The Steel Tower (Dragons of Midnight Book 2)

by Silver Milan

  “So wait, humans go to these clubs?” Ariel said. “I thought humans didn’t know vampires live among us.”

  “Sorry, I meant human witches,” James said. “Though I’m sure a few humans occasional stumble in. All of the clubs employ witches of some sort, high-ranking enough to perform any necessary mind wipes.”

  The conversation fizzled out shortly after that, and Ariel pulled up a book on the ereader app she had installed on her phone. These days she liked paranormal and urban fantasy, but she also read romance and mysteries. Her current novel was about a big bad dragon who had slept for centuries on a pile of gold, and had his rest rudely interrupted by a woman treasure hunter. He could shift into human form, like Jett, but otherwise he was nothing like the man she loved. Still, it was an enjoyable way to pass the time.

  Five hours into the flight almost everyone was asleep. The lights had dimmed, and the Potentials had spread out across the spare couches to lie down.

  Mathis was awake beside her. Hugh was up, too, but he was using a laptop on a different couch on the far side of the cabin.

  “I could never sleep on a plane,” Ariel said, looking up from her ebook. “Something about trying to catch some Zs while sitting never really works for me.”

  “You want to try the bedroom?” Mathis said. “No one has claimed it yet.”

  “Hmm,” Ariel said. “That’s an interesting idea. I might take you up on that offer when I feel tired enough.”

  She waited for him to say more, but the witch was a man of few words. Ariel hadn’t really gotten to know him in the preceding days. Maybe it was time to change that.

  “How did you become a witch?” she asked him.

  “Same way as you,” Mathis said. “I was discovered by a tester.”

  “So it has to work different with normal humans,” Ariel said. “The testers can’t just go into cities and towns and round up the people for testing. That would ruin the whole under-the-radar thing you Wayfarers have going for you.”

  “No you’re right,” Mathis said. “A little over two hundred years ago I was found by a Wayfarer in Scotland. I was a prince of my clan, and traveled to Venice to learn the trade of glassblowing. My works were renown, treasured by nobles across Europe. I didn’t know it at the time, but I tapped into the Strength and employed Weaves while I worked, imbuing my glass works with a little bit of magic. A Wayfarer bought one of my works in a faraway country, and sensed the Strength imprint I had left in the glass, then tracked me down.”

  “But I thought humans had to touch dragon bone to siphon?” Ariel asked.

  Mathis nodded. “There was an heirloom passed down to me when I came of age.” He held up his finger, indicating one of his bone rings. It contained a bright blue ruby in the center. “I didn’t know it was made of dragon bone, of course. Not until the Wayfarer showed up at my clan and took me away under the cover of darkness.” He shook his head.

  “It must have been hard to leave your clan,” Ariel said. “Especially if you were a prince.”

  “The first year was hard, very hard,” Mathis admitted. “But it was also the best year of my life. The camaraderie, the learning… there was a certain other apprentice whom I bonded with immediately. A dragon shifter, from Midnight in fact.”

  “A dragon shifter?” Ariel said. “What was her name?”

  “You’re assuming it was a her,” Mathis said.

  “Well, wasn’t it?” Ariel said.

  Mathis smiled, his eyes looking distant as he vanished into his memories. “Yes. She was so beautiful, that first time I saw her. And every day thereafter. It was like someone had taken the rays of the sun and sculpted them into a living and breathing person with hair of gold and eyes of fire. I was smitten.”

  “Sounds like she was a huge distraction,” Ariel said.

  He laughed, sounding sad. “That’s one of the reasons the first year was so hard. But I’d never take back those memories. Never.”

  Ariel considered everything he had told her. “Is that why you stopped to look back one last time when we were boarding the jet? To stare out across the open hangar, toward Midnight? Wishing a silent farewell to the dragon you left behind all those years ago?”

  Mathis looked at her a moment, and she thought he was going to say something, but then he looked away.

  Ariel wanted to press him further, but it was obvious their relationship hadn’t ended well. So instead she decided to change the subject.

  “So you never really did answer my original question,” Ariel said. “The Wayfarers found you because of the ring, but how do they normally find humans who don’t have dragon bone heirlooms?”

  “There are a few ways,” Mathis said, clearly relieved by the subject change. “If someone is exceptionally bright or talented, the top of their field, there is a good chance they are Potentials. We have testers who specialize in humans. They’ll arrange a meeting with one of these candidates, come up with an excuse to have them wear the testing device, and then it’s done. We also set up events at exhibitions and fairs, under the guise of ‘aura reading.’ We usually snag at least two or three a year that way.”

  “Jett told me the Orions also search for witches among the humans,” Jett said.

  “They do,” Mathis told her. “The hunters use similar methods, going after the best and brightest. Sometimes they’ll set up a watch on a given person, and when the Wayfarer comes to test them, they’ll attempt to capture both. The hunters have special compulsion collars they give to captured witches, similar to what the dragons of Midnight use on their vampire slaves. Those collars only work on the youngest witches: if I was captured, they wouldn’t bother with a collar, they’d just execute me.”

  “What about Hugh?” Ariel asked.

  “If I was captured, he’d already be dead,” Mathis said.

  “The hunters sound like such a friendly bunch,” Ariel said. “Do they know about the Steel Tower?”

  “Of course they do,” Mathis said. “But just like Midnight and the other big dragon dens and vampire covens, they wouldn’t dare attack. You’ll understand why when we arrive. Let’s just say, there are more than a few defenses.”

  That didn’t bode well for Jett intending to visit her every weekend…

  “What’s going to happen to us when we reach the Tower?” she said.

  “You’ll be assigned rooms and begin your training,” Mathis said.

  “Will we dorm with human Potentials?” Ariel asked.

  “So many questions,” Mathis said, sounding exasperated.

  Ariel had to smile. “That’s what Jett always tells me. I guess I just like to know what I’m getting myself into.”

  “You’ll dorm with everyone,” Mathis said. “Lions. Wolves. Bears. Humans. We make no distinctions. The moment you set foot in the Tower, you all become apprentice witches to us. Men and women have separate dorms, however. We do have some rules...”

  “I guess it would be bad if an apprentice got pregnant...” Ariel said.

  “Very much so.”

  “What happens?” Ariel asked.

  “What, if an apprentice gets pregnant?” Mathis said. “They’re relocated to Belgrade until their pregnancy is done. And until they find an appropriate nursery to care for the child in their absence. If their pregnancy is because they slept with another member of the Tower, both of them are reprimanded of course.”

  “So having relationships with other apprentices is a no-no?” Ariel asked.

  “Not really,” Mathis said. “But getting pregnant by another apprentice is.”

  “Strange rules,” Ariel said. “But I guess you witches have had a bit of time to come up with them.”

  “Just a little bit,” Mathis replied. “After four hundred years of training apprentices, you tend to collect a few rules. Some perhaps odder than the rest.”

  On schedule, nine hours later the private jet landed at the Belgrade Nikola Tesla airport and taxied to the FBO provider: Euro Jet, the sign proclaimed in big bright letters.
>
  Ariel sent Jett a quick text to let him know she’d landed.

  “We’ve prepared passports for all of you,” Mathis said.

  Hugh handed out the passports. When Ariel got hers, she opened up to the photo page. Her mug shot stared back at her against a white background.

  “When did you take this picture?” Ariel asked.

  “Didn’t have to,” Mathis said. “You forget, I’m a witch.”

  “He came into the room I shared with Ked while we slept in one of the motels,” James said. “He thought I was sleeping, but I watched him hold his phone in front of my face. He took a picture from the front and the side. My guess is he was creating a 3D model of our faces. I’ve seen apps that work similarly.”

  “So nothing magic about it after all,” Brian said.

  “Hey,” Mathis said with a shrug. “We witches are practical people. Why expend energy on magic when technology will do?”

  After the jet entered the private hangar, a Serbian customs agent dressed in a black suit and tie came aboard and stamped their passports.

  “Welcome to Serbia,” the agent said in accented English after stamping Ariel’s passport.

  When the agent was gone, Ariel deplaned with the others. An attendant was waiting for them with their luggage piled onto a cart, and Ariel collected her backpack from the man.

  Outside the hangar, they crammed into an SUV, this one a bright red and made by a company called Skoda. Ariel, Katelyn, Michelle and Tina took the middle seats. The rear cargo compartment obviously hadn’t been designed to fit passengers, and James, Ked and Brian were forced to sit with their knees jammed right up against the seat backs of the middle row. Ariel kind of felt sorry for them, until they started repeatedly kicking the middle seats that is. A scolding from Katelyn set them straight.

  Hugh took the driver’s seat of course, and Mathis rode shotgun.

  In moments Hugh was driving them out of the airport and onto the main road to Belgrade.

  9

  Ariel gazed out the window, trying to absorb everything. Still in the vicinity of the airport, the vehicle passed an interesting donut-shaped glass building labeled “Vojvodanska Banka,” and she quickly realized the whole structure was serving as a billboard for some Serbian bank. According to her phone, the building actually functioned as an Aeronautical Museum.

  Up ahead, on the side of the highway, she saw a green sign with the letters Београд and an arrow pointing right; she took a quick picture and fed it to her translate app, which gave her “White City.” That was the Serbian name for Belgrade, and it was called that because of the white wall of a fortress that once enclosed the city in medieval times, though the wall was mostly in ruins today. Yup, she’d been reading up on it.

  Ariel was a bit disappointed because Hugh took a left turn, heading west away from the city. She was really hoping to see Belgrade, if only by car, but it seemed they weren’t even going to pass through the city.

  She pulled up her map and followed along as Hugh drove west on a highway labeled “A3,” which crossed the Syrmia region of Serbia and led all the way to the border with Croatia. The highway was bordered by fenced off villas, estates, and farms. They passed Dobanovci, considered a suburban neighborhood of Belgrade according to her phone. The buildings were quaint, plaster-walled structures with red tile roofs.

  Well, at least I got to see some of Belgrade, if only one remote neighborhood...

  They reached a small town after a few minutes and exited the A3, heading north. Thirty minutes and two more small towns later, Hugh turned off onto a secluded road bordered by thick trees on either side.

  They reached a checkpoint consisting of two rifle-wielding men clad in army gear beside a glass-walled booth. A red-and-white checkered boom gate blocked the road. The men wore headsets, and also glasses with small metal attachments on the right lenses. Projector screens?

  Mathis held up one of his rings. The closest soldier beckoned toward the booth behind him and the boom gate opened. The soldiers waved the SUV through.

  “You’ll all be getting one of these,” Mathis said, turning around to show Ariel and the others an inconspicuous silver band he wore next to the bone rings. “It contains an RFID. It will tell the guards, or any witch for that matter, your name and rank, as well as where you’re supposed to be at any given moment.”

  “So basically a way to make sure we don’t sneak out of the Tower,” Brian said.

  “I always knew you were the smartest one here,” Mathis commented dryly.

  The SUV continued down the winding country road for several minutes. Finally the thick trees fell away on either side and a cylindrical tower, at least twenty stories in height, loomed ahead. Architecture-wise it reminded her of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, without the lean, and much bigger. It was surrounded by a tall concrete wall. Walkways on top of the wall were patrolled by soldiers between lookout towers. The edges of the walkways were wrapped in deadly ribbons of razor wire.

  “Looks more like a prison than a witch training camp,” Ked said.

  “Believe me, we’re concerned more with keeping people out than trapping witches inside,” Mathis told him.

  Along the top of the wall, Ariel spotted large anti-aircraft launchers stocked with batteries of missiles.

  “Wouldn’t want to get hit by one of those,” James commented.

  She wasn’t sure how Jett was going to get past all that. She retrieved her phone, set it to silent, and took surreptitious pictures. Whatever she could do to help him, she would.

  The SUV approached a gate in the wall. More soldiers waited there, and once again Mathis raised his ring hand and the soldiers let the vehicle pass.

  Immediately inside, clusters of satellite dishes bumped up against the road on either side. Ariel spotted helicopter pads beyond some of the satellites, some of the pads holding well-armed gunships. She continued to take pictures.

  “Wow, scratch the prison comment,” Ked said. “Now it feels like we’re entering a military base.”

  Outbuildings began to crop up, and Ariel saw warehouse workers ferrying crates between two buildings. She spotted mechanics in one hangar, maintaining helicopters and vehicles, and cooks shouting from the window of another small building, from which the mouth-watering scent of cooking meat wafted. And through it all were the omnipresent soldiers, guarding buildings or out on patrol.

  She saw some witches, too, easily identifiable by the bone accessories they wore. They all dressed somewhat similarly, in different forms of business casual. White dress shirts were common, as were blouses and blazers. There were no ties, or robes, and certainly not any trench coats. Mathis was alone in his attire, at least among these witches.

  There were large swaths of land between buildings. In one such field, Ariel saw a group of young men and women in green robes gathered around a woman in business casual, apparently their professor. The woman, a witch, had an open palm held in the air, and above her fingers hovered a small red globe.

  “Slow down,” Mathis instructed Hugh, and the driver complied. “I want the Potentials to see this.”

  “Don’t tell me we have to dress in green robes while on the Tower grounds,” Tina said.

  “Oh no, you don’t dress in green robes,” Mathis said.

  “Good!” Tina said. “Because those things are fashion nightmares!”

  “You get to dress in the white robes of First Years,” Mathis said.

  “Gah!”

  “Green is the color of the Second Years,” Mathis said. “Most of you probably won’t make it that far.”

  Ariel squinted her eyes at the woman professor. “What’s that floating above her hand?”

  Mathis glanced out the window. “Water. Dyed red.”

  “Neon red,” Michelle said. “Like a hair coloring session gone bad.”

  As Ariel watched, the floating ball of water changed shape, forming a long arc, then spread apart into a lattice. More water flowed into the air from a bucket on the ground beside the p
rofessor. It was colored a neon blue.

  “The witch is demonstrating a Weave of Fire and Air,” Mathis said.

  “With water?” Katelyn asked.

  Mathis shrugged. “Water is the best medium to demonstrate Weave formation, as the affinities are otherwise only visible to the caster.”

  The two masses of different-colored water combined in an intricate pattern, and then remained in place, floating higher into the air so that all the students could see. The witch seemed to be encouraging the apprentices to follow her lead, because the green-robed men and women spread apart and began moving their hands.

  A curved, glowing mass of energy appeared in front of one of the apprentices. The field appeared before the others one by one as more students achieved the invisible design.

  “A defensive Weave,” Mathis said. “It will prevent Fire, Water, Air, or Earth from touching the apprentices.”

  As Ariel watched, the professor hurled fireballs and lightning bolts at the shielded students. The magical creations dissipated upon touching the masses of energy, and Ariel noted that those defenses shrunk after each impact.

  “Something to look forward to,” Mathis said.

  “Yeah, in a year, if we make it,” Ked said.

  The SUV reached a garage door at the base of the tower. That close, she realized the building really was made of steel. The surface was covered in small embossed symbols and polished to a burnish.

  Hugh drove inside the garage and a scuffed ramp took them to the first level. Parked between the gray concrete pillars that held up the low roof were other vehicles, most of them SUVs, though all of different makes, models and colors.

  Hugh descended to the second underground level and parked in a numbered spot between two SUVs.

  Mathis opened the door. “Well then, let’s meet your handler.”

  Ariel opened the sliding door and joined Mathis and the other apprentices outside the vehicle. Flickering lights overhead cast odd shadows as they walked across the parking garage. The group reached a small concourse area containing a stairwell and two elevators.

  A dark-skinned, middle-aged gentleman with a receding hairline was waiting for them. Dressed in a suit and tie, he wore a headset and those glasses with the metal attachment on the right lens, like one of the soldiers. The bone rings on his fingers told Ariel he was a witch.