“I won’t turn you into a frog, Herzer,” Megan said, sliding back under his arm and snuggling into his side. “Maybe a newt. But a pretty one. With red spots.”
“Oh, thanks,” Herzer replied, grinning.
“The newt king,” Megan said. “King of the Newts.”
“Just what I need.”
“You really are different than I’d expected,” Megan said, leaning into him. “I’m glad that my love at first sight made sense. And I do trust you. We’ll have problems, I don’t know any couple that doesn’t. But we’ll work them out. Okay?”
“Okay,” Herzer said. “I’m glad. Love at first sight, huh?”
“Pretty much,” she replied. “I guess I’m just a sucker for big guys in armor.”
“You just like my dragon.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
“Prepare for air-ops!”
“Enemy flight off the port-quarter!”
“Well, Shar, it begins,” Edmund said, stepping out from under the dragon platform to look off to the east. The anti-dragon dreadnought had automatically changed course and now was coming into line on parallel course to the carrier, close alongside. Close enough that he knew the helmsmen on both ships had to be sweating.
“Better than three to one odds,” Chang commented as the first of the Silverdrake dropped off the crosstrees and climbed for altitude to engage the oncoming dragons.
“I don’t count that many,” Edmund replied squinting against the light. “I think some of them are going for the dreadnoughts.”
“That ought to be interesting.”
“UFS dreadnoughts at two o’clock,” one of the riders -signaled.
“They’re carrying troops,” Captain D’Allaird yelled to his second in command. “No anti-dragon frigates covering them.”
“Some of those damned Silverdrake, though,” Lieutenant Ringle signaled, pointing to the smaller dragons that were bearing down on them.
“Second division, go for the Drakes,” D’Allaird signaled. “The rest, bear on the dreadnoughts. Close in, they’re not rigged for anti-dragon defense.”
“You think they’d have gotten word,” Gunny Rutherford said, shaking his head as the dragons lost height and lined up for the close drop on the dreadnought.
“Every Cannae requires a Varius,” General D’Erle chuckled. “Or, more appropriately, every Agincourt requires the French. Prepare to receive dragons!”
“Message from Corvallis, sir,” the messenger said. His face was blackened with soot from the fires that had just been put out. The main-sails were going to have to be replaced but other than that the ship was fit to fight.
“Corvallis reports fires out,” Shar said, passing the message form to Edmund. “That firefighting system of Evan’s is a life-saver.”
“But they also report that their dragons had to turn back from the attack on the fleet,” Edmund growled. “And they lost nearly half their dragons.”
“I hope we do better.”
Sergeant Fink had wanted to be a dragon-rider from the first time she saw them. She had a normal fear of heights, she wasn’t insane, but dragons were the only thing in this Fallen world that gave any of the powers that had been lost. She had enjoyed high-floating, a form of hang-gliding, before the Fall. And she’d even thought about getting a wyvern or doing a full-flight mod. But that was before the Fall.
She’d joined the Navy because they told her that she could apply for dragon-riding. And she had but she hadn’t been accepted. Too many applicants. So she’d done her job and bided her time until, by luck as much as anything, she made it in. Now she spent as much time as she could riding. Some of the riders had gotten a bit burned out and there weren’t many that would take even the slow, boring, reconnaissance flights. But she would, any flight she could.
So now she was up, on a pleasant day, slightly overcast with high cirrus clouds. Winds were pretty solid but that just made the gliding easier. She had about another hour and a half to go before she was relieved, lying on the back of her dragon, banking occasionally to keep the fleet in sight while still staying as far out as she could to the southwest. Somewhere out there was the New Destiny fleet. With luck, she’d spot it before either she or her own ship was spotted.
Charoo rumbled in his chest and turned slightly to the south and she spotted what the dragon had. Regular splashes and the wide V of wakes. She turned and looked behind her and, sure enough, she was right into the sun from the New Destiny fleet. There was little or no chance that she had been spotted. She looked for their own security dragons but didn’t see any.
“Okay, we’ve got ’em,” she muttered to the dragon, banking it back to the north. “Let’s see if the lookouts are paying attention.”
She withdrew a curious mirror from a pouch on her harness and put the back to her eye. The mirror had a clear spot in the middle with a metal grid buried in the glass. The bright sun caused a small intensely bright reflection to form in the grid. By laying the reflection over the distant ships she could be sure the reflection of the main mirror was pointed at them. As soon as she had it aligned, she started angling the mirror so that it was reflecting towards them and then away, careful to avoid pointing at the New Destiny fleet.
“Commander Gramlich?” Captain Karcher said, dropping through the overhead and landing lightly.
“Ma’am?” the dragon said, getting to her feet.
“We’re about to start air-ops,” the captain said. “Be damned if I’m going to sit this one out. The New Destiny fleet is in range to attack. I’ve put out a mer team as a turning point. Get your damned wyverns in the air.”
“Yes, ma’am!”
“Take the Powells and head for the New Destiny fleet,” Karcher said, springing back through the hatch. “I’ve got another job for Vickie.”
“I thought we were staying out of it!” Megan said.
“Corvallis and the Richard are outnumbered,” Herzer replied, calmly, as he finished putting on his leathers. “We’re in range. We can’t just let them carry the whole fight.”
“What if we’re attacked while you’re gone?” she asked, angrily. The shambles from the fight still wasn’t cleared from her quarters and, ignoring the suggestion of the captain, she had installed herself in Herzer’s. Bast was still sharing the quarters but despite the crowding the elf seemed actually pleased that she was here. So was Megan, until this stupid plan had come up. “For that matter, you could be killed!”
“Megan,” Herzer said, gently. “I’m a soldier. Sometimes I ride a dragon, sometimes I swing a sword. I… hope that we have something special between us. But you’re going to have to accept that one of the problems of being my friend is that I go out to try to kill other people. And they try to kill me. It’s my job and I’m good at it. You’re going to have to decide if that’s what you want in a… friend.”