But if they now saw Draycos on the ground running away . . .
"I need you to do something for me, Taneem," he said, gingerly cupping his hand under the Phooka's triangular jaw. She twitched a little at his touch but didn't try to pull away. "I need you to run north—that way"—he pointed—"until you find your other people and the Erassvas. Can you do that?"
She cocked her head again, her glowing eyes steady on him. Then, abruptly, she turned and bounded off through the trees.
"Right," Jack muttered under his breath. Whether she'd understood any of that or not, at least she was headed north. Now if she would just keep going past the Malison Ring soldiers and not get distracted by a pretty butterfly, this might work.
He could only hope she would also run past the soldiers fast enough to keep herself from getting shot.
But there was nothing he could do about that now. Settling the helmet back onto his head, trying to listen to the chatter through his still-ringing ears, he headed after her.
There was a flat crack, and even at his distance Draycos felt a ripple of the shock wave roll over his scales. From the sound and the lack of flame, he guessed it had come from a concussion-type grenade.
And it seemed to have come from near the spot where he'd left Jack.
Had the boy been captured?
He hissed in frustration. But whatever had happened to Jack, there wasn't anything Draycos could do about it right now. The soldiers below continued to plaster his tree with gunfire, the machine-gun rounds slowly but steadily chipping away at the edges of the trunk.
So far, Alison's own gunfire was keeping them from leaving their positions and coming around to where they could get a better shot. But sooner or later her weapon would run dry, or reinforcements would arrive, or the hail of metal would simply chew away enough of the tree for them to get to him.
They were making considerable progress toward that last goal, in fact. Already a couple of inches on each side of the trunk had been splintered away, forcing him to tuck his legs more tightly against his body to stay clear. Other rounds were hammering against the back of the tree, and he could only imagine how much more damage was being done back there. Two to three more minutes, if they didn't run out of ammunition, and they would start hitting him.
Unless . . .
He twisted his head around to look upward along the trunk. It was tall enough, he decided, and in the faint and sputtering light of the gunfire it looked like the top section was leaning the right way.
There was one way to find out for sure. Turning to face downward again, he made sure he had a solid grip on the trunk with his hind paws. Then, extending his forepaw claws, he began digging into the trunk in front of him.
By the time the flying splinters began jabbing against his scales, he'd carved a groove perhaps two inches deep into the wood. That might not be deep enough; but whether it was or not, he'd run out of time. Digging his foreleg claws into the tree beneath the groove, he leaned forward, pushing as hard as he could against the upper part of the tree with his hind legs.
Nothing happened. Setting his jaw, he pushed again. Still nothing. Even with the tree as badly damaged as it was, he simply didn't have the leverage to break the top section free.
And then, as he tried to think of something else to try, there was a startled shout from below him. The gunfire faltered; and then, to his surprise, it started up again at full force.
But this volley wasn't directed at him and his tree. Instead, it seemed to be concentrated on something at ground level.
Jack? Hissing helplessly between his teeth, Draycos forced himself to look.
But it wasn't the boy he spotted running at full speed through the trees. It was, instead, one of the Phookas.
How the creature had ended up here in the middle of the battle he couldn't guess. But for the moment, that didn't matter. What mattered was that with the mercenaries' attention distracted, he finally had a chance to move.
He twisted around on the tree, half-expecting to get shot in the process. But the soldiers' full attention was apparently on the sprinting Phooka below. Digging his claws into the wood, he headed up, climbing onto the thinner sections of trunk where there was little protection from gunfire from below.
But again, the mercenaries were apparently not watching. He reached a main branch extending outward in the direction of the soldiers and leaped onto it, running as far along it as he could.
The branch seemed to dip beneath his weight. Then, from below and behind him, he heard the sharp crack of fracturing wood. He stopped and turned back around.
And as he did so, the tree finally broke. Slowly, almost majestically, the top bowed over and began to topple toward the soldiers below. Holding tightly to his branch, Draycos rode it down.
The treetop didn't make it all the way to the ground, of course—the forest was far too dense for that. Instead, it tore its way noisily through the surrounding trees, ripping off its own branches and twigs as well as theirs, before getting caught up in larger branches and stopping a dozen feet above the ground.
But that was all Draycos needed. Caught in the rain of debris, with the spectacle of a tree falling toward them, the mercenaries had reacted exactly as he'd expected. Abandoning their positions, they were scrambling madly to get out of the way.
And as the treetop settled reluctantly to a halt, Draycos attacked.
It was no contest. Between Draycos's earlier tangler attack, the incident with the concussion grenade—whatever exactly had happened with that—and now the falling treetop, the soldiers had had one confusing distraction too many.
He caught the first two completely off-guard, knocking them out with blows to the sides of their necks before they even knew he was there. The third was able to turn nearly all the way around before Draycos sent him to join the other two. The fourth and fifth managed to get all the way around, and the fifth was even able to get off a wild shot.
And with that, it was over.
Or at least, Draycos hoped it was over. Crouching low to the ground, his senses alert, he scanned the area to the south. If Frost had sent in reinforcements, they could be arriving at any time.
Across the way, a figure wearing a Malison Ring helmet emerged from between a pair of trees. Draycos tensed but then relaxed as a hint of the newcomer's scent touched his nostrils and tongue. It was Jack, alive and apparently well.
There hadn't been any fire from Alison's position since the treetop had come down. Still, Draycos doubted she had lost any of her watchfulness. Keeping a wary eye in that direction, he headed toward the distant figure.
Jack had taken off the helmet by the time he arrived. "You've been a busy little dragon, haven't you?" he commented as he surveyed the area.
"And the busyness is going to continue," Draycos said. "We must leave before reinforcements arrive."
Jack shook his head. "Don't worry about it," he said. "Frost has another wave on the way, but I'm guessing they're just coming to retrieve this first bunch." He grinned tightly. "He wants them back before you hamstring them like you did those first two."
Draycos looked back toward where he'd left his latest batch of unconscious soldiers. Now that Jack mentioned it, it really wouldn't take very long to deal that same injury to them. And it would certainly put them out of the fight.
"Jack?" Alison's voice called cautiously.
Draycos grimaced. It wouldn't take long, but he certainly didn't want to do it with Alison watching. "We should be on our way," he said.
"No argument here," Jack agreed, putting out his hand.
Draycos laid his paw on the palm and slipped up the sleeve, settling into his accustomed place across the boy's back. A surge of warmth and strength flowed into the K'da as he did so—he hadn't realized just how long it had been since he'd been connected to his host. "I'm ready."