Page 96 of Dragon 7

God. . .stop showing me these things. Please.

I put my gaze forward.

The baby reached the middle of the field, stopped, and sat back on her chubby haunches. Then, she looked up, and her eyes found my face across the distance.

No. Don’t look at me. I don’t like that. It hurts my heart.

A breath caught in my chest and refused to leave.

She had the prettiest eyes I had ever seen.

Dark.

Loving.

Deep.

Calm.

Eyes that had never learned what fear was.

Eyes that watched me across the grass with the patient curiosity of a child who had wandered into a room full of adults and felt entirely safe.

Eyes that reminded me of our Tiger.

Eyes that made me want to walk out onto that field of our armed enemies, pick her up, tuck her against my shoulder, and let her safely sleep there.

I wanted to wipe the blood off her cheek with my thumb.

I wanted to ask her whose baby she was, and where her mother and father had gone, and whether anyone had ever told her how beautiful her eyes were.

She blinked at me.

And then she was gone.

I breathed slowly through my nose, and my eyes watered.

There was a seed of truth in my chest that was trying to rise. It was trying to plant deep in my heart and grow. Trying to bloom into the facts of who she was, but I would not allow myself to give it sun and nutrients.

No. . .whoever you are. . .don’t come back again. It hurts to see you. I have to fight tonight.

The lollipop went sweet on my tongue again.

I shifted my eyes back to the field.

A ripple moved through Akiro's men. It started at the left edge of their formation and spread right.

Voices stopped mid-shout. Guns lowered from the air. Men turned their faces upward and squinted at a sky that held only the moon and the clouds.

One man near the front of their formation dropped to a knee and stayed there with his rifle pointed to the sky.

They saw nothing.

But they had felt something just like I did.

Yes. . .I think Kenji really has control of this dragon-shadow.

Whatever moved above our canopy had passed over them now, and hundreds of armed men went quiet in a wave I could watch with my own eyes.