In Part 4 (Ch. 26-36), Emilie finally told everyone just what she was, and what that meant for the future of the town. More specifically, she let them know that there was a threat of extreme violence hanging over her head. To prepare, she’s been added to the high school’s combat training, while everyone else also gets ready for a fight.
In the second week of July, the Defense Force was notified that Martha had crossed into Kentucky, which is adjacent to Virginia, though thankfully not the border Blacksburg is right next to. She’s been making rather slow progress, but we know why: she hasn’t stopped her army from attacking towns on the way, and somehow their ranks have only grown. That means she’s actively sending out recruiters to any monster towns they pass. As a counter, Blacksburg has warned Roanoke and surrounding villages, and I’ve personally warned Rich Creek about her. While she might be making an army of monsters, she doesn’t like them at all. There’s both evidence and tactics about it in the Mymoir: she encourages recklessness and over-reliance on herself so that it’s easy to backstab members of her army without anyone finding out.
By contrast, our strategy plans for me to stay out of the fight unless it’s strictly necessary. I’ve learned a lot since January, but that’s still an experience measured in months against Martha’s centuries. Brice living only a few hours’ flight to the south means he might join in, too, which has put my spear training solidly in the “not useful” column. Instead, I’ll be taking refuge and hoping they won’t find me. Some people weren’t too keen on fighting to protect me until I pointed out that them knowing Dragons are humans makes them a target, too. Martha isn’t just coming here to kill me—she wants to wipe Blacksburg off the map, with zero survivors. Well, zero that won’t join her army, at any rate.
When I told Mr. Manning that Akiko’s Resistance Canceler exists, he set things up so I could try to train with created weapons until I selected one to be made by a blacksmith. The blacksmith said I should be older before he made one, but I told him about the aging thing and he relented. (While I could technically fight with a created weapon, that would also make me vulnerable to all sorts of spells—fire, augmentation, stun, creation, summons, etc.—that would otherwise not affect me, so a non-magic weapon is the way to go.) However, orange dragons can simply remove my spear from existence even more easily than I can light a fire, so if Brice shows up, I need to leave my spear behind. I don’t want Dad to have to buy another one.
As for Blacksburg itself, the town is currently… strange. I suspect this is how it would have felt if a hostile Dragon moved here instead of the Dragon for the area being myself, but I hope things can go back to normal soon. Alex’s family left for eastern Virginia (and took her with them) as soon as the school year ended, and they weren’t the only ones to leave. I’m used to most of the college students vacating every summer, but even then, the town is never so empty. And tense. Shannon is still here because her dad is actually a beast hunter and is somehow thrilled by current events. I don’t think he likes me personally, but he’s actually spoken to me and not around me. That’s miles ahead of how he and his wife treat the rest of my family. And of course Jess is still here. Almost everyone else still in town is either Dynamic or a monster, but I’m not sure whether that’s because of relative risk or the Defense Force’s outlined strategy.
Jess informed me during our morning run that she’d be at the library today to do her summer homework and would try to get Shannon to come as well. I’ve already done the work, but with that in mind, I asked my parents if I could go, too, and they let me. So now the three of us are gathered at the quieter-than-normal library, in the group meeting area, of course.
“How’s our Dragon holding up?” Jess asks after closing her math book. She’s not done yet, but about halfway there.
I don’t have any other answer: “Nerve-wracked. I came mostly to distract myself, but Alex’s absence isn’t helping.”
“She definitely knows how to distract people,” Shannon responds with a small laugh.
“Yeah,” Jess agrees. “I’ve noticed that homework is a lot easier to do now.”
I fiddle with my lizarkin wand. “My distractions mostly come with all the forms people are trying out.” Martha uses people’s clothing against them, so the DF looked into countering that while maintaining public decency laws. The conclusion: no one should be in a human form for as long as she’s within range, and people should practice beforehand. Due to “specific anatomy stuff,” avian and reptilian forms are the most popular. Well, that’s what people said when I asked, anyway. That probably goes back to the “public decency” topic the DF was worried about.
“Is it making you wish you could be a monster?” Shannon teases. Some people have decided to do just that. I wonder what the ratio will be after this is over? Probably higher than the 1 in 50 that I heard at training.
I shake my head. “I, uh, can, technically. That’s what – you know the spell that I use to let you two make me look like a lizarkin? That’s what Akiko made it for.”
“She’s a monster?” Jess asks.
“No.” I shake my head again. “Or, well, sometimes. Shifting gets rid of that, too.” Becoming a monster is normally a one-time thing. You can’t undo it. Normally, anyway.
“Sounds like an expensive lesson to learn,” Jess remarks. Since it’s a one-time thing, it’s important that the Wizard doing it for you knows exactly what he’s doing, so it costs quite a lot. Not the “a lot” cost of my lizarkin wand, but like buying fifty of those.
Shannon lifts a finger. “Wait, ‘sometimes?’”
The other Dragons have a list of all the kinds of monsters Akiko has been. It’s a long list. I smile. “She doesn’t seem any more decisive than Alex on what form is best.”
“That many, huh? Don’t tell Alex. I guess she’s figured out how to make a lot of money.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” I assent, nodding. I guess in a pinch I could sell scales, but that’s probably not—
*BREE BREE*
I flinch, startled. This place is way too far from the town walls for me to sense anything, but the timing—I hand the lizarkin wand to Shannon, pull out my feather (so it’s not in clothing) and stand up, casting Akiko’s spell. “Dull crimson, please,” I request as the emergency board lights up and confirms my guess. It’s time. My eye color is the default scale color, but that’s not a good color to be for this. A few seconds later, I’m instead a shade of red that stands out much less—not as dull as Natalie’s scales, but certainly not vivid—and I drop Akiko’s spell so my defenses are back up.
I waste no time grabbing my spear and by the time I’m ready, Shannon is also ready in her own gold-furred upright wolf form. I know full well that Jess will be a bear as soon as we leave the building. The next part of the plan is to join the rest of the non-fighters in the indoor stadium, now reinforced with living vines to keep Brice from easily collapsing the place. He still can, just not with any spells I’ve read.
Because the university is right next to the stadium, my friends and I are among the first to arrive. The Defense Force’s plan included everything down to strategically planning where people would stand or sit; the space under the stands is for most folks who have no intention of fighting, including Jess and her family. Anyone who is still in town is not completely incapable of defending oneself, but some are more prepared than others. While my family will be under the stands, I’ll be with the remaining members of my high school combat class on top of them. The fact that the seat backs are above big slots that form gaps in the stands’ floor never really mattered to me before, but it’s great now that we all have tails. (Well, avians sort of do, but it matters more for mammals and some reptiles.) I tried going to school as a lizarkin once. I now greatly appreciate the various seating styles made in case of non-human forms. Someone put a lot of thought into those.
Between early warnings and my limited range, I couldn’t, and still can’t, detect signs of a fight. I bet sound will be the first indicator, so long as the stadium remains quiet. The cafeteria at school never is, though, so my first indicator might end up being someone breaching the defenses. If that happens, I hope it’s Martha or Brice, because if it’s not a Dragon then today might be my last day. And everyone else in town’s. If it is a Dragon, they probably just flew over everyone. It’s hard to stop a Dragon from flying anywhere they wish. Even if you’re flying around carrying a rifle, you’d need to be exceptionally lucky to shoot a Dragon before they disabled your weapon. If someone tried against me, well… Steven has a spell for melting critical gun parts. I just have to specify a general volume to check.
Minutes pass, and the trickle of incoming people quickly rises to a flood as those that were in housing areas have time to get here. My section fills with people who apparently all chose to be lizarkin today, which is a surprise because that was not the case in our training. Now that I think back, though, everyone did have at least one day as a lizarkin.
“Surprised?” Davidson snaps me out of it.
I nod. “Yeah.”
“Murphy said it’s as much for my protection as it is for yours. We don’t stand out so much this way, hey?”
I giggle, “You’re right.”
A yellow lizarkin leans over, and the voice tells me it’s Robertson. “Nice trick with the scale color. How’d you get here so fast?”
“I was at the library with my friends.”
She approximates a wince. “I’m not a friend? Ouch.”
I glare at her, and she laughs. “I know, I know! Hey, if you want to know what’s happening out there, you should chat with James.” Murphy. “He’s scrying the walls. No illusion of it, though, because he doesn’t want folks crowding him. He’s lime today.”
I look around and spot James quietly chatting with someone else. I excuse myself and make my way over to him, which is slightly assisted by using heat for extra awareness of myself and others. Still, I could stand to improve my movement in this form. Maybe I can get some coaching from Rich Creek’s lizarkin once things calm down. They probably know even more than Davidson, and he hatched a lizarkin.
“Gaschler!” James whisper-calls when I’m close. “I was wondering when you’d get here.”
“I’ve been here. How could you tell it was me?” I’m kinda wondering for Davidson, too.
Rather than verbally answering, he lifts a hand and grasps a newly-conjured spike of ice in it. Then he moves to tap me with it, and it vanishes on contact.
“Oh.” I guess that’s something Davidson could do, too.
“Dragons would have to be hermits for people to not know they’re special. There are abjuration spells to match that ability, but I bet Dragons are some of the people documented as having ‘unusual magic.’”
Huh. I guess that’s another reason for Dragons to have gigantic territories: they’re never spending too long in one place. “Anyway, how’s the fight going? It’s outside my current range.”
“I think it’s pretty even,” Murphy answers. “The Dragon doesn’t show up, so she must not be active right now. But it looks like your idea worked and I’m not seeing her usual tactics. There’s even some confusion since everyone looks like a monster.”
I try to frown. “Doesn’t that mean we don’t know who to attack? How is that good?”
“I chatted with Nick. Even Martha can’t tell friend from foe and has trouble directing any tactics, and these monsters were probably told they’d be fighting humans. Dana is gryphon-shaped today and hasn’t had any trouble scouting the battlefield. Today certainly won’t be injury-free, but it’s also not the usual bloodbath for when a Dragon shows up to fight.”
That’s… well, it’s not terrible. Hopefully the pattern can hold. “Has Dana spotted any orange dragons?”
James widens his eyes. “Good point. I’ll ask Nick to let me know if she does.”