“You have no idea what I’ve been up to, Marban!” Wally’s mustache quivered.
“Negotiating plushie prices?” Marban smiled at him in that evilly benevolent way.
“Why you--”
“Wally, ignore him. He’s punching your buttons,” Caden begged.
The kid’s face was full of misery. Wally sighed. “I know I might be a bit rusty, but all I’m doing is watching. Not getting into a knife fight with the Behemoth.”
Caden’s hands tightened on his shoulders almost painfully. “If there’s even a whisper of them seeing you, you run away as fast as your little rat butt can.”
“Something like the Behemoth won’t notice a little rat!” Wally cried. “And think about finding other people involved in the plot. That’s worth a little danger, don’t you think?”
He certainly believed that. Caden’s expression though showed he didn’t agree.
“Promise me, Wally,” Caden insisted. “If you’re seen, you’re getting out of there. No heroics!”
From the strength of that grip on him, Wally was pretty sure Caden wouldn’t let him go until he agreed.
“I promise, kid!” Wally nodded vigorously, but he wasn’t sure he was telling the truth.
He was Caden’s Councillor. More than that, he was the kid’s friend. He had been Landry’s friend too. He needed to do better by both of them. Now was potentially his chance. After all, when Caden had heard he had a dark past, the kid could have turned away from him. But Caden hadn't even asked him about his past. He knew that Caden was interested in his past, but wasn’t going to pry until Wally offered. But Wally wasn’t ready to discuss things. He didn’t know if he ever would be. He had closed the door on that life, on that person he had been, and he didn’t want to open it. Not even to glance in.
Slowly, Caden released his hold on Wally’s shoulders. “Okay. All right. I can handle this. Handle risking you in this little bit.”
“I know you want to go down with me all dragony-like but that will just let the Behemoth keep hurting people. Maybe not me or Rose or Tilly, but others,” Wally reminded him. “And you won’t be able to live with that, Caden. I know you.” He had pointed to the center of Caden’s chest. “Am I wrong?”
Caden’s shoulders slumped again and he shook his head. “I just can’t… Wally, I saw her frozen in that wall, turned to stone, and I don’t want that to be you. I don’t want to see that again.”
“Everything will be fine, Caden. The risks are worth it,” Wally reminded him. “I will be uber-careful.”
Caden had nodded, but still just looked more miserable. He clearly had not wanted to lose anyone else. Wally was going to make sure that didn’t happen.
“Not far now,” Marban answered, drawing Wally out of his thoughts. The pause before he’d answered was, undoubtedly, him checking with Rose.
“You could just give Rose the phone and eliminate the middleman, Marban,” Wally reminded him, not for the first time.
“You and I are used to working together. I thought it would be good to do so again,” Marban said.
On the one hand, Wally thought it was foolish for them to be speaking. Shouldn’t he be silent and ghost-like--or rat-like--as the case may be. But on the other hand, he was sure that the people down here knew he was here. So maybe being silent would mark him out even more. Yet he didn’t hear anyone. But these beings were used to being whisper-quiet. Still he was unnerved.
But speaking to Marban was not his idea of a good time ever. It was like someone was knocking on that door of his past and that knocking grew louder and louder the longer that Marban spoke.
“Are we going to go through this now?” Wally asked abruptly.
Marban pretended not to know what he meant. “I don’t understand what you--”
“C’mon, Marban!” Wally huffed. “You must want to talk about the old days, because the new days are strangely similar.”
“Both of us Councillors for two of the most powerful beings on Earth? Well, we wanted to be those beings before,” Marban chuckled.
His voice was cast low. Wally wondered if Valerius and Caden were listening. Probably not. They were likely speaking quietly to one another. But Rose was there. Rose should understand Marban’s depths, too. She thought she knew them, but she only had seen Marban as her “Grandfather” and a crime boss that had to be obeyed. Wally had known more of Marban as they had been equals. So it was worth having this conversation.
“We could never have been so powerful as we are now on our own,” Wally pointed out.
There was a quiet moment. “No, I suppose not.”
It was almost laughable now to think of their seething empire of worms as anything compared to these beings that flew through the sky and could turn a world to ash. When Caden had become the ninth Dragon Shifter, Wally felt like he had lifted his head to the skies after looking down at the dirt for so long. He’d agreed to be Caden’s Councillor even though he feared being close to power again. If he slipped off course once more, would Caden notice? Would Caden stop him? He wanted to think “yes.” He wanted to think that life and circumstance had caused him to dig into his darker nature where there wasn’t that need now.
