Page 55 of The White Dragon Revealed

“Aw, man! Come on! I can get you there faster!” Stevie whined and began to pout.

“You stay here and monitor the radio, Stevie,” George told the boy, which immediately had Stevie brightening. “And you radio me any shortcuts that you know.”

“Yeah! Awesome! I can do that!” The boy grabbed George’s chairand scooted over to the desk where he put on the headset. “Oh, people are having problems getting over there, George!”

“Yeah, I bet, Stevie,” George answered grimly.

George went to a cabinet and grabbed a gun from inside of it. He slipped it into the back of his pants. He then stuck a bluetooth device in his right ear. He didn’t head towards the door back out into the market area of the Below but instead went to a bank of shelves. He reached between two books and the shelf slid to the side revealing a stone staircase that led up into the bare rock.

“Keep us in the loop, Stevie!” George called back over his shoulder.

“Will do!” The boy made a salute with two fingers.

Valerius wasn’t sure if he felt comforted by having a child as their backup but it was as it was. He took the stairs two at a time after George with Kaila on his heels. The staircase was so narrow that he had to almost turn sideways at times to get through. It was lit only by yellow utility lamps that cast a dirty, ugly light over the stone. The air smelled of damp stone and garbage rotting in corners.

“Ugh! What has died in here?” Kaila hissed from behind him. She was used to salt-tinged breezes and the clean scent of coconut. That was not the case here.

George had led them to a T-intersection. Valerius’ sense of direction told him that the Stairs should be to their right, but George was hesitating.

“What’s wrong? Shouldn’t we go to the right?” Valerius asked him.

“One of these tunnels has collapsed,” George answered. “I’m not sure if it is this one or the level above this one.”

“Should we have brought the boy?” Kaila’s right eyebrow rose.

“Contact Stevie if you do not know!” Valerius cried, feeling time ticking down.

George pressed a finger against the bluetooth device in his ear. Even before he had a chance to say anything, even Valerius could hear Stevie’s voice rising over the device, “George! George! Iolaire flew over to the Stairs!”

What?Valerius’ eyes widened in alarm.

“Iolaire must have seen them coming in,” Kaila guessed. “Well, if one of them has a bomb on them, Iolaire will deal with it.”

“How? By cuddling them?” Valerius hissed. He knew that was unfair. Iolaire was, of course, capable of violence. Every dragon was. But both Iolaire and Caden werenotkillers and violence of any kind was not natural to them.

“Bah! Iolaire is no lightweight! They will take action to help others,” Kaila said with a dismissive wave of her hand.

“I do not want them to have to do anything like that!” Valerius hissed.

Kaila’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, well, I see.”

He wondered what she did see. He leaned in towards George menacingly. “Find out which way.”

George gave a jerky nod and cut off Stevie’s excited-panicked patter, “Stevie! Stevie! Chill! King Valerius needs to know if its Level 4a or 4b that’s blocked.”

“Oh! Yeah, it’s like both, dude! Didn’t you know that?” Stevie asked. “Where have you been that you--”

“Stevie!” George hissed with a scared glance at Valerius. “How do I get them to the Stairs?”

“Easy! You take stairwell 7i to passage 1z and then…” Stevie rattled off more stairwells and passageways.

Valerius listened to them carefully even as adrenaline poured into his system. Raziel was now completely awake and shifting uneasily. Its claws dug into the earth of its lair. It wanted to get to the White Dragon.

Iolaire is brave. It will take care of Caden,Raziel assured him.

They are goodhearted, Raziel. I do not want them to have to kill…

Raziel’s eyes burned redly. It said nothing, but he knew it was intent on the same thing. He also caught a whiff of Raziel’s former attitude towards humans, and even other Shifters, which was that they would be better off on a mountaintop with just them, Caden and Iolaire.

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