War of the Princes 02: Dragoon (2 page)

C
hapter 3:
A Persuasive Offer

“Haven Valley has been isolated from the outside world since its founding, with one exception,” Officer Sandra Loring told me joylessly. “Rivermarch has long protected a secret: a single pool, without moisture but filled with liquid, and surrounded by stone masonry of the highest quality.”

I gripped the
arms of my chair.

“
There is no record of the well being constructed,” she continued. “It has remained under lock and key for centuries. This information may sound strange to you but it is relevant.”

It didn't sound strange. It sounded like I wasn't the only one who knew the way out of Haven Valley. This was horrible news. Haven's citizens freely wandering the Outside World would be a deadly liability for the entire country. Clearly, she mistook my
shock for surprise. If that were possible.

“
So, you're calling it a well?” I asked carefully.

“
The Still Well. It’s ten feet wide and ten feet deep, surrounded by the finest white marble masonry. Every year, for as long as we have recollection, educational documents appeared in the bottom of that well. Books on language, grammar, architecture, art, music, and science, though the latter was always somewhat dated. There were encyclopedias of oceans and bestiaries of mythological creatures like metal cats, elephants, and shadow horses. Countless debates and discussions have been held on how and why such information was given to us, but we've always studied it, and put the best parts to use. Like clockwork, on the same day of every year, we would find something.”

Listening intently, I was at the very edge of my seat. The way she spoke of it, I doubted she knew of the existence of the
glowing, aquamarine dry water pool I had discovered in the mausoleum. Mine was tucked away beneath a tomb and encircled by walls of disturbingly grim warnings. There was certainly no white marble.

So there are two.

Shards of a jigsaw, dashed into thousands of pieces, began to click together and take the shape of a larger picture. The people of Haven were receiving information about the Outside World all along.

So that's how we spoke the same language after seven hundred years of separation.

It also explained why everyone I'd met in Breakwater had such strange accents. Text alone couldn't control how pronunciation evolved.

“
It happened twelve years ago. For the first time in history, the documents ceased to appear. It may not seem of vital importance at first glance, but keep in mind that these secret manuscripts were as consistent as the dawn for seven centuries. It was a heavy blow to Haven's historical researchers and theorists, and it set us on alert.”

“
Do you know who built the Still Well?” I asked, choosing my words so I wouldn’t give my own knowledge away.

“
Not precisely, but our best theory is that we did. The craftsmanship surrounding the well is a match to our earliest work. What we know for certain is that it’s a gate. It acts as a doorway to a place far away, somewhere in the outside world.”

Welcome to the party, guys.

“Have people used it to get to the other side?” I asked, frightened at the prospect.

“
Not immediately. There has always been a copper door with an intricate lock built into its center, barring the way within the Still Well. Really, the thing was more lock than door. For all these centuries, despite our technological developments, the door had been impenetrable. When the texts didn’t arrive on time, a small piece of the lock broke. The impossible seemed possible. Our finest specialist worked on cracking the broken lock these past twelve years.”

“
Doesn't that sound like a bad idea to you?” I blurted.

Agent
Loring didn't so much as lean into her chair for comfort. She watched me with a calculated eye. “Miss Kestrel, if such an old tradition was suddenly broken, would you not wonder what went wrong? Something happened in the outside world, something changed.”

Of course they'd be curious. They had nothing to fear.

They're just like I was.

“
Don't go in. Tell your people to leave it alone.”

She raised a brow at my sudden
adamancy. “Our specialist broke through, six months ago. We speculate that without careful maintenance on the other side, the mechanism began to slip. It was all we needed. A four-man team ventured out shortly after to recover information. It was a groundbreaking day, but one better left a secret until our people returned.”

Six months ago.

So I really had been the first one outside. I would have felt special if I didn't think my countrymen were about to bring the involuntary massacre of our homeland upon us.

I barely stifled a, “No...”

Squeezing my jaw I kept my big mouth shut. My fingers tapped furiously against my arm. Keeping a secret had never been an easy task for me. Keeping one this important was going to
end with my spontaneous combustion. I couldn't exactly tell her that I had dreamed up a bloodthirsty Prince and his obscenely vast army, dead set on murdering or enslaving us.

I could tell her
the truth… make her understand.

It would be better for me to spend the rest of my life in a cell for breaking Haven’s highest law than it would be to witness the destruction of my country. But my honesty would surely come at a high price. They would make me tell them how I’d managed to get out of the Valley. They’d find out about the mausoleum and my
dry water pool. Haven would be bleeding sweet idiots out into the world through two passages instead of one.

I didn’t know much about this Prince, but if what I’d learned from Dylan,
Fallux and Stakes amounted to anything, I could trust that he’d come for us.

If Prince
Raserion was able to catch our people and discover the location of the pools, he could pick and choose his method for attack. He could invade all at once. He’d surely occupy Breakwater to do it. What would that mean for Lord Brendon and his people?

Would I see a familiar Dragoon during the invasion? Would I have the chance, before they capture
d or killed me?

Easy, Kat. Calm down. One thing at a time.

“You look ill,” she observed without concern. “I understand. You’ve had a traumatic day, and this is a great deal of information for a child to take in. Do you need a moment?”

“
No. What did they find out there?” I asked, hoping she didn't notice that my voice had risen in pitch. I needed to be strong.

“
The team hasn't returned,” she told me heavily.

No? Of course they didn't. Why would they?

A tune thrummed in my head. It was from a song that was popular a few years ago. The chorus was, “Lucky to be alive.” My stomach churned, and the foreboding feeling in my chest intensified.

The question of all questions
had to be asked. “So what does any of this have to do with me?”

“
We have become aware that you are in possession of a remarkable talent. Our team must be found. You need to lead us to them. You alone have the capability.” I opened my mouth, but she bowled me over. “Losing this team could be disastrous for Haven. We must know what they have learned. Your task will be to attempt to locate the team leader, operating under the code name, Paperglass To Be. Remember that name and do not search for any other.”

I looked down at my hands marveling at how they trembled, ever so slightly, against my will.

“Upon our return, you would be rewarded. Any reasonable monetary desire can be granted you and your family, of course,” she said smoothly, lacing her fingers together atop the desk.

And if I don't return? What do you give my family then?

Taking my silence for compliance, she pressed on in her debriefing. “You will depart in two weeks. Time enough to test the proficiency of your talents and train you in what you'll need to know. Our seasoned team will be comprised of ten outdoorsmen, a scientist, a historian, a documentarian, and two officers, like myself.”

A single airy chuckle slipped from my unsmiling lips. The
“seasoned team” would have been laughable if the situation had any room at all for humor. Those people would be chewed up and spit out before they knew where they were. What were ten outdoorsmen and two officers, against thousands of men and women, trained to be killers since childhood, all wielding incredible powers? The scientist, historian, documentarian, and me, would be tortured prisoners, if we survived at all. If caught, what chance was there that none of our twenty-one adventurers would break down and spill Haven's secrets? Twenty-one personalities, with hopes, desires, fears, and weaknesses. Twenty-one liabilities, in addition to the missing team. How long would I last this time? I wanted to vomit.

“
Each person will be equipped with a pack like this one,” Loring said, lifting a second, smaller case to the table. It was a square satchel with a shoulder strap, made of fine quality leather. Opening it, she revealed a small blue bottle, an eyedropper, a compass, and a flintlock pistol made from rosewood and brass. “The vial contains eye drops that will stain your irises brown. It will help you move about undetected. A boon from the knowledge shared with us via the Still Well. You won't need the compass, of course. We assume that we may see people with talents similar to yours, outside. The pistol shoots a single dissolving pellet. When it reaches the bloodstream, the pellet extinguishes the victim's talents for a short time. The first should only last one day. Three shots, and their powers are gone forever.”

My ears were ringing. I barely heard what she was talking about.

“Can this mission be done without me?” I interrupted.

The eagle-like woman frowned, ever so slightly.
“No. It would not even be launched. Without you, we'd be lost. It's far too risky to strike out into the world blindly in the midst of some unnamed crisis. We would never know where to begin looking. You are the linchpin of this operation.”

The entire thing was a mistake.
Four missing citizens of Haven. It shouldn't have happened. I was so sure my life had returned to a semblance of normalcy. If I hadn't shocked Calvin, I wouldn't be sitting here and they wouldn't know about the Pull, but those people would still be outside. After everything I'd sacrificed, Haven was in danger again.

“
Simply sign here, and the process will begin,” she said, tapping the pen down on the top sheet of printed-paper. My name was already on the document. My initials were beautifully oversized, as though the flourishes of ink should coax me into believing that this journey would be nothing more than an innocent, educational field trip.

How long will I last?

“Sign, Miss Kestrel.”

Beside the flashbacks of Commander Stakes, summoning the courage to look this eagle woman in the eyes was a simple thing.
“No.”

She was clearly taken aback by my response.
“I must insist you think clearly about this.”

“I am thinking clearly. The answer is no. I'm not going.”

“A child of your age wouldn't understand the dire importance of these circumstances,” Loring said with antagonistic patience.

“I wish that you were right about that,” I said sadly. “For what it's worth, I think the more people that go out, the worse danger Haven will be in.”

Agent
Loring's eyes narrowed and she rose to her feet. “You are free to go Miss Kestrel.”

Before leaving me alone in the interrogation room with the contract, the pen, and the leather satchel, she turned back once more.
“See if you can't muster a little bravery to sign those papers. The missing team leader, Paperglass To Be, was the closest friend I've ever had. Your mother.”             

C
hapter 4:
A Friend Indeed

I was free, but I wasn't. The shiny leather satchel sat heavily in my lap, atop the stack of contract papers. It was difficult to decide which of the two items was
weightier. I doubted it had been Officer Loring's intention to leave the equipment bag behind with an untrained teenager. Or was it? Maybe it was a show of trust, or a test of responsibility. I was uncomfortable with either scenario.

A gentle fog had rolled into my town, making the arriving sunset as dim and mysterious as a light show behind a soft curtain. There was a dull pink and
lilac cast to Rivermarch's idyllic, stacked cottages and corner stores. The low rolling cloud didn't dampen the spirits of my town's citizens. Many were homebound after a long day's work and chatted about the odd evening weather as they climbed aboard carriage or steam train.

Lazily, my eyes tracked one such locomotive across the street as we passed by. It was a proud black and green vessel, spilling its own clouds over the back of its glass topped cars. That very train had taken me to
Pinebrook once.

I sat beneath the canopy of my dad's mechanized horse drawn coach
, watching the world slide by. Our shaggy piebald pony, Grendel, was pulling the small carriage at a brisk trot. It was hardly any work for the old gelding. Thanks to modern engineering, the wheels mostly turned themselves. Each rotation took us farther away from Constable Mason, Officer Loring, and the interrogation room. My relief expanded by the second.

“I need to stop by the station before we go home. It won't take long,” my dad said, finally breaking the silence. He hadn't spoken a word to me about my arrest or Calvin.

I wanted to know about Haven, the
dry water pools, my Abilities, Sterling's. There were questions I desperately wanted to ask him. I couldn't bring myself to speak the words, after what I'd done.

A sigh escaped my chest and I bopped my head against the
doorframe.

“Something wrong with that?” he asked, looking over at me, trusting that our pony would continue to follow the road.

“What? No,” I said, forcing myself back into a more regular posture. Another question was nagging at the back of my throat. It demanded to be released, above all the others. There was no smothering it, no waiting. “When was the last time you saw mom?”

Asking the
deceptively simple question left me feeling exposed, like a bird without feathers. There was no protective covering to shelter me from the damage of a hard answer. Part of me wondered if my dad would finally yell at me, for the first time in my life.

“This morning, when she gave me an omelet,” Dad answered casually. He wasn't angry with me, as usual.

I slumped as if struck by the anticlimactic response. Time to try to form the words again.

“No Dad, I mean my mother,” came my clumsy correction.

“
Oh, I see. Kendra. You never call her Mom,” Dad commented, keeping his eyes carefully fixed on the road. “Well, not since she left, I suppose.”

“
Do you have any pictures of her?”

“
No.”

“
What did she look like?” I persisted.

“
Busy,” he half chuckled. “Most of the time. And a bit like you.”

“
Her hair was black. That's all I remember.”

“
Yes it was, and curly, more so than yours. She wouldn't leave the house if they weren't in perfect spirals. Took us two hours to even get out for lunch.”

“
Do you know if she ever came back to Rivermarch?”

“
Not that I know of, and we're lucky she hasn't.”

But she must have. It meant, at least, that he didn't know about her work here, and certainly not her disappearance.

It wasn't easy to ask the questions, but I trudged on. “What did she do for a living?”

Again came his shallow laugh, like a dangerous joke had just presented itself.
“You have no idea how difficult it was to get a straight answer out of her. She worked with the Historical Society, but that's all I ever knew. Why the sudden interest?”

“
Uh,” was all I could say.

There was silence for a time, but my dad said,
“Ah,” as though I had actually given him an answer.

He
reined Grendel onto the grounds of the weather station, and the carriage rocked to a stop.

“
You've been through a lot today, I understand. I wish I could tell you more, but trust me, Bug, there's a reason for everything. We're all pieces of a machine. Don't roll your eyes. We all have to do what is needed of us. Your mother knows that, better than most.”

He had no idea about the danger my mother was in, or the offer Agent
Loring had made me, but somehow, what he said made sense. It was eerie. There were still things he wasn't telling me. What was he holding back?

“
What about you? Are you doing what Haven needs you to do?”

“
Of course. Being a weatherman for Eastern Haven County wasn't exactly my first career choice, but it's where I was most needed at the time, and here I am,” he gestured to the smooth stone architecture of the three-story building across the broad lawn. “That teacher of yours, Professor Block, he's a good example. You liked his classes, did you have him this year?”

I shook my head.
“No, he took the year off or something.”

“
Well, years ago he was something of a prodigy. Razor sharp mind. Every prestigious organization in Pinebrook was clamoring to give him work, even our own government. It turned out that being a teacher was where he was needed most. Guiding students toward the path of knowledge was more important than wealth, pride, or excitement. He did what he had to do. We all do, and you will too, when the time comes.”

Or maybe he'd been forced to teach, after shaming himself and being arrested for trying to find a way out of Haven. So far, we don't seem too different.

According to my dad, though he didn't know it, Haven was telling me that I needed to enter the Outside World and plunge myself back into the darkness of that deadly place again.

Why did my stupid mother have to get involved in this?
We didn’t exactly have a relationship to speak of. You’d think I wouldn’t care what happened to her… but I did. She was the broken part of my family, but she was still family. No matter how I felt about her life choices, I wouldn’t be alive if not for her. Imagining my own mother being torn apart by Commanders was more than I could bear, even if I couldn’t remember what she looked like.

“
Be patient,” he told me with a smile. That was all I'd ever get out of
him
now. If my dad was one thing, it was patient. “I'll just be a minute.”

Dad popped his door open, stepped out of the carriage, and walked briskly to the weather station. As usual, he was unflappably positive and calm. You'd think that I'd be grounded for the rest of my life after electrocuting my
ex-boyfriend and getting arrested. No, my dad trusted me. He always had, and I was grateful.

I followed his lead and climbed out of the square carriage car to take in some fresh evening air. Stretching, I walked the park-like grounds and stared up at the
massive radio tower that stood proudly beside the station.

Weather towers like this one were the tallest structures in Haven, and ever since I was a child, I enjoyed marveling at their height. Four beams, each connected by a steel lattice, were constructed around a single mast for
the best possible stability. The leg beams sloped gradually toward the central pole, and joined together to form the long neck of the tower. I couldn't see the top today. The fog had rolled in and obscured it. A dim light flashed slowly through the clouds, marking its position. I felt comfortably tiny beside it, just as I had as a child.

“
There you are!” a voice exclaimed behind me. I turned to see Ruby running up to me from the street. Her artificially bright, candy apple red hair made her impossible to miss. “We were looking for you. Kyle came straight here this morning for spare parts and stayed all afternoon. Where have you been?”

Today, such a simple question
tempted my brain to melt into a simmering pool of goo. What could I say to her? “It's been a bad day.”

“Ugh,” she sighed. “Mine too. My parents are completely losing it. I finally told them about me and Sterling, and you can guess how that went. They won't stop telling me how bad he is for me, and all because his initials don't match, it's a bad sign, blah, blah. And then, my dad says I'm not allowed to date him unless he changes his last initial to an, 'R.' Why won't they leave me alone? He's not going to change his name just to go out with me! I don't even believe in that superstitious stuff.”

Not so long ago, I would have agreed that
Ruby's were the worst problems I could think of. I would have sympathized and worried for her. My life had changed though. I had spent the whole year smiling and nodding, pretending that Haven's daily dramas were as devastating as everyone else seemed to think they were. Desperate to regain what I'd lost, I had pretended to be happy, content. All the while, my frustration grew, but I kept it quiet. I clung to humor and light-heartedness like it could save my life, but it was an act of desperation. I could parade around all day, wearing my splintered mask of lies and smiles. Jokes were the best place for me to hide. They were a perfect camouflage of distraction. Inside, I was desolate.

My dreams were ravaged by
twisted terrors and cruel memories. I awakened from sleep screaming more often than not. For the first three months, I couldn’t look at the scars on my chest without blacking out. I did my best to hide the toll my experiences had taken on me.

There were problems in the world, real ones, and
unlike everyone in Haven, I knew about a select few of them.

Ruby was lucky she had the luxury of friendship at all. We all were.

I will not think about him.

She looked at me closely and pushed up her glasses.
“Oh, gravity, I'm sorry, Kat. You don't look so good. What happened?”

I wanted to answer her honestly.
Ruby and I were close. We usually told each other everything, but now I didn't know what to say. She knew about my electrical Ability, but showing it to her had made her uneasy. I couldn’t really blame her for that. Electricity is a prickly and dangerous element, and she had no idea how much control I actually held over it. I’d explained that it took a level of concentration to summon even a small lightning display. When we talked about it, she sounded supportive, but I saw the truth behind her eyes. Ruby’s quiet fear made me feel isolated.

If I told her that I was the reason
Calvin was in the hospital, would she sympathize, or be afraid of me? If I told her about Officer Loring, would I get arrested for talking? There was a weight at my side and something in my arms. I was wearing the satchel and holding the papers tight against my chest. It was at that moment that I realized exactly how out of it I was. I hadn't even noticed that I’d brought them from the coach. Stress was poisoning me.

“
I'm fine,” I lied. I could tell her the truth later. “My brain is dying, but as long as I have my looks, I won't need it, right?”

Ruby looked at me
, bewildered.

“
Uh oh. That bad, huh? I guess I should save my brain after all.”

“
Save
your
brain
? Kat, it scares me when your jokes barely make sense. Is your dad working? I can go get Sterling if you need a ride home,” she offered with concern.

“
No! Definitely not Sterling,” I said adamantly.

“
Why?” she asked, ruffled.

I sighed. The only honest answer would make her angry, but what else would I say?
“Ru, I really didn't want to tell you this right now, but Sterling is not someone we can trust.”

“
What do you mean?” she asked. Her black eyebrows narrowed behind her glasses.

“
Remember what I told you about last year?” I lowered my voice to a whisper. “The things I can do? He's been following me. Spying.”

“
That's ridiculous,” she scoffed.

“
He can sense my Abilities,” I whispered, hoping she'd believe me.

She looked at me as though I had set her house on fire.

“He sold me out,” I told her. “I think he's been hanging around with us just to get information about me for his dad.”

“
About you?” She, on the other hand, was not whispering in the slightest. “You're telling me that my boyfriend is using me to get close to
you
?”

It sounded horrible, but I couldn't say no. Sterling had shown his true colors. I had no reason to believe he would suddenly
become close to Ruby, conveniently after I had discovered my Abilities. Wasn't it better that she knew?