Dragon Roar Chapter 2

 

Jordan

I watched the car as it disappeared around the corner and frowned. It was one of the sleek black ones the generals used. What was a dragoness doing in a military car? I couldn’t reach her, no matter how hard I tried. Her voice had seemed muddled, and I’d almost missed it, but I couldn’t mistake the pleading in her voice. Was she drugged? What did she mean by Langley? There was only one Langley who was a general. Was that who had her? By the time I reached the corner, the car would be gone. I had no way to track her except by transforming, but that would blow my cover to hell. I knew someone with an in to General Lance Langley. Or maybe I had been imagining the call for help? No, I definitely heard her. The desperation in her voice was so clear, despite the drugged quality.

“Shanna?” I reached for my team leader and possible anam cara as I continued my way into the complex, trying to reign in the anger that anyone, human or dragon, male or female, would be kept like that. I set in motion the only thing I could do for the dragoness, by passing on the information to those that could hopefully find and rescue her.

“What’s wrong?”

“Just got contacted by a dragoness. I think she’s drugged and I’m pretty sure it has something to do with Langley. Remember Malik’s comment about a pet?”

Her own anger spiked into my mind. “I will see what I can uncover.”

I waved to guards and other workers as I returned to the complex for my shift. A few hours later I was in the cafeteria, surrounded by people downing cups of coffee to get themselves moving for the morning or shoveling in what looked like eggs, but was probably poured out of a carton or rehydrated. Not only had I been up most of the night already, but my worry for that dragoness added more energy. There was something about the touch of her mind that I recognized. Not like Shanna. This was different. Familial. It was similar to Jael, or Nova, or even Delilah’s voices. The duties of a facilities worker took little mental power for me to accomplish and there weren’t any conversations I needed to absorb, so I let my mind wander. From my concern for the dragoness to pondering my relationship with Shanna to how I could help the rest of the team improve their infiltration and information gathering skills.

Eventually I ended up back in the mess hall emptying trash cans filled with half-eaten meals and coffee cups that weren’t completely emptied. The stench of the garbage was why I never ate here, add I’d had my fill of mess hall cooking to last me two dragon lifetimes, but my duties still took me here. The television was playing low, but when the reporter mentioned Kaldona, I glanced up . . . images of a smoking pile of rubble filled the screen . . . scrolling at the bottom. “Dragons attack their own.”

What the hell were they trying to blame us for now? I stepped closer, listening to the report. As I got near the television and the scenery around the rubble became clearer and more familiar, my heart thudded loudly in my chest.

“In a sad turn of events yesterday, the Kaldonian dragons destroyed this orphanage. As you can see, the stone building is still burning. It is known that this facility took in children from both Aurumden and Kaldona. There were no survivors.”

My knees threatened to give out, and it took everything in me to stay standing. The hell it was dragons! Those flames were the wrong damn color for it to be dragon fire, even a day later! The bastards had done it, just as Gabriel said, and my son had paid the price. Dimitri. A young man, who lost an arm to an Aurumden mine and destroyed by a woman's hurtful words. It was the only thought running through my mind as I stood there, trash can in hand, staring at the television but not seeing it.

“Jordan? Talk to me. What is it?”

Shoshanna’s voice was a balm I couldn’t afford to grasp. Her concern was something I couldn’t accept. Not right now. If I did, I’d lose what little hold I had on my JT persona. I closed my eyes, trying to bury the pain. I’d become pretty good at that after decades of hiding my sadness from my family.

When I opened my eyes again, there was another man standing next to me. “Ruthless bastards, those Kaldonians,” he muttered. “Can’t wait ‘til the generals wipe them out.”

I gripped the trash can hard, the industrial plastic crumpled in my grip. Thankfully, my talons hadn’t made an appearance, so I dumped it into the bigger rolling one I pushed around to keep from wrapping my hands around his throat. My pain might not show on my face, but I didn’t trust myself to talk just yet, so I grunted as a response. He could take it as agreement if he wanted as long as he didn’t say another word. I wasn’t sure I could control my desire to risk indigestion. Fortunately, he moved off, and I went to the next can. I passed a low-ranking officer quietly eating breakfast by himself, his eyes glued to the screen with a malicious gleam in them. His name tag caught my eye. Spencer. The name rang a bell. Then I remembered Langley had called in Shoshanna because he had a meeting with a Spencer. I really couldn’t think of much of anything beyond the fact that one of my sons was dead.

I tried to carry on and waved off Shoshanna’s continued inquiries with an assurance I was fine. It did not fool her. Why would she be? If she truly was my anam cara, she’d be feeling every bit of emotion that I was. The only thing I really wanted to do, besides line up every single general and officer in Aurumden and roar until their heads exploded, was find Shanna and hold her until this unbearable heartache went away. After the second person stopped me to ask what was wrong, I knew I wasn’t doing as good a job of hiding my feelings as I hoped. When Shoshanna contacted me and told me to make some excuse and get back to the condo, I was already wrapping up so I could beg off early. I finished rolling the trash out and dumped it into the bin, then went to my supervisor’s office, gave the excuse of stomach problems and left early.