War of the Princes 02: Dragoon Read Online Free Page A

different.
    According to my dad, though he didn't know it, Haven was telling me that I needed to enter the Outside World and plunge myself back into the darkness of that deadly place again.
    Why did my stupid mother have to get involved in this? We didn’t exactly have a relationship to speak of. You’d think I wouldn’t care what happened to her… but I did. She was the broken part of my family, but she was still family. No matter how I felt about her life choices, I wouldn’t be alive if not for her. Imagining my own mother being torn apart by Commanders was more than I could bear, even if I couldn’t remember what she looked like.
    “ Be patient,” he told me with a smile. That was all I'd ever get out of him now. If my dad was one thing, it was patient. “I'll just be a minute.”
    Dad popped his door open, stepped out of the carriage, and walked briskly to the weather station. As usual, he was unflappably positive and calm. You'd think that I'd be grounded for the rest of my life after electrocuting my ex-boyfriend and getting arrested. No, my dad trusted me. He always had, and I was grateful.
    I followed his lead and climbed out of the square carriage car to take in some fresh evening air. Stretching, I walked the park-like grounds and stared up at the massive radio tower that stood proudly beside the station.
    Weather towers like this one were the tallest structures in Haven, and ever since I was a child, I enjoyed marveling at their height. Four beams, each connected by a steel lattice, were constructed around a single mast for the best possible stability. The leg beams sloped gradually toward the central pole, and joined together to form the long neck of the tower. I couldn't see the top today. The fog had rolled in and obscured it. A dim light flashed slowly through the clouds, marking its position. I felt comfortably tiny beside it, just as I had as a child.
    “ There you are!” a voice exclaimed behind me. I turned to see Ruby running up to me from the street. Her artificially bright, candy apple red hair made her impossible to miss. “We were looking for you. Kyle came straight here this morning for spare parts and stayed all afternoon. Where have you been?”
    Today, such a simple question tempted my brain to melt into a simmering pool of goo. What could I say to her? “It's been a bad day.”
    “Ugh,” she sighed. “Mine too. My parents are completely losing it. I finally told them about me and Sterling, and you can guess how that went. They won't stop telling me how bad he is for me, and all because his initials don't match, it's a bad sign, blah, blah. And then, my dad says I'm not allowed to date him unless he changes his last initial to an, 'R.' Why won't they leave me alone? He's not going to change his name just to go out with me! I don't even believe in that superstitious stuff.”
    Not so long ago, I would have agreed that Ruby's were the worst problems I could think of. I would have sympathized and worried for her. My life had changed though. I had spent the whole year smiling and nodding, pretending that Haven's daily dramas were as devastating as everyone else seemed to think they were. Desperate to regain what I'd lost, I had pretended to be happy, content. All the while, my frustration grew, but I kept it quiet. I clung to humor and light-heartedness like it could save my life, but it was an act of desperation. I could parade around all day, wearing my splintered mask of lies and smiles. Jokes were the best place for me to hide. They were a perfect camouflage of distraction. Inside, I was desolate.
    My dreams were ravaged by twisted terrors and cruel memories. I awakened from sleep screaming more often than not. For the first three months, I couldn’t look at the scars on my chest without blacking out. I did my best to hide the toll my experiences had taken on me.
    There were problems in the world, real ones, and unlike everyone in Haven, I knew about a select few of them.
    Ruby was