Dragon Fire Read Online Free PDF Page B

as she introduced his sister to the others and then started to warm up. She was agile and athletic and he found himself absorbed by her movements. Finally, she turned and returned his stare. He looked away, only to meet June’s eyes. He felt a heady rush of her power and wondered how he had let himself be caught off guard. He hadn’t even felt her come out of the locker room. At least it would help confirm the disguise that they were putting up of being untrained. He pushed his curiosity about Anna out of his mind. All they needed to know was why she was important to June. Nothing else.
    The girls began a game and Rakan let his mind roam around the gym. He had already identified most of the people there from school, but there were a few others, including the couple that had brought June. He let his mind wander back to them. The guy had the bulky mass of an Old Dragon and Rakan had already checked him several times, but he didn’t have a rök or a Maii-a and his trail was typically human. Rakan turned away – they were involved in each other and totally unaware of his presence. Just like all the other humans. He let his mind wander even farther. He hadn’t felt the other dragon since they had arrived. It was as if he had vanished, leaving Jing Mei inexplicably alone.
    Confused and frustrated by the male dragon’s disappearance, Rakan focused back on the handball practice. He could feel Dvara’s thrill as she played. Jing Mei – June, he reminded himself – was goalie and Dvara was attacking. Rakan smiled as his sister played, gently increasing the pressure of her attacks that June blocked easily. But then June began to let some balls slip by on purpose. She had backed off. Rakan sat up. If Jing Mei was Paaliaq she would never have allowed an apparent novice to think she could get by her defenses. Or was it part of her disguise?

Chapter 3 Questions
    O BLIVIOUS TO THE COLD, RAKAN SAT perched in the open window of their apartment, watching the street below. He liked picking out each person’s scent from the many interwoven trails spread out everywhere. Tracing where they had been and where they went. It was a huge three dimensional maze that was in constant flux. And being so close to the center of it made the small arctic town seem like a living animal of pulsing threads.
    “It doesn’t make sense,” Dvara said, interrupting his tracking. “Did you see her eyes? They’re blue. Cobalt blue. But Paaliaq is green.”
    “Maybe she isn’t Paaliaq.” The thought had been nagging him all day.
    “Don’t be stupid, Rakan.”
    “Then she’s wearing contacts, like we do.”
    “No. I checked when we were playing.”
    “Then she’s changed color. Yarlung has.”
    Dvara snorted. “Yarlung lost her color after Kraal died. It’s not the same thing. And Yarlung’s eyes haven’t really changed; they’ve just become cloudy with her blindness.”
    “The only other possibility, if Jing Mei is Paaliaq, is that she’s found a way to change them while she was hiding. Just like she’s managed to make herself feel like a whelp.”
    Dvara stared out the other window. Her frustration echoed his.
    “If she is Paaliaq she’ll eventually let something slip,” Dvara said after a long pause. “Or we’ll have to find a way to make her slip up and give herself away.”
    “Normally whelps love to play,” Rakan said. “So maybe we need to play in front of her and see how she reacts. We can do things like place triggers all over town for each other to set off or disarm.”
    “And she’ll have to respond eventually since no whelp would ever resist playing for very long.” Dvara smiled. “And then I can hide a double layer of triggers that no whelp could disarm by herself – and if she doesn’t disarm them, they’ll explode.”
    “Exactly.” Rakan felt the thrill of closing in. And then it disappeared. They looked at each other, and knew what they were both thinking, but didn’t want to admit. They had no idea where