“We have another issue,” Henry said.
“What’s that?” Jason asked. He took another sip of the tea.
“Your hand.”
Setting the mug down, he rested his hand out, squeezing it for a moment. “I could wear a glove.”
“You could, but if they notice it, there will be questions.”
“What happened to it?” Sarah reached for his hand, holding on to it, tracing her fingers along the metal. Her touch was gentle, almost a caress, and he was tempted to pull away, but he enjoyed the connection. “I remember seeing it after the fight, but I didn’t ask what happened then. I should have.” She looked up at him. “I’m sorry that I didn’t.”
Jason studied his hand. The metal looked no different than the skin had. And it blended in, so it looked nothing like an actual glove. He could still see the wrinkles and the lines on his fingers. “When I was holding on to the iron dragon pearl when Therin attacked, heat began to wash through my hand.” He could remember the way it felt, the way the metal had slowed, swirling around him. How much of that had been him, and how much of that had been the iron dragon working on his behalf? It was difficult to know. The iron dragon had no real control over how the metal flowed along his back. When asked, he had not been able to explain any of that to Jason.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” she said.
“No one has,” Henry said. “The dragons are so different, so unusual, that no one has seen anything like it.”
“Why do you think this will raise questions?”
“Look at it,” Henry said.
“It glows when I draw power from the iron dragon,” he said.
“It glows?”
Jason connected to the iron dragon, focusing on power. Heat began to build through the glove, but as often happened, there was no pain that came with it. It was simply an awareness of that heat. It was there, a presence, but nothing more than that. It wasn’t painful in any way. The glove continued to glow, getting warmer, and then he released it.
“If you do that around any of the Dragon Souls, they’re going to question it,” Henry said.
“If I did that as a slave, they would question it,” he said.
“Then we need to know which way he could hide it most easily,” Sarah said.
“I suppose he could wear leather gloves,” Henry said.
“As a Dragon Soul?”
Henry nodded. “I don’t like it. It means he’s going to have to hold on to a change. He doesn’t even understand his powers that well yet.”
“Could I change the glove, too?” If he could modify his eyes, then maybe he could learn to modify his hand, concealing it.
“Again, it would be difficult.”
Difficult, but not impossible. He didn’t know what it would take in order to mask his eyes, but adding to what would need to be done for his hand would be even more challenging.
“I don’t like doing this.” Sarah got back to her feet and turned, her back facing them. “I’m going with him.”
“You can’t do that, Sarah,” Henry said.
“And why not?”
“For one, I doubt your parents would be thrilled with you going, but for another, you know too much. You’re going to raise the wrong sort of questions.”
“No differently than him. With his abilities, he’s going to need help to hide them.”
“Sarah…”
She spun back, facing Henry. “I’m going. If he has the ability we think he does, and if he can free the dragons, then we need to use that knowledge.” She glanced over at Jason. “While you help your people, I’m going to do what I can to help the dragons.”
Henry grunted. “You’re going to make me regret this.”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t think you can go alone. Either of you.”
“You can’t return to Lorach. They would recognize you.”
“I have ways of moving around the city that won’t be noticed. At least by going there, I can ensure the two of you don’t end up dead.”
“What about what we’re dealing with to the south?”
Henry looked over at Jason, shaking his head. “I don’t know that any of it matters. If we can get in there and rescue some of the dragons, we have a real chance of changing things,” he said. He leaned forward, locking eyes with Jason. “I know you don’t love the idea of getting involved, but if you do this, we’ll need you to do more than just try to save your people.”
“If I do this, then I don’t know if I’ll have much of a choice.”
Henry smiled slightly. “You might find that you have a choice, but you may not care for what choice you’re offered.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“What it means is I have very little doubt that the Dragon Souls will be eager to take you in. Given your natural talent, they’ll be thrilled with seeing what you might be able to do. That’s not what I worry about. What I worry about is whether or not you reveal too much to them.”
“About what? My ability to help the dragons?”
Henry nodded. “We don’t know exactly what it is that Therin is after, only that he clearly is looking for something. If he’s doing this to draw you out, then we need to be careful that we aren’t falling into some trap of his making.”
“He wouldn’t expect us to come to Lorach,” Sarah said.
“He wouldn’t expect the two of us to go. That’s part of the reason I’m willing to do it. But he wants Jason to do it. I think he expects you to head to Lorach, to see if you can do something to break the dragons free, and then he’ll capture you, the same way he captured your people.”
“Then you don’t think we should do this?” Jason was confused, not sure at all what Henry was getting at.
“On the contrary. I think we need to.” He leaned back, pressing his hands together, rubbing them. “It’s been a while since I’ve been to Lorach. We are going to have to work out a way of communicating.”
“We’re going to have to work out more than just a way of communicating,” Jason said. “If it’s about me trying to hold on to this power, using it to shield myself, then I’m going to need something more. I’m going to need training.”
“We can train, but I wonder how much time we have,” Henry said.
“I thought you said they wouldn’t hurt my people.”
“If they put them in the pens, it’s not about hurting them. It’s about how long they might survive.”
Henry got to his feet and slipped out of the room. It left Jason and Sarah looking at each other. She took a seat across from him and rested her elbows on her knees.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said.
“You’re starting to sound like him.”
“This isn’t your fight.”
“Were you not paying attention? If you were, you’d know the reason I’m doing this. If you can get me close enough to help some of the other dragons, this will be worth it. All of this will be worth it. We need to help them as much as possible, and this might be the only way to do it. We’ve never really known how to help the dragons, not in any way that would make a difference. We tried, and we have failed. Too often when we have gone after dragons, trying to free them from Lorach, their training kicks in. Whatever the Dragon Souls have done to them changes them. We don’t know how to overpower that, even though we have tried.”
“If the ice dragon is injured, I don’t know how much I’ll be able to do.”
“That power is within you, Jason. You have to find it. You have to use it.”
“I don’t know if I can.”
He focused on the cold, letting the sense of it flow through him. It might be there, but it came distantly, slowly, and the longer that he thought about it, the more that he tried to reach for that power, the harder it was to do anything with it. He could feel it bubbling within him, though it did so slowly. It was different than when he had the ice dragon pearl to use. When he had that, he was better able to connect to the ice dragon, and he had to wonder if perhaps there would be a way to find another dragon pearl. If he could do so, then he wouldn’t have to worry about reaching for that power.