Page 48 of Guardian's Dilemma

Douglas carried on. “Did you see it?”

“Yes.”

“And? Was it like the witch said?”

I blinked. What witch?

We stared at each other for a few seconds until I realised what he meant. The original dragon I’d been sent after. With the excitement of finding the dragon territory and then the sheer strangeness and horror of everything else, I’d completely forgotten about them.

“Yes. They were acuraidh.”

Douglas nodded and jotted something on his notepad. I made a mental note to speak to Glimmer about that. Had he known about thecuraidh?

“It’s a shame about Leonard.”

“Actually, there’s something I need to tell you about Leonard,” I said.

“Oh? Go on.”

“There’s no easy way to say it, so I’ll just tell you straight: he was using dragon’s blood to fight.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. I could sense it, Douglas. You have to believe me.”

To my relief, Douglas waved a hand at me. “Of course I believe you, Kingsley. You have a special talent for sensing magic. It’s your greatest strength. It’s what makes you such a good tracker.”

For perhaps the first time ever, I didn’t follow up the word ‘tracker’ with a request to lead a hunting party. Douglas noticed that, too.

Without warning, he pulled back his fist and thrust it forward, sending a blast of magic out. He was aiming for my right-hand side, exactly where Glimmer had been standing and where he’d left his magic.

The blast ripped through the spells and thudded into the wall, sending out a spray of plaster.

“You’re not the only one who can sense magic, Kingsley. I can feel you using dragon magic, too.”

Already, Glimmer was building protections between me and Douglas. The sunset-orange spells were being layered up like a wall and it was making it difficult to see Douglas through them.

“I’m not using dragon’s magic,” I said, and even I heard how unconvincing that was under the circumstances, with dragon’s magic all around me. “I’m not. I brought something with me; I’m not channelling through dragon’s blood.”

Douglas paused.

“I swear to you, Douglas, I’m not using dragon’s magic. I had no idea Leonard was doing that.”

It was hard to see his expression through the protections Glimmer had made, so I went to step around them. I felt a strong hand on my arm and felt Glimmer’s presence beside me. I didn’t dare to look round at him because I wasn’t sure whether Douglas could see him or not.

“What magic is that, then?”

Douglas waved at the protections.

“It’s…”

I couldn’t finish that sentence. Because it was dragon’s magic. And if I was meant to be the only one in the room…

Glimmer stepped forward. “It’s dragon’s magic.”

Douglas’s eyes went wide and he pulled back his fist as he saw Glimmer for the first time.

Glimmer rushed forward, towards Douglas, and I shouted, “No!” and threw myself at him, tackling him to the floor. We crashed onto hard tiles and I was rolled into the heavy desk. Glimmer growled and threw a swathe of protections up over us as we tried to untangle ourselves.

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