Cage after cage filled the small, dark room, stacked on top of each other in piles that stank of bedding long uncleaned. As Rose swung the candlestick in a slow, horrified circle, she caught the glint of dozens of pairs of startled draconic golden eyes and innumerable glittering scales, wings and tails. Low, unhappy chortles sounded in a panicked chorus as all the dragons scooted to the backs of their cages, lengthening their necks and pressing their small heads against the bars behind them.
“Oh, you poor darlings,” she crooned. “No wonder you’re frightened, but I won’t hurt any of you. I promise!” Lifting her candlestick higher, she peered deeper into the darkness. “Rhiannon? Are you here?”
No answer came from the other side of the room, but Mr Aubrey spoke from just behind her.
“There appear to be four empty cages.” His face was clenched tight with emotion, high cheekbones sharp against his hollowed cheeks, but he kept his voice soft as he pointed over Rose’s shoulder. “You see?”
“Aha.” She sank down to the ground by the closest one, grimacing at the stench. The door of this cage hung open, but a pair of iron manacles still lay inside. At the sight of them, Rose’s stomach clenched. “This was the cage that held Rhiannon.” She knew the width of those cruel clasps; she’d seen their marks in the little dragon’s skin.
“The others have all seen recent use as well. In fact, this one ...” Mr Aubrey rattled the closed door of the nearest empty cage. “Appears to still be locked, with leftover food inside.”
Rising, Rose peered under his outstretched arm. “Not good food.” Her nose wrinkled. “How old is that meat?”
“Judging by the state of your two dragons when they arrived at Gogodd Abbey, I doubt any of the creatures here would ignore any meal they were offered, no matter how unappealing. This meal is still only half-eaten, and I can’t spot any mould.”
“So Rhiannon may have rescued this dragon just now, while we were drinking tea downstairs.” Rose cringed. “How could she be so reckless with her safety? If Montrose or Sir Gareth had caught her at it—”
“Ahem.” Mr Aubrey cleared his throat pointedly. “I seem to recall asking you very nearly the same question just over an hour ago. That type of heedless courage, no matter how admirable it may seem in theory—”
“That is entirely different, and you know it.” Shaking her head, Rose backed up to inspect the cages around her, nearly all of them full of rustling, chittering dragons who watched her with panicked golden eyes. The other two empty cages, like Rhiannon’s, had doors that hung wide open, their inhabitants’ loss already catalogued. “One of those cages must have belonged to Griff,” she said, “but as for the other ...”
“Let us shelve that discussion for the moment, if you please.” Mr Aubrey’s tone was sharp; when she glanced at him in surprise, she found him eyeing the door they’d passed through, which was still cracked open. “May I suggest that we take our departure? Quickly?”
“And leave these poor creatures trapped here, in this state?” Rose gaped at him. “I cannot believe that you, of all people, would countenance that idea!”
His jaw hardened. “Trust me, I have no desire to leave any of them here. However, I also have no desire to put you in danger, nor to allow Sir Gareth to discover that we’ve found his secret – and highly criminal – cache.”
“Criminal?” Rose blinked. “You mean, there actually are laws regulating the proper treatment of dragons? I hadn't heard—”
“If only that were the case!” Mr Aubrey’s lean chest rose and fell with his sigh. “The existing laws regulate only the acts of importation and breeding ... but I can tell you with certainty, merely by cataloguing the numbers here, that Sir Gareth has broken them. No reputable breeder would ever sell a single buyer over two dozen dragons, even if he could somehow afford them ...”
“And as he had to resort to misusing Miss Thomas’s inheritance to buy this ramshackle house, he certainly couldn’t afford to buy himself so many dragons,” Rose finished thoughtfully. “Unless the reason he’d run out of funds was because he’d spent all of his savings on them?”
“No.” The scholar’s voice was firm. “There simply aren’t enough dragons legally available in Britain for him to have bought so many young specimens. And if he had, as we discussed earlier, he would have presented his certificates of ownership to your uncle in order to reclaim his property.” Tension stiffened Mr Aubrey’s spine, drawing him up even higher. “Miss Parry—no, wait, it’s not Parry—dash it, Rose ...”
“Yes?” The sound of her first name in his mouth made her look up with sudden attention.
His shadowed gaze intent, he raked one hand through his fair hair. “I know I am not the most practical or reliable of men, but you must trust me on this point, if nothing else: the owner of these dragons is a desperate man.”
“Sir Gareth?” Rose’s eyebrows rose even higher. “Oh, he is clearly an appalling person, I agree, but—”
“Listen.” Mr Aubrey’s voice vibrated with conviction. “When you look around this room, you see mistreated creatures in distress, waiting for your help. But I was sent for years to exactly the sort of brutal, elite school for boys that trains so-called gentlemen like Sir Gareth, and I can tell you that when he looks at these dragons, he sees nothing but potential profit ... no matter how impolite it may be considered to speak of finances in company.”
“Profit?” Rose gave a sceptical snort as she looked back at the closest dragons, who were still hiding nervously at the backs of their cages. “Do you imagine he’s planning to train them in some sort of carnival act?”
“Do you have any notion how much all of these dragons would be worth, even without any inexplicable powers?” Mr Aubrey demanded. “If any more of them do happen to possess the sorts of unheard of abilities that we’ve witnessed in your Griff and Rhiannon ... well, once the word of such possibilities is spread ...!”
He closed his eyes for a moment, as if in pain. “Trust me. The amount he could charge for each of them individually would be more than worth the risk of illegally smuggling all of them into Britain in the first place ... but only if he isn’t caught.”
Biting her lip, Rose took a long moment to think through her pseudo-fiancé’s words. Could Sir Gareth truly have illegally smuggled these poor creatures into Britain? That would certainly explain why he’d chosen to hire such an unsavoury man-of-business and why he’d chosen to lead such a reclusive lifestyle in this remote location … to keep those dragons safely hidden until he could arrange their sales.
Even the most cursory of glances across this sad, stinking little room left no doubt that he had no interest in actual dragon-keeping.
“We still can’t leave them here,” she said at last. “I don’t care how desperate Sir Gareth may be. I couldn’t live with the knowledge that I’d done nothing for them.”
“Then we will devise a way to sort this out,” said Mr Aubrey. “But if Sir Gareth discovers us here, now, before we can devise any logical, legal plans to work against him ...”
The door behind them let out a creak of warning too late, as it was finally pushed the rest of the way open. “So, you asked for my help ‘as a very great favour’ in order to conspire against my uncle?” Miss Thomas enquired.
