From Jennifer Ashley, With Love

by Jennifer Ashley

  “No,” I repeated.

  “What are you? Navajo? I could use a Native American to find me more artifacts. The tribes hide away the best ones. Pretend it’s all secret and their heritage, but they just don’t want mages who’d know what to do with them to get a hold of them. Am I right?”

  “I’m not working for you,” I said. “Pericles. Is that really your name?”

  “My parents had a strange sense of humor. No, I didn’t kill them for it—they’re living in comfortable retirement in Tucson. I visit them every once in a while, and my father talks about his golf game. I have a good life, Stormwalker. Lots of money. Don’t you like money?”

  “To a point.”

  He snorted a laugh. “Your choice is—you work for me, or I try to kill you. I say try, because Stormwalkers aren’t weak, and you have a little sting in your tail. But I’ll keep at it until you’re dead. Not only that, I’ll put out the word to everyone who works for me to try to kill you. A lot of people work for me, so they’ll be coming from all sides.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  My bravado, unfortunately, wasn’t anything more than bravado, and Pericles knew it. The man was strong—he’d thrown off my Beneath magic like it was nothing. Not many could withstand it. The only one I’d ever seen stare at me without blinking when he got a full dose of my magic was Sheriff Jones, who sucked up all magic and never felt it.

  Pericles had felt it, but he’d destroyed it with a spell of his own.

  But then, if he were so powerful, why was he looking for an artifact to help him out? Objects could be laced with incredible magic—the same way the magic mirror had been—but Pericles didn’t seem like the type to need a boost.

  “What is it about this pot that makes it so popular?” I asked.

  Pericles shrugged. “If you agree to work for me, I’ll tell you. I’ll even ask you to help me find the real one for me. Want to satisfy your curiosity?”

  “You seem plenty capable on your own. What do you need the pot for?”

  He laughed, still relaxed. “I collect things. And people. I like having all the magic users and little shamans on my payroll. A good job and cushy living keeps them from getting ideas about moving up the mage food chain and ousting me. By ousting, you know, I mean killing.”

  “Not all mages kill each other,” I said. “Most know it can take a lifetime to learn about the powers they do have.” I still didn’t know everything I could do, despite the guidance of first my friend Jamison, then Mick and Coyote.

  “Ambitious mages kill each other,” Pericles said. “Trust me.”

  I thought again about Emmett Smith. He qualified as an ambitious mage, and he’d slaughtered his way to the top. I guessed that Pericles aspired to be the next ununculous. There was only ever one at a time.

  “I’ll have to try to make it on my own,” I said.

  “Last chance.”

  “No.” I readied more magic, my body aching all over. “You’re kind of sleazy.”

  Pericles finally lost his smile. He gestured at the pot that dangled beside my face, and it exploded into fragments, sharp pieces slashing my skin. I threw up my hands to fend them off, and Pericles sent a wave of darkness at me.

  The darkness held cold and death and the screams of helpless things, things from which the magic had sucked all power. Now it wanted mine.

  I desperately blocked the black wave with Stormwalker-laced Beneath magic. The deadly wave hovered in front of me, making me weak and sick, then it reluctantly dispersed. The tendrils that touched me before it dissolved froze my skin, leaving behind little burned patches.

  The backlash of his magic mixed with mine was like a dam bursting, except instead of concrete and water, a flood of chaotic power poured through the basement.

  The wave swept up everything in its path. It lifted me from my feet and threw me backward with the force of hurricane winds. I crashed into a workbench, smacked my head on something hard, and went to sleep.

  * * *

  I woke surrounded by the aura of dragon.

  Dragon aura is fiery with a hint of smoke—sweet-smelling smoke, not oily like a furnace. I think I fell in love with Mick’s aura before I realized I loved the rest of him, even before I knew he was a dragon.

  I reached up, hand landing on a muscular arm, and I smiled.

  “Wakey, wakey, Janet.”

  I popped my eyes open. Mick would never say something as asinine as Wakey, wakey.

  The overhead light was on, and by it I saw that the muscular arm was covered with tattoos. Completely covered, wrist to shoulder.

  Colby grinned down at me as he hoisted me to my feet. I landed against his solid chest, and he steadied me with his arms around my back, in no hurry to let me go.

  Lines of tattoos emerged from the neck of Colby’s T-shirt, climbing his throat to his chin. Every part of his body was inked, except his hands and face. And I do mean every part.

  I pulled away from him. “Where’s Mick?”

  “Is that any way to greet a friend? I saw that look of disappointment when you realized it was me, not Mickey. Hurts, Janet. That really hurts.”

  “If you’re here,” I said when I found my breath, “where is Drake?”

  “Tossing the place upstairs. He told me to look down here. Imagine my surprise when I found you out cold on the floor.” Colby pressed a loud kiss to my forehead. “Mickey’s about to take the town apart to find you. He told us to keep an eye out.”

  “Yeah, I’d better call him.” I rubbed the back of my head, my brain still not working right. “Drake won’t find anything up there. I already looked.”

  “You’re probably right, but you know Drake. Stick shoved firmly up his ass. Has to go over every inch of ground, even if he’s done it before.”

  I reached for my cell phone but found empty air in the little holster. The phone must have flown out when I hit the floor. “If Drake has searched here before, why is he doing it again?”

  “Because he got wind that Pericles had come back here. Drake hauled ass—his and mine—to get here, but he was too late. Peri was gone.”

  “Then why search?”

  Colby rolled his eyes. “Because he’s Drake. He’s convinced that if Pericles came back here, there was something to find. Drake says he’ll figure out what Peri took based on what isn’t here this time.”

  “Logical.” I rubbed my head again.

  “Yeah, well, that’s Drake. Mr. Logic.”

  I pushed Colby out of my way and started hunting for my cell phone. “You two knew all about Pericles, the wonderful mage. Why didn’t you tell me? Why are you telling me now?”

  “Well, you know about him now, obviously. He get what he was looking for?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  I spotted my cell phone under a worktable and stooped to retrieve it. The phone wasn’t a phone anymore, but a melted mass in my hand. “Damn.”

  “Looks like he fried it,” Colby said. “Lots of other stuff too.”

  Our magic backlash had been bad, but Pericles must have blasted the place with fire as well before he left. The tables were marked with black streaks, glass and plastic containers had melted, and curios had been reduced to small piles of ash. Whatever Laura had been working on, sitting at one of the worktables, had been smashed to powder.

  Pericles had tried to burn the room behind him. For some reason—maybe my residual magic, or maybe because he thought I might be useful later—the fire had burned out instead of building into an inferno. I went cold.

  “I’m glad you found me,” I said, heartfelt.

  “Any time, sweetie. Does this mean I get a reward?”

  “No way,” I said.

  “Damn. I’ll keep trying until you dump that fire lizard you call Mickey.”

  “I don’t call him Mickey. You do.” I dropped my useless cell phone to a table. “Help me with this.”

  I bent to the floor and started gathering the shards of the pot Pericles had broken. Colby picked up a p
iece and stared at the pattern. “Where the hell did you get this?”

  “Richard Young.”

  Colby tossed the piece onto the table next to my melted cell phone. “It’s a fake.”

  “I know. And you’ve just revealed to me that you know about the real one.”

  Colby shrugged, unembarrassed. “So why do you want this one? If it’s fake?”

  “Because it’s handy to have a replica of what I’m looking for, for when I shove people up against the wall and question them. Like I want to do to you. This is what Drake was after the night he fried my hotel, wasn’t it? The real one, I mean?”

  “Yep. You sure your Nightwalker doesn’t have it?”

  “No, I’m not sure. But that doesn’t mean I’m letting your dragons have him. Ansel and my hotel are off limits.”

  “Not my dragons. Don’t insult me, Janet. I’m a prisoner here. A victim.”

  “Right. You never did tell me what you did to get yourself into so much trouble with the dragon council.”

  Colby lifted his hands. “It was a big misunderstanding.”

  I glared at him, but he wasn’t going to budge. Never mind. I’d get it out of him later.

  “Help me put this back together.” I rummaged in the metal cabinets that hadn’t melted, searching for glue. “And call Mick before he hurts someone looking for me.”

  “Demand, demand. I can’t do everything at once.”

  “Call Mick, then.”

  “I don’t have a cell phone.”

  I bit back some bad words. “Then start sorting pieces, and I’ll make Drake call him.”

  Colby lost his grin and lowered his voice. “I didn’t alert Drake that you were down here. We need to keep it that way. He’s mad at you for the way things went at your hotel. When I say mad, I mean he’s in a killing rage.”

  “He’s mad at me?” My voice started to rise, and Colby frantically waved me quiet. “He’s the one who set fire to my hotel.”

  “I know, but he’s pissed off because you wouldn’t turn over the Nightwalker to him. It’s dragon law that creatures of evil aren’t allowed to walk free. Nightwalkers are creatures of evil—dragons are creatures of good.”

  “Since when?” I snapped.

  “Let me finish. In Drake’s worldview, you should have given him the Nightwalker without argument. Drake would have found out what Ansel knew, then fried him. End of Nightwalker problem. You defended Ansel, an evil being, and you’re letting him live in your basement. Plus, you defied Drake, and he doesn’t like that.”

  “Too bad.”

  “It is too bad.” Colby looked more serious than I’d seen him look in a long time. “Drake’s hot to arrest you and take you prisoner, like he did me, for violating dragon law. Mickey would try to defend you—you being his mate—but Drake would take it to court.”

  “You mean up before the dragon council? But I’m not a dragon.”

  “No, but you’re a dragon’s mate. They can’t kill you without going through Mick—and trust me, they don’t want to go through Mickey—but you’d do time in the dragon compound. But hey, it wouldn’t be so bad. We’d be inmates.”

  I growled under my breath. How easy my life had been when I hadn’t believed in dragons. Now I was beleaguered by them.

  Dragons were the most arrogant creatures in the universe. They didn’t trust me, and they’d assigned Mick, long ago, to watch me, to kill me if I ever got out of line.

  Mick had told them what they could do with themselves, but Drake and his master, Bancroft, still thought I needed that restriction. And I couldn’t blame them. I was pretty dangerous, after all. But that didn’t mean I’d sit still and obey their rules.

  I dumped the rest of the shards I’d gathered to the table and slammed the bottle of glue down in front of Colby. “Start repairing,” I said. “I’m going to talk to Drake.”

  Colby grabbed my arm. “Haven’t you heard anything I’ve said? Drake will arrest you. That means bind you, not have a chat over an interrogation table.”

  “He can try.”

  Colby studied me, concern in his brown eyes, then he released me, letting his grin return. “In that case, can I watch? Please?”

  I tapped the glue bottle. “Glue now. Watch later.”

  “Aw, you’re no fun.”

  I patted Colby on the shoulder, grateful to him even if he was a shit, and marched upstairs.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Drake had opened the bottom of a cabinet and was on his knees pulling out the contents—flattened boxes, paper, little foam popcorns, and shredded paper. The popcorns and paper had scattered across the tile floor, but I don’t think Drake cared about being neat with Laura’s things.

  He was fully dressed in a black suit, his black leather duster draped over the counter. He and Colby must not have flown here—they wouldn’t have taken the time to dress again. Drake had probably insisted on bringing the limo.

  The store’s lights were on, Drake unconcerned if anyone saw him. I remembered how, during my stay in the dragon compound, the police had been suspiciously deferential to Bancroft and Drake, instead of arresting them for kidnapping me. If the Santa Fe cops caught Drake turning over an antiques store, they’d probably apologize for interrupting him and leave him to it.

  I cleared my throat.

  Drake’s head whipped around, but he only lost his composure for a second. Then he was rising to his feet, smooth as butter, dark threads of a binding spell streaking for me before I could so much as say hello.

  I countered the spell with my very last spark of storm magic, which then went out. The binding spell regrouped and came at me again.

  I quickly pressed a bubble of Beneath magic out around me—a trick I’d learned from Gabrielle. The binding spell hit it and bounced back toward Drake. He snapped off the spell with a flick of his fingers, the black threads disappearing.

  “What’s so special about the pot?” I asked him. “And why couldn’t you explain before you burned down my saloon?”

  Drake lowered his hand, as cool as ever. Did he look ashamed for vandalizing my hotel, terrifying my guests, burning off a piece of my hair, and destroying my magic mirror? Not in the slightest. “Council orders,” he said. “Those same council orders forbid me to tell you any more than you already know.”

  I sent him a smile, not a nice one. “Come on, Drake. I thought we were friends.”

  His look told me he wondered where I’d gotten that idea. “Council orders are that I bring you in for harboring a Nightwalker. Nightwalkers are deadly, Ms. Begay. It doesn’t matter if some of them pretend to reform. As soon as they let down their guard, they go into a blood frenzy and become killing machines. You know that.”

  I did know that. I’d had my share of encounters with blood-frenzied Nightwalkers, up to and including Ansel last night.

  “I agree,” I said. “And if Ansel gets out of control, both Mick and I know it’s our duty to kill him. But Ansel is trying. Being Nightwalker isn’t his fault. He was turned against his will.”

  “That makes no difference.” Drake’s eyes were dark like a starless night. “Nightwalkers lose their humanity the instant they are turned. That’s why there’s nothing left but blood and sinew when they die. The human being they once were is gone.”

  “Since when do you love humans so much?”

  “I don’t. But I also don’t like to see humans slaughtered like animals. As I have. Believe me, it’s a terrible, terrible thing.”

  The quiet horror in his expression wasn’t feigned. Drake was a tight-ass, but he wasn’t completely cold.

  “Tell the dragon council that I’m protecting Ansel,” I said, “whether they like it or not. That means I’m willing to take full responsibility for him. If he screws up, I kill him. Even if I can’t, you know Mick will. The dragon council will have to live with it.”

  “My orders are to bring you in,” Drake said, stubborn. “And find the pot and take it out of the world.”

  “What’s so special abo
ut it? It has magical abilities—I get that—but what does it do? Enhance magic? Protect the mage? Sing sea chanteys while you’re working tough spells?”

  I watched his reaction as I spoke, and I realized—Drake didn’t know. He’d only been told the pot was dangerous and had to be found.

  I knew that, like Nash, Drake was a straight-up guy. He liked rules and regulations, believing they’d been put in place for a reason, and strove to abide by them. If Drake said he wanted to protect the world from the pot, he meant it.

  However, I didn’t trust the dragon council he worked for an inch. I’d seen what they could do—what they thought they were entitled to do. I didn’t want a vessel filled with magic anywhere near Bancroft, leader of the dragon compound in Santa Fe, or even Colby, as warmhearted as he could be.

  Dragons might decide that the pot was too dangerous for humans to use but not for dragons. Dragons could be perfectly trusted to know what was best, their rationalization would go. They loved power, and they didn’t mind using people, gods, supernatural beings, and even other dragons to get more of it.

  “I don’t know where the real pot is,” I said.

  “Your Nightwalker does.”

  “I don’t think so. He’s as baffled as I am by all this.”

  Drake shook his head. “He stole the woman.”

  “You mean Laura?” I went through what little I knew in my head. “I looked over her campsite. I saw the aura of Nightwalker there, but also of dragon. That dragon was you, wasn’t it?”

  “Not me,” Drake said, giving me a little shake of his head. “Colby.”

  I paused for one surprised heartbeat, then turned around and yelled down the stairs, “Colby! Get up here!”

  Colby barreled up so fast that I knew he’d been listening on the stairs.

  “I heard,” Colby said as I opened my mouth to tell him what I thought. “It wasn’t my fault.” He pulled at imaginary threads on his chest. “Binding spell, remember? I have to do what the dragon shits order me to do.”