Riley
Wes opened the doors with a spare key and I followed him up the narrow stairs to a living room halfway up to what should be the first floor. Room was small and ugly, but there was a large gray fabric couch there and on it, I beheld Autumn, Pearl, Vivian and Opal laughing at something. Four backpacks casually lied on the floor beside them. Mist and Nettle shared an old balding velvet armchair and Kain sat on the floor leaning his back on the side of the armchair. Between his bent legs sat a girl, she leaned comfortably against his chest and rested one hand on his knee. She was laughing too. All were cradling different mugs of tea and seemed completely at ease. The scene exuded ease and warmth, that stood in stark contrast to the hell, we've just escaped.
The mood cooled somewhat when Kain's eyes met mine, he looked away immediately and said nothing, but the girl straightened up and looked at me with wariness, before she looked at her brother.
"Wes!" She rushed to him and the two hugged. I didn't remember Wes to be a huggy guy, but didn't comment. We had bigger issues to deal with.
"Molly, meet Riley" Wes said finally and the girl released him to send me reluctant smile. I got her, she wanted to be polite, but I've just scolded her crush.
Three hatchlings watched me coolly and I cursed Kain in my mind. I didn't need this drama now! And why would the girls back him up against me? He was a baby, I have kept them alive all this time...
I looked at the armchair again. Nettle and Mist leaned on each other exhausted. I remembered that Mist got a nasty slash to her rear when she pivoted to shield Madison from a vessel attack. And Nettle almost got pinned by three clones, when she tried to get to St Anthony, who ran away... Kain himself got many minor scratches as he was larger than the vessels and trained in combat. All these wounds were soon completely gone... But this didn't mean they didn't matter. I reeled from the realization, that a year ago I explicitly forbidden them to fight and now demanded, that they'd risk their lives. What was going on with me? Was, whatever corruption changed Ember, getting to me too?
I was tired. I needed a break after the ordeal with the vessels and Kain and goddamn St Anthony and fucking Stealth. But first...
I strode to where they sat aware of dragonells watching me from the couch.
"I'm sorry for the earlier Kain" I said and saw surprise on his face. "You had some valid points and I've lost my temper."
Nettle smiled broadly at that and Mist's gaze gained a couple degrees of warmth.
"No problem. I've might have lost my temper as well" Kain said amicably.
"Of course I will not cut you off, though I would appreciate if you cut down on your expenses" I added to make the reconciliation complete.
"No need for that. My tuition fee is paid for the whole course and we wanted to get independent anyways" Kain said surprising me.
"I'll help them in the beginning" Mist said and I felt another stab. My hatchlings were flying from nest, really cutting the cord. I couldn't protect them any longer. I needed either to let go or lose them, neither option sat well with me at the moment.
"Let's get you guys ready for the night. I need to get Molly home before supper" Wes announced and the rest of the time passed on counting linens, blankets and bed places among a lot of caring questions and comments and comradeship.
Wes and Molly have bought everything second hand and therefore nothing matched. But they washed and cleaned everything.
Kain acted on his own, when he told Wes and Molly about the rescue mission. But it was good judgment on his side. I had no safe houses here, I didn't know the city and frankly, in the rush to get dragonells and eggs out, I have dismissed the issue of accommodation in London. Wes knew what to do and Kain knew to tell Wes. Maybe I could let others do things too?
At last it was decided where everyone was going to sleep and Wes left with Molly.
Mist have rented a three bedroom house somewhere on the East End, and she, Kain and Nettle were going to sleep there. This house was hardly large enough for the four dragonells. I was to sleep on the couch.
I could hardly breathe in the cramped house.
I picked up some super spicy food from a nearby food place and we ate it around a chipped but stable table in the kitchen. Then dragonells retreated to their "bedrooms" that were more of a broom closets to me and I was left alone in the empty living room.
Against my fears sleeping on the couch was extremely easy. The battle have exhausted me and I fell into dreamless sleep as soon as my head touched the flat pillow.
"... and you must meet Felix." Nettle rattled over a breakfast brought by the trio, as I began to call her, Mist and Kain in my mind.
"What? No. No meeting with unknown, all powerful, ancient dragons." I protested. I had to press my elbows to my sides to not jab Autumn and Opal, as the eight of us tried to fit around the kitchen table.
"We need to lay low, get our bearings and try to find out, how we are going to survive, now that Talon is on a war path and our network is as good as gone." I stated exasperated.
"And picking a brain of an all powerful ancient is a way to figure out how we are going to thrive away from Talon" Nettle countered and added carelessly "Besides I had no time to meet with Chris yet and I miss him."
"Who is Chris?" I asked annoyed by how everyone's lives seemed to have moved forward while I was in Ember's thrall.
"A human friend of ours." Kain said in a way that made me suspect, there was more.
"Great, what does he have to do with us?" I sighed.
"Nothing, just one more good thing about seeing Felix." Nettle smiled.
I bristled at the sheer idiocy of her answer but then checked myself. Haven't I just decided to let others decide too?
"Mist, you've met them too. Are you on board with this?" I asked the person whose judgment I had most faith in.
"Yeah... If you guys want to?" She addressed the dragonells around me and I kicked myself in my mind.
"Would you like to meet this all knowing ancient dragon?" I asked Autumn and added "Knowing, that this can be the last thing you do in your life?"
"He could know how to hide and protect our hatchlings, once they're hatched" Pearl offered.
"Or how to avoid getting caught by Talon, it sounds like neither Talon nor the Order have learned about them in four hundred years..." Vivian added.
"And if not more than that, he could grant us permission to stay in his city." Autumn seemed to agree and I sighed inwardly.
"I'll not beg anyone's permission to do anything." I retorted resolution or not.
"You guys do whatever you like, I need to talk to Wes and St George, and plan seriously. Don't wait for me." I said and propped the last piece of my sausage into my mouth standing up. It felt great not to be squeezed between two other dragons.
"We could show you the way..." Kain offered carefully, clearly sensing the change in my mood.
"Nah I know how to read Underground map." I said quickly exiting the cramped house. I was so fed up living with others in cramped spaces, that after the Elder Wyrm got slain and I no longer needed to squat with my entire underground in a motel room or Jess house, I promised myself never to share a bedroom with anyone else again.
I pressed a buzzer at the doors of a plain looking white two story house. It was strange to see "Higgins" displayed beside the doors. After a while a window on the first floor opened and upper half of Wes stuck out. His eyes widened when he saw me.
"Riley?! Wait mate I'm opening." Wes said and disappeared closing the window behind him.
The doors clicked and I entered a dim grey white staircase and climbed concrete stairs to the first floor. The doors at the top recess opened before I reached it and Wes greeted me dressed in sweatpants and t-shirt.
"Come in mate. What's possessed you showing up so early on Sunday?" He said without reproach in his voice.
"There's no room to stretch my neck in the house, they don't listen to me and we need to talk." I said.
I followed him through a short hall with cloth hangers and shoes shelves to a living room with a black leather armchair a black leather couch, glass coffee table, huge TV and a couple of half-empty bookcases. The floor was of lacquered wood most if it covered by a rug with black and white swirls.
"Sit down, want some tea?" Wes asked and I sat in his armchair
"Coffee." I said and waited in silence when Wes cooked water in a small kitchenette.
"Here", Wes placed a mug in front of me and sat on the sofa.
"So what's the matter?" He said watching me carefully.
"What's the matter?! Ember and the entire Talon is after us!" I answered not very diplomatic, but I was so relieved to finally have him to talk to, openly without wrapping things in.
"So I've heard mate. Kain didn't know much about the details though, will you fill me in?" Wes said. Straight to the point, God I've missed this.
"Ember have screwed us all over. She's either used us to avoid the fate of Elder Wyrm's vessel and gain control of Talon, or the power corrupts anyone. I don't know and I really don't care by now. She's power sick and a threat to all of us..." and then I told him everything.
I told him about the rape mating flight and the strange captivity that followed, about betraying the Order of St George and the eggs and dragonells and everything. I needed him to know, to fully understand the gravity of the change in Ember and the danger, that we were in.
Wes listened to all this without his usual cursing and wailing. He reacted with sympathetic grimace hearing about the horror of mating flight with Ember. When our essences touched and I beheld the twisted, cruel creature, full of hatred and only living to hurt others. I almost shuddered with fear and disgust at the mere memory of her.
"What are you going to do?" Wes asked. It felt slightly odd, that he didn't say we. We've been we for such a long time, that you was new and... odd.
"I'll do, what I have always done I guess." I said, though it sounded weak in my own ears.
"It won't be enough. With the Order as good as gone there won't be anything keeping Talon in check. They have all the time in the world to track down and kill each and every one of us." Wes said matter-of-factly.
This new Wes was unnerving. How about you wail a bit, mate - it helps me think.
"What choice do I have?" I asked.
"Mist and the others are looking for an alternative way of living. They've met a dragon, who was very successful at it..." Wes stopped seeing my sour expression.
I didn't care for being confronted with the issue I came here to avoid... among other reasons of course.
"I don't know Wes, wasn't Elder Wyrm bad enough? Should we accept leadership of a dragon twenty times her age?"
"So it's about age? You dragons still surprise me." Wes looked incredulous.
"He's not offering leadership, he's just answering their questions, tells them stories and teaches Nettle some magic..." Wes continued explaining.
"He's deadly dangerous! He can travel in time! He doesn't age! What can we do against a creature this powerful?!" I interrupted him, tired of this.
"I'm sure every fuck up in history looked like a good idea at the time! Dragons followed the Elder Wyrm in good faith! People followed thousands of bloodthirsty dictators in good faith. Shouldn't we learn from this?"
Wes gave me a hooded look.
"He exists weather you acknowledge that or not Riley. Your paranoia can do better than that. If he is all powerful, we should try to learn as much as possible about him."
"But can we? We don't know if he can read or even control minds, we don't know if anything we know about him is real..."
Wes shook his head.
"I understand that you feel outmatched mate. But throwing tantrums won't help. You need time to adjust to this new world, where Elder Wyrm was just a spoiled brat, I get it. Thankfully we have plenty other problems to take care of." He added sarcastically.
That's not what I meant and I would have argued him on tantrums, but suddenly I wasn't sure. Maybe I was having hard time adjusting to the world where Ember was worse than Elder Wyrm and a possible very powerful ally existed all this time and done nothing...
Suddenly I could see his point of view, there was no need for me to insist on anything about this Felix dragon. There was plenty of other, urgent stuff to take care of.
"Yeah" I relented "Garret needs your help to crack some encryption on Order's money."
"And you want me to help him?"
It was nice to be asked what I wanted for once, and to feel a bit like leader again.
"We need Order if we are to challenge Talon. And Garret is my friend, I want to help him."
Wes rubbed his face. "No going back to bed for me today huh?" He said. "Let me shower and get some breakfast first."
Wes was fast. He was back wearing a white t-shirt under a green hoodie and a pair of brown corduroy pants before my coffee was completely cold.
"There's a coffee shop nearby, I like eating there." He said stuffing his laptop into a gray rucksack.
I put the mug on the coffee table and went out.
"Riley!" Nettle almost fell into my arms when I opened the doors to the street.
"Archivist has contacted Mist! Ember issued an order to kill Garret and Mist says we must protect him!" Her eyes were open wide as she rattled out and then stopped abruptly and looked at me expectantly.
"What? Where is Mist?" I asked as confused as her if not more.
"She's off to warn Garret. She asked me to get you." Nettle said and added looking at Wes "Do you want a ride?"
"What? No! And why do you kids keep on asking?!" Wes retorted with fake annoyance.
"Underground or a cab, you may choose young lady." He said with a fond smile.
We took the cab.
I eyed the mansion with apprehension.
"This is the address?" I asked and Nettle nodded typing on her phone.
We jumped off in front of the gate, that opened on its own account. Nettle seemed to have lost her self-assurance and looked to me and Wes.
I was about to ask them to wait outside while I check the premises, when well known silhouette appeared on the gravel of the drive-in. Mist beckoned us and we followed her inside.