There was a dragonmancer already waiting inside the tent when we entered. She was a tall, thin woman with angular features and blue hair that had been shaved into a severe mohawk. Her tanned face was covered in intricate tattoos that might have been runes of some kind. Her hands had long, clever fingers and fluttered constantly at her sides. She was dressed in worn, comfortable-looking traveling leathers.
“Seer, Dragonmancer Noctis, this is Dragonmancer Scrutor, head of my scouting network,” General Shiloh said, introducing the stranger.
Head of the General’s scouting network, I pondered. Sounds like the fancy way to say someone is a fucking capable spy.
The tall woman, Scrutor, nodded to me and bowed to the Seer.
“Dragonmancer Scrutor is paired with a dragon of most singular abilities,” General Shiloh said, as she rummaged for cups and a fresh jug of Hangman. “Isn’t that right, Scrutor?”
“Yes, General,” Scrutor said, in a surprisingly high and feminine voice. “Tindruth is a Scry Dragon.” She nodded at the dragon that was lying curled at her feet, watching proceedings out of one fishy eye. The creature was about the size of a Basset Hound and mottled brown and green. It was so unobtrusive that I had not even noticed it in the gloom of the tent until Scrutor had pointed it out.
Claire nodded at this, though I had no idea what the hell a Scry Dragon was.
“Scrutor has been on a do-or-die reconnaissance mission of unparalleled danger,” General Shiloh said. “She has pushed further forward, on her lonesome, mark you, than anyone in the Empire has yet gone. She has only recently returned from the frontier.”
Scrutor’s angular face and intelligent eyes remained impassive as the General explained what she had been up to.
“Show the Seer and Dragonmancer Noctis what you just showed me, Scrutor,” the General ordered, handing around the cups of potent spirit.
“Very good, General,” Scrutor said.
She nudged the dragon at her feet with a boot and clicked her tongue a couple of times at it.
The Scry Dragon rose slowly until it was sitting back on its haunches like the caricature of a dog begging for a treat. Then, it opened its mouth. A thick, coiling vapor flowed out from between its jaws and formed a solid cube of smoke in front of us. The smoke must have been under the little dragon’s control because it did not dissipate but hung stolidly in the air.
Scrutor clicked her tongue again.
A bright orange light blossomed in Tindruth’s throat and, suddenly, I was looking at a castle projected into the smoke. It was very much like watching an old film being projected onto a screen, or a Star Wars-esque hologram. The picture was in muted colors, but I hazarded a guess that it was being projected from the dragon’s own memories.
“This is something that you and your dragon saw?” I asked, wanting to make sure that my guess was right.
“Correct,” Scrutor said. “It was the finding of this kobold stronghold that convinced me to return with all haste to our base here and show my findings to the General.”
“And what exactly is this stronghold?” Claire asked, tilting her head and taking a step toward the projection.
The fortress looked to be on a scale that made the ruined castle where we had fought the wild dragons and kobolds look like a toy. It was huge and looked unassailable. It might have been designed, for all its obvious size and strength, by a child: a mammoth main keep with a tower set a little way away from each of the four corners, and on top of each one of these towers…
“Are those…?” I asked.
“Dragons,” Scrutor said. “Yes. Wild ones. This is a kobold mega-stronghold, the likes of which the Lorekeepers would be able to tell you more about. Each of its towers is a temple for a wild dragon, and the wild dragons are perched on their peaks, as you can see. And these are not just any wild dragons, but Elder Dragons.”
Scrutor spoke in neat, clipped syllables, never using more words than were strictly necessary.
“We do not know the exact name of this stronghold,” she continued “but—”
“It is called the Bronze Citadel,” said a voice, as the tent flapped was ripped aside.
The General opened her mouth in outrage, at the sight of Hana, the bearmancer standing there.
A guard burst through the flap a second later and grabbed the bearmancer by the arm. He looked sheepishly at General Shiloh and said, “General, my apologies, she slipped past me and—”
Claire raised a single small hand, and the guard was silenced as effectively as if someone had pressed a mute button.
“Speak, Bearmancer,” the Seer said, her eyes locked on the petite woman wrapped in her cloak and shawl, her wrists bound. “Speak. For you clearly have something to say.”
Hana regarded Claire with an untrusting eye, but said, “That is the Bronze Citadel. It is where you will find more crystals—more Etherstones. Their exact location, however, is a mystery.”
A soft light pulsated suddenly at my side. Casting my eyes downward, I saw that Will, the wisp, had come into being right next to me. I couldn’t say how I knew, but I was certain that the little will-o’-the-wisp was staring intently at Hana.
General Shiloh’s eyes flicked from me to Hana to Will to Claire and back again. With an impatient gesture, she banished the guard from the tent. The man gratefully retreated. She grunted a laugh, looked at Claire and said, “You knew about this, Seer?”
Claire gave an enigmatic little shrug of one shoulder. Then she placed a hand on my shoulder and subjected the General to a long, slow look.
General Shiloh huffed a half amused, half irked sigh. “Yes. Well. I suppose that’s where you come in,
