Steel Dragon (Steel Dragons Series Book 1)

by Kevin McLaughlin

  “Do you think a confession would work?” she asked, the gears already turning in her mind.

  “I don’t know. Maybe? It’s happened before. I’ve looked into it. There have been cases where a dragon admitted wrong-doing and has been punished for it.”

  “Then what’s the damn problem?” she said. “We have enough already.”

  “Not for a human court, we don’t. They’ve been punished in the past, but not by us. He’s a dragon, Hall. Shit, the only reason he talked to you was because you’re one too.”

  “I am not.”

  “Yes, you are, goddammit, and if you weren’t, we’d all be dead a hundred times over already.” He looked so beaten, she could hardly bear it.

  “So you think a confession plus our evidence would do it?” she asked after a minute.

  “I don’t know if the evidence even matters. I think that if—and this is like the biggest damn if of all time—if he confessed to other dragons, maybe he’d be held responsible. At least I damn well hope he would be. Otherwise, we’ll know those monsters can simply wreak havoc on our cities anytime they want.”

  Kristen sank onto the couch and rubbed her face. It was all so damn exhausting. She stood, snatched a donut, and sat again. Was this really how the world worked? Justice meant something different depending on who you were, on your connections, and how much money you had? It was disgusting—absolutely disgusting—that people rotted in jail because they’d been desperate and done something stupid like rob a convenience store while at the same time, the most powerful of all could get away with almost anything. If one was powerful enough, laws didn’t matter. All that mattered was prestige. And Shadowstorm had cultivated his for centuries.

  He could do anything he wanted. Well, Kristen thought, not anything. He’d said he’d wanted to throw that dragon Ironclaw off a building for a long time, but he hadn’t. There was some kind of code dragons lived by. There had to be laws too—if there weren’t, why would there be a dragon SWAT?

  “You know, I think… I think there might actually be a way,” she said in mid-bite of her donut.

  Drew smirked. “I gotta say, I love that you don’t know how to stop.”

  “No. No, I’m serious. I know, he learned about me during our training, but I’ve learned about him too. I think we could do it.”

  “Oh yeah?” He raised an eyebrow. “Do you want me to go to tell the captain to ready a cell for a goddamn dragon?”

  “No, no, not at all. Listen.” She looked hastily around the empty lounge and lowered her voice. “For this to work, I’ll need a team.”

  “Yeah, well, you obviously have one of those. I’m sure even Jim would fight for you now. You’re Detroit PD’s Steel Dragon. You know that.”

  “Not for this. Are you willing to work outside our normal modes of operation?”

  He inclined his head as he considered that. “Absolutely. If it means bringing down the shitbag who’s responsible for Jonesy’s death, you have my support.”

  “Do you think the team will go for it?”

  The question drew an immediate laugh. “Are you kidding? Hernandez would do anything for Jonesy’s memory, and the others would do anything to make the Steel Dragon proud.”

  “Dragon or not, I want Black to know he’s not untouchable, not in our city.”

  Chapter Forty-Five

  The team took to Kristen’s plan far more quickly than she’d anticipated. Which possibly meant they should have spent a little more time developing it, but no one had wanted to wait.

  Mr Black had said he was above the law, but if he left town, he really would be. Maybe he was nervous, too, although she couldn’t be sure. He had raised the matter of jurisdiction so perhaps he might consider running. At least, that’s what she had told her team. The result was that in less than twenty-four hours, they already began to put the plan into action.

  She told herself it was because she’d convinced them and they’d seen the logic of acting quickly before he could adjust to the new status quo, but she really couldn’t be sure. It was preferable to believe it wasn’t her aura that had made her team agree so quickly, even though she knew she still didn’t have perfect control of the ability. She wanted to catch Mr Black so badly and knew they did too. He’d taken one of their own, after all, but for her, it was more than that. She wondered if her team felt the way she did because she forced them to. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling but she decided she could feel guilty about it when her city was no longer in danger from a monster who’d tried to compel it to consume itself with violence.

  The team pulled up to the gate of the dragon’s mansion in a SWAT van disguised to look like a utility truck.

  Kristen wasn’t inside. She waited a block away for the right moment with a radio on to hear the conversation.

  “We had a report of a gas leak?” Beanpole said from the driver’s seat. It was amazing how completely disinterested he sounded—like every repairman called in for every false alarm ever all rolled into one dude who simply wanted to get home.

  “We didn’t report any gas leak,” the guard said. She could practically hear him frown.

  “Are you sure about that?” her teammate replied, his voice thick with sarcasm. “I told you this was another waste of our time. If we’re outdoors and can smell it, that normally means it’s already at a dangerous level.” He turned to Butters, who was in the passenger seat. “Do you smell anything I don’t?”

  “Of course, I smell it. You can’t miss the stink. And I also told you that the gentleman who lives here wouldn’t waste our time.” His mock outrage at his companion slighting Mr Black seemed to work. The guard cleared his throat and sniffed loudly enough for her to hear him over the radio. If he had to side with one of the repairmen, the thinking was he’d go with the one who called his boss a gentleman.

  “You know, now that you mention it—”

  Part of the fence exploded in a shower of white sparks. They had hoped the guard wouldn’t be able to recognize different kinds of explosions and it seemed the gamble had paid off.

  “Holy shit! Holy shit—what do we do?” he shouted so loudly it forced feedback.

  “Let us in! We need to shut the mainline off before this whole place goes up. Do you guys have a control switch in there?”

  “I…I don’t know!”

  “That’s fine,” Butters said. “Let us in and we’ll take care of it.”

  The guard turned to his controls and opened the gate.

  When he looked down, Hernandez and Kristen snuck in through the hole in the fence the demolitions expert had created and ran through the garden, keeping the truck between them and the guard.

  Kristen had never learned the full story behind Sebastian’s collection of cowering human sculptures. But she found that she no longer particularly cared about them either. She knew she didn’t like them, so when they began to blow up, one by one, from the explosives her teammate dropped at each of their feet, it filled her with nothing but a sense of pleasure at seeing those tortured faces freed from their master’s gaze.

  At the third explosion, she felt him. Either he’d heard the explosions or the guard had told him. His aura—normally so calm and controlled—had ignited with rage.

  The servants poured out of the house but Mr Black wasn’t with them. That suited her perfectly.

  She’d given her team a plan, but she didn’t know if she would stick to it. While her purpose was to defeat Shadowstorm—she had to defeat him—if she had an opportunity to do more, she would take it. If she saw an opening to kill him, she would do so. She’d killed the men who’d worked for him. Why did their leader deserve anything different?

  There was no way to be sure how all this would play out, but as she raced across the manicured grounds that now erupted in flames and used her dragon abilities to quickly outpace the rest of her team, she became sure of one thing. She would make the dragon pay for what he had done to her city and she would make him answer for what he’d done to her friend.

&n
bsp; Chapter Forty-Six

  Her body already transformed to steel, Kristen barreled through the mansion and tracked the other dragon’s aura. It led her through his home and she followed the direct route and simply pounded through walls as easily as football players ran through paper banners.

  She bulldozed a path through room after room and crushed treasure after treasure until she thrust through the final one and found Mr Black outside.

  He stood on his sandy training court, wearing nothing but black pants and black gloves trimmed with red. She hated those gloves.

  His posture stiff and rigid, he glared at her. “I knew you were coming, Steel Dragonling. I’ve waited for you outside, in the obvious place to have this fight.”

  Thunder cracked, and an eerie darkness gathered on the horizon. She never had asked him if he could control the weather, but it looked like she had her answer.

  “Oops? Did I track mud through your house?” She stepped onto the sandy court and kicked her shoes off.

  “You do understand that I didn’t teach you everything I know, correct? That for you, this will be the fight of your life, and for me, this will be but another demonstration from a student destined to live in my shadow.”

  She snarled her defiance. He had taught her a considerable amount, this was true, but he hadn’t taught her anything about her steel abilities that she didn’t already know. And one of the things she’d learned from him might be his downfall. After all, it was Shadowstorm who had delivered the lesson of what it felt like to lose a friend. She wasn’t so naïve as to think she could make him feel the pain of it but she could still take something from him. The arrogant look on his face would be a good start.

  Without warning, she raced forward and her steel toes propelled her through the sand until she moved at a blur.

  He anticipated her, clasped his hands together, and raised them above his head. She veered at the last moment, but he had anticipated that too and twisted his body so he could still strike. His fists caught her on the shoulders, and she catapulted out of the court. Her steel body scraped a groove into his manicured lawn.

  Kristen stood. She’d hardly felt the blow. Being made of steel had advantages, after all. She attacked again and this time, leapt into a flying kick. Something about being in the air felt right. She had a moment of exhilaration like a foreshadowing of that other still-elusive dragon part of her as it tried to break free.

  But the feeling was a distraction. Shadowstorm caught her leg and hurled her away with a roar. Once again, she careened away and the feeling of weightlessness was quickly replaced by the knot in her stomach from momentum she couldn’t control. She impacted a marble statue that shattered in the collision.

  Unperturbed, she picked a broken hand up and threw it at him, followed by a woman’s crying head and a torso.

  Her adversary deflected the first two, but she could tell they hurt his forearms all the same. His skin wasn’t steel and she had thrown chunks of marble at him as fast as most of the pitchers for the Tigers could. The third piece—the torso—caught him in the shoulder with sufficient force to make him stumble.

  She had already begun to sprint when that thunked into him. He recovered quickly, though, and she only managed to land a few punches to his gut before he grasped her by her throat and threw her across the sandy arena.

  Shadowstorm was breathing hard. Obviously, tossing her around wasn’t easy for him. So much of her training with him had been focused on using her speed and strength rather than her steel abilities. He obviously hadn’t taken into account how much heavier it really made her. She realized that she might actually be able to win the fight.

  While she wasn’t stronger than him, she carried far more bulk and weight. If she could use that difference in their bodies, she could finish this.

  Encouraged, she took a few steps back until she stood near one of the metal dragon statues that looked like it was rising from the ground. She caught hold of the clawed hand and pulled it loose. While she didn’t quite have the strength to lift it directly, her adversary had taught her how to use leverage.

  It took effort but she managed to yank it free and swung it as he launched himself onto her. She powered a blow across his head with the arm and he tumbled with a curse.

  He stood and spat blood. The grass ignited with hissing flames where his spittle touched it. She swung the arm again. He dodged, darted forward, and kicked her in the groin.

  The strike accomplished little except to hurt his foot.

  Kristen tried to swing the arm for another assault but she was too slow. By the time the weapon arced toward him, Shadowstorm had clamped a hand on her forearm. He squeezed hard and despite that it wasn’t particularly painful, the pressure was still enough to make her drop her impromptu weapon.

  She tried to kick him and thought she managed it, but the blow went past him. Or through him? She couldn’t be sure but she felt certain it should have landed.

  Her opponent used her confusion to his advantage. He caught her by the neck and tightened his grasp.

  Although she was made of steel, it wasn’t exactly rock solid. She could move, after all, which meant his grip on her neck compressed her flesh exactly like it had when he’d squeezed her forearm.

  The dragon grunted and lifted her from the ground. Veins bulged in his neck and his arm flexed so tightly, she thought it might burst. Still, he didn’t drop her to the grass and instead, lifted her higher and squeezed.

  Involuntarily, she choked around the crushing hold around her throat and began to hammer on his shoulders with steel punches and kick his chest with steel feet. He really was a huge opponent. Her feet were nowhere near the ground.

  “Enough of this!” Shadowstorm bellowed and dropped her. She landed hard and managed to keep her feet under her, but he simply shoved her to the left and over his outstretched leg. Her ass hit met the sand but he didn’t release her. Instead, he followed her down and drove her throat to the sand as he did so. He tightened his hold and dragged her by the neck toward the outside edge of the training court.

  “You still don’t understand leverage,” he said while she gagged and tried to cough. The advantage didn’t come without a price for him, however, and he panted with the exertion required. The weight of her steel body was considerable, even for the hulking man. If she could go back on the offensive—if she could only breathe and fight back—she could do this.

  Kristen found it more and more difficult to believe those thoughts.

  When her adversary heaved her over the edge of the training court, his hand faltered and she struck him in the thigh. He cried out in pain and dropped her. Instead of a punch, she’d tried a karate chop. The smaller surface area of the blow had worked well and magnified the force of her blow. Given that her skin was made of steel, it didn’t hurt her at all. Funny, he had never shown her that.

  She rose, her hands held like knives in front of her and told herself she could do this. Truthfully, she had no choice. If she lost, she knew he would slaughter her friends in a heartbeat and it wouldn’t even matter to him. They were only people, after all.

  Shadowstorm roared and attacked. She lashed out with chops and tried to get inside his greater reach and work his torso. He adjusted his attack and attempted to grab her, so she retaliated in kind. For a moment, they simply pulled at each other, each dragon trying to displace the other and seize the upper hand. In the end, the victory was hers.

  Her greater steel mass worked to her advantage and she threw a shoulder against him and managed to unbalance the taller man. As soon as one of his feet lifted, she wound her arms around his torso and pulled back with every ounce of her dragon strength. She managed to hoist both his feet up and used the full power of her weight to pound him into the sand. Before he could recover, she simply fell on top of him and he gasped from the abrupt force and pressure.

  It really was odd how effective wrestling moves were when one’s body was made of steel.

  The other dragon struggled to escape from be
neath her bulk, but he couldn’t. Brian had made her watch enough wrestling that she knew the real holds from the fake ones.

  “Give up, Sebastian. It’s over. You’ve lost.” Kristen hissed her annoyance at his obduracy.

  “Foolish…girl,” Shadowstorm wheezed between breaths.

  In the next moment, her hold on him was gone and she lay in the sand.

  A dark mist drifted around her like a cloud. Flashes of lightning cracked and she narrowed her eyes against the flare of brightness. For a moment, she thought the storm on the horizon had descended onto the battle.

  The roiling mass of shadowed cloud resolved itself into her adversary’s dragon form.

  He was utterly enormous—bigger than an elephant or even two—and was covered in black scales that looked as hard and impenetrable as her steel skin. Red, angry eyes glowered with hatred above white, pointed teeth. Spines covered his back and jutted from the joints of his knees. His claws were like butcher knives on the ends of hands bigger than her torso. He might not be able to use them to slice her steel skin, but then again, she didn’t actually know what dragon claws were made of. She knew they were capable of punching through suits of armor, though, and had seen a relic in his house that bore marks of exactly that.

  She couldn’t beat him. Not like this. He was too big and too powerful, and he could fly. He knew her limitations better than she did. Panic surged in her chest and she realized he’d simply toyed with her.

  Kristen pushed herself up to run. She made it perhaps four steps before a bolt of lightning struck her.

  Everything went white-hot for a second before she tumbled into the sand, her shoulder aflame with pain that made the tasers feel like nine-volt batteries. It felt like someone had stabbed a sword through her shoulder, attached a powerline to it, and turned on all the electricity that powered Detroit.

  The pain was so intense that she couldn’t even writhe. It took everything she had to merely stay conscious.