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O

nce everyone had left the room, Hara was left with Angel and Gideon. He was still seated at the table playing with Angel and the nuts she was counting on the table.

He said without looking up at her, “Thank you.”

Hara frowned. “For what?”

Gideon turned to look at her. “For risking your life to go after this man.”

Hara shrugged. “I think it is stupidity. You do know that even if we take him down and Puck that it still won’t change that they gave the recipe for the poison to someone outside of the Empire. It will get out eventually, no matter what you do.”

“I know and I will see if Harlen can track down the party outside of the Empire. We might have a few more years if he had stalled that leak.”

Hara sat down next to him and stole some of Angel’s nuts until she chittered and the two of them played tug of war with a nut.

Hara didn’t look at Gideon as she said, “I don’t know if gaining time will solve the problem.”

Gideon sat back and watched the two of them. “With time, we can come up with an inoculation or an antidote. I’m not a doctor but I have talked to Harlen about it. He likes medicine more than I do and he says that within a decade they will have a way to combat the poison. We just have to stall for that long. We know you can’t keep secrets forever.”

Angel finally got all the nuts and Hara turned to Gideon. “What about the traitor?”

He frowned and said sadly, “That is something I will deal with.”

Hara raised an eyebrow. “You already know who it is.” It wasn’t a question.

Hara didn’t want to even contemplate what he was feeling. To find out that one of your kind was willing to risk all of them for some sort of power play against those who had found some happiness on this planet. Dragons were an endangered species and they were all male on this planet. Without this bonding with humans, they would have been an extinct race just waiting to die.

Hara said, “Your kind is an endangered species. I can’t imagine what would have to go through someone’s mind to contemplate the genocide of almost your entire race.” She shook her head, grieving lives that weren’t even lost yet.

Hara asked as the thought occurred to her. “Will I die if you do because of the bonding?”

“Most likely not straight away but you wouldn’t have the same healing powers you do now and that is not acceptable.” Hara also realised that Gideon would have very little mercy for whoever was the dragon traitor. Hara added, “Just make sure that whatever you do about the traitor that it sits right with you. This is not a time to be rash.”