his head to the level of Jack's face. The bright green eyes bored into his face, the tip of the long snout nearly touching his nose. "Listen to me, Jack," the dragon said. "They are coming. They are not yet close enough to harm you. But they soon will be if you do not leave. You must go now."
Jack peered out into the shadows. Draycos was right, he knew.
But his legs still refused to move.
Because what if the dragon was wrong? What if he'd missed one or two of the enemy on his scouting trip? What if there was someone right now hiding in the trees, waiting for him to give away his position?
"Jack?"
Jack clenched his teeth together. No, the dragon was right. He'd been in this same kind of situation before with Uncle Virgil. If he just sat here, sooner or later he would lose by default.
Besides, how much more conspicuous could he be than sitting here with a bright, gold-scaled dragon standing beside him?
"Okay," he breathed. Slowly, cautiously, he stood up into a crouch and backed away from the stump.
No one shot at him. He kept backing up, passing the Argus monitors. Draycos stayed by the stump, his tail arched, his ears pointed skyward as he listened. Jack reached the first group of trees and passed between them.
Only then did Draycos turn and bound silently toward him. He reached Jack's side, then stopped and turned around. "Keep moving," he ordered, his ears lifting again. "I will guard you from any approach."
Jack kept going, walking as quickly as he dared. The night seemed alive around him, and he could feel a thousand hidden eyes staring in his direction. Three more times along the way Draycos caught up with him, and each time then stayed behind as guard. Wishing fervently he'd listened to Uncle Virge and come up with a better way to trace those blasted Djinn-90 pursuit fighters, Jack kept moving.