Then with another roar, the dragon reappeared.
He turned his attention to Jason, deep blue eyes that matched his scales surging, catching a glint of gold, and then roaring again.
“You freed him,” David said.
“I think we were lucky that worked,” Jason said.
“It worked, but there are others.” He pointed, and in the distance, Jason noted another red-scaled dragon. This one was enormous, easily twice the size of the maroon one.
He focused on it. He would need to pick off the largest dragons first, and from up here, he thought there would be enough time to heal the dragon and give it time to recover before it crashed to the ground.
As he drew power from the ice dragon, sending it across the distance into the other dragon, he felt resistance. It was more than he had detected before. Jason focused, pulling on power from the ice dragon, sending it across that distance, into the other dragon. He strained against that resistance, trying to find some way to overwhelm it.
He had to pull on more power.
He needed the ice dragon to help.
Was there any way to signal to the ice dragon that he couldn’t do this alone? The dragon seemed to know his mind, and in doing so, he should have some way of recognizing what Jason was doing, but how was he to bridge that distance?
Power exploded.
He was thrown back, and the iron dragon roared.
Another explosion struck the side of the dragon, this one ringing out like a bell.
“There are too many,” David said. “A dozen. Possibly more. It seems the dragons brought a regiment.”
“How many is in a regiment?”
“Two dozen.”
“How many regiments are there?”
“Many,” David said, staring into the distance. It might be Jason’s imagination, but it seemed almost as if David were disappointed by this turn of events.
“They aren’t going to claim these dragons.”
“There’s only so much that you can do against them,” David said. “I hadn’t expected them to bring such power out here.”
“They would have if they knew there were other types of dragons.”
“They didn’t know. There was a suspicion, but no one knew what might be out here. We came thinking that we might find something, not knowing we would.”
Jason looked across, seeing the massive red dragon as it approached.
A figure on the back caught his attention. There was something about it that was familiar.
Therin.
“Look,” he said, pointing.
David leaned forward, and a strange sense radiated from him. “That is unfortunate. If Therin has decided to join this fight, there may be very little that you can do to prevent him from succeeding.” David looked at him. “Therin commands the largest regiment of Dragon Souls.”
“How many are in his regiment?”
“Many.”
David leaned forward and closed his eyes. He began to mutter to himself, saying quiet words, but Jason couldn’t hear them. The wind whistling around them carried the words away, and yet, he had a sense of them.
It was something of mourning.
19
Jason tapped David on the arm. “You need to come back around.”
“I’m sorry, I really am. As much as I want to help, there isn’t anything that can be done.”
Jason didn’t know whether David really wanted to help or not, but he did get the sense something bothered him.
“You never really wanted to harm the dragons.”
“I’ve never wanted to harm the dragons. I’ve wanted to understand them, to work with them, but they do need to be protected, much like we need to be protected.”
The wind whistled around them, and it carried a strange scent on it. It was that of ash, but it was something else as well.
Heat blasted them, one explosion after another, and with the way the iron dragon spun, they managed to avoid most of it, though Jason didn’t know if they were avoiding it or the iron dragon was absorbing it.
The other two dragons that had joined them were twisting in the air, shooting flames from their mouths and roaring. The sound of it filled the air, that of explosions and dragon screams and thunder.
All of it was a torrent of power, a torment of explosions. All of it was more than Jason could stomach.
And all of it had come here because of him.
He could have done nothing. He could have sat back, hiding on the mountain, staying with the ice dragon, and if he had, then Therin would never have known about any of the other dragons. He would’ve known about the ice dragon, but that was it. Jason could have brought the ice dragon to Dragon Haven, and… then what?
The dragon wouldn’t have been happy in Dragon Haven. He might’ve been able to tolerate it, but it wasn’t his home.
Much like anyplace else wasn’t home to the iron dragon. He deserved to go to Varmin, not anywhere else. And what about the forest dragon? What would happen to that one? He had no idea how many other misfit dragons there were, however many strange and powerful and wonderful dragons existed, but the ice dragon believed there were several more.
What would take place if the Dragon Souls managed to acquire them?
Jason knew what would happen. They would be controlled. They would be used.
He focused on the dragon Therin rode. He called upon power, sending it through him, through the dragon. The ice dragon seemed to recognize what he was doing, and he added to it, sending strength flowing through Jason, and it spilled outward, exploding into the red dragon.
It was getting closer. The twisting movements of the iron dragon were hard for Jason to follow, but it seemed almost as if the iron dragon recognized what he needed and understood where they needed to target. He focused on the red dragon, hurtling toward it. They were moving quickly, so quickly that Jason was struggling to track it all, and he focused power instead, letting it explode outward.
The other dragon roared.
Jason pushed with everything he could.
There was a surge of power, and it came from high overhead. Like a blast of lightning, only this was ice, and it arced through the dragon pearl, through him, and directed out toward the red dragon.
It slammed into the creature.
There was a brief sense of resistance, but it faded quickly. It was almost as if any resistance left was blasted by the lightning. Or ice lightning, however the case may be.
Jason sat for a moment, holding on to the iron dragon, feeling the intensity of the power the ice dragon had loaned him.
The red dragon roared.
Jason had done nothing.
He had been trying to heal the dragon, but was there nothing to heal?
“It didn’t work,” Jason said.
The red dragon was coming closer, moving with incredible speed.
“Let me help,” David said.
“How can you help?”
“I need dragon pearls.”
Jason hesitated. He didn’t know if he could trust David, but David had been with him long enough that he had to trust him a little bit. If David betrayed him, what would it do other than lead to their failing that much sooner? With his help, there might be something that could be done, some way he could continue to overwhelm the dragons circling them, but…
Jason reached into his pocket, pulling out the dragon pearls for the maroon and black dragons. He handed them over, and David stared at them for a moment before cupping them and holding his fists out. Somehow, David managed to stay seated atop the dragon as it spun.