I run.

The music fades. The grin dissolves. The ghosts — gone.

But something is wrong.

The field is silent. Not the silence of battle. The silence of after. Everything is dead. Or still. Or waiting.

I slow down. My lungs burn. My ears still bleed.

I can't hear. Not properly. Everything is muffled. Distant. Like I'm underwater.

"Where are we?" I ask. My voice sounds wrong.

"Past the battlefield. Maybe past the gas. Keep moving."

Don Juan's voice is inside. Not through my ears. Through my head.

I walk. For a long time. The dead field turns into dead trees. The dead trees turn into rocks. The rocks turn into hills.

Then I see them.

Figures. Tall. Bark. Roots. Standing between the stones. Not moving. Watching.

"Ents?" I mutter.

"Trees. Just trees. Don't look at them."

I don't.

Above — shapes. Metal. Wings. Mechanical birds. They circle something in the distance. A structure. Low. Wide. Smoke rising.

"What is that?"

"A nest. Or a hangar. Or both."

I move closer. The smell hits me. Copper. Steel. Kerosene.

Then I see inside.

Through a gap in the metal wall. A cave. Or a workshop. Machines. Steam. Pipes. Pistons. Boilers. Steam engines. Row after row. Humming. Working. Alive.

I don't hear them. I feel them. Through the ground. Through my bones.

The dragonling tenses in my arms. It snorts. Smoke curls from its nostrils.

Then it spits.

A small burst of flame. Weak. But real.

"Did you see that?" I say.

"It's a dragon," Don Juan says. "It breathes fire."

"It's never done that before."

"Then it's growing. Or it doesn't like this place."

I look at the machines. At the birds. At the trees.

"Neither do I."

"Then move."

I move.

The mechanical birds watch. I don't hear them. But I see them.