Only…they were. Ember had already shaken every belief the Order had instilled in me about dragons; that she’d spared my life was the final blow, the proof I couldn’t ignore. Which meant that some of the dragons I’d killed in the past, gunned down without thought because the Order had told me to, might’ve been like her.

And if that was the case, I had a lot of innocent blood on my hands.

“After the raid,” Tristan said, continuing to address the table, “Garret and I were ordered to follow Ember Hill in the hopes that she would lead us to the other targets. We tracked her to a beach on the edge of town, where she did indeed meet with two other dragons. A juvenile and an adult.”

Another murmur ran through the courtroom. “An adult,” Fischer confirmed, while the rest of the table looked grim. Full-grown adult dragons were rarely seen; the oldest dragons were also the most secretive, keeping to the shadows, hiding deep within their organization. The Order knew
Talon’s leader was an extremely old, extremely powerful dragon called the Elder Wyrm, but no one had ever laid eyes on it.

“Yes, sir,” Tristan went on. “We were to observe and report if the target revealed itself as a dragon, and all three were in their true forms when we got there. I informed Commander St. Francis at once and received the order to shoot on sight.” He paused, and Fischer’s eyes narrowed.

“What happened then, soldier?”

“Garret stopped me, sir. He prevented me from taking the shot.”

“Did he give any reason for his actions?”

“Yes, sir.” Tristan took a deep breath, as if the next words were difficult to say. “He told me…that the Order was wrong.”

Silence fell. A stunned, brittle silence that raised the hair on the back of my neck. To imply that the Order was mistaken was to spit on the code that the first knights had implemented centuries ago. The code that denounced dragons as soulless wyrms of the devil and their human sympathizers as corrupted, beyond hope.

“Is there anything else?” Fischer’s expression was cold, mirroring the looks of everyone at the table. Tristan paused again, then nodded.

“Yes, sir. He said that he wouldn’t let me kill the targets, that some dragons weren’t evil and that we didn’t have to slaughter them. When I tried to reason with him, he attacked me. We fought, briefly, and he knocked me out.”

I winced. I hadn’t meant to injure my partner. But I couldn’t let him fire. Tristan’s sniping skills were unmatched. He would’ve killed at least one dragon before they realized what was happening. I couldn’t stand there and watch Ember be murdered in front of me.