For the first time, I wished I’d taken longer with Thain.
To push the thought away, I told Rose about Thirteen’s world and the details I’d learned about him. I talked about how Thain died and about beating the shit out of him. I told her about what I’d seen of his homeworld, and the millions upon millions of corpses waiting for orders.
We sat in silence for a time, just enjoying being together again. When the downstairs television came on, I sighed and grabbed a robe.
Rose pulled on a bedtime T-shirt, grumbling and growling. “Can’t believe I’m getting dressed for a cat,” she muttered. “It would be different if we had cake.”
“How would having cake make things different?”
“It would give me something to eat besides that damn cat.” She tied her hair back and we headed downstairs.
Thirteen was sitting on the couch, holding an olive-drab gear bag. He had three shot glasses and a dusty bottle of whiskey sitting on the coffee table. He tipped his hat to Rose when we came in and held the bag out to her. “For your treasures, Miss Dragon, and my apologies for taking David so abruptly.”
Rose opened the bag and pulled out Thain’s gold necklace, a beaded Cleopatra-style collar done in gold and set with an assortment of gems, and an ivory scepter crowned by a sapphire you could play pool with.
Rose’s eyes lit up and she all but purred. “Where did you find these?” Yea, verily, the way to a Dragon’s heart is paved with gold and gemstones.
“Someplace long forgotten,” he said. “Far away from the things of Man.”
I sat down and poured the whiskey. “I think that means he robbed a museum. By the way, how did I wind up wrapped around a tree?”
Thirteen grimaced. “I dropped you on it to give you a cover story. Sorry about the leg.”
“No worries. All better now.” I passed out the glasses and raised mine for a toast. “To those who weren’t as lucky.”
Glasses clinked, and we gave the dead a moment of silence before drinking.
After the toast, we settled back into quiet reflection. The new treasure improved Rose’s impression of Thirteen, and for his part the cat seemed much more relaxed.
I poured another drink and said, “Thank you for changing my mother’s life. Just how does that time travel thing work, anyway?”
The cat flexed his paw and tucked a dried catnip stem between his teeth. “You haven’t paid to see those cards.”
“Fine.” I said. “Why did you do it?”
“Balancing the books,” the cat said. “I needed you to kill Thain. I couldn’t do it on my own. I paid up.”
I nodded and started to pour another drink. I stopped when I remembered the pain killers were probably still in my system. Not a cocktail with a good track record. I pushed the glass away and sat back from the table. “What will you do now?”
“Go home. Keep the lights on. Bear witness to the end of the world.” He raised his glass in salute. “If I do not hope for my fellows, who shall?”
I shook my head. “Keeping watch over a dead planet… That’s a long vigil.” I looked at Rose a moment and added, “You’d be welcome here. You could die in battle and earn a place in Valhalla.”
“Tempting, but no,” he said. “No matter what happens, it’s not a dead world as long as I’m there. Besides, your world doesn’t need me.”
“I beg to differ,” I said. “This is the second time we’ve saved the world, and it cost a lot of good people their lives. As much as I’d like a nice, quiet life, I doubt the universe is going to cooperate. It would be good to have you around the next time something goes horribly wrong.”
“Exactly my point. You’re a Hero. Heroes attract threats the way writers attract ideas or politicians attract corruption. I’m not a Hero. I’m a Soldier. All I have is duty. I’m on watch until my relief arrives.”
I shook my head. “Oh, no. Not me. No way. I’m all for fighting the good fight, but not when it means people I care about getting caught in the crossfire. Forget it.”
Thirteen got to his feet. “Spoken like a true Hero. Like all Heroes, you’ll soon learn the best way to protect the people you love is to stop the threats early and hard. Now, as you are a Hero, I have a favor to ask of you. Watch for Orion. He seeks out Heroes, especially those with hopeless causes. Tell him I am waiting.” He removed his collar and handed it to me. “Keep this, in case he’s forgotten the smell of home.”
“Hang on—I think I have something to replace that.” Rose rummaged through her dimensional closet, emerging with a red bandanna. She knotted it around his neck and said, “There. It looks great with your hat.”
Thirteen shook until the handkerchief settled into place. “Thank you. These are hard to find back home.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for him,” I promised. “You still need a goal. You need purpose. Watching for someone who may never come isn’t enough.
“I have a goal,” the cat said. “I’m re-seeding the canyon. Making it livable again. Next spring, I’ll have four dozen blue spruce seedlings ready to plant. My grasses and scrub oak are spreading, and soon there will be flowers. When I sleep, I dream of green places, and all of us are young again.”
“A land delightful beyond all dreams,” I said. “I’d say that’s a worthy goal.”
Thirteen nodded. “It gives me hope my world can live again, and that nature will forgive us our trespasses against it. Therefore, I will walk on, until the Mother of Cats calls me home.” He saluted us and said, “Take care of each other.”
Then he was gone.
A Hero Comes Home
For the next week and a half, it seemed all we did was attend funerals and argue with our insurance company over paying for our Range Rover. There was no question we were covered for new model replacement—the problem was the damage wasn’t consistent with a tornado. Bullet holes, for example, or all the organic components being burnt away but no damage to anything else. Since I couldn’t tell them how the damage happened, they concluded it was self-inflicted and refused to cover it.
Not that the car is in the same league as the lives lost in Thain’s attack. It’s just…bitching about the car is easier.
Anyway.
In accordance with Denver police tradition, the service for Miranda and Jake was held at the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception on Colfax. The service was carried live on the local news channels. Police officers from four states attended, including Jake’s previous partners from Santa Barbara. The Mayor and the Governor joined the Chief of Police in praising their service and sacrifice.
I kept looking at a folded piece of parchment on the altar. It was a sample wedding invitation. They had just settled on the style and wording the day before they died. Only their parents had known about the engagement—the invitations would have been their announcement to the world.
I wanted to tell their parents how they died. Why they had died. Who caused their deaths, and what had happened to him. I wanted them to have the truth. Too bad they’d never believe me.
At the graveside, Rose and I gathered with familiar faces, those who knew Jake and Miranda’s private lives. The community of police officers draws together to mourn their own, and our communities do likewise. Both keep their own secrets about the friends they’ve lost.
The families had arranged for adjoining plots, respecting Jake and Miranda’s intended union. It didn’t help the grief, but it felt right.
Filing past the caskets, I offered each my apologies. For not killing Thain sooner. For not anticipating his attack on the archery range. For not being able to save them. For being alive when they weren’t.
Knock that shit off—you sound like Thirteen
. I couldn’t argue—Miranda would be threatening to break my kneecaps if I didn’t pull head from ass and get on with living. It’s better to celebrate lives well-lived than to wallow in grief over their passing. I shook my head, shoving the survivor’s guilt away and replacing it with determination to keep buggering on.
Even that resolve was frayed to the breaking point by the time we’d finished our tenth funeral in seven days. The last one was for two pre-teen brothers killed in the feed store. They’d only stopped by to get a bag of alfalfa pellets for their pet rabbits.
I didn’t come out of the service grief-stricken—I was angry. Not just the tragedy of it, but the fact that they might be alive if my aim had been two inches better.
All the way to the Dushanbe Teahouse, I pondered what I wanted to happen and what I would need to do to bring it about. I wanted to be better prepared for the next threat. I wanted to be able to stop it sooner. I did not want to be helpless again.
All around the tea house, Boulder was overcoming Thain’s devastation. New grass and new trees lined the restored river. The river had been restocked and native wildlife brought in to repopulate the area. Determined to reclaim their city, hundreds of volunteers had worked on the project, doing in days what should have taken weeks.
As we looked through our menus, a wind came up, rustling leaves in the trees, sending waves through the grass, and stirring the birds to grievous complaint. I stopped and closed my eyes, just listening to the world around me.
It was alive.
After seeing Thirteen’s world and Thain’s world, Earth seemed as fragile as a soap bubble. Back at Stonewall, Maraz had asked me what I did to make Earth a better place. At the time, I didn’t have a very good answer. Now I had a quest to find a better one, armed with a set of blueprints and a bundle of drugs swiped from a disused armory’s first aid kit.
The threats that were coming did not care that I wanted a quiet life. I could either prepare for them, or be a victim of them. And Dragons don’t date victims.
That realization made my decision a simple one. I had won the love of a Dragon, and to keep it, I would dare mighty things.
The thought lifted my heart, blowing away the dust and cobwebs brought by grief and self-pity. I would always miss Miranda and Jake, but I was done mourning them. I would honor their lives, not their deaths.
Sure, more threats would come, but plenty of threats existed already. The idea wasn’t frightening—in fact, it filled me with a curious elation. This was battle-joy in its most serene form—absolute self-confidence and absolute self-worth.
I felt a rush of delight from Rose, and recognized the same battle-joy in her. This elation, this confidence, this feeling of being the standard to which all lesser creatures should aspire, was how Dragons felt all the time.
I opened my eyes and found Rose smiling at me, joy shining in her eyes. I clasped her hands, bringing her fingers to my lips. I leaned in to kiss her, and she threw her arms around my neck, shouting “Yes!”
“Arrrgh!” I took her hands and disentangled myself. “You don’t even—”
“I do too! Yes!” She pulled me to her, Draconic strength well overmatching Human and crushing the air from my lungs.
I turned my head to get away from her kisses and gasped, “Willyoumarryme?”
Rose relaxed her grip enough for me to inhale. “For the third time, yes,” she whispered. “Weren’t you listening?”
“I was, but the last time I asked, you said, no. What changed your mind?” I didn’t really care, but I had to ask.
“You changed,” she said. “You stopped seeing me as broken. You stopped seeing your limits and accepted your potential. You don’t do the impossible by becoming mighty. You become mighty by doing the impossible.”
“I see. When did I do the impossible?”
Rose brushed my hair back, out of my eyes. “Just now,” she said. “When you accepted who you are meant to be, you made me want to fly with you. To fly
together
with you.” Her eyes lit up as she spoke, glowing gold and blue.
For several agonizing seconds, I had no idea what she meant. “Flying? Why would… Ahhh!
Flying
. You mean…?”
She nodded. “Yes.
That
kind of flying. A Hero will find a way.”
“I’ll give it some thought,” I said. “In the meantime, we have rings to get, a Range Rover to replace, a wedding to plan, and a fusion battery to invent. I might be swamped for a little while.”
“I will worry about the wedding,” Rose said. “And the rings. And the car. I made an appointment to see the claim adjuster’s manager. He will see things our way, I’m sure.”
“Do the car. We’ll do the rings together,” I said. “How do you feel about asking Maraz to officiate?”
Rose pushed me on the shoulder. “Officiate, my ass. You just want to see her naked and covered in pig blood by the light of a full moon.”
I stopped. “I… Naked? What—full naked?” I took a deep breath and asked, “You are kidding me, aren’t you?”
“You don’t want to let your mother get an eyeful of you during our joyful time of bliss? I could tell her what good work she did with you.”
“No! I mean…” I looked around to make sure we were alone. “I’ll go for naked on a beach at sunrise, but I’d really rather skip the pig blood.”
She started giggling. “I’m kidding. Dwarves don’t do that. We can ask Maraz. The only problem is I’d have to grow a beard. That is required for the ceremony.”
I shook my head to get rid of the hair images. “Fine, that’s out. Maybe we’ll just send her an invitation. How do Dragons get married? Could we adapt your traditions to something mere Humans can work with?”
Rose thought about it and nodded. “Yes. We’d jump out of an airplane wearing only our parachutes and make love right up to the point where we have to pull the ripcord. Our friends would be on the ground watching and shooting off fireworks as we climax. Then we’d join our friends and listen while a lawyer reads our prenuptial agreements, followed by gorging ourselves on ale and raw meat.”
I smiled at the waitress and gave her our orders. When she left, I said, “Let’s put that one down as Plan B. Are there any Earth wedding traditions you like?”
“Oh, yes!” She bounced in place like a puppy. “The one where everyone pins money on the bride’s dress. We have to do that. And a pay-as-you-go bar. And someone has to kidnap me until the guests pay my ransom. Pirates! We need pirates!”
“Kidnapped by pirates, eh?” I nodded and smiled. “As you wish, my love. As you wish.”