Issuu

One

THE KNIFE IS COLD IN MY PALM. I retrieved it from Canna in the wake of battle, where it lay alongside the other tools for killing left scattered across the island’s beaches. I stole Ralph Wyvernmire’s favoured weapon with exactly that word in mind. Kill – with its violent K and its equally violent translations. Tuer in French. Necrire in Drageoir. Marbh in Cannair. Except I’m not going to use this knife to kill. I’m going to use it the way Ralph did. The door to General Goranov’s iron cage gives a metallic groan as I push it open. The guard keeps a spare key for me, although I’m not supposed to be here. These days, it seems many people are happy to help the Swallow. There is no actual need for a guard, not with the two detonators inserted beneath Goranov’s skin and the fact that he’s missing a limb. But Hollingsworth is nothing if not meticulous. The Bulgarian Bolgorith doesn’t move as I enter the prison. Britannia, as it turns out, has plenty of dragon

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prisons. Giant dungeons built deep beneath the streets of London, designed to keep their prisoners as far as possible from the sky they so desperately crave. One might almost think this country has a history of Draconic persecution, I imagine my cousin jeering. I think of the long years Chumana spent locked in the library of the University of London without so much as stretching her wings and feel a shiver of disgust. Marquis would be right. Still, what I’m about to do to Goranov is infinitely worse. I let the door clang shut behind me and peer into the gloom. A shaft of sunlight filters in through a glass circle set into the stone ceiling; the size of my fist and the only source of warmth aside from the heat rising off the scaly body in front of me. General Goranov – brother to the Bulgarian Regal Krasimir – is sleeping. His head is tucked beneath his tattered wing and the stump of his back leg sticks out at an odd angle, congealed with blood and blackened flesh. His willingness to breathe fire on to his own wound is the only reason he didn’t bleed to death after Chumana bit his leg off on the Isle of Canna. ‘Goranov,’ I spit. His tail twitches. ‘Wake up.’ ‘The brasstongue again,’ he mutters, his voice resounding from deep in his chest. Then, louder: ‘Do you not let dragons die peacefully in this hadyva?’ The word is Slavidraneishá for hovel, or hell-hole. ‘You kidnapped my cousin and won’t tell anyone where

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he is,’ I reply as anger licks across my skin. ‘There will be no peace for you until you do.’ Marquis was on board the boat due to sail us home from the Isle of Canna, where we won the battle against Krasimir’s Bolgoriths, when Goranov attacked from the sky and took him. The general lets out a long, hissing sigh. ‘An eye for an eye, is it?’ ‘You could say that.’ I take a step forward. ‘Where is he, Goranov? Where is Marquis?’ His black eyes flick open. ‘I have already informed you,’ he snarls, ‘that the human you seek is with the Regal Vasil.’ His mouth spreads into a grin. ‘You will never see him again.’ The Regal Vasil is the head of Bulgaria, whose dragons massacred their own countryhumans and are now invading Britannia. The knife glints in the light. Perhaps torture is simply a part of war, an unsavoury part I was too blind to see when I was prancing about learning dragon tongues and coaxing wyverns from their hiding places. But there’s no room for the frivolity of linguistic debate or lofty ideas about the nobility of translation any more. Not if I want Marquis back alive. Language may be a figurative weapon, but the weapon I need now is the kind that can tear through flesh. Break bone. Slice scale from skin. Within the prison – within me – a dark rage rears its head. The blade slots perfectly against the dragon’s body like one monster embracing another. I angle it, then slice.

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Goranov roars as the scale falls to the floor with a clang and a splatter of blood. I don’t blink. Is this who Viv Featherswallow is? ‘I’ll kill you, kurtapula,’ he snarls. My lip curls. ‘You could set me on fire, activating your detonators and blowing us – and an entire London quarter – up. But you won’t do that, will you, Goranov?’ I turn the bloody blade. ‘Because you want to live.’ Goranov shifts so that he’s towering above me. I stare up into his spiked face. ‘You took my cousin to the Regal Vasil, hoping to be pardoned for losing the war you began. But instead of joining his entourage, you were found by British dragons in the Hackney Marshes – dying – and arrested. Why is that?’ Goranov lets out another pained sigh, his breath rancid. ‘He banished me.’ ‘For invading Britannia without his permission?’ ‘For partaking in the art of blood-perfuming, which is reserved for Vasil alone.’ ‘You drank Ralph’s blood because you’re ill, and now Vasil wants to do the same with Marquis.’ My stomach churns. ‘Is he dying, too?’ ‘We are all dying.’ Goranov laughs. ‘But the human blood keeps time at bay.’ ‘Do you mean,’ I say slowly, ‘that it keeps Vasil immortal?’ ‘It is the reason he drained the blood from every human left in Bulgaria and came to your country looking for more,’ Goranov snarls in reply.

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My hands trembles on the hilt of the knife. ‘But . . . isn’t one human enough? Wasn’t Ralph a replenishing source?’ Goranov watches the blood drip from his missing scale. ‘Only if one’s partner is . . . willing. If not, one soon finds oneself feeding off a corpse.’ I don’t understand. ‘Tell me where Marquis is,’ I repeat. ‘Your cousin belongs to Bulgaria now.’ I slice. ‘You are weak,’ he pants painfully. ‘Weak with love for him.’ Blood drips through my fingers. ‘I don’t feel weak,’ I whisper. ‘Yet you are here harassing me instead of using the national forces at your disposal to locate your kin. Can the Swallow not command armies to find him?’ My eyes narrow. ‘And if you cannot,’ Goranov says quietly, ‘then what purpose do you serve? You have been driven mad by love, raging like a dragonling who has failed to breathe its first flame. How much time have you lost down here, instead of applying yourself to the work at hand?’ ‘The government is searching for Marquis,’ I reply. ‘But are you?’ Goranov’s eyes flash in the direction of the knife. ‘Because if you think you are going to find him with that, you are mistaken.’ I step backwards, my heart palpitating. Is he right? Have I let my emotions cloud my judgement? Have I wasted time? Am I weak?

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Goranov grins again, two fangs protruding over his lip. ‘You are not the first. Love causes madness in even the most powerful of dragons.’ I step out of the cage. ‘See you tomorrow, Miss Featherswallow?’ the guard asks. I wipe my bloody hands on a towel and hand it to him with a nod. Then I slip the knife into my pocket and walk up the dungeon steps. The sunlight is blinding as I emerge on to the street. People rush past me – two men carrying briefcases, a woman pushing a pram, a couple having an argument across the road, bulging bags at their feet. I smell cigarette smoke. ‘Heavy session?’ says a voice. Atlas is leaning against a stone pillar, wearing a soft tweed jacket that complements his brown eyes, his curls swept to the side. ‘How can you tell?’ I ask. Atlas raises an eyebrow. ‘It’s hard to ignore the sound of a dragon screaming, even when it’s below ground.’ I take our usual route and he falls into step beside me. I’m aware of his every movement – the brush of his hand against mine and the way he gently pushes me so that I’m walking on the inside of the pavement instead of next to the road. We haven’t spoken much about our relationship since I refused his marriage proposal back on Canna, but even here in London we can’t seem to stay away from each other. I nod towards a group of Pyrenees Pythons stationed as lookouts on top of St Paul’s Cathedral. Their long manes cascade down their backs, making them look more like fairy-tale yetis than dragons. But beneath the pale fur is the unmistakeable glint of scales.

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‘There are plenty of dragons around now,’ I say. ‘What makes you think it was Goranov you heard?’ Atlas takes my arm, a gesture that still makes my heart flutter. ‘You forget that I was held in a government prison before I was recruited to Bletchley Park, Featherswallow. I know the sound of torture when I hear it.’ I swallow and focus my gaze on the dragonsmoke rising from a building surrounded by firefighters, the result of another night-time Bolgorith attack. I know what’s coming. ‘How do you bear it?’ ‘How do I bear breathing the same air as the dragon that kidnapped my cousin?’ I reply dryly. ‘I don’t. I endure it.’ ‘That’s not what I meant, Viv.’ He brushes a piece of ash from my hair and frowns. ‘And you know it.’ We cross a road where Western Drakes are erecting a line of gigantic perches for the influx of allied dragons who have come to our aid. The great pillars are made of huge rocks and, according to those who lived before the Peace Agreement was instated, used to be on every street corner until dragons began to be pushed out of society. The streets are busy: there are no Guardians of Peace any more, but uniformed government officials are directing army units and volunteers in the clearing of the latest rubble. A Ddraig Goch lifts an overturned double-decker bus from within a huge crater in the road and Red Cross workers search the debris of nearby buildings for human victims. Since we learned on Canna that the Bolgoriths we were fighting belonged to only one of several Bulgarian kingdoms, the rest have been assailing the country in droves. Our front

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line is located on the British coasts, but the thousands of Bolgoriths that make it through have turned London into a war zone. Attacks occur almost daily, and it’s only thanks to our European allies that we have been able to withstand them. I think back to the sand-swept moment on Canna when we thought we had won the war and want to kick myself. All the allies, wyverns and Speerspitzes we could muster weren’t enough to keep my cousin safe. ‘We need to find Marquis fast, Atlas,’ I say. ‘I’m prepared to do that by whatever means necessary.’ He pulls me to a stop. ‘I know,’ he says, looking me in the eye. ‘But torture, Viv? Really?’ I let go of his arm. ‘I prefer to call it an enhanced interrogation technique.’ His gaze hardens. ‘How very Wyvernmire of you.’ I scowl. We’ve stopped outside a yellow building. St Bartholomew’s Hospital. A truck is parked outside, full of soldiers smoking and laughing and speaking a musical language with a pair of Italian Tortoiseshells that take up an entire road. It’s Retillese, Italy’s national dragon tongue. Sometimes I forget that other countries aren’t as estranged from their dragons as we are in Britannia. One of the men catches my eye and winks. It’s Atlas’s turn to scowl. I force myself to meet his gaze and swallow down the sudden grief rising within me. ‘Marquis could already be dead, Atlas. That’s what Goranov keeps saying.’ ‘He’s just goading you.’ I shake my head. ‘He was already weak after the battle

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on Canna. We hadn’t slept or eaten properly in days. And now he’s Vasil’s blood perfumer. What if his strength gives out before . . .’ I grit my teeth and fall silent. Atlas lifts his hand and runs a thumb across my cheek, along the smooth skin of a healing burn and the white scar left by Ralph’s knife when he cornered me in the glasshouse last year. The same knife that sits in my pocket now. ‘We’ll find Marquis. But you have to be careful, Viv, not to lose yourself along the way.’ ‘Lose myself?’ I laugh. Everything I thought I knew was unravelled at Bletchley Park or annihilated in the wyvern tunnels of Canna. The inequality on which Britannia’s Class System was built, the corrupt Peace Agreement between humans and dragons, the imperfection of translation and the space it took up in my life . . . the truths I couldn’t see were all brought to light. I thought I was an exemplary citizen whose hard work had earned her a dazzling future in languages, but it turns out I was just a stubborn little girl lucky enough to be born Second Class, who based her entire identity on praise and success. ‘I don’t have a self to lose, Atlas. I have no idea who I am any more.’ ‘Well,’ Atlas replies, ‘one thing you’re not is a person who tortures dragons.’ His jaw tightens and he stares at me, waiting for an answer. I take a deep breath, ignoring the pain in my chest. Have I let my love for Atlas weaken me, too? Have I let it distract me from the work at hand?

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‘I’ll be whoever I have to be to get Marquis back alive.’ I point at the hospital. ‘I have things to do. I’ll see you later.’ I know he’s watching me as I walk past the Italian allies and up the hospital steps, but I don’t look back. Because if I do, I might be forced to face the truth that this war is shaping us both into people who are simply too different to be together. Serena, at least, will agree with me. I find her on the children’s ward, changing bedpans. She’s the daughter of First Class aristocrats and was never supposed to work a day in her life, yet she was the first to volunteer almost as soon as we stepped off the boat from Canna a month ago. She claimed that if the war really wasn’t over then she wanted to spend it healing rather than killing, but my guess is that she’s simply biding her time. Wyvernmire had her parents killed to punish her for joining the rebellion, and on returning to London she found out it was Bulgarian Bolgoriths that carried out the execution. I know she won’t miss a chance to return the favour. She’s wearing a white apron and a nurse’s cap, her nose wrinkling in disgust as she pours the contents of the bedpan into a bucket. With her sharp tongue and cold gaze she isn’t exactly the motherly type, but her strict routines and no-nonsense attitude must make the children here feel safe, because they’re always tugging at her skirt. The air is taut with the smell of disinfectant and the sound of babies’ cries. ‘This is the thanks we get for finding those wyverns?’ she says when she sees me. ‘Up to my eyes in human waste and sitting in on the occasional Coalition meeting?’

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‘Government meeting,’ I correct her. ‘The Coalition is the government now.’ I take the empty bedpans from her and soak them in the hot, soapy water waiting in the sink. This has become an almost daily arrangement, meeting in various places to rant about the current circumstances of our lives. Unlike Atlas, Serena never seems shocked by the things I can’t help but say. She’s as angry as I am – angry that the government still hasn’t found Marquis, angry that Hollingsworth has barely acknowledged us since our return. I’ve never counted Serena as a friend and yet, since Canna, I feel like she understands me better than anyone. The ward buzzes with activity, nurses, visiting parents and the occasional government official. ‘Miss Featherswallow?’ says the small boy following Serena around. ‘Can you tell me about that dragon again?’ I guide the child back to his bed. His head is shaved, a scar running across his scalp. He was pulled from the rubble of his parents’ house several weeks ago, after a Bolgorith crushed it during an attack. Serena says his injury has healed well, but he must stay on the ward for now. There is no one left to send him home to. ‘She had scales that glittered like the Royal Jewels,’ I say. ‘And when she spoke, she had a voice so deep that you could feel the ground tremble beneath your feet.’ ‘And spikes on her face, like the other Bolgoriths,’ says the boy. ‘That’s right,’ I reply. ‘But she wasn’t like the other Bolgoriths. She was a good dragon. She was on Britannia’s side.’ ‘And she wasn’t black or red, was she?’

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I shake my head. ‘She was pink!’ says the little girl on the next bed over. ‘Pink like my doll’s dress.’ ‘Pink like the candy floss at the seaside,’ says a second girl. ‘Pink like the sunset,’ says the boy, smiling to himself as he lies back against his pillows. ‘Pink like hope,’ I say softly, tucking the blankets around him. ‘How adorable,’ says a voice behind me. ‘Did you get that?’ I’m suddenly aware of a faint whirring sound. I turn around and see a man and a woman, both of them holding large black contraptions with glass lenses at the end. They’re wearing black armbands depicting a white swallow. It used to be the Coalition’s symbol, but now it’s worn by the British Army and anyone else who wants to show they’re anti-Bulgarian dragon. ‘What are you doing?’ I say. ‘Capturing the Swallow in action,’ the man replies. ‘Do you think you could kiss the boy’s head?’ Rage fills me. ‘I saw you back at St Paul’s,’ I say, remembering the couple across the road from Goranov’s underground dungeon. ‘You’ve been following me. Hollingsworth sent you, didn’t she?’ Only a few days ago she showed me a small screen that had been installed in her office, a wooden box called a television that played images of the people of Britannia – flashes of citizens cheering on the allies or policemen arresting Vasil’s masked human supporters. At first I thought that those who were collaborating in the Bulgarian occupation were

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merely disgruntled followers of Wyvernmire who now found themselves without a leader, but that was something else I was blind to. These traitors sabotage Britannia in silence, then chant Vasil’s name when they’re discovered as if he were some long-awaited saviour. The screen, though, gave me hope that they are a minority. I remember the black-and-white faces of the people across the country working together to fight the Bulgarian invasion. I could even hear their strident voices through the box. ‘The radio was a powerful rallying too,’ Hollingsworth told me, ‘but this is something far superior.’ ‘Time to sing, Swallow,’ says the woman, pointing her camera at me. ‘My cousin is missing,’ I hiss. ‘People in this hospital are dying. And you’re here filming me?’ The man shrugs. ‘Necessary promotional material for the war effort.’ ‘Out!’ I shout as the children shrink down in their beds. ‘Now.’ Heads turn to look in our direction and I see a doctor make his way towards us. ‘And the delicate bird becomes a dragon,’ the man sneers. ‘You can’t give us orders,’ the woman says. ‘We have permission to be here.’ She waves a piece of card at me, which has been stamped at the reception. But before she can react, Serena snatches it off her. ‘Permission revoked,’ she says. ‘This is my ward. Now leave.’ The pair gather their belongings, muttering loudly as

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they exit the ward. The doctor reaches us and gives me an apologetic look. ‘This ward is meant for medical staff and visiting family members only, Miss Featherswallow,’ he says. He glances around at the beds. ‘Do you have a—’ ‘No,’ I say quickly, aware that the only family member I would be visiting on this ward would be Ursa. ‘Thankfully, no,’ I say again. ‘In that case, I’m afraid you cannot stay.’ Serena opens her mouth to protest, but I shake my head. ‘Of course,’ I say. I look at Serena. ‘I’ll see you soon.’ I walk quickly through the halls, my mind spinning. During the Battle of Canna, Hollingsworth attempted to sell me to General Goranov as a blood perfumer for the Regal Vasil in exchange for a Bulgarian retreat. Since then our relationship has been tense – awkward at best. Now she’s using images of me to spread the idea that I am still her Swallow, that somehow I am going to help us defeat the Bolgoriths. Yet she allows me to do nothing. Sit tight, were the words she used back in her office when I asked her how I could help find my cousin and the Regal Vasil. Is she even looking for Marquis at all? On my way home, I cross the border between Camden and Fitzrovia. Since the election of Prime Minister Fitzflame following Wyvernmire’s death on Canna, the quarters – along with the Class System – have been dissolved, but the old signposts are still in place. And although the classes are mixing now, the Third Class free to drink a Scale Ale elbow to elbow with the First Class in the public houses, the inequitable

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effects of Britannia’s old economic structure are still being felt. The former Third Class greengrocers should be stocked with fresh goods but despite the recent rationing rules, food shortages are rife. The allied soldiers are extra mouths to feed, and the constant dragonfire means crops are either burning or suffering from heat damage. Thousands of cattle have been culled to feed the European dragons now living among us. And despite the abolition of the Class System, its legacy still persists. Marquis warned me of that back at Bletchley Park, when he said that the inequalities entrenched in our foundations would have to be dug out over time. Hypothetically, the Third Class should now be allowed access to medicine and education, but I wonder how many of them are currently slipping through the cracks. Just yesterday I saw a line at a chemist’s that stretched down two entire streets. I slip the handheld radio out of my pocket and press a button. ‘Soph, it’s Viv. Are you there?’ There’s a crackle, and then I hear my best friend’s voice. ‘I’m here. All okay?’ ‘All okay,’ I reply quickly before the emotion can take over my voice. I clear my throat. ‘Just calling in for a progress report?’ There’s a long silence. On our return to London, Sophie set up a Morse code machine in her parents’ house. She communicates daily with telegraph and railway signal offices across the country, counting on former Coalition members to look out for a dragon carrying Marquis. She has always been one to rebel quietly, and it was Sophie’s knowledge of Morse

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code that got her a spot a Bletchley Park. She can receive information on possible sightings in a matter of minutes, rather than relying on dracovols or weak radio signals. ‘No sign of him, Viv. But there have been reports of an influx of Bolgoriths in the West Midlands. Most of the human inhabitants have fled. Do you think, maybe, it could be Vasil?’ The Bulgarian dragons have created various strongholds on British land and have even succeeded in occupying a portion of East London thanks to the help of human collaborators. They operate by deceit – Vasil’s masked supporters come from every class and often hold positions of responsibility, from dockworkers tampering with supplies to government officials turning a blind eye. And the few British dragons that follow him have been known to pretend to fight for Britannia before turning on their own mid-battle. ‘Goranov told me that he kept Marquis with him for several days while he waited for Vasil to breach British borders,’ I reply. ‘He’s definitely here – we just have to find out where. Radio me if you hear anything else.’ As I walk across Fitzroy Square I attempt to still my heart. Sophie is searching for Marquis via the telegraph wires and I know Serena seeks his face in the crowds of new patients each day. Atlas is working as part of the government team sent out to search for him, although even he admits that ground-based efforts are fruitless as Vasil is likely to fly between his various strongholds. And I suspect, although he won’t tell me so, that the Army has already pulled several dragons from the search, as their efforts are needed elsewhere. As for the rest of the Bletchley Park crew, Gideon is working within the Academy,

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secretly using translation budgets to hire mercenary dragons to look for Marquis, and Karim is with Dr Seymour, reading through every book about Bolgoriths they can get their hands on in search of useful information. And what of me? I am what Mama and her Bulgarian folklore would call a vampirdjia. A vampire hunter. Day in and day out, I search for the Regal Vasil, trailing my own path of destruction. But hours of torturing Goranov, dozens of bloody scales, have yielded zero results. Perhaps Goranov is right, and it’s all been a waste of time. At dinner, Ursa chatters excitedly about returning to school, and my parents cast concerned looks at me across the table. Our reunion last month was supposed to be joyful, but instead I had to announce to them and to Uncle Thomas – Marquis’s father – that Marquis was gone. My uncle has since left us, intent on searching for his son with a few ex-military friends. Mama fusses around me, fetching my meals and tea, laying a cool hand on my forehead, insisting that I join her in the sitting room each evening, and she never mentions what she and Dad must have gone through while they were imprisoned by Wyvernmire for rebelling against her government, with no idea of whether their daughters were safe. They went to Highfall Prison just days before I was sent to Bletchley Park and were only released when Fitzflame was elected. I push my food around my plate, feign interest as Dad tells us of a successful battle that took out almost a hundred Bolgoriths and nod in greeting to the soldiers traipsing dust

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into the house. These ones are French and Austrian, and my parents are lodging them on camp beds in their office and in the spare room Marquis used to sleep in. They have names like Pierre and Franz and Josef, and if Marquis wasn’t missing, then perhaps I would talk with them, either in French or in a first attempt at German or an Austrian dialect. I might ask them about human-dragon relations in their countries, or what moved them to pledge their support to mine. But not even the excitement of a linguistic exchange can tempt me today. By the time I sink into bed, my mind is exhausted. My room is as I left it six months ago when I first went to Bletchley, the walls covered in advertisements from the University of London prospectus – sketches of a sprawling campus, of students clutching books, of the Thames running between the great stone buildings. The remnants of a long-lost childhood dream. I pull out one of Ursa’s dolls from beneath the covers. She’s been sneaking into my bed every night since we got home, seeking comfort from her recurring nightmares of Bulgarian dragons and a red-haired lady I know to be Wyvernmire. I lie in the dark listening to the creaking of the house, wondering what time my sister will join me. I’ll welcome her with open arms. Only a few weeks ago, I thought I’d never see her again. My mind drifts until it’s flying, skimming the stars alongside a great pair of pink wings, and my hearts lifts as a deep voice murmurs the words human girl. A tremendous crack.

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I wake with a start. ‘Chumana?’ I murmur through sleep. My heart pounds as I sit up in bed. I’m in my room, not in the sky. The ceiling above me groans. Something is on the roof.