Voices of Dragons

“Are you trying to kill yourself?” he asked.

It was going to look like it, wasn’t it? The trouble was, none of them trusted Artegal. And none of them knew about the secret map. That was one secret she couldn’t reveal. People like Branigan could never find out about it. She’d taken it out of the book and kept it with her.

“No,” she said finally. “But I may have to go away for a little while.”

“What about school? What about your mom?” She could hear him swallow over the phone. “What about us?”

Her eyes stung with tears. She was trying not to think about the really hard parts of all this. “Jon, if you had a chance to stop a war, would you?”

The logical thing for him to do would be the reality check. To tell her that nothing she could do would stop a war. Not this one, not any. But he didn’t do that.

He said, “Yes, I would.”

“If it weren’t for me and Artegal accidentally meeting, we wouldn’t have this chance. We have to try.”

“Okay,” he said, his voice steady now. “Just tell me what you need me to do.”

23

Kay made one more call that evening. After digging out the business card he’d given her, she dialed Captain Will Co

The co

She recognized the voice. “Captain Co

When he did speak, he sounded angry. “That was some stunt you pulled. Just what exactly were you trying to prove?”

“It’s like you said,” she answered, defiant. “I can talk to him. I had to show people—”

“That’s not what I said—I didn’t tell you to start a fight. That was a friend of mine in that plane that went down. He died.”

Kay’s eyes stung and her tears slid free. “Like my dad,” she said, her voice thick.

Co

“I need a favor. I don’t know if you can do it, but if you can, I had to try. I just had to see.”

“What favor?”

“Can you make sure there aren’t any jets over Silver River tomorrow at noon?”

He hesitated. “What are you pla

“I can’t tell you,” she said, trying to stay coherent. Trying to stay strong so she could get through the next day. “It’s…it’ll be fine. Everything’ll be fine.” She had to believe in the mantra.

“Kay, how dangerous is this? Maybe you should let the adults handle this one. Stay safe and help out your mother.”

She hadn’t expected Co

“But you were right. I may be the only one who can talk to them.”

“Maybe that’s what I said, but that was before—”

Kay said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about your friend.”

“Kay, whatever you’re pla

Kay didn’t sleep. She tried. She didn’t know when she’d have a chance to get a good sleep again. Maybe never, but she tried not to think of that. She’d packed a bag of supplies—warm clothes, hand warmers, granola bars, beef jerky, and bottled water. She found the GPS tracker in her mom’s glove box—she was going to make sure she knew where she was this time. She had coordinates to follow. She didn’t think her mother would mind, when all was said and done. She tried to think of what else she’d need, but her mind couldn’t focus. She put the gear in the car that night, so she wouldn’t have to explain it to her mother in the morning.

Breakfast with her mother was strained. Kay wanted to have breakfast with her, wanted to spend this time with her. This was the worst part of the whole plan, knowing what it would do to Mom. But Kay couldn’t tell her. She couldn’t even really say good-bye without revealing everything, and if Mom knew, she would stop her. Even with all the good this could do, Mom would stop her.

But it wasn’t forever, she reassured herself. This wasn’t like Dad at all.

Her mother kept glancing at her, her expression worried, searching. Kay couldn’t eat. She’d have a bite of cereal, and it would take forever to chew it. Swallowing it was like swallowing sawdust.

“You look nervous,” Mom said, and Kay flinched. Of course she was; she just didn’t think it would be so obvious. She nodded. “It’ll be okay. You don’t have to answer any of the questions if you don’t want to. Just look at this as a chance to tell your side of the story. You can stick it to Branigan.” She was trying to be fu

“All right,” Kay said, but she thought about what she could tell the world if she had a chance.

She was cleaning up her dishes when the phone in her pocket rang. Tam’s voice over the co

“I saw him,” Tam gasped. “He was there. I saw him. Neither of us crossed the river, but he was there and we talked. Kay, he talked to me—”

Kay rushed back to her bedroom and closed to the door, cupping her hands around the phone as if the sound would leak out and her mother would hear.

She wished she’d been there to see the look on Tam’s face. “I told you you’d be okay.”

“He said he couldn’t stay, he was being watched, but that he understood. Kay, he said he understood. Does that mean what I think it means?”

“It means everything’s going to be okay.”

They had a plan. It was going to work.

“Jon came with me, he showed me where to go, but he’s being watched, too, so he went the other direction to throw them off. I don’t know if it worked. Kay, does Jon know? Does he know what you’re pla

“Yeah.” Her heart was racing. Scared, but excited—there was something amazing about having a plan come together. “The press conference is at noon. Can you be there?”

“I wouldn’t miss it. Kay—I talked to him. I trust him. I don’t know why, but I do.”

“I told you.”

Kay had a few more things to get together. She found the book Dracopolis and the notebook with the translations. Most recently she’d worked on the final page, because she wanted to know what happened, how it all finally turned out—not that it was a story and not that it had an ending. But, obviously, the dragons leaving the world, going into their secret caverns and into hiding, hadn’t been the end or the book wouldn’t have been written, and the dragons wouldn’t have returned.

The last page, or what she could make out of it, didn’t explain it all. But it explained a little.

There is a haven for those tired of this war. There is a haven, out of view, where dragons and people still keep peace. It will always be a haven, and we pray that those who need it will find it in time.

Kay tore the sheet out of her notebook, folded it up, and put it in her pocket, along with the extra, hand-drawn map that had been slipped between the pages. She didn’t want anyone to find it. She didn’t know what keeping it secret was protecting, but she was going to find out.

She left the book on her bed, open to the page depicting the virgin sacrifice, so people would understand.

In her closet she found her homecoming dress, wrapped in plastic, destined never to be worn again. It sparkled white, shimmering even in the closet’s shadows.

This part of it was probably just like the virgin part—it didn’t really matter; the tradition had just built up over the centuries: The virgin always wore a white gown, a bridal gown, when she went to the sacrifice. She took it anyway, folded it as carefully as she could, and put it in her backpack. The weather outside had turned warm. Maybe she wouldn’t be too cold.