Zoe stared at the dark wizard, the sick feeling inside of her rising. It had been her fault. She damn well knew better than to walk around with a broomstick, but she’d gotten careless about it. She didn’t dare look over at Grayson. She was breaking out into a cold sweat just thinking of the disapproval that must be in his eyes right now.
“You didn’t answer my other question,” Zoe said, raising her voice and pointing her ring threateningly at the wizard. “How many of you were there?”
The wizard laughed at her. “Touchy, touchy,” he said. “What’s the matter? Feeling a little flustered that we found you? Or that I’ve scanned all those papers and sent them to Saul? I’m assuming, since they were in code, that you were not supposed to let them fall into the wrong hands, eh?”
“Just answer the question!” Zoe yelled, shaking her ring in his face.
He laughed again. “Oh, there were just the three of us. Don’t worry, no one is going to be jumping out of the woodwork and attacking you. Not yet, anyway. But I’m sure Saul will be sending an army after you as soon as he sees the papers I sent. I might not be able to read everything that was in code, but I know enough to recognize a picture of the dragon ruby when I see it. As soon as the big boss sees that you were after the dragon ruby, he’ll be sending reinforcements. And I can die with honor, knowing that I was the one who finally intercepted a Falcon Cross quest for the ruby.”
“Die with honor?” Grayson asked in a puzzled voice. Zoe shared his confusion. The wizard didn’t appear to be seriously wounded. But then, Zoe realized that the wizard’s eyes were turning black, and everything made sudden sense.
“Turn around!” she yelled at Grayson, already turning around herself. “Turn around and run!”
He did as he was told without asking for an explanation. Which was a good thing, since it was only about five seconds later that the explosion came, knocking Grayson and Zoe both flat on their faces.
Chapter Ten
Zoe leaned down against her broomstick, pushing it to the upper limits of the speed it could handle. She ignored the throbbing pain on the left side of her head. She could feel the sticky warm wetness of blood where she’d landed hard against a rock, but she didn’t dare raise a hand to wipe at the wound right now. She needed to concentrate all of her energy on flying.
Grayson was behind her, his chest pressed close against her back. The explosion had destroyed his backpack, so they’d rescued as much as they could of his things—which hadn’t been much—and consolidated everything into Zoe’s bag. Grayson now wore that bag on his back, meaning that now there was no bag separating him from Zoe as they flew. She rather liked the closeness of his body to hers, but she wished the chance to fly with their bodies against each other had come under happier circumstances. Even Grayson’s arms circled around her waist could not lessen the terror Zoe felt right now.
The wizard in the clearing had self-destructed in a remarkably large explosion. Self-destruction was becoming a common problem amongst Saul’s dark wizards. They had, it seemed, been taught to self-destruct rather than be taken captive. The wizard Grayson had caught must have realized he wasn’t going to escape, and had set off a timed self-destruction spell before Zoe had frozen him with a stunning spell. Zoe was lucky she had realized what was happening. If she and Grayson hadn’t started running away from the wizard when they did, they would have certainly been killed. Grayson had sustained worse injuries than Zoe. He had two huge gashes in his head, another large gash in his arm that probably should have been stitched up, and some sort of problem with his ankle. Zoe guessed it was sprained, but Grayson insisted it was nothing—even though he hadn’t been able to keep from hobbling on it as they rushed around preparing to fly like the wind for the location up on Red Point Mountain where they hoped the dragon ruby was located.
Zoe kept giving herself the same mental pep talk over and over as she flew. Saul hadn’t known until about half an hour ago that the dragon ruby’s location had been discovered. He likely didn’t have many soldiers out here in the middle of Colorado, just waiting and ready to go searching for a dragon ruby. If Zoe and Grayson flew quickly, they had a good chance of reaching the ruby’s location before anyone Saul could send.
Zoe had abandoned all attempts to maintain invisibility or protective shields by flying slowly. She and Grayson had both agreed to screw the shields and focus on beating the forces of darkness to the ruby. This was why, not too much later, a dark wizard had no trouble spotting them zooming toward him across the sky. The dark wizard had been waiting for them, and he raised his magic ring to place an invisible magic wall right in front of Zoe.
She saw the wizard and realized what he had done. But she was flying so fast that, despite her attempts to come to a screeching halt before the wall, she still collided with it at an uncomfortably fast rate of speed. She raised her magic ring and prepared to attack the dark wizard, cursing under her breath. She’d been hoping to make it a little further without having to fight another battle with one of Saul’s dark wizards, who seemed to be everywhere. Behind her, Zoe heard Grayson let out a low growl, and felt him tensing up. He was preparing to shift. Damn it, this meant their backpack was going to go flying to the earth again.
But before Zoe could launch an attack, or Grayson could begin shifting into dragon form, the dark wizard raised his hands above his head, showing a clear gesture of vulnerability and that he was not preparing another attack on them.
“Stop!” the dark wizard yelled. “I’m not here to attack you. I merely have a message from Saul.”
Zoe paused, uncertain. Behind her, Grayson remained tense, but did not yet begin to shift.
“What’s your message, then,” Grayson yelled, his voice coming out in something representing a growl. Zoe tensed up quite a bit herself. She kept her hands firmly on the handle of the broomstick, hovering. She never took her eyes off the dark wizard. If he made one false move, she’d have her magic ring in the air, unleashing a destructive spell at him before he had time to complete any attack spells of his own. Zoe was the fastest wizard on the draw, and she felt confident that she could move faster than the wizard in front of her. He didn’t look like much of a warrior. His appearance definitely fit that of a simple messenger or scout. Zoe felt herself relax just the tiniest bit. There were plenty of mortal threats out there, but this wizard was not one of them.
“What’s your message?” Grayson yelled again. “Speak up now, or we’ll make short work of destroying you and continuing on our way.”
The dark wizard gave Grayson a withering look, which Zoe found somewhat amusing. Unless the wizard had backup somewhere that Zoe couldn’t see, he didn’t stand a chance in a fight against Grayson and Zoe. Part of Zoe wanted to go ahead and destroy him now. After all, he was an enemy soldier, and he was directly blocking their flight path to the dragon ruby. But another part of her wanted to hear whatever supposed message Saul had sent. She hoped there was some information in the message that would be helpful in determining whether Saul had any chance of actually reaching the dragon ruby before them.
She should have been more careful what she hoped for. She wanted reassurance that Saul was too far behind them to be able to stop them. But when the dark wizard finally spoke, his words were anything but reassuring.
“Saul would like to inform you that we’ve dispatched a large squadron of soldiers to the town of Shadowdale,” the wizard said, his face twisting up into a wicked smile. “You must be familiar with Shadowdale, since it’s the closest town to Red Point Mountain, where the dragon ruby is waiting for Saul’s men to recover it.”
Neither Zoe nor Grayson replied. The dark wizard was baiting them, trying to get an angry reaction by stating that Saul’s soldiers would be the one to recover the dragon ruby. Zoe would not engage in petty arguments with this fool. She would let him finish his message, and then, he’d better hightail it out of there before she took him down with one strike from her magic ring.
The wizard’s face looked a bit crestfallen
at the lack of reaction from Zoe, but he pressed on in a haughty tone nonetheless. “Within the next half hour, our soldiers will have reached Shadowdale. We’ll be holding the citizens hostage, and we’ll be killing one every ten minutes unless you abandon your quest for the ruby.”
Zoe felt her heart dropping. Saul knew all too well that the one way to disrupt the plans of the good shifters and wizards was to hurt innocent people. Unlike Saul’s soldiers, the good soldiers cared about what happened to people. It’s why they were fighting this war in the first place. Zoe knew that Saul would have no qualms about killing off an entire town of people if it served his purposes. Still, a small part of her wanted to believe that this wizard was bluffing. That there wasn’t really an army on its way to Shadowdale. After all, Saul wouldn’t have had time to organize something so quickly, would he have?
“You’re lying,” Zoe said, glaring at the other wizard. Behind her, Grayson let out a roar.
“Let’s get rid of this fool now, and be done with it,” Grayson said. But the dark wizard only laughed.
“Oh, I’m telling you the truth,” he said. “Make no mistake about that. But if you want the blood of hundreds of innocent people on your hands, that’s on you. We’re still going to beat you to the dragon ruby. We had wizards close by, and they’re flying even faster than you are to reach Red Point Mountain.”
Zoe wished she was close enough to spit in the dark wizard’s face. Where did he get off, telling them that the blood of innocent people would be on their hands? The dark soldiers were the ones actually doing the killing. Still, Zoe knew she would not be able to turn her back on a whole city of people in need of protection. And she could tell that the dark wizard was not, in fact, lying—as much as she wished he was. One of the things the Masters back in Falcon Cross had taught Zoe was how to spot a liar, and this dark wizard had none of the signs. He was a craven asshole, to be sure. But he was telling the truth. Saul was going to destroy Shadowdale. Zoe felt her heart dropping. She put a brave, determined expression on her face and yelled at the wizard.
“You can’t stop us from getting the ruby!” Zoe yelled. “We’ll get it first, and then we’ll use it to destroy your army at Shadowdale, along with the rest of Saul’s blasted army.”
But the other wizard just laughed. “Yeah, good luck getting the ruby before us. Our soldiers are closer than you are to Red Point Mountain. You can’t beat us there. And all you’re doing by trying is giving us an excuse to destroy Shadowdale.”
Before Zoe or Grayson could reply, the dark wizard had turned and zoomed away as quickly as his broomstick would carry him.
“Get him!” Grayson yelled, pointing after the wizard. But Zoe only shook her head.
“Magicae murus terminantur,” she said, pointing her ring at the invisible magic wall that the dark wizard had erected. The spell removed the wall, and Zoe could fly forward once again. But she didn’t move very quickly. Instead, she slowly drifted, rubbing her forehead in frustration.
“Go!” Grayson yelled, his voice filled with frustration of his own. “Get him!”
Zoe shook her head. “Grayson, chasing after him would be a waste of our time. I think we need to adjust our course to head to Shadowdale.”
Even though Grayson was behind Zoe and she couldn’t see his face, she knew it would have an angry expression on it right about now.
“Zoe, are you out of your mind? There’s no way we’re abandoning our quest for the ruby to save a couple of random people in a town out in the middle of nowhere. Once we have the dragon ruby, we can use it to go back and drive back Saul’s soldiers from Shadowdale.”
“By then, people will have died. Also, we don’t know how to use the ruby, and if we can’t figure it out it won’t do us much good in a battle.”
“We’ll figure it out between the two of us,” Grayson said, his voice rising. “It can’t be that hard.”
“It might be,” Zoe said. “I’ve heard the stones are pretty useless if you don’t know how to use them right. Besides, we might not even be able to get to the ruby first. That wizard sounded pretty certain that Saul’s soldiers were going to beat us there.”
“Yeah, well, they are going to beat us there for sure, if you don’t get moving. Jesus, Zoe, fly. If we don’t get that ruby first, everything is ruined.”
Zoe felt a strange chill run down her spine at Grayson’s words. Something about his tone told her that this was about more than whether the wiser option was to save Shadowdale or get the ruby.
“Grayson,” she said, in a suspicious tone. “We cannot let a whole town of people die. Not for a ruby that we don’t know is even there, and which we probably won’t beat Saul’s men to, anyway. What’s ruined if we save the town of Shadowdale instead of letting them die? Your chance at glory? At being famous as the dragon who recovered the dragon ruby?”
Grayson’s stony silence was all the answer Zoe needed.
“Grayson, you should be ashamed of yourself! This mission isn’t about fame or about proving that you’re the coolest dragon around. It’s about saving lives. And right now, the only way to do that is to go to Shadowdale and fight for its people.”
“Oh come on, Zoe,” Grayson countered, the tone of his voice bordering on all-out rage. “You’re in no position to talk about things not being about fame, when fame just fell in your lap. It’s easy for you to say that it doesn’t matter. And besides, you’re wrong. We can let a whole town of people die. I don’t care if our chances of reaching the dragon ruby before Saul are slim. I have to try. The dragon ruby is too important to just let it go without a fight.”
“Grayson. The people. They’re going to die.”
“I don’t care,” he said. His voice sounded strangely cold and emotionless now. “Are you going to fly to the dragon ruby, or do I have to fly there myself?”
Zoe felt herself growing hot with a mixture of anger, disbelief, and disappointment. “Fly yourself,” she spat out. “If you’re going to abandon a whole town of people to their death in a futile attempt at glory, then I can’t stop you. But I want no part in it.”
“It’s not about glory,” Grayson said. But his empty words didn’t convince Zoe.
“If you’re going, then go,” she said. “I have some lives to save.”
“So do I,” Grayson spat back. “That’s what capturing the dragon ruby is all about. Saving lives. Here, take this.”
He handed Zoe the backpack he’d been wearing. She grabbed it with one hand, not saying a word to him. A few seconds later, he jumped from the broomstick, already letting out a roar. Zoe watched him falling away from her toward the earth, already morphing into dragon form. She watched as wings sprouted a few seconds later, and he flapped them vigorously to bring a halt to his freefall. He turned his giant dragon body toward Red Point Mountain, flying at top speed.
Zoe hovered in the air, watching him go for several minutes with an empty feeling in her heart. She’d been such an idiot, she realized. She’d let herself fall for a man who cared more about fame than about people. And wasn’t fame the thing she hated more than anything? It was so stupid, so arbitrary. What had she been thinking, letting herself give in to an attraction to Grayson? He was obsessed with fame. Obsessed with the thing she hated. Why had she ever assumed things between them could work?
Still, she couldn’t deny she cared for him, as angry as she was right now. It hurt to watch him fly away toward the dragon ruby, more than anything in her life had ever hurt before. She wouldn’t go after him, though. She knew in her gut that they were not going to beat Saul to the dragon ruby. She knew Grayson would think she was being ridiculous if she told him she just had a feeling that it wasn’t going to work out. He would have laughed at her, and told her that dragons rely on facts, not feelings.
Zoe took a deep breath and rallied the last bit of her strength. She didn’t have time to sit here and pine after Grayson, or mourn the loss of the man she thought he was—the man who would have placed the well-being of a town of people high abo
ve a losing quest for glory.
Sadly, Zoe turned her broomstick in the direction of Shadowdale and bent low against its handle, once again picking up speed until she was flying like the wind.
Chapter Eleven
Grayson never bothered to look back at Zoe. He knew she wouldn’t be following him. She was going to go save Shadowdale. Try to save it, anyway. Although Zoe was more talented than your average wizard, he still wasn’t sure one wizard could do much against a whole squadron of Saul’s soldiers. He should have admired her willingness to try, but, right now, he was too angry at her for abandoning the dragon ruby to feel anything but frustration toward her. The dragon ruby was their mission. Not saving Shadowdale. She had no business changing course mid-mission.
Even as Grayson fumed, he had to push away the little voice within his head telling him that Zoe had been perfectly within her rights to change course for Shadowdale. There was a well-understood rule that any mission could be adjusted at any time if necessary to save the lives of innocent people. A threat like the one the dark wizard had just made against Shadowdale certainly qualified as something from which innocent people needed to be saved. But Grayson could not bring himself to give up on the dragon ruby. If he botched this mission, he might never get another good one. This was his chance of a lifetime, and he wasn’t about to blow it.
Grayson pumped his wings harder, ignoring the burning sensation of overworked muscles. He was pushing himself too hard, he knew. At this rate, he wasn’t going to have any strength left if he needed to fight Saul’s soldiers to get the ruby. He was placing his bets on beating everyone else to the ruby. He had no idea how much of a gamble that really was. The dark wizard claimed that Saul’s soldiers would beat Grayson there, but there was no proof. Grayson flew faster still, giving all his energy over to this one quest.
Courage and the Dragon (Redwood Dragons Book 9) Page 10