A/N: Thank you for the reviews! Here's chapter 3 :) Chapter 4 will be up tomorrow.

Chapter Three

So, America looked like a shithole. Goldshield glanced down at the ground again, but the landscape still had not changed. It was still arid, brown, apparently lifeless. Here and there were rivers, shrunken and twisted things flashing silver under a merciless sun. Then there were roads, which she was somewhat more heartened to see. Thirty years of no maintenance hadn't worked wonders for them, but nature had been less voracious than it might have been. Apart from the cities they'd flown over, most of the rural roads were still intact. That would help with the evacuation. The towns they had passed were ruined shells laid out in perfect grid patterns, if they were in the middle of nowhere. The large cities had been mostly craters. Large, messy craters. So far, Goldshield had seen no sign of animal life. Plenty of plants – mostly algae taking over everything it could – but nothing that moved. Not even birds. Poison Province was an eerily silent place.

She was in the belly of a Chinook helicopter with forty others, the only one not strapped in. Stanner looked like he was having kittens each time she leaned out, but he couldn't order her to sit down. According to the reconnaissance photos Gardiner's air force had produced, the fae army had indeed gathered around the Potomac. They were of considerable size; perhaps seven thousand assorted elves, goblins, pixies and faeries. Her force was equally large, but they did not possess the same regenerative abilities, magical powers or preternatural reflexes. However, Silverlance expressly forbad the use of any weapon humans had invented – which meant that only Goldshield's army had guns. Goblin-made crossbows could be nearly as devastating, but nearly didn't get you as far as being armed to the teeth did.

The only thing that truly concerned her was that they had no element of surprise. In this still, silent air, the sound of the aircraft armada would carry for perhaps twenty miles. More, for a fae ear. The fae might not know that the Americans had sent for help, but they probably already knew Goldshield was on her way. Still, with the dragons in Asia it would likely not matter too much. In fact the thing that was most getting on her tits right now was the scientist sitting just down from Stanner. He had a Geiger counter in his hand, and while she couldn't hear the infernal thing clicking away, she could see his wild gesticulations and expressions of horror. And the closer they got to Washington DC (or its former position, anyway), the worse he became. Finally he leapt from his seat and spoke to her through Stanner's microphone. His voice came through her headset, his voice tinny and panicked.

"General, the radiation count is well above five hundred now, if we're exposed to it any longer there could be deadly-"

She sighed. "Stanner, let me talk to him." The German did so, and she beckoned the scientist over. "You're worried about the Geiger counter, is that it?"

"Yes! Look – the needle is consistently rising-"

She took the Geiger counter and casually tossed him from the chopper. It fell in a graceful arc to the ground, though she couldn't see where it fell. The man beside her watched open-mouthed, then returned his gaze to her. "There. Now you don't have to be worried by it," she smiled.

A voice crackled in her headpiece before he could reply – not that he'd have come up with one. "General, could you come to the cockpit?"

She made her way to the front of the Chinook, where the flight crew sat. "What is it?"

"We've got something on radar."

"Radar? What is it?"

"Can't tell. But it's about the same size we are. Air Marshal Gardiner confirms they have it too."

"Battle stations. Tell Gardiner." The instructions were relayed, and then she leaned forwards, looking in vain for the mysterious flying object they were picking up. "How fast is it coming?"

"About eighty-five knots."

"Goldshield," Gardiner's voice cut in, "if it's that big, but not mechanically fast, then it may be organic."

"But we've seen no sign of a horde."

"There were those rumours."

She frowned and looked out of the window again. Was it just her, or there a speck on the horizon? The rumour was that Silverlance had an honour guard who rode on dragons. As did Silverlance. This wasn't him though.

"No," she decided.

"Sure? It could be him."

No it couldn't. It couldn't, because she was calm, because her heart wasn't pounding and her every nerve wasn't alive. Her fingers weren't already on her weapons. She could not explain that to her subordinates. It would smack of obsession and delusion to anyone else. Yet Goldshield knew in her gut when she had a chance of killing him, and it wasn't now. Not yet. But that didn't mean what was coming towards them wasn't a threat. She pressed the button on the radio to reopen the channel. "Gardiner, take the main fleet 45 degrees east and keep heading to D.C. We have to get those people out. B group, follow the lead chopper and engage whatever that thing is. We stop it-"

"Them," her radar operator suddenly cut in.

"What?"

"There are two more."

Goldshield mentally swore, returning to the radio. "We stop them from following the rescue craft, understood? Goldshield out." She put the radio back and addressed the crew of her chopper. "Ready missiles."

They still had no idea what they were facing, however, so she peered intently through the windscreen of the helicopter. The blob was moving closer, and she picked out a shimmer of metallic scales, a flutter of wings. Definitely a dragon. What was more, she could see three other dots joining it in the sky. Looked like those rumours were true. "Fire!"

Six identical missiles detached from the Chinook's flanks, trailing identical white smoke as they zoomed off towards the dragon. She didn't have high hopes that they'd hit anything. Dragons were the most agile creatures in the sky. Sure enough, the first one twisted and contorted in mid-air, causing two of the missiles to hit each other and two others to veer off-course. The other two found their mark, however, and blew holes in the dragon's leathery wings. Enough to ground it, not enough to kill it. And there were others visible now.

"Find a landing site," she ordered the pilot.

Though it might seem like suicide, taking their chances on the ground, against razor-winged, fire-breathing monsters, it was the best option. The nimble movement and lithe manoeuvres the dragons could pull off simply could not be matched by the heavier, more lumbering helicopters. The best comparable aircraft the humans had had was the Eurofighter Typhoon. And they had all been destroyed long ago. Goldshield had departments working on new fighters, but so far their work hadn't borne fruit. She was stuck with what she had. And what she had would stand less chance of being blown up if they were on the ground.

She hung on to straps as the chopper banked and went into a sharp decline, white-knuckled to keep herself standing instead of stumbling to the floor. Stanner, still strapped in, reached out to grab her free wrist as well. Not to hurt her, just because while they were descending he couldn't protect her in any other way at the moment. Goldshield's concentration was on two things: any noises above the roar of engines, and any glimpse of their enemy. Difficult to do either, as there was well over a hundred and fifty decibels of sound, and that was coupled with the decades of dust and sediment that their arrival was billowing up from the ground. Visibility was extremely limited. Still, they touched down safety, and immediately the pilot shut the rotors off. No fuel out here, so no fuel to waste.

Goldshield was the first on the ground, jumping down even before the craft was fully still. Without the sound of the engines, the roar and shrieks came from the dragons. She'd counted six of them in all, but from the ground, nine pairs of wings kept blotting out the sun. They flashed in glorious precious-gem shades: reds like blood, lustrous golds, gleaming colbalts and glowing emeralds. There was also, of course, the shining ivory of their talons and fangs. This was going to be fun. Soldiers poured from the belly of the Chinook behind her, rapidly setting up gun posts. Nothing less than a 50 calibre bullet would pierce dragon hide, and indeed she found Stanner next to her going one better. He was hefting a bazooka onto his shoulder. He took careful aim and fired. The dragon he'd targeted was hit in the wing, half its flying apparatus reduced to shreds of scales and exposed bone in a matter of seconds. It plummeted to earth, landing in a crash that made the ground quiver. Its rider leapt off twenty feet from the ground, moving with the lithe agility that all elves had. The dragon was not so lucky; though it still had a spiked tail, razor teeth and a fire breathing maw, it also had six anti-materiel rifles pointed at its head. Three men were burned alive, toasted in their skins. But they died with fingers on triggers, and the dragon's head was ripped apart.

Her heart hammering with the rush of it now, Goldshield kept her eyes trained for the elf. He had been unharmed, from what she'd seen, and was therefore lethal. With thirty years' of dust still filling the air, it was difficult to see much, but silver mithril shone in whatever conditions, and it was not long before she spotted the flash of an axe.

"Stanner, Lebowitz, Murchison, with me!" she called.

The four of them set off further into the remnants of the town, dodging fireballs, grenades and the occasional abandoned shopping trolley. Huh. She'd forgotten those things had even existed.

There was one more chopping coming in to land, and it was there she'd seen the elf headed. Sure enough, humans were being slaughtered even before their feet had left the helicopter. Goldshield opened fire, her Uzi spitting bullets faster than the eye could see. Faster than the human eye, anyway—but unfortunately, the elf evaded or deflected most of them, throwing shining metal shurikens in return. At her side, Sarah Lebowitz collapsed with a gurgling cry, one in her throat. The elf who'd murdered her seemed to flit in and out of view, completely armoured in leather and scale. Leather didn't stop bullets. Goldshield signalled for Stanner and Murchison to keep firing. One of them would get the bastard. Sergeant Frank Murchison, however, did not get the bastard. He got decapitated. But in the time the elf took to do that, both Stanner and Goldshield utterly destroyed his lower legs. He collapsed to the ground on stumps. The general let her bodyguard have the final blow, and he put one bullet between the elf's eyes.

Goldshield put a new clip in and moved over to her fallen soldiers, bending to brush Lebowitz' eyes shut properly. It would be about the only send-off she'd be able to give them. She tugged on the chain of her dog-tags, preparing to pull them off—but before they came away, instinct warned her, and she rolled, moving six feet away just in time and dropping the submachine gun. An enormous fireball slammed into the ground, incinerating Lebowitz as effectively as any cremation could have done and setting Goldshield's sleeve alight. She kept rolling until the flames went out, though her skin was a little burned. Stanner fired on the dragon attacking them, but he might as well have been throwing water at the huge reptile for all the damage it was doing. Goldshield unhooked a grenade from her belt, pulling the pin and chucking it as hard as she could upwards. At the last second, the dragon made a hairpin turn twenty feet above them, and the grenade exploded only next to its tail. The last five feet of the appendage were blown to bits. Without a tail, dragons couldn't steer, couldn't balance properly. It dove to the ground, its rider—like the last one—jumping off to avoid injury. The humans on the ground ran for cover, Goldshield and Stanner heading for an alleyway between two ruined buildings.

Unfortunately for them, the dragon crash-landed on one of those buildings. There was a moment of yet more chaos and confusion as the wall collapsed, prompting more diving out of the way. Neither of them quite managed it; Goldshield was partially buried under brickwork and she'd seen a steel girder headed for Stanner. Now however, they were completely separated.

Dimly, she made out Stanner's frantic tone. "General! General!"

"Here!" she called back weakly, coughing through the smoke and dust. It was thick in the air, limiting her vision and hearing.

Still, she knew he was shifting through bricks and crumbling mortar in an attempt to reach her. "Are you injured?"

"No. Bruised, but fine. You?"

There was a pause. "Fine."

"Your leg's broken isn't it?" Goldshield asked wryly.

"No. My left elbow may be."

"Stay where you are and wait for evac. I'll come to you."

"But-"

"That's an order, Stanner."

"Yes, ma'am."

She walked over to the collapsed wall between them. It was a big shambles, and while she knew she could shift the bricks, there was also a high possibility that the whole lot would collapse on top of her and crush her. And as far as ways to die went, she'd prefer 'being stabbed' or 'shot in the chest' over slowly suffocating. There seemed to be a small crawl space leading to … somewhere. Had to be better than here. She dropped to all fours and pushed her way through, emerging back out into daylight again. And into the same bit of space that the dragon was, getting back to its feet. Wobbly feet, yes, and it was swinging its head wildly around to compensate for its missing tail, but it was still standing. Goldshield actually had to duck when it turned, though she was gratified to see the white bone gleaming out of the bleeding green flesh where its tail had used to be.

But she still needed to kill it.

There was no weaponry on her that would get through its hide. So she needed to be looking in places other than thick scales for her opportunity: that left her with eyes and mouth. And the mouth was full of teeth and fire glands. She had two short swords strapped to her thighs, two feet long, titanium composite and honed to deadly double edges. Not mithril, but pretty bloody close. And they'd do the job. When the dragon's head was turned away from her, she charged, pumping her legs to sprint as fast as she could. The dragon could hardly fail to hear her coming, but it moved back slightly too late; Goldshield already had her foot planted at the joint of its wing, using the momentum to get her up onto its back. The dragon reared with an ear-splitting shriek, causing Goldshield to nearly lose her footing along its narrow spine. She fell, but managed to fall astride its sinewy neck. One sword was stabbed straight into its muscle, but while verdant blood covered her hands and body armour, it didn't do much damage to the dragon. But it gave her a bit more anchorage to haul herself forwards. The dragon apparently had worked out where she was headed, and tried to rear up onto its hind legs, tossing its head from side to side. Goldshield was eventually thrown off; but as she fell, she hung on for a second around its head, and was able to plunge her second knife straight into its eye. By the time Goldshield hit her head against a wall, the dragon had hit the ground, and was dead.

She didn't get time to relax though. Aside from the black spots of dizziness crowding her vision, there was that strange roaring noise. Sounded like speech. Was speech, though in a language she half-understood and which made her gut clench. And then, of course, there was the shining elvish weapon being thrown like a javelin at her head. Or rather, like a lance.

Nuada had seen enough grenades in this war to recognise what the small, dark green object lobbed at Orophin's left flank was. He uttered a sharp command, and with his almost telepathic intuition, the dragon was already turning. Too late though, and the explosive detonated right beside Orophin's tail, bowing the vital limb to smithereens. Knowing they both stood a greater chance of survival if Orophin did not have to land with a rider, Nuada leapt from his mount, landing on a roof and then jumping to the ground from there.

And from there, while temporarily lost in the dust, noise of gunfire and piles of brickwork, he failed to prevent Orophin's demise. Too far away. Too focused on the humans in his vicinity. There were found that had met their ends before he heard the first roar from his dragon. Taking to the rooftops again was the fastest rout, and he used it, running and almost gliding across the ruins of this town that the humans themselves had burned. When he sighted Orophin, the dragon was being attacked by a human woman brandishing two short swords, moving with a lethal grace he'd rarely seen in her kind. Even by elven standards, she looked fast. Within ten seconds, she had mounted, stabbed, and then murdered Orophin, only suffering a mild blow to the head herself. But she had left inches of metal buried inside the dragon's skull, straight through his proud golden eye. That proud eye that would never shine fiercely again. The dragon had been more than a steed—a comrade for years, who'd given up his chance at a mate and drakes of his own to battle with Nuada, who had seen him through battles with their flying metal wasps and bombs being thrown at them from every direction. Whole armies had been brushed aside and drowned in fire by the two of them. And now, one human with a knife had ended that great, glorious life? It was an outrage which could not be borne. Not without vengeance.

Lance extended, he launched his weapon at the human's head. It was a perfect throw, and he yelled an ancient curse as he did so. Over the maelstrom around them, she could not have heard, not have known that certain death was flying for her. Yet some instinct or sense must have warned her, and she managed to duck out of the way quickly enough so that the lance pierced the wall rather than her skull.

Like a soldier, she headed for her weapons, racing for the swords she'd left in Orophin's carcass. By the time Nuada had retrieved his own weapon, she had sheathed one, and had one of their pistols in her free left hand. As she squeezed the trigger, her eyes did not leave his. She did not seem in the least bit afraid, even as he deflected the first eight bullets she sent his way. The ninth was slightly too fast, and ripped through his black silk sleeve, grazing the ivory skin underneath. At the reflexive hiss of pain he gave, she smirked, throwing the empty gun aside and drawing her other blade. It still had the green tinge of Orophin's blood on it. A red haze passed over Nuada's vision. Neither of them took the defensive, the woman's short swords clashing against his lance, swinging and stabbing, aiming to chop and cut at him wherever possible. It was not often possible, but she proved stubbornly difficult to kill, leaping backward when he went to ram the blade through her torso; twisting to the side to avoid her head being severed from her body.

Worse still, other humans could clearly hear the fight, and were beginning to clamour. A man's voice came frantically from somewhere to their right. "General! General, what's going on? General!"

A general—yes, she carried herself like a figure of authority. Used to being in command, having her orders—

Without warning, a piercing ringing began, shrilly worming into his brain. The woman heard it too, and when the sound intensified, they both ducked under the weight of it. There was nothing mechanical or natural about it, and that coupled with the cold shiver crawling over him confirmed his suspicion. There was mag- Then there was a blinding white flash, and then nothing.

A/N: Review please!