***
Flora gathered us, not in the basement, but outside in the full sunshine, between the hotel and the railroad bed. I was the last to arrive, having taken time to quickly shower and dress. By the time I made it outside, I saw that she’d called in every earth magic person she could find in Magellan, which included our hotel guests.
The couple Cassandra called goblins stood a little apart from the group, hand in hand. Pamela watched Flora with her usual suspicion, ready to break in and stop her if she thought the woman was a danger. Colby had come as well, and greeted me with a sound hug.
“Glad to see you in one piece,” he said after squeezing me. “Again. You need to start taking me as your backup.”
“I couldn’t stop her getting hurt,” Mick said, sounding irritated. “What makes you think you could?”
“Hey, two dragons are better than one. Three,” Colby added as Drake strode out from the hotel. “Even better. What’s the word, Drakey?”
Drake gave him a stern look, but halfheartedly, as though he couldn’t conjure up the energy to be angry with Colby. He looked unhurt, destroying my theory that a person had to be knocked into a coma to go dreamwalking. Dragons healed quickly, but Drake’s words confirmed he’d been nowhere near the jail when it had come down on me and hurt Maya.
“I was deep in meditation,” he said without bothering to greet us, “when I seemed to go back in time. I found myself reliving the night Micalerianicum told the Dragon Council he would protect you against them. You were there, when you shouldn’t have been.”
Drake looked straight at me, and I nodded. “I know. I lived it too. None of it really happened, did it? When I woke up, Mick was his dragon self, and I bet the Dragon Council had no memory of you fighting them.”
“They did not.” Drake’s sigh held deep regret. “All the same, I tendered my resignation with the council. I am no longer employed by Bancroft.”
I blinked, and Colby whistled. Mick looked unsurprised, so Drake must have already told him.
“But it didn’t really happen,” I argued. “It was only a dream. Or an alternate reality that fled when we woke.”
Drake gazed pensively at Flora, who was laying out crystals around the mirror. “That does not matter. That night I saw Bancroft’s true colors —he was willing to kill Micalerianicum to prove a point, when Mick was in the right. I realized that, to Bancroft, the might of the Dragon Council is more important than the lives of those who have made sacrifices in the fight against evil.” He looked at me again, sorrow and shame in his dark eyes. “Bancroft and Aine are more interested in their own power than keeping the world safe. I decided when I woke from this dream that I could no longer work for the Dragon Council.”
I listened in surprise, but Colby was even more stunned than I was. “So you finally saw the light, did you Drakey? You might not actually have a heart of stone.”
“They let you quit?” I asked. “Didn’t they try to stop you?”
Drake gave me a patient look. “As I explained before, I took the job with them of my own free will. I had a salary, along with room and board and a pension plan. But none of that is worth losing my integrity.”
Gabrielle had joined us from the hotel in time to hear him. “Dragons have pension plans?” she asked. “What, more things for your hoard?”
“Yes,” Drake answered in all seriousness. “Annually, I am given a bonus to take back to my island.”
“Cool.” Gabrielle slid her hands into her back pockets and looked him up and down. “Show it to me sometime?”
“Hey, my hoard’s way wickeder than his,” Colby said. Gabrielle looked over her shoulder at him and sent him a broad wink.
Colby wasn’t finished. “Does this mean your position with the Dragon Council is vacant?” he asked Drake. “What are the qualifications, besides being a good toady?”
Mick rumbled with laughter. “You’d never make it with the Dragon Council, Colby. They’d end up killing you, or you them.”
“Why would you want to?” I asked. “You’ve never had anything good to say about the Dragon Council, and Bancroft held you prisoner for a while.”
“I know.” Colby studied the blue sky. “But someone needs to keep an eye on them, don’t you think? Bancroft knows me, and I can pretend to obey his every command. Plus, I wouldn’t mind a pension plan and yearly bonuses.”
Mick looked thoughtful. “Not a bad idea. Sure you won’t reconsider, Drake? You could be our inside man.”
Drake gave a faint shudder. “No. Not after seeing their true colors. I knew Bancroft and his ilk were not kind, but they have a cruelty I did not understand. I cannot unlearn what I’ve learned, and I cannot pretend anymore.”