Page 60 of Nine-Tenths

"If we can't take it back, and we can't tell everyone, what can we do?" Pedra asks, when the silence goes on too long.

"We get ahead of it," Dav says, sitting forward.

See, here's the thing about Dav. I never forget that he was a career soldier— is a soldier, could be called up to serve at any time—but sometimes I need reminding that his medals were earned in tents, and bunkers, and secret meeting rooms, rather than on the field.

Sure, he fired guns, stormed strongholds, went over the top, set fire to the Presidential Mansion with his own breath.

But he's really the plans guy.

"What's the best way to negate the power of a blackmailer?" he asks us, his Peter Pan kiss curling deviously into his almost-dimple.

"Don't do shady shit?" Mauli asks.

"Besides that," Dav asks. When no one answers, he says: "Expose the terrible truth yourself."

"But you just said you can't ," Dike protests.

"Not to the humans," Dav agrees. "But we can to the dragons.

They have kept this secret for centuries, devoted fortunes to its upholding, believe firmly that it benefits them.

But what if we convince them that it's not a benefit to us any longer?

That the old ways are harming our greatest resource—humans?

What if we can show them that there are other ways, ways that preserve the planet, and our people, and their selfish wealth?

And what if we get someone powerful on side, someone who can change laws, implement them slowly, thoughtfully, and world wide.

So if the research becomes widely known, it will be old news, even if some of it is shocking. "

"Think of it like my thesis," I explain. "But not viniculture—for, I dunno, call it sapiensculture, I guess." I spread my arms wide.

Hadi snorts. "As if dragons are factory farming humans when we should be free-range organic?"

"Sorta, yeah!" I laugh. "But we can't just go in and blow up the factories. We gotta convince them to convert. One by one, bit by bit, you know?"

Mauli makes a noise pretty similar to Onatah's frustrated click. "Right, but where are you gonna find someone with that kind of power?"

Because I have never once in my queer little life passed up the opportunity to be a dramatic bitch, I pull a dollar coin out of my pocket. I hold it up, face-side out. It takes everyone a second to get it.

"The fucking queen ?" Hadi says. "Are you serious?"

Dike plucks the Loonie from my hand and stares at the embossed profile. "You can do that?"

"Apparently," I say, patting Dav's thigh showily. "This guy right here used to hang out at court when he was a snot-nosed shit."

"I was never a shit ," Dav protests gamely.

"I'll just have to ask Elizabeth Regina to verify that," I snark back.

"You're crazy, princess," Onatah says. "It might actually work, but I also think you're crazy. "

"I am not content to spend the rest of my life with my head down hoping Simcoe will let us both not only live in peace, but just live in general. He wants your territories—and Dav being all happily shacked up is a distraction he could try to use to his advantage."

Dav grumbles, a low serpenty noise of displeasure, but doesn't disagree.

"Come with us," Dav says, low and imploring. "Show them what the world could be—"

"No," Onatah says.

"What? No, you know I can't speak on your behalf—"

"Nuh-uh. You saw how well that went for Matoaka. Man, she's buried over there. I'm not letting Simcoe have the satisfaction," Onatah says using the same Big Sister Voice I've heard from Gem. "You have to do this on your own, and we both know it."

"I don't—!" Dav starts, stricken, but then he squeezes his eyes shut, frowning hard. "I need you," he says, soft and small.

"I know you do," Onatah says, just as small, just as soft. "But what you're asking me to do, Dav, that's not fair to me. Besides, if you go, one of us needs to stay to protect both our territories."

" Your territory," Dav insists.

"Onatah's?" I ask. Dav flushes, realizing that we've got an audience of interested humans. "No, hey, it's cool, honestly, the size of your patch is not anything I give a shit about. But like, are you talking about giving it all back?"

Dav heaves a frustrated sigh. "As much as I can."

"The Europeans, they ate away at the whole continent, bite by bite," Onatah explains when Dav doesn't elaborate.

"There are so few pockets of protected territory left.

'Reserved' for us, as if this Continent was a goddamned restaurant and we'd been rude and forgotten to book our table in advance.

My people sided with the British during the war, and they promised our payment for fighting on their side would be their retreat up the peninsula. "

"But Simcoe lied," Dav explains. "He never returned it."

"No. He put him in charge of it, instead." She jerks her thumb at Dav.

"What a fuckhead!" Mauli blurts.

"When I realized the settler propaganda was nothing but falsehoods," Dav picks up the narrative, "That the land wasn't underused, or underpopulated, I tried to return it and go back to Wales.

But I had already been trapped into it—Simcoe had the queen's ear and I was commanded to stay.

I could have defied it, but that would have meant—" he gives Onatah a significant look.

It would have exposed her to Frank.

Panic shoots through me as I realize what he's saying. If we're successful, if he moves home, I have to go with him. I don't know if I want to move to the other side of the ocean!

He must hear my heartbeat kick into overdrive because he says, "Don't worry, Mine Own. I'll be keeping Fynyth. Onatah and I sorted this out decades ago."

"More like you came to me and sobbed 'tell me what you need'," Onatah chuckles.

"I won't deny it," Dav allows. "It was unseemly for me to make the decisions when all of yours had been ignored."

"Which is why I'm cool with you staying. I know what it's like to have your home taken away."

"I love it dearly, and I don't need more than the farm," Dav sighs.

"I grew up where dragon's territories are small, dense, and contained.

No more than an estate, a village or two, a dozen farms. No more people than they can speak to once a week, no more land than they can walk in a few days. It is what I prefer."

And instead he'd been forced to take on a sprawling area, still wet with the blood of the people slain defending it from the Americans, cutting the Onguiaahra territory in half.

Surely there must have been more Onguiaahra dragons who had been stewarding that parcel.

Everything I'm learning tells me that Onatah can't oversee it all on her own. She must have cousins, siblings, a community. Not an empire, not the way Elizabeth Regina commands the far-flung territories of the world from the top down, but a family . And those dragons in her family were denied, squished into a smaller space with fewer humans, while greedier dragons took more than they could ever need, more than they could ever guide, and let the humans under their care suffer for it simply because they wanted more. They’re so remote, so distant, it’s like they don’t even exist.

I mean, I didn’t even know who Dav was.

Even now, I have no idea who commands Orillia, where I grew up.

"I've already been fucked in as many ways as they can fuck me," Onatah says. "Which means I have to stay, princess."

"I understand," I say.

Onatah's phone pings in her pocket, and she ambles over to the window to track a motorcycle coasting up the street.

"And that's my time up," she says. "I wish you both the best of luck. Let me know if I can send you anything."

"Of course," Dav says, and we follow her out to the street.

I offer Onatah the bow with my fist over my heart, and she snorts and gives me a careful hug—moving slowly when Dav tenses—with no skin-to-skin contact.

"He's your problem now," she whispers in my ear.

"He sure is."

"Take care of him, eh?"

The bike parks right beside the café, and Onatah swings her leg over the seat to nestle in close behind someone wearing a face-obscuring helmet. "Let's go home, N?cimos," she tells the driver, and they're off before I can shout after them:

"Hey! Wait, no! Hold on, I want to meet—! Aw, fuck."

"Our own ride is coming, Mine Own," Dav says, putting away his phone.

"That was—!"

"I'm aware."

I point a sharp finger at his nose. "I'm gonna meet them one day," I threaten. "I'm gonna befriend them and there's nothing you jelly sneks can do about it."

Dav laughs. "If you say so."

"Now you're just humoring me."

Hadi steps outside to join us, unsettled by everything that’s been confessed. She's flipping her keys in her hand, over and over, click click click , a metronome keeping time with her discomfort.

Don't think about having to attend Hadi's funeral in half a century. Don't think about her getting old, and sick, while you stay the same. Don't think of her dying so soon when she doesn't have to. Don't… don't…

Without warning, Hadi cups my face in my hands, squishes my cheeks. "Congrats, Colin."

"Hadi—" I start sadly. She sniffles once, but forces a bright smile. "Hey, you okay?"

"I'm fine. I'm fucking happy for you, you jerk. He loves you and he's trying to change the whole stupid world for you. He loves your stupid clothes—"

"He doesn’t, actually."

"—and your self-deprecating humor, and your drive, and that thing you do with your tongue—"

"You can't possibly know about that!" I squawk.

"What, you don’t think that Rebekah didn't kiss and tell, do you?"

"Oh my god! You're never meeting anyone I date ever again!"

"I've already met Dav. Tough shit."

"And he's making you cry!"

"It's romantic , you fuck."

We're both quiet for a moment.

"I guess… see you when you get back?"

"Yeah," I promise. "Make sure our usual spot is open."

I hug her, holding on for as long as the prickly bitch will let me. I'm acutely aware that there's now a time limit on how long I'll be able to do this.

The car pulls up, and Janet tell Dav she's "packed everything he asked for" through the window.

"Packed?" I ask, as Dav opens the door for me.

"Get in, Mine Own. We're going to the airport, before Frank can stop us. Right now."