“Kanin? Who is Kanin?” Seven asked belligerently. “Unless he can make the pair of you invisible, you’re getting nowhere near those machines.”
“Kanin is not a person, he’s a dragon,” Khollo said impatiently. “We can drop boulders on the catapults. That ought to crush them, I suppose?”
“Very funny,” Seven snarled. “But some of us are mature enough to take this matter seriously, boy. Keep your trap shut if all you’re going to do is offer fairy tales as solutions.”
“Seven, I would advise that you do not antagonize Khollo,” Janis said mildly. “His friend Kanin is very temperamental and easily-angered and he is, in fact, a fire-breathing, silent-flying, sharp-toothed, razor-clawed, heavily-armored killing machine most commonly known as a dragon.”
Seven shut his mouth, but Khollo could tell he still didn’t believe them. The young warrior got to his feet and crossed to the north window, peering downwards. Kanin was just visible in the fading light, curled up at the base of the cliff.
“Come here and tell me what you see, Seven,” Khollo commanded, not looking back at the other man.
Khollo heard a chair scrape back and a series of quick impatient footsteps. A moment later, Seven was standing beside him, following Khollo’s pointing finger.
Khollo turned his head and watched the emotions racing across the spy’s face. First disbelief, then shock, then, unmistakably, fear.
“That’s not possible,” he croaked, stepping back from the window. “Not at all possible.”
Janis snorted with amusement. “It is very possible. And Kanin can help us get rid of those catapults. We’ll lose the element of surprise after that, but I think those war machines ought to be our first priority regardless.”
“What if we take them out before they even get here?” Ondus said suddenly.
“How?” Janis asked.
“Khollo, how good is Kanin’s night vision?”
“Excellent,” Khollo replied immediately. “Better than a vertag’s, and that’s saying something.”
“Exactly,” Janis said, rolling his eyes. “Ondus, the vertaga will see Kanin just as easily as he sees them.”
“Not if they don’t look up, or if Kanin comes out of the clouds,” Khollo countered. “If it’s cloudy enough and they’re stopped, we could hover and drop the boulder with near perfect accuracy.”
“But would the same trick work twice?” Janis asked doubtfully.
“We won’t know until we try.”
“What does Kanin have to say about all of this?” Ondus asked Khollo, glancing towards the windows on the north side of the tower room.
Khollo frowned and reached out to the dragon. Kanin? Have you been listening?
There was a long pause. No, I was trying to sleep, Kanin finally replied, a little testily.
Khollo quickly filled the dragon in. So, what do you think? he asked when he had finished.
Kanin considered the plan for a moment. It is risky. If there were clouds, that would help.
Would a day attack be better?
I don’t know. Maybe. The sun might shine off my scales and make us very obvious.
We could just coat your scales in mud so they don’t reflect the light and-
No.
Night attack it is then, Khollo decided.
“Have you managed to get anything out of your overgrown lizard yet?” Janis asked.
Overgrown lizard? Kanin asked indignantly. Apparently, he had been listening through Khollo.
“Yes,” Khollo replied. “He does not like being referred to as an overgrown lizard.”
Janis’ jaw tightened and a muscle in his cheek twitched.
“He also thinks that a night attack would be best, but the plan is still risky. It will be difficult to get the positioning of the boulder exactly right.”
“Hold on a moment,” Ondus said suddenly. “Seven, you said that the vertaga were moving by night and making camp during the day, right?”
“Yes,” Seven confirmed.
“So if they make camp during the day . . .”
“Then there will only be a few sentries awake to guard the camp and it will be much easier to sneak in, destroy the catapults, and sneak out,” Khollo finished.
If there are only sentries, I can dive and flame rather than drop boulders, Kanin interjected. If I start the dive from high enough, the vertaga will never be able to catch me with arrows.
“Brilliant,” Khollo murmured. “Sounds like we’re leaving tomorrow morning then.”
“Be careful, Khollo,” Janis warned. “The vertaga know by now that Kanin was set free. They may be expecting an attack from a dragon.”
“Especially now that we’ve openly assisted Ishkabur against the vertaga,” Khollo agreed.
“Was there anything else we should know, Seven?” Janis asked, clearly ready to end the meeting and move on to other things.
“No,” Seven said in the same flat voice he had used earlier.
“Then we are adjourned,” Janis announced. “Get some rest, all of you. We need to be ready for battle at a moment’s notice.”
“Hard to sleep under those conditions,” Ondus remarked drily. “What do we do about these two?” he asked, jerking a thumb at Sermas and Hern. The two cadets were swaying from side to side and laughing to themselves, eyes unfocused, looks of happy idiocy still on their faces.
“We need them in shape for the battle,” Janis growled impatiently. “Isn’t there anything we can do to fix this quickly?”
“Knock them out?” Ondus suggested.
“That will hurt,” Khollo observed.
“Only for a moment.”
Janis knelt next to Sermas. “Sermas, look at me.”
Sermas laughed to himself and waved vaguely at Janis. “He is sideways. Why is he sideways?”
Janis slapped the cadet hard and Sermas recoiled. His eyes crossed, uncrossed, then slowly cleared, finally focusing on Janis’ face.
“Did I miss something?” Sermas asked slowly, blinking like an owl. “What’s wrong with Hern?”
Janis slapped the other cadet forcefully as well, trying to bring him out of his loopy trance. “Nothing anymore,” he said, watching as Hern too looked around curiously.
“I remember . . . flying?” Hern asked doubtfully.
“Yeah, what happened?” Sermas asked. “We were hanging in these rope
