Dragons Walk Among Us by Dan Rice

Author:Dan Rice [Rice, Dan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Dragons; Fantasy; Magic; Young Adult; Coming of Age; Family Conflict; Friendship; Science Fiction
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Published: 2021-05-20T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

Tanis leads me toward the man and woman standing in front of the table with the laptop. Their draconic companions intermingle in a brilliant fusion of sparkling green and coppery light that is so intense it takes my prosthetics a few seconds to adjust to the brightness. I recognize the woman with thick glasses and hair chopped off unstylishly just below the ears from the week before. From the neck up she looks owlish due her oversized circular glasses, even boyish. Her bosom and curvy hips are not entirely hidden by her baggy clothes and betray her sex. The man is tall with a military crewcut and a sumo wrestler’s build. He wears a loud Hawaiian shirt and pink man capris.

Tanis indicates I should take a chair before her compatriots. After a moment of hesitation, I comply. What else am I going to do? I tried running from Dr. Radcliffe, and that got me squeezed within an inch of my life by a gigantic dragon. Now, I’m facing three of them, not to mention Ion. Owl girl looks harmless enough, but the sumo wrestler sneers at me, and I suspect Tanis will kill me without hesitation if she thinks I’m a threat.

“Sit down over there, boy,” Tanis tells Haji.

Haji mutters a response, and a chair scrapes against the concrete and creaks when he sits. The old woman turns to her companions.

“This is Allison Lee,” Tanis says. “I suggest you smell her. She’s not human.”

The man arches an eyebrow. “Is Ion right?” His voice is gruff, and he waves a hand at me. “This thing pretending to be a girl is a skaag?”

“I don’t think so,” Tanis says. “She is something else. I don’t recognize the smell, but it’s decidedly not skaag.”

I chew on my lower lip and squirm. I’m seriously through being sniffed.

“You’re making her nervous,” owl girl says. “Should we introduce ourselves?”

The sumo wrestler scoffs. “She’s our captive. We don’t need to introduce ourselves to her. The less she knows, the better.”

“Well, she probably already knows my name. It’s your name she might not know,” owl girl says and smiles at me. “My name is Mauve, by the way. In case you had forgotten. His name—”

The sumo wrestler interrupts. “Tatsuo. You probably already knew that. Frederick and the youngling are supposed to be our security experts, but they don’t take security very seriously if you ask me. That goes for all of you. If this thing is an agent for our enemies, she knows too much.” He waves a thick finger at me. “Far too much.”

“She is under our power and has not been in contact with our enemies,” Tanis says.

“As far as we know,” Tatsuo says.

Mauve makes an exaggerated sigh. “If you’re so worried, why are you even here?”

“I respect the chain of command,” Tatsuo snaps.

“I suppose that’s why you weren’t on the call last week,” Mauve says. “Respect for the chain of command and all.”

“I was indisposed,” Tatsuo says.

“Regardless, we are here now,” Tanis says. “Frederick will soon be joining us.

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