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“Feel the path?” Rodrigo carefully repeated, arching one eyebrow at the taller man.
“Don’t worry about it, Snowy. It’s an earth dragon thing. You wouldn’t understand.” As he spoke, the king reached out and gave Rodrigo’s nose a little tweak.
Rodrigo batted his hand away and then might have given his own mate the evil eye when Ha Na dared to giggle. Though the expression melted away as quickly as it formed under the weight of her broad smile.
“While we’re confident the earth dragons can clear the old path, our main concern is the structural integrity of the cave where the mages and dragons still rest,” Evora said, putting an abrupt stop to their silliness. “Once you start moving rocks, can you be sure you won’t cause rocks to come crashing down on the sleeping mages?”
“You’re not going to wake them up before we start working?” Chalo asked.
Evora shook her head, but it was Amaru who chimed in. “The majority of the Sousa down there are either children or the elderly. We thought it would create less of a panic if we had an exit ready and waiting for them when they woke. We considered letting people swim out…”
“Not a first choice for that many children and elderly,” Chalo finished with a nod. “I understand.” The earth dragon rubbed his pointy chin and frowned at the map. “No, I don’t think this is going to be a problem. We’ll have two dragons digging out the route and two in the cave keeping an eye on the ceiling. Even if we have to claw out an entirely new path, this shouldn’t take more than a day or two.”
“Thank you, my friend.” Rodrigo sighed, clapping a hand on his back. “The assistance is much appreciated.”
Chalo held up one finger, stopping the ice dragon. “Now that we have that settled, I do have a couple of questions for you.”
“Of course.”
“I had a long chat with Roca before I left. He and his father had scuffles with the Lightning Clan centuries ago.”
Amaru leaned in close to Vasily. “Who’s Roca?” he whispered.
Vasily pressed his cheek against the side of Amaru’s head as he replied. “King of the Metal Dragons. Their territory ran north of here through Central America and down into parts of Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. The metal dragons fought in the Dragon War and later moved with many of the other fractured clans east to form the Sodalicium.”
That was a good start, but Amaru was going to need to hear a lot more about this war since its effects were still being felt around the world.
“Do you know if old King Cote is down in the cave?” Chalo asked.
“He’s not,” Amaru answered. “King Cote took his eldest son to fight Woodsfather, along with the majority of the Lightning Clan. His youngest child, Princess Maíra, and only a handful of the lightning dragons were put into a deep slumber with the Sousa Clan. They were to be our protection when we woke up.”
Chalo grunted and stared silently at the table for a second. “Very well. Roca sends a reminder all the same. These dragons went to sleep when we weren’t getting along all that well.”
Luka snorted from where he stood near Rodrigo. “When we were all snarling and fighting over the tiniest strips of territory.”
“Hey, battle scars were a way of showing off to mages that we were strong fighters,” Dimitri countered.
A low, derisive scoff erupted from Sam as the mage elbowed Dimitri in the stomach. “Idiots. Battle scars are not sexy. Having my dragon in one piece is sexy.”
Chalo coughed, though it sounded like he was covering up a laugh. “Yes, well, my point is Princess Maíra and the rest of the lightning dragons might react poorly to waking up to a bunch of ice dragons and earth dragons standing around them.”
“Ah, yes. Good point.” Rodrigo rubbed his chin, his brow furrowing slightly. “To keep things from escalating, we’ll need to keep the number of dragons to a minimum when they awake. At least until we can tell them everything that has happened and how much time has passed.”
“My other question is whether you’ve given any thought as to where you are going to put all these mages and dragons once you wake them up?”
Rodrigo opened his mouth to answer but not a sound came out. It was one question no one had asked. Everyone—Amaru included—had been so focused on waking up the sleeping mages and dragons that no one had talked about what happened afterward.
Chalo grimaced. “You can’t be thinking to take them all back to your compound. Yes, it’s big for your clan, but you’re talking about taking on another four hundred people.”
“And what? You think you’re taking them all back to the Sodalicium? It took you over two days to fly here. You think they’re going to want to spend two days in the air after being asleep for five hundred years?” Rodrigo asked, a rosy flush painting his cheekbones.
