‘They’re going after a couple of those Brothers and Sisters of Dragons.’

Hunter raised an eyebrow. ‘Finally. I was starting to think they were scared of them or something.’

‘They’re beginning to feel backed into a corner. Glenning didn’t make it.’

‘He was a stupid bastard for volunteering.’ Hunter paced across the sumptuous rugs, stretching his lithe body. A large black tattoo of a snake rose up his spine from somewhere below the waistband of his trousers to the nape of his neck, slithering as the muscles beneath it rippled.

‘How can you be so hard-hearted?’ Hal protested. ‘Glenning sacrificed himself for the sake of the country.’

Hunter stared at Hal in disbelief. ‘Don’t start falling for the propaganda. It’s not good for your health.’ He pulled on a loose-fitting red silk shirt that masked his hardness with a dandyish air. ‘Glenning was a drone who jumped through hoops whenever anyone higher up the pecking order shouted at him. That mission was always going to fail. You know that.’

‘Someone has to try-’

‘Yeah?’ Hunter shrugged. ‘Why?’

‘We’re at war, fighting for the existence of civilisation… everything we’ve achieved-’

‘And what have we achieved, exactly?’

‘There’s no talking to you when you’re in this mood.’ Hal marched to the antique sideboard and poured himself a glass of vintage wine from a crystal decanter. ‘It shows our resilience as a race that we’re still clinging on after all we’ve endured in recent times. The basic rules of science shown up for what they are — just one way of looking at the world, and not the most important by a long way. Society turned on its head-’

‘You say all that as if it’s a bad thing.’ Hunter flopped on to the edge of the bed and pulled on his boots.

‘It’s amazing that we’ve managed to establish a new Government here in Oxford after what happened in London. We’ve even got the power back on, instituted some semblance of normality. A year ago, no one would ever have thought that would have been possible.’