“All over the place. Austin, Phoenix, San Francisco. There was even one in Mexico for a little while.” I listened to myself ramble on, unable to stop. “I thought about moving some of them overseas, but that would require me to travel more. I can’t be on two continents at once.”

“No, you cannot.” I heard the triumph in her voice. “And how many hatchlings are you hiding, right now?”

“Twenty-three.”

She blinked, the only outward sign of surprise. “You have been busy, haven’t you?”

“I’ve been doing this awhile.”

“Indeed.” Mist leaned farther forward, her gaze intense. “Where can we find them, Cobalt? Tell me exactly where they are.”

“You’ll never find them,” I slurred, smiling up at her with the knowledge. “If I disappear, Wes will give the signal for everyone to move. They’ll be gone before Talon ever gets there.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Mist said. “Once we have them on the run, they’ll be easy to track down. You’re only delaying the inevitable.” Her voice dropped, became soothing again. “Stop fighting, Cobalt. Where are they? Tell me the closest safe house from here.”

Fighting. Why was I fighting? That seemed hard right now, too much work. “The closest safe house from here?” I shrugged. “That’s easy. I have one right in the city.”

Mist frowned. “Here?” she asked. “In Las Vegas?”

“Yep.” I nodded, tilting my head back. The inside of my skull felt full of cotton; a weird sensation. “We were just there a few days ago, in fact.”

“Who was there?”

“All of us. Me, Wes, the soldier of St. George, Ember…”

Ember.

Deep inside, the dragon stirred, rousing sluggishly at her name. It struggled into consciousness, growling defiantly, before sleep overcame it and it sank into the void again. But that brief rush of heat and fire burned away the fog and, for just a moment, my thoughts were clear.

“Was there anyone else in that safe house?” Mist went on, her voice closer now, not seeming to come from a great distance away. “Any hatchlings that could still be there, right now?”

I clenched my fist, curling my fingers around the item in my palm. It bit into my skin, and I exhaled in relief. Still there. I hadn’t dropped it. “No,” I muttered, almost before I knew what I was saying, and winced. The damn truth serum was still in full effect. “There was no one else. Just us.”

“All right.” Mist slid off the table, coming to stand in front of me. “Enough of this,” she said, and a note of impatience had crept into her voice. “You know what we want, Cobalt. You know you cannot hide them from Talon any longer. I will make this as clear as I possibly can. Where—”