Dragon Blood

Chapter 37

Nolan jerked awake as the door opened behind him. He looked around at Sophie walking in. She smiled and closed the door again. "Just you?" she asked. "Where's the family?"

He stifled a yawn and sat up in the chair without letting go of Rhia's hand. "Maddox got recalled to his department. He took their mother home to get some rest. Or yell at Richard. Exactly which wasn't clear." He rubbed his eyes as Sophie pulled up a chair to sit next to him. "What time is it?"

"Five a.m." she grimaced. "You know we have a place you can sleep. That chair can't be comfortable."

"I'm fine. I want to be here when she wakes up." He looked carefully at her. Her finger tapped a steady rhythm on the files in her hands. "You sure you're alright?" he asked. "How bad are the voices?"

"I'm managing." She shrugged stiffly. "I'm not the first and I certainly won't be the last. Mithras sent out a radio silence order, but the communication teams are still reaching out to the dragons and the elders spend most of their time in their true forms. I am a conduit for the link. It comes with the territory."

"I always hated that term. Conduit. Your more of a badly tuned radio. You're just picking up on everyone else's link."

"How ever you want to put it, it's exhausting."

They sat in silence for a while, broken only by Rhia's raspy breathing. Nolan's thumb glided slowly over her knuckles. "I'm still trying to figure out how." He whispered. "I know you can't keep track of everyone, but she would have hatched in her dragon skin. There must be something that leads back to where she came from."

"We have a few theories." Sophie closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. "Mithras thinks her dragonkin parent was unbound, got themselves into trouble with Quin, and the human parent abandoned her to avoid being hunted down."

"What do you think?"

She opened her eyes and looked at him. "She's, what, twenty-five?"

"Twenty-six."

"There's only so much I can say, but..." her voice trailed off as she tried to figure out how to explain around her restrictions. "About thirty years ago there was... a mass unbinding. A bunch of kin were suddenly on their own. So, they went out and... found companionship. I wouldn't be surprised if there are others. We'll find out in about ten years."

"She's so young." His voice cracked. "Do you remember when we were hatchlings? You, me, Dáithí... the only yfeerie on the island. We would have done anything to awaken early. It didn't matter how many times our parents and the other kin told us it was dangerous."

"All we ever wanted was to be a part of the big dragon picture." She smiled.

"Yeah... Had I known it could be like this... gods, I still remember being so jealous of Dáithí's first shift."

"I remember." She chuckled. "You sulked around your palace for two straight weeks."

"I did not sulk."

"We were family, Nolan, we knew when our baby brother was sulking." She sighed happily. "I remember getting into so much trouble with you two. We were thick as thieves. The three goddamn musketeers."

"More like the three stooges." They looked around at Dáithí standing at the door holding a tray of coffee cups. He raised an eyebrow at Nolan. "You're not going to hit me again, are you?"

"Haven't decided yet." Nolan growled.

"Fair enough."

He stepped further into the room and handed out the coffee. Nolan took his and narrowed his eyes as Dáithí tucked a strand of hair back behind Rhia's ear. "Why didn't she tell me about you?" he asked, trying unsuccessfully to keep the anger out of his voice.