Last Dragon Standing (Heartstrikers #5)(11)
Fredrick opened his mouth to argue, but Chelsie raised her hand. “I believe you, Julius,” she said quietly. “I can’t forgive him for all the years he left us to rot, but I believe you when you say that this is Bob’s doing. Even accounting for the Qilin’s fortune, this whole situation is simply too improbable not to have a seer’s fingerprints all over it. Also, if the Nameless End eats everything, Bob will die too, and he’s much too selfish for that. But if this is all part of Bob’s grand plan, what does that mean? What did he bring us here to do?”
“Work together,” Julius said, looking pointedly at General Jackson. “All of us. The dragon clans, the UN, spirits, Merlins—we’ve all got our backs against the same wall. If we’re going to survive, we have to join forces.”
“And do what?” Myron asked. “The magic outside might not be deadly, but it’ll still knock any of us out cold before we make it three feet. Maybe dragons would fare better, but I don’t see how we’re supposed to work together when half of us can’t leave the house.”
“We’d make it more like ten feet, but the general idea still holds,” Amelia agreed. “Magical fallout is no joke. It’ll take you down in a heartbeat, and it’ll burn the entire time. But the good news is I think the magical crash is affecting the Nameless End as well.”
“How do you know that?” General Jackson demanded.
“Because, as Marci already pointed out, we’re not dead yet,” Amelia said. “It’s been sixteen hours since Algonquin kamikazed herself into the Leviathan. It takes time to eat your way through five Great Lakes, but not that much time. I bet the Leviathan is just as stuck as we are. That buys us some wiggle room.”
“How much?” Julius asked.
“Not enough,” Raven said, hopping off Amelia’s shoulder to perch on the windowsill. “Heavy as it looks, the fallout’s actually been getting lighter for a while now. In my unprofessional and unresearched opinion, I’d say we have an hour, maybe two, before we can safely go outside.”
“Then we need to get to work,” Marci said, standing up.
“I thought we just agreed to wait for Bob,” Amelia said.
Marci rolled her eyes. “We can’t just sit here doing nothing until a dragon seer shows up and tells us what to do.”
“It worked last time,” Amelia said with a shrug.
“Only because he told you it would,” Marci pointed out. “Do you have any instructions for this crisis?”
The dragon spirit shook her head, and Marci spread her hands. “There you go. Maybe Bob will show up with a plan of action to save us all, but until then, I say we listen to Julius and pool our resources to come up with a plan of our own, because we don’t have time to mess around.”
“I agree,” the Qilin said, rising to his feet and turning to Julius. “You have the full support of the Golden Empire. My dragons are already on their way here. We will help you fight the Nameless End in whatever way we can.”
Julius blinked. “Um, that’s fantastic, but how do you know they’re coming? I only said we should work together a minute ago.”
The Qilin shrugged. “Because I want them here, and when I want something, my luck generally makes sure I get it.”
“Really?” Marci whistled. “Dude, that is a crazy power.”
The Golden Emperor shrugged again, but Julius was grinning from ear to ear. “I think I see how this is supposed to work,” he said excitedly, turning to Fredrick. “You’ve got Chelsie’s old Fang. That means you can cut to any Heartstriker, which gives our clan a way into the city as well. Between the Heartstrikers and the Golden Empire, we’ll have half the dragons in the world fighting together against a common enemy. That has never happened before!” He smiled even wider. “Don’t you see? This has to be Bob’s plan! This is why he had us jump through all those flaming hoops! It was so we’d all be here at the right place and the right time with the trust and the tools necessary to fight together against the Leviathan!”
“It does make sense,” Marci admitted. “But weren’t you the one who always said it was foolish to try to guess a seer’s intentions?”
“What else could it be?” Julius asked. “He got you here too, along with General Jackson, Raven, and Amelia, plus the Mortal Spirits. That gives us the Merlins, the human UN, and both types of spirits. Between all of us, every sentient magical force in the world is represented. We’re even stuck in the same house. If that’s not a seer’s doing, I don’t know what is.”
“You make a good point,” Fredrick said, frowning down at his Fang. “I suppose I should start bringing in the rest of the clan, then?”
“Not yet,” Amelia said quickly. “The magic’s better than it was last night, but it’s still waaaaaaay too unstable for teleportation. If you try to cut anywhere, you might end up slicing off your own head.”
“And we need a better idea of what we’re up against,” Julius added. “The Golden Emperor can command his dragons however he likes, but I’m only one vote on the Heartstriker Council. If I bring Bethesda and Ian into this, and they see the Leviathan as an unwinnable fight, they might decide to take their chances underground instead. We may only get one shot at this, which means we can’t bring anyone else into this fight until we have some kind of idea of how we’re actually going to win.”