The Draykon Series (1-3)

Orlind: Chapter Eighteen

Eva sat with Tren, Ana and Griel in the latter's house in Ullarn. The four had gathered there for a final discussion, prior to their infiltration of Krays's Library. The conversation was not going well.

'I want to emphasise how dangerous this is,' Ana said, slouching into one of Griel's armchairs. 'If you two mess up, it will be me who is punished first.' Her stare was unfriendly and devoid of anything resembling sympathy or fellow-feeling. 'I still do not like this plan.'

Tren shrugged. 'We're open to other suggestions.'

'I have none, of course,' Ana snapped. 'Otherwise I would never have agreed to this folly. Let me say again: the utmost care must be taken in everything, especially when you are going to places that you should not.'

'Yes, yes,' Tren sighed. Ana had gone over this multiple times already, and even Eva's patience was running out.

Ana glared at him. 'It has occurred to you, I suppose, that he will insist on tracering you both.'

Eva grimaced. Tracers seemed to be popular with the Lokant Libraries. The tiny tracking devices were embedded somewhere in the body, so that they couldn't be removed or switched off by the bearer. Once tracered, the individual could be located at a moment's notice, no matter where in the worlds they happened to be.

Eva hadn't yet suffered that indignity, but she knew she'd have no choice. If she resisted the tracer, Krays would never consider her trustworthy.

'It has occurred to me,' she said coolly.

'It hadn't occurred to me,' Tren muttered. If she didn't know Tren better, she might have called his current mood bad-tempered. But since she did, she recognised it as anxiety. And no wonder, because on top of everything else he considered himself responsible for her safety, too.

Don't be separated from me, he'd said earlier, and he had made her promise to stay with him at all times. Nothing she had said could convince him to relinquish his self-appointed role as her guardian, so she'd had to accept it.

She just wished it wasn't so obviously wearing on his nerves.

'You will be tracered,' Ana was saying with brutal bluntness. 'You will not resist, because that will give away the game. You will be expected to report regularly on whatever duties you are assigned. You will not be permitted to argue with the Lokantor. You-'

Tren interrupted. 'Lokantor? Isn't that Limbane's title?'

Eva was puzzled too. Limbane had never insisted on their using the name, but she'd heard the other Lokants addressing him that way, with the sort of respect that suggested it was an important term.

'How should I know?' Ana snapped. 'I'm telling you that Krays uses that title and he will expect you to address him by it.'

'Then we shall,' Eva replied. Tren had eschewed the comfort of a chair and taken up pacing instead. The more frustrated and worried he became, the greater the speed of his ramblings. She abandoned her own chair and followed him, catching at his hands to make him stop.

He sighed. 'Sorry. I think it's the waiting that's getting to me.'

'Me as well,' she said, gripping his fingers with gentle pressure. 'It would be well to get it over with.'

'Then let's.' He looked back at Ana, subtly assuming some of the commanding air he'd adopted for his role as a partial Lokant. His dark hair was hidden under Limbane's white wig and he looked every inch the Lokant. 'We're ready to go, Ana.'

'I will tell you when we are ready to go!' she replied, her temper flaring. She jumped up and advanced on Tren, but whatever she might have said was interrupted by a soft, but penetrating, beep. Aysun's voice-box, deposited in the pocket of Eva's coat, gave a sudden shudder, knocking against her leg.