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“Miss McKinnon? I’m Klara.” A tall woman wearing the close fitting garb of a rider, but without the helmet or spear approached us. “You can have your dragon rest on one of the eyries provided while the hearing is underway.”
“Why would I do that?” M said, his teeth baring in his version of a smile when she jumped back. “If you wish to discuss the matter of my existence, surely I should be present?”
“Oh, well, yes, of course, Great One. There is a precedence for this but we usually use the open-air meeting spaces to do so. I’ll just check to see if it’s available.”
“No need,” he said with a shiver and his form condensed down into that of a dog.
“Oh, oh…” The woman looked like she was in full brainfart mode, her mind not able to take in what she just saw. Our escort walked over, flicking their spears to life.
“I’m handing them over to your custody, Chief Official,” Raith said, passing her the scroll. “Alert Lord Graves to the fact we need to speak to him about the Damorican insolence.”
Klara took the document and nodded, still looking a little shell-shocked, but she pulled herself together with some effort. She led us inside, through a massive complex filled with the office spaces of the various government departments. The Council met towards the back of the building, apparently. We were brought to the waiting area and told that someone would bring us into the hearing once they were ready.
My knee began to bounce the moment I sat down, M sitting next to my feet. “It’ll be OK,” Jez said, sitting next to me and patting my leg. People seemed to be doing that a lot lately. Why the knee? What was so reassuring about knee patting?
“We’re in a foreign country, about to go through god knows what legal proceedings, surrounded by soldiers who have weapons that could slice and dice us with little to no effort. I’d say there're grounds for worry,” Flea said, grabbing a cigarette out and lighting it.
“I’ll have some say over that,” Miazydar said.
“Yeah? Do plasma spears cut up dragons as well as humans?”
My dragon fell silent at this, considering the idea. ?
??Stop worrying,” Jez said. “Nan McKinnon is watching over us. All will be well.”
We were about to find out if what she said was true. The massive twin doors in front of us opened and a man walked out onto the polished stone floor. He looked down at his scroll and said, “Therese McKinnon and…Miazydar?” I stood up in response and he waved us over.
“Joon Nelasca,” he said by way of introduction, “I’m the Council secretary. The members are ready to see you now.”
We walked down a dark hallway, pictures of what I assumed were prior councilmen and women hanging on the wall. Another set of doors were placed at the end and when we went through them, the space expanded out into a long oval room. A brilliant skylight made of stained glass stretched above us, depicting several dragons and men fighting some battle of note. A table that echoed the shape of the room filled most of it, men and women arranged on the far side of it with empty chairs on ours. “Please, take a seat,” Joon said.
Impassive faces greeted us across the table and I noted that several plasma spears had been left standing in a purpose-built rack behind them. A large man sat in the centre, his brown hair pushed back from his forehead. He skimmed over a scroll before him, then put it to one side.
“So, we have an unregistered dragon and a non-Aravisian rider. How the hell did this happen?”
I opened my mouth to answer but one of the men held up a hand. “Milord, it appears that the dragon has been a pawn in some kind of Damorican internal power structure. I‘m not sure how, but the revolutionaries have obviously found a feral clutch and decided to augment their forces. I’ve been in frequent communication with my counterpart in the new regime and got little else other than that they were used to remove the former Prince.”
The leader, Lord Graves I assumed, rolled his eyes. “Little communication is unsurprising. What they’ve done contravenes about half of the treaties that keep us from their borders. All dragonlets or eggs found are to be brought to Aravisia or face the combined might of our forces.” He sat back in his chair, hands behind his head. “What’s our situation currently, General Grall? There was that border dispute with Sariah, correct?”
“Resolved a fortnight ago, milord.”
“Good, good. Well, we’ll hold off on military action for now, but will consider it if diplomatic avenues fail. They need to pay for this and well. Aravisia does not lend its dragons like mercenaries to overthrow monarchs placed in power by the gods themselves. Now, to this matter.” The man looked up at me. “Our usual punishment for the illegal raising and bonding of dragons is death.”
“I’m sorry, what the freaking hell?” I said.
“The fuck you will.” Flea got to his feet. He started rummaging around in his bag of ‘toiletries’ but I stopped him with my hand.
What the fuck, what the actual fuck?
“But in return for some information about your Damorican handlers, we could commute the sentence to life imprisonment. Your bond with your dragon will, of course, be sundered and he will be placed with a more suitable candidate. Who do we have on the waiting list currently?”
A woman with long dark hair peered at a scroll. “If we’re going with a merit-based selection, and we’re due to, there’s a Luce Windar. Excellent scores, intellectual capacity score was off the charts. Well liked within his workplace in the Department of Primary Resources.”
“I’d prefer a soldier if we’re going with merit,” General Grall said. “Too many of these merit riders have no idea of what it takes to succeed in battle. I have several candidates I’d like to put forward.”
“If you’re quite finished deciding my fate,” Miazydar said, “I think I might have something to say about this.”
Well, you could have heard a pin drop. Every eye swivelled around to look at my dog, who had placed his paws on the shining timber surface of the table.
