The Dogs of War (SkyLine 3)

Chapter Fourteen: Two Coups

Even Caullen slumped over in his chair, even with the stick so many suspected was lodged between his rear scales. He sat across from and next to every last member of the

Higher Order other than its Chairman. Krystis waited outside, with a small contingent of Caullen’s followers. She waited for the same thing everyone inside the councilroom waited for. The same thing no one could quite believe.

“He calls an emergency council meeting, then he has the audacity to leave us all waiting,” Caullen growled. He let his claws thud on the table, as if he was truly frustrated. Really, he couldn’t have hoped for a better start to the meeting. With every passing minute that Donellanus left them waiting, the crowd’s energy shifted. They became more malleable, though most of them were already leaning his way. Caullen was twice as impatient as all the others in wait, for very different reasons.

Then the doors swung in. The Faders that lined the wall and the Dragons at the table alike straightened up. Chairman Donellanus of the Higher Order entered the room. He strolled past row after row of once loyal leaders. He wore a wide, wicked smile under his ruby eyes, knowing they’d be loyal again. Fealty to the King, Donelannus let himself think. He let it snake through every head at the table. He rounded the table to his usual seat at its head. At this particular meeting, however, for the first time, he did not take it. Donellanus wrapped both his claws around the ornate, Fader-carved stone chair, to stand steady behind it.

“Thank you all for coming on such short notice,” Donellanus opened with. He took several leisurely breaths before continuing. He let Caullen stew just long enough, just until containing himself became impossible.

“A stipulation that you deemed below yourself, I see,” hissed the beast of light-blue scale. Several growls of agreement rumbled across the Higher Order. Donellanus waited patiently, his ruby eyes fixed on Caullen’s yellow ones. He sliced silently into his subordinate, deeper with each driven second, until Caullen eventually averted his face.

“This meeting is for one critical reason. You are all here to answer a question. You will answer yes, either now or later,” Donellanus outlined for them, with a confidence that chilled the scales of all who heard him. “You’ll find cooperation to be infinitely more pleasant… Do you swear fealty to your King?” Scaly throats gulped. Uneasy steam slipped from the jaws of nervous beasts. Sparkling gemstone eyes shifted from one Dragon of the Higher Order to the others, all of them wondering if their Chairman was serious.

“King?” Caullen scoffed, if only to combat the weight of the silence. “This is too much, and yet just what we needed to show us…the stresses of leading the Higher Order jade you, Chairman. Perhaps it’s time to step down?”

“I knew you would drag this out, Caullen. What of the rest of you?” Donellanus shook his smirking head. “Who among you swears fealty to your King?” Again, silence befell the Order.

“Alright, open the doors. Krystis,” Caullen signaled. The red-scaled acolyte entered, along with others of similar rank and alignment. Puppets on the strings of a different, lesser master, Donellanus thought.

“Yes, Krystis. All of you, in,” Donellanus welcomed his sworn adversaries with open arms. Those already loyal to him, he ushered out with swinging talons. There was no reason to subject them to more horrors. “Kreetah metah, Pulareh, Dormis.” Take your people and leave, Dormis. The leader of the Faders had seen firsthand what terrible darkness had fallen on Donellanus; he took his people from the room instantly.

The Higher Order was plunged into immediate and uncomfortable chaos. Caullen, Krystis and those from outside swarmed around the table toward the one who called himself King. Some rose to join them. Some went for the door. Others still were frozen in their chairs. So many minds and hearts to call together as one, under one banner of darkness. Donellanus unclamped his claws from his chair. He closed his eyes to reach inward, to the formless, ancient life within him. He felt the other Dragons near him in the fire of his blood. Donellanus opened his eyes to twenty or more grasping claws.

“Kneel,” he commanded. That single word roared through the minds of every Dragon present. With it went a dense wave of black mist. It flooded the room, from one wall to the next. It wrapped around every member of the Higher Order, smothered them inside a tightening cloak of darkness. The fog of Machaeus swept up under the scales, behind the eyes and down their throats. Most of those who knew what it was took a knee at once, and no pain befell them. The others littered the floor, twitching. Darkness dripped from every seam of their scaly armor.

“Donellanus…you…bastard…” Caullen coughed. Shards of Machaeus cut their way in and out of him, until he too fell to the floor. The blackness swirled around Donellanus, leaving his scales untainted as he stood over a squirming pile of those who opposed him.

“Do you swear fealty to your King?” Donellanus asked again.

“You…” Caullen choked, along with eight others who raged against Machaeus’ control.

“Yes,” Krystis finally gave in. Her crimson knee dug into the stony floor. The blackness inside unclenched from around her organs.

“You…will never…be…” Caullen tried to roar, though it left him as more of a gargle. Words became impossible for him, with the black tar seeping through his lips.

In the middle of the chaos, Donellanus pulled his chair out at last. He took his spot at the head of the table. No longer was it the seat of the Chairman. Donellanus settled into his throne, the King come home at last.

The Jupiter base was quieter that night than it had been since the Faders built it. Donellanus sat firmly planted on his throne until every last Dragon had left. For the first time in months, he took a stroll to the top of the base. There was an observation deck there, a place the Faders had built for their lords to enjoy the hot breeze of Jupiter’s clouds. Donellanus stood alone there, a single shadow in the ever-lashing color. He stared up at the bobbing protrusion of an unfinished tower. Mankind’s futile attempt to find a hypothetical surface of Jupiter. Soon, it would build itself down far enough for them to see the Dragons’ base. There would be no point by then, as Machaeus often reminded him.

“Sir,” Caullen said through his compliantly gritted teeth. Donellanus hardly gave him the courtesy of half a turn.

“What news, dear friend?” asked Donellanus.

“Dormis and his most trusted Faders are en route to Mercury. As you commanded,” Caullen told him.

“And yet, you still don’t understand why?” Donellanus picked from his newly loyal servant’s brain. Machaeus had given him access to the minds of all ensnared by its dark touch.

“I’m afraid not,” Caullen admitted, knowing the futility of lying now.

“Let me make it as clear for you as it is for me,” Donellanus said. He paced over, calmly, to rest a claw on Caullen’s tense shoulder.

“The Universe is on a course that will tear it apart. It is, in no small part, our fault. The only thing that can save it now is returning it to a time before it was so doomed. We will restore it to conditions before humans or Dragons tainted it so,” Donellanus told him.

“But…how?”

“The same way it was formed in the first place,” Donellanus shrugged, “Bang!” Caullen flinched away from so acute a sound. His King only wandered back to the edge of the viewing platform, to gaze into Jupiter’s boundless stormwinds. It took Caullen a few seconds to work himself up to submitting his second, more urgent report, especially after hearing so heavy a divination of his future.