Burn(46)

“I don’t think either of us will, Great One,” Malcolm said, somewhat sorrowfully. “But you will. That’s what’s important.”

“Then why did those who sent you wish for me to die, oh, Believer?”

Malcolm was immediately angry. “We would never, Great One, it would be sacrilege—”

“This girl’s father tried to poison me, I can only assume through blackmail, as I could practically smell the struggle in him. Your leader wanted me out of your way.”

“The Mitera Thea would never harm a dragon!”

Kazimir got right up into his face. “Your Belief will let you down.”

“It won’t.” Malcolm flicked the blade with impossible speed at Kazimir’s face. Kazimir could only flinch fast enough to have it cut just his chin. He roared back, but the blood was already dripping. Malcolm expertly caught some of it in the hand holding the claw.

Which started to glow.

“Thank you, Great One,” he said.

And Nelson struck Malcolm on the back of the head with a rock.

Agent Woolf sped along the dirt road where Sarah and her father had been picked up by the dragon and flown home. She would have warmed to the synchronicity of this, had she known.

She rounded a corner and could see the antenna on a far hill, barely more than steel and wires, the whole arbitrary reason why all of this was happening here. She had no doubt Malcolm would use the Spur of the Goddess to complete his mission. Blue dragon or not, prophesied girl or not, whether he lived or not. She had trained him herself. She knew the desire in him, the absolute Belief. She had worried at first at his pairing with the new boy, but on balance, she felt it gave Malcolm even further incentive to succeed.

He would save the world.

She smiled to herself. It was the least happy smile Agent Dernovich would have ever seen had he lived. It was grim, a smile of the gallows.

Because she knew the world Malcolm was saving was not his own.

She heard police sirens behind her.

Malcolm dropped the claw. That was the worst part, not the pain or the blood on the back of his head, not his certain knowledge that it was Nelson who had struck him (a beat of sad, inevitable betrayal he felt beyond the pain from the rock), but that the Spur of the Goddess was falling, falling, falling to the frozen ground. Malcolm intoned the words he’d been taught, dragon language itself, hoping it would work even if he wasn’t holding the Spur.

It worked.

The tip of the Spur struck the ice, piercing it as if it were aflame. A light opened above it, shimmering, almost as if something were trying to open.

“You fool,” the Great One said, still bleeding.

Malcolm heard cars, coming from both directions.

Agent Woolf had her gun on the passenger seat, ready to use it the moment this podunk cow-jockey of a sheriff tried to make her pull over. She didn’t even slow; on the contrary, she pressed the accelerator as far as it would go, nearly reaching the floor.

But whatever the Sheriff’s Department was investing in its police cars was clearly a scandal, as it reached her with ease, then raced right by as if she were standing still.

The grim smile was gone. This could not be good news.

“What’s happening?” Sarah asked, as the aura around the claw grew, now as big as an orange, now a grapefruit. The sirens were getting nearer, as was what she guessed was her dad’s truck, on its way from the farm.

“This fool,” Kazimir said, meaning Malcolm, “thinks the Spur is a weapon. One that will stop the satellite and save this world for dragons. But that is not all it is.”

“What is it then?” Jason said, nervously, his eyes on the aura, too.

“It is a key,” Kazimir said.

The aura rising above the claw was now pig-sized, and Sarah thought she could actually see things in it, a change of light, shadowy ground . . .

“A key to what?” she asked.

“The satellite’s moving into place,” Malcolm said, his voice distant. “The moment is arriving.”

Sirens blared as the sheriff’s car screamed into view, its headlights—when had it grown dark enough for headlights, Sarah found herself wondering—lighting up Jason.

Jason, still holding the pistol.

“Throw the gun down!” the sheriff himself shouted, getting out of his car, holding up his own gun. “Throw it down, now!”

“What are you doing here?” Sarah found herself asking, as if that were the thing to be curious about.

“Your librarian saw a gun in Jason’s schoolbag,” said the sheriff. “One that looked an awful lot like a deputy’s sidearm.”

“It’s not what you think, Sheriff!” Sarah said, moving forward.

“Do not move!” the Sheriff snapped, and Sarah froze. The sheriff had seen the aura above the claw, still growing, still shimmering in light. “What the hell is that?”

“Dragon magic,” Kazimir said, simply, dread in his voice.

“I suggest you stop it right now,” the sheriff said, in a way that made it clear it wasn’t a suggestion at all. “And you,” he said to Jason, “I said, put the gun down, son, and I meant it.”

“You don’t understand,” Jason said, gun still on the boy Malcolm. “This guy is here to kill Sarah.”

“What are you talking about?”