“Is it done?” Henry asked.
Jason looked around the clearing. The crowd had thinned a little bit. At first, Jason worried it was because they didn’t want to know what he was doing, but the more that he thought about it, the more certain he was that they weren’t sure whether he was going to be successful.
When he had first approached the dragons, letting them know what he was going to do, they had been hesitant, but then the iron dragon had done something—or said something—that had changed their minds.
“It’s done.”
“How will we know?”
David shook his head and strode forward. He held his hands up and muttered something under his breath. Henry dove toward him and David flicked his wrist. Henry went flying.
Jason stood frozen, unable to even react.
Power washed away from David.
It struck the yellow dragon in front of him. The creature lowered his head, blinking pale golden eyes, and breathed out a streamer of steam.
“Have I influenced you?” David asked the dragon.
“No,” came a deep voice.
Henry pulled himself off the ground, dusting himself off, and approached. “Don’t try that again.”
“If you aren’t willing to test it, I am. And I am unable to do anything.” He turned to Jason. “And you see, I don’t need a dragon pearl in order to summon power.”
“How did you do that?”
“There is much you could learn, if only you believed.”
“I believe you have power, but I don’t know what it was that you were doing.”
“I was using what I learned as an Auran on them.”
“That’s what it means to be an Auran?”
“It means we’re willing to explore a different side of power. We’re willing to work with what we have within us. I have seen something similar in you.”
Henry regarded Jason for a moment before turning his attention back to the dragons. He squeezed on something in his hand, and a sense of energy radiated from him, washing over the nearest dragon. The pale yellow dragon lowered his head and looked into Henry’s eyes, studying him.
“You did it,” Henry said.
“I told you I did.”
“Can you repeat it?”
Jason thought the question was for him, but it seemed that he was directing it at the dragon.
“We cannot. We don’t have the same type of power.”
“Is it him, then?”
“I don’t know,” the dragon said.
Jason didn’t think it was him. The power had come from the ice dragon, not from him. And yet, if it was not from the ice dragon, if it was from him, then why would he be different?
He looked over at David, but David said nothing.
Something about all of this troubled him. The Auran was hiding something, and the more that Jason learned, the more certain he was that David wasn’t quite who he wanted others to believe he was.
Why would he conceal that?
If he had no interest in harming the dragons, and Jason felt increasingly certain that was the case, then why not come out and say it?
Henry went from dragon to dragon, testing each of them. When he was done, he turned back to Sarah. “I can’t influence any of them. Whatever he did seems to work. We won’t know for certain until we encounter Dragon Souls, but…”
“You think it worked,” she said.
“I think it worked,” he said.
Jason turned away. He wasn’t going to remain here, not now that the dragons had been protected. Which meant it was time to go and do what he had intended to do all along. It was time to return and protect the dragons.
He stopped in front of the iron dragon. He nodded to the creature, who lowered his head, allowing Jason to climb on. David followed him, but waited before mounting.
“You can come as well,” Jason said.
“That’s it?”
“For now.”
“What about them?”
Jason looked over at Henry and Sarah. “If they’re going to come with us, they will make that decision. Now, I can’t wait any longer. I need to get to the forest dragon.”
He didn’t know what Henry and Sarah were going to do, and, as far as he was concerned, it didn’t matter. They could choose for themselves, and if it involved coming with him, working to help protect the misfits, then he was glad of the help.
“Jason,” Sarah said, approaching carefully.
“What is it?”
“We aren’t ready to go. The others need more time.”
“There is danger.”
It came from the ice dragon, as if he were speaking within Jason’s mind. The dragon was high overhead, circling and waiting for them.
“What danger?”
“They come.”
Immediately, he knew the danger. Dragon Souls.
If they waited, the forest dragon would suffer.
He turned to Sarah. “I can’t wait any longer.”
“You don’t know that.”
“The ice dragon does, and we have to go. Please help.”
She frowned at him, and he hoped that she’d come, but she backed away.
Shaking his head, he tapped the iron dragon on the side. With a surge of heat, the dragon blasted into the air.
They circled for a moment, parting the clouds, and as they did, he looked up to see the ice dragon high overhead. Spikes protruded from his body, and it seemed as if snow drifted around him, swirling in a cloud.
It was enough to make Jason smile.
“You are an interesting man,” David said.
“Why?”
“Because you really do care about them.”
“I didn’t,” he said. He turned so that he could meet David’s eyes. “I feared dragons. My entire life, I was taught to hate them, to be afraid of them, to know they could destroy my village. And then I met a dragon. And then I met another. I came to understand they aren’t at all what I believed.”
They were something so much more than what he’d ever imagined.
“If you learned from Dragon Haven, then why aren’t you staying with them?”
“Because they revere the dragons, almost to the point where they feel as if they need to serve the dragons, but that’s not been my sense at all.”
“What is your sense?”
“That we’re equals in a way. Different, and yet, I think the dragons need us as much as we need them.”
He turned, wrapping his arms around the dragon, and held on tightly as they surged forward.
“Others are coming,” David said.
“How do you know?”
“Because I can feel them.”
Jason slipped off to the side. “You said that before. How do you feel them? How are you so connected?”
David shrugged. “You believe you are only connected to the dragons. And yet, your power is different. I see it within you. I know you may not believe it, but I understand the nature of what it takes to be an Auran, and I understand just how similar you are to us.”
“I don’t even know what an Auran does.”
“No, but you could.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“I want to return to my village. I want to help my mother. I want to save my sister.” He trailed off at the end and inhaled deeply, looking back behind him. As David had said, there were dragons now following them, but it wasn’t the dragons he expected. The five dragons he’d helped weren’t there. The maroon and the black dragon were instead.
“Did you know they were here?” Jason asked David.