The Dragon Corps Read online

  The Dragon Corps

  Natalie Grey

  Contents

  Also by Natalie Grey

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Dragon’s Honor

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Also by Natalie Grey

  Original Series

  Bound Sorcery (Shadows of Magic, Book 1)

  Blood Sorcery (Shadows of Magic, Book 2)

  Bright Sorcery (Shadows of Magic, Book 3)

  Set in the Kurtherian Gambit Universe

  Bellatrix

  Challenges

  Risk Be Damned (Trials & Tribulations, Book 1)

  Damned to Hell (Trials & Tribulations, Book 2)

  Vigilante

  Sentinel

  Writing as Moira Katson

  Shadowborn (Light & Shadow, Book 1)

  Daughter of Ashes (Rise of Aiqasal, Book 1)

  Meridian (set in Nick Webb’s Legacy Fleet Universe)

  Mahalia

  Prologue

  As humanity spread across the universe, it spread, too, beyond the reach of laws and governments. In the vast distances of space, wars could be started and finished before governments knew to send troops—and there were many willing to take advantage of that fact.

  To protect its citizens, the Alliance created a military unit under the auspices of Intelligence. Elite, adaptable, and deadly, the Dragon Corps attracts the best soldiers and spies in human occupied space. Their missions have taken down slave traders, weapons traffickers, and more.

  They are the best of the best, and they are legends. Their name is a byword for justice, and their honor is unimpeachable.

  1

  The Ariane broke through the clouds and banked towards one of the central districts of Ymir’s only city, while in the shuttle bay, the members of the 9th Dragon Team double and triple checked their gear.

  There was no noise. No conversation. No banter.

  Right now, they were preparing to take on one of the worst of humanity: the Warlord of Ymir. Forty years ago, the man had marched 50,000 troops onto what was then no more than a backwater planet with a few farms, and had begun to mine the planet’s hitherto-unknown resources.

  He had taken a planet. Just taken it and everyone on it.

  How many had died since that day? How many would die if he were allowed to continue ruling? How many more would die as others tried to emulate him, seeing that the Alliance had not managed to stop the man?

  “Approaching drop point.” Sphinx’s voice came over the comm links, cool and controlled.

  Major Talon Rift’s second in command, Nyx, appeared silently at his shoulder. That was how she’d gotten her nickname on the team: by moving as silently as nightfall. No one ever heard Nyx coming. She had been one of Talon’s first picks for his team, and he dreaded the day she was given her own command. She deserved it, but he couldn’t imagine how he would ever replace her.

  “Any last impressions?” He saw her lips move, but her voice came through the personal channel in his helmet. She grinned when he jumped. Her voice was jarring in the silence. “Or, you know … first impressions.” They’d only been chewing on the new intel for as long as it took Talon to turn the Ariane toward Ymir.

  Talon gave her a Look. “I’ll have you know that I have looked at every one of the mission briefs.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. They were in a very neat pile on my desk. They looked comfortable there, so I decided not to disturb them.”

  Nyx gave a snort. “You know, if I were going into an op with anyone else and they said that, I’d worry.”

  “‘Worry?’” That didn’t sound like her. Arguing and challenging orders sounded like her.

  “Did I say worry quietly? I did not. Although hitting someone over the head with a brick and taking over command is fairly quiet, now that I think of it.”

  Talon’s lips twitched. “If I ever get sloppy, I’ll watch for bricks.”

  “Sloppy people never watch for bricks. It’s why I always win.” When he laughed, she gave him a smile. “Good, you’re relaxing. You gotta stay loose, Rift.”

  Talon checked his sidearm and slid it back into his holster before answering.

  He was famously determined to free this planet. It was the reason Nyx wasn’t worried about him having the knowledge to pull this op: from his research, Talon knew the layout of every district, and from his own experience on the planet, he could probably have navigated a few from memory--and point out some of the bullet holes he’d made there while he did it.

  A great many people agreed that if anyone could take the planet back with the sixteen soldiers that comprised a Dragon team, it would be him. Most of the Dragons had placed bets on it, in fact. Sphinx’s conservative estimate--she had, as Mars liked to say, the heart of a warrior, but the soul of an accountant--had placed the total volume of money that would change hands, when the Warlord finally died, at 7 million IGA.

  There was not, she reported, even a single bet that didn’t have Talon killing the man himself.

  Talon wished he were as certain. It was easy to joke … until you remembered what this man was capable of. In a showdown between the most elite soldiers in history, and one of the most ruthless politicians, the two combatants might never come face to face. This was an enemy such as Talon had never faced … which only made it the most engaging challenge of his career.

  He was well-suited to his job.

  “We need to play a long game.” He looked over the members of his crew. They were the best humanity had to offer: the most determined, the most relentless, with more loyalty and morals than he had seen anywhere else in this universe.

  It wasn’t just the skill of the Dragons that was legendary. They were mythically loyal to their commanders, and willing to take on any mission, no matter how great the odds against them. Dragons stood for the best of humanity.

  Talon liked to think that his team was the best of the best, and the number of commendations they had earned backed him up. Even better, they never complained about his personal mission to take the Warlord out.

  Any time Talon received word that there was a chance to take Ymir back, he jumped at it, but he was getting more and more impatient. Every time up until now, the situation had changed at the last minute. Sometimes they got boots on the ground, sometimes not. Often, they got through some of the Warlord’s forces, but it was only ever the throwaway lackeys who kept the districts in line. Talon didn’t mind killing them—they deserved to die—but they weren’t why he was here.

  The Warlord was why he was here.

  This time, once again, they had been assured that their first and most pressing target lay at the heart of Io District.

  This time, he promised himself, they would get through the district before they were ordered to pull out. They would get to the castle the Warlord had built in a disgusting echo of the palaces of old earth, and they would end his reign, here, today.

  He liked to say he was here to play the long game, but the truth was that Talon Rift was a deeply impatient man.

  Nyx’s smile told him
that she understood this. “Playing a long game, boss.” She gave a mock salute.

  “And failing that,” Talon said as the alarms sounded and the door opened, “kill the motherfucker. Preferably painfully.”

  Nyx laughed, the sound barely audible over the whistle of the wind, and then she led the team, running over the deck and out into the open air above Io.

  Talon watched the team follow, and took up the rear.

  Did he dare hope? Was today going to be the day they finally did it?

  Samara shifted on aching feet and willed herself to stay upright. After a 14 hour shift in the mines, she was covered in sweat, grimy, and tired to the bone.

  But this was important. What was happening right now, in this little cave, might free the millions on this planet who walked into those mines every day. She brushed her fingers through her dark brown hair and tried to focus on the table, and the woman who stood there.

  “Once the charges are set, the team should have fourteen minutes to get out in advance of the first patrol.” Jacinta Nikolau, leader of one of the two resistance cells in Io District, was now 47, the oldest person in the room by far, and one of the oldest people Samara had ever seen. How she had survived the mines this long, no one knew. Her black hair was liberally streaked with grey at this point, but she was unbowed. Her face, more handsome than pretty, held only calm resolve.

  For Samara, who had never had a chance to know her parents, Jacinta was the mother she had never had—and the reason Samara had joined the rebellion. Jacinta seemed uniquely forged by the planet on which she lived. On Ymir, beautiful, rolling hills hid the hellscape of the mines, and so it was with Jacinta: a calm, beautiful face hid more resolve, and more self sacrifice, than most would ever know.

  It was Jacinta who made them all take the oath never to have children—never to have someone that might be used against them. It was Jacinta who always went first on missions, never ordering her soldiers into any situation more dangerous than she herself would endure. And it was Jacinta who tended to their wounds when they were injured, and let them speak freely of the dreams they had for their planet.

  She knew they needed something to fight for, not just something to struggle against. She had been forged into something as strong as steel, and purer than diamonds. If anyone could lead them to victory against the Warlord, it would be her.

  Now she braced her hands on the map and gave a look at her lieutenants. “Svoboda. Which path would you take?”

  Arlon Svoboda took his time before answering. At 19 years old, he looked shockingly youthful, and far too lighthearted to be a soldier. His light brown hair and melting brown eyes both warm and soft, and he smiled easily—most of the time, that was.

  Right now, with the unexpected chance to make a breach in the district walls and start the rebellion cascading through the city, he looked harder and colder than Samara had ever seen him.

  “Through the breach,” he said finally. “Wait, and hide, and be ready to push forward as soon as the charges go.”

  Jacinta’s eyebrows rose, but she looked pleased by this. She looked around the room, nodding to each of the lieutenants in turn: Stefan, Zela, Sicia, Rowan, Samara. Samara flushed when her leader’s eyes landed on her.

  “What do all of you say?” Jacinta asked quietly.

  All of them nodded. No one wavered. Arlon was right, this was their chance. The Warlord controlled his people through the exhaustion of the mines, the rigorous control of any communications, and by shutting them in tiny districts where they could not communicate with one another. If any one of those holds was to be broken….

  They could start the chain reaction that would bring him down, and free their planet.

  Jacinta told them that the Warlord was terrified of them. No matter how small and insignificant they felt, they were his greatest fear.

  Today, they intended to prove him right.

  “We should send half to the east gate, and half to the west,” Samara said. She stepped forward and moved markers into place. “Keep some of the explosives in reserve. One group will go first on each side, and the rest will follow when they’ve engaged the guards. As many walls as we can get down, we will—and our example will show the cells in the other districts how to do the same.”

  They knew there were resistance cells in other districts, but communication was limited. Any drop point could be found and bugged, and any frequency could be scanned.

  They would just have to hope that when they breached the walls, the members of the other cells were ready to mobilize.

  Jacinta nodded. “It’s a good plan. The best we have, and there’s no knowing when they’ll shore up the walls.” She looked down at the map, and Samara saw tears in the woman’s eyes.

  The younger leaders looked at one another. No one had ever seen Jacinta cry before.

  “I have waited for this chance for many years. Get as far as you can.” When their leader raised her head, the tears were still there, but her resolve was clear. She knew, as did they all, that not one person in this room was going to live past today.

  They would free Ymir. They would give everything they had to do it—to stop the midnight raids that dragged whole families from their beds and saw them executed in the street, to save children from the mines, to take down the ships that took their family and friends away as slaves, just another commodity that could fill the Warlord’s coffers.

  But none of them would ever see the world they fought for.

  “Be brave,” Jacinta told them. She was smiling now, though her eyes were bright. “Every one of you has been dearer to me than you could know. Every one of you is a spark in the soul of Ymir. When next we meet, the troubles of this world will be behind us, and we will know that our families are free to build a better world.”

  Samara clenched her hands. Where there had been exhaustion before, now there was only peace. She felt as if she could run for miles. She would fight without fear. She would know that her life had meant something.

  Aryn, I wish you were here to see this. She felt a tear trace down her cheek, and bit her lip against a sob. Aryn would see this. She would be able to come back from her exile when Ymir was free, and she would know, Samara told herself, that Samara had done this for her as much as anyone.

  “Very well.” Jacinta looked back at the map. “Sicia, Arlon, Samara, you go to the west. Zela, Stefan—”

  The klaxons burst through the air in a wail that half-deafened Samara. She bent over, hands over her ears, and felt the bottom drop out of her stomach.

  It had been too quiet for too long. She should have realized that. It had been months since a raid, and they had thought the Warlord might not know they were here.

  But the Warlord only ever let the resistance cells grow big enough that he could see them—then he squashed them like bugs.

  “Ma’am?” One of the other resistance fighters appeared in the doorway of the tunnels. “You should come see this.” He came closer to whisper in Jacinta’s ear.

  For a moment, the look on Jacinta’s face was remarkably like fear. And then it was gone.

  “I’ll be up to the surface in a moment.” She swept a look around the cavern, and her eyes lit on Samara. “Samara, take a team and go to the generators. Make sure they stay up and running. Stefan, you head for Calyx with these schematics. Let’s get them in as many resistance hands as possible, you know the drop point. Nick—”

  Samara picked four faces out of the crowd and beckoned to them to follow her. When Jacinta gave an order, that meant now. That she had a plan for how to survive this raid, Samara never questioned. She would execute her part in it and then they would regroup, and—God willing—advance.

  They were halfway through the tunnels to the generator when they all heard it: the sound of a ship’s engines hovering over Io District. Samara stopped, looking up.

  A ship. That meant this raid wasn’t the normal guards who patrolled the streets, or even the Warlord’s elite fighters.

  A ship meant Dragon
s.

  Behind her, someone threw up.

  “Move.” Samara pushed each of the four of them down the tunnel ahead of her.

  “Jacinta—” one of them began.

  “Jacinta knew.” Samara delivered the news through numb lips. She remembered the flash of fear in the woman’s eyes. “She knew that if she kept us there, we would be found and we would be killed. She sent us into the tunnels to keep us safe, now do not undo that work. Keep moving.”

  “But what about her?” Katrin stumbled and winced with pain as Samara hauled her up to keep going.

  “She has a plan,” Samara said. Through every setback and every cruelty, Jacinta had protected them. When the members of the other cell were slaughtered in the streets 14 months ago, she had talked her team out of going to their aid.

  She had a plan now. She had to.

  Or all of them were going to be dead within minutes.

  They ran until their lungs were aching and their tired bodies were on the verge of collapse, and then they huddled into the too-hot cave that held the generator. The scream of the engines came closer and closer until, with a deafening roar, it seemed to stop right over the cave system.

  Huddled in the darkness by the generator, Samara willed herself not to cry or rage. She was picked by Jacinta to lead this team, and she would do it.

  But it wasn’t fair. Like everything else in this goddamned world, it wasn’t fair.

  Once, long ago, the Dragons had been the vanguard of the Alliance. They had sought out injustice and saved the powerless. Once, but not anymore. Everyone on Ymir knew that very well.