I don’t want to get too close to the settlement, because this bobont could raze it all without knowing it.
And now I can see it. There’s the army camp, and there’s the village, with the fields and the groves of fruit trees. And theeere… are the remains of my house, now a heap of rubble.
I place the butterfly right in front of the bobont’s eye, and it immediately stops as fast as it can.
I raise myself onto my knees and look down and ahead, as high above my old home as if I sat in a helicopter.
There’s no sign of life in the village. Nobody’s sitting by the main fire, and there’s no flame. There should be someone cooking lunch about now, there should be some toddlers and babies to be seen. There should be movement, at any rate.
But there’s nothing. The place is deserted. The army camp looks desolate, as well. Not a single shed is left standing, not a single tent.
I scratch my chin. Of course, they would all have heard the bobont coming from far away, and maybe they’re hiding. But I don’t think so. The caveman warriors don’t usually hide from anything.
I’m not in a great mood from before, but seeing the village I’ve lived in for two years destroyed and abandoned sends further pangs to my heart. We made a good place for ourselves, damn it. The best village on the planet. And now it’s in ruins.
I turn the bobont around, which takes several minutes because it’s still standing in one place. Then I do my trick with the fake butterfly and the bobont starts walking in the direction of the flat marsh where Bune is now.
I’m not sure what I wish for.
I want the girls to be okay, of course. I want them to be safe. I want the siege Ashlynn mentioned in the letter to be over.
And I want the escape ship to work.
But would that make any difference? If Caronerax gets his way, he’ll be going to Earth as soon as possible, to plunder and pillage. There might not be much of an Earth to come home to for the girls and me. We know Plood ships work fine.
Did I make the wrong decision? Should I have stayed and talked to Caronerax, convinced him to have the Plood take us home? Him and me and the girls, without the other dragons?
I probably should have. But those Plood froze my mind with terror. That saucer… still the thought of it sends chills down my spine. I remember so well the one that abducted me. It looked just like that, and it totally horrified me. I’m still badly traumatized by that whole event, like the other girls are, too.
Him and me. Caronerax and Jen. We were an unlikely couple. But no more unlikely than Kyandros and Mia. Or Aragadon and Eleanor. They make it work. We could have, too.
I believed that this was it. That he was the one. And now, while the pain is still raw and untreated, I don’t regret it. I felt it, I dared it. I followed my instincts and took a chance that it was right.
And I think it was, for a while.
I miss that dragon, though. He made me safe, and he looked at me with such intensity. He stroked me and made sure I was comfortable. He applied the healing paste to my shoulder without me asking him to.
I think that was real.
You can never know with a dragon, though. They’re deceptive and calculating.
But I want to think it was real.
There’s a bright, white crescent in the distance. I’m hundreds of feet up in the air, and the view is great. I can see for miles and miles. That has to be Bune.
Soon I’ll know how bad things are for me and the girls. We might be totally and irrevocably screwed. From the things in Ashlynn’s letter and the cavemen that caught me and Caronerax, I think that’s the most probable outcome.
And the Plood are here.
Hey, he asked me to come with him. That has to count for something.
No, I think it was real.
I kissed him first, but then he kissed me.
I said ‘I love you’, but he didn’t. If he was deceiving me, it would have been so easy for him to say it. Only if he was really confused would he hesitate like that, only if he had to straighten out his thoughts first. Only if that phrase had the same meaning to him