Just before he reached the crest, he slipped off the path to the tallest of the surrounding trees, climbing it quickly and, for lack of a decent sized branch at this height, securing a sling to the trunk. Line of sight wasn’t as high as he’d have liked, but it was the best the site offered given that he had no safe way to reach the small copse of trees actually on the summit. The scattering of glacial boulders offered fuck all protection from an aerial attack. That the trees were barely budding was a good news/bad news thing. It made him more dependent on the glyphs for camouflage but reduced the chance of a sudden wind screwing things up.
He raised his M24 and glanced through the scope.
Still no sign of the target. Just a brown expanse of dead grass and a few exposed rocks.
He had the special round in the chamber and a magazine of Blessed rounds as well as half a dozen more loaded up with full metal jackets ready to load as soon as he took his shot. Hopefully, once shit and fan impacted, the Dragon Lords would be too busy fighting each other to notice him.
“Are you in place?” Kalynchuk’s voice rumbled out of the earpiece.
“I am.”
“Remember, you’re to keep me fully informed of everything that’s occurring, no matter how apparently insignificant. You have no way of knowing what small piece of information may be relevant. Is there any sign of the creature emerging?”
“No.” Kalynchuk had been unwilling to allow him to carry even a small camera, convinced his enemies could track him through the signal. Hell, maybe they could. How big a step was it from large, flying, fire-breathing lizards who turned into something that looked like men to large, flying, fire-breathing lizards who turned into something that looked like men and could surf video signals?
“Have you seen any sign of the Dragon Lords?”
“They’re keeping their distance.”
The sorcerer snorted. “So far. Remember, we don’t know which of them will be acting in my best interests, so you have to get that shot off before the first of them makes their move.”
“I know. You’re sure Allie… the Gales are unaware we have a go?”
“They don’t, as a family, seek knowledge. By the time they discover the emergence is occurring, it will be too late for them to interfere.”
Then it would be too late for Allie to be in danger.
He took another look through the scope.
Still nothing.
“There’s a man up a tree at the edge of the hill,” David said quietly.
Allie glanced over at Charlie, who made several exaggerated expressions all essentially boiling down to “Gee, I wonder who it is?” and while it was unlikely Kalynchuk had climbed a tree… “Is it Graham?”
“Steel and gunpowder seems to suggest it is.”
Graham.
“Can he see us?”
She could hear the smile in David’s voice as she ducked under a low branch. “Not if I don’t want him to. Tidier if I took him out, though.”
“No. We’re here as impartial observers…”
“Like UN peacekeepers,” Roland offered.
Charlie snorted. “Who keep getting their asses shot off because they can’t shoot back.”
“Not like UN peacekeepers, then,” Allie amended.
“So we can shoot back?”
“Back, but not first. No matter what Han Solo did,” she added pointedly to Roland.
“So we just let Graham blow away Junior when he shows up?” Charlie wondered.
Allie wanted to say no if only because they’d had proof the Dragon Lords could trace the shot and, by taking it, Graham would put himself in danger, but Graham was not her concern. If Kalynchuk had been telling the truth and this emerging, youngest Dragon Lord was more than a personal danger, but also a danger to the city and beyond, then allowing Graham to try and remove that threat was the smart thing to do. If he failed, they could act as backup.
“See, Auntie Jane, we can work with sorcery. We don’t need to destroy it.”
“You can work with a man with a gun. The sorcerer had his ass tucked safely behind a wall of hexes.”
“But David was out here, helping to save the city.”
“And you think that David allowing you to stop a Dragon Lord without any of the first circle present is a good thing? Because that amount of power will corrupt!”
“Allie?”
Wonderful. Even in her head, Auntie Jane got in the last word.
“Just thinking.”
“Nice change. Do we know where exactly the shit’s hitting the fan?” Charlie muttered as they peered out across an empty hilltop. “Because there’s a fair chunk of real estate out there.”
David shifted to settle the weight of his rack, and pointed. “About six meters out.”
“How the hell do…?” Allie glanced up, picked a leaf off one prong, and crushed it between trembling fingers. Even though he wasn’t channeling power, David was manifesting physically. She’d thought only Granddad could do that. But they were very close to the sacred site and that proximity could easily be causing strange effects. “Never mind.”
She let her gaze drift out along the direction David had indicated and, suddenly, concern about her brother was no longer front and center in her thoughts. She couldn’t say if it was six meters or ten, but something grabbed her attention and held it. Groping behind her for Roland’s hand, she gouged a quick charm into the dirt, anchored herself, and reached out for more information.
The ambient power, this close to a sacred site, surged up through the contact and knocked her on her ass.
Strong hands pushed into her armpits and hauled her back up again.
“Allie? What was it?”
“Not what I expected.” She rubbed at a stone bruise and frowned out toward the center of the hill.
“What did you expect?” David asked cutting both Roland and Charlie off one word into their own questions. Roland growled, low in his throat, but let it go.
“Something that felt like a Dragon Lord.”
That wasn’t the answer to the question David had asked, but he stayed with her. “And this didn’t?”
Allie leaned against Roland and thought about it. “My sample for comparison is a little small; he didn’t feel like Adam, that was for sure, but he felt sort of like Adam and sort of like something else. Something I know, but…” Lower lip between her teeth, she let her voice trail off as she tried and failed to define the second power signature.
“You said he?”
“Male, definitely.” If there was one thing a Gale girl knew, it was how to identify male power. “Weirdly familiar but not.”
“Patina of the UnderRealm?”
She glanced over at Charlie. “A what?”
Charlie shrugged. “You know what they say, there’s nothing like the UnderRealm for leaving a waxy buildup.”
“Who says that? Don’t actually tell me,” she added quickly. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s not the UnderRealm. It’s something from…”
The middle of the hill exploded, the sound strangely muted given the violence of the emergence. A fountain of dirt rocketed into the sky surrounding a pillar of light so bright it seared afterimages on the inside of Allie’s eyes. Rather than painting the bottom of the cloud cover, like a searchlight, the pillar capped out about ten meters up.
“Like a light saber,” Roland murmured.
“When this is over,” Allie told him, “we’re expanding your knowledge of media into this millennium.”
Graham had expected fire. It was how the Dragon Lords did things. It all came back to fire. A pillar of light felt wrong in subtle ways that lifted the hair on the back of his neck. Finger around the trigger, he stared through the scope and waited for the emerging form to coalesce.
Scales would be easier.
Skin wouldn’t stop him.
Weird how Kalynchuk insisted on referring to it as “the creature” as if they didn’t both know it was another Dragon Lord.