If she’d been out long enough that she needed to really pee when she woke up, and had spent that time curled against her talisman, why were her calling scents still spewing at epic levels? Why hadn’t Dragon’s touch allow her body to heal?
Her stomach growled so loudly the Burners probably heard it all the way in the center of the warehouse.
“The beastie wants you to come out, luv.” Billy’s voice carried through the door. “Or at least I think he wants you to come out. Can’t read his finger wiggles.”
She slid down the back of the door and her butt hit the tile floor hard. At least it was a numb pain and not the new rawness coming from her seers. “Why are you here, Billy?”
“When we had your mum, she told me to drive west. Seemed best to continue to do so after your boyfriend was all gracious-like and kind.” A knock pulsed through the door and it sounded as if he’d moved away. “It says on my arm Listen to Rysa so I’m listening to you, princess.”
Billy was listening to her?
Another growl rolled through the door. Dragon was out there. Her seers danced around throwing all sorts of images of the beast and the warehouse and the sneeze-inducing dust and cobwebs he moved through when on the ceiling and his underlying unease because of her illness and because Ladon wasn’t handling anything very well right now.
Rysa buckled forward. The talon dropped from her hand and clinked slightly when its uncovered edge hit the tile.
The chatter, though still too loud, washed out. The what-was-is-will-be returned to thunder in the back of her mind. The chorus of students, at least for the moment, stopped trying to yell over each other.
I can’t touch it. What was she going to do? Even wrapped up, it seemed to do its thing, and do it too well.
Carefully, she used her toe to push it to the side. When she opened the door, Billy jigged around a dragon-length away. He looked like he was about to climb the nearest rack and belt out “Singing in the Rain.”
“Feel better, my sweet?” Billy stopped dancing and looked up at the ceiling. “The dinosaur is here.” His fingers encircled his neck in an unconscious gesture to protect himself. Not that he could, from a dragon.
“He’s not a dinosaur, Billy. I suggest you stop calling him that.”
Dragon winked into visibility less than three feet from Billy. The Burner screamed like a little girl on a playground and fell on his ass.
The Burners know to stay back, Rysa.
Billy sniffed and gave Dragon the finger. “He was with you the entire time you were asleep, like a good dog.”
“He’s not a dog, either. Do you need me to write that on your arm?” Rysa held out her hand and wiggled her fingers.
Billy jumped up and twirled in a circle. He wrapped his hands around his neck again. “We’re not supposed to be any closer to you than the dino… the dragons are long.” Dancing backward, he gave Dragon the finger again.
“What’s going on?” She needed answers. “Where is everyone?”
A second growl rolled from the aisle framing Dragon, but from above. The invisible Sister-Dragon hung on the ceiling.
Dragon pointed toward the van. We are here. Please walk toward the door. I must meet Human. He is on the roof and cannot come down until I move closer. Dragon stayed back thirty-five feet, like before.
Her calling scents must have ramped back up the moment she woke up. And they were in a warehouse with Burners. And she’d passed out because she had a vision. A bad vision. One she couldn’t control.
She remembered Ladon driving north, into the Yukon, his soul completely hollow.
It hit her so hard she staggered into the door frame. She knew what she meant to them, but this was beyond anything she understood. This held the weight of centuries.
She had to get her abilities under control.
Her talisman sat on the floor, a bundle of fabric, paper, plastic, and talon. “I can’t touch my talisman, Dragon. I can’t carry it back.” She’d thought she’d seen it helping. She’d thought she had known what to do. But it wasn’t working. It made things worse.
Maybe she’d gone too long without it. Maybe Vivicus’s damage had crossed a line and now she was beyond healing.
“I’ll get it!” Billy skipped toward her but Dragon burst forward and snagged the collar of his t-shirt between two still-attached talons of his giant claw-hand. He backed away, Billy in tow.
“Fine!” Billy smoothed the front of his shirt when the beast let go. He pointed at the words on his arm. “I trace this for a reason, you big… big whatever the hell you are! Because I’m better now.” He gave Dragon the finger yet again. “I still think you’re a dino-dog.”
“Stop making rude gestures at Dragon.” Billy’s lack of calm and his snark made things worse and she felt like hitting him. And goodness knows how her overactive healer would react to the resulting chemical scorch to her hand.
Billy shrugged. “You smelled so very lovely when you were asleep.” But his nose crinkled. “But now you’ve gone Shifter-nova. And they say we smell bad.” He pointed at Dragon. “I’m being good around her, so back off.”
Sister-Human comes, the beast signed.
Billy was within her thirty-five foot circle of isolation. “My calling scents don’t affect you?”
“Of course not, luv. Enthrallers are particularly tasty.” He smacked his lips.
AnnaBelinda appeared behind Billy, in the long aisle between two rows of stacks, but she stopped at the edge of Rysa’s scents. “You are better?” She jogged up the aisle, a pistol out and in one hand.
“Better than what?” Rysa called.
Billy snorted and tapped the side of his head. “I may forget things, but my ears work brilliantly.” Stepping closer, he leaned forward. “The little mean one here thinks your boyfriend is ‘acting like a Burner.’” He air-quoted the last words. “And said ‘no one wants a rampage.’” He air-quoted “rampage,” too. He turned toward Anna. “Right?”
Rysa felt lightheaded. All this talk of Ladon cracking made her want to pass out again. And she couldn’t use her seers to check on him.
“I will gut you, Burner.” Anna pointed the pistol at Billy’s head.
He shrugged. “Like you’re going to pop me inside, right next to the princess.” This time, he gave Anna the finger.
“Stop antagonizing everyone!” Rysa yelled. “I am the Ambusti Prime! I am your Fate! You will do as I say or I will gut you, Billy. Do you understand me? Shut up!”
AnnaBelinda smiled. She lowered her weapon, and patted Dragon as she moved closer.
A deafening growl erupted from Rysa’s stomach. Maybe the lightheadedness came from hunger. “How long was I out?”
Billy snapped his fingers and a little puff of Burner haze popped into the air. He opened his mouth to answer, then snapped it shut.
Anna nodded toward the van. “Ten hours.”
Ten hours. No wonder she had to pee. And was hungry. “So I am in a warehouse.”
“Yes.” Anna glanced up at the ceiling. A burst of energy moved between her and Sister-Dragon.
“Full of Burners.” Rysa sensed the other beast moving silently closer to hang directly over Rysa’s head. They must be able to get closer than thirty-five feet when up instead of next to.
Billy wiggled like a toddler who had to speak no matter how much trouble it got him into. “Not full of Burners, sweet. Most of us are outside. We kinda stink up the place.”
Rysa pressed on her forehead. “Why?”
Billy’s face took on the same reverence she had seen on the faces of people on television who were in a religious fervor. The same lip-quivering. The same wide-eyed, glassy stare. “You said why. You’re the Ambusti Prime.”
They were worshipping her? Why would they worship her? “Talking bags of monster chaos think I’m a goddess?”
Billy frowned. “Hey! I’m trying! We’re not bags of chaos, luv. Your boyfriend wrote no killing on my arm next to your words and I haven’t killed anyone since! I swear!” He
twirled around. “Because you’re the princess and we Burners love you.”
Oh for the love of all things great and good, Rysa thought. Why the hell wasn’t she screaming her lungs out right now? Why the hell wasn’t she panicking? Because she should be panicking.
This was a panic-inducing kind of situation.
But she was mad now, and the anger built in her gut right alongside her hunger and she felt like slapping someone. And yelling. Which she shouldn’t do.
Rysa frowned back at Billy.
She was going to yell anyway. “Get out of my way!” She pointed at Billy. Dragon needed her to move toward the door so Ladon could come down and, damn it, she wasn’t going to stand here whimpering. “Do not touch my talisman! Only the dragons touch my talisman. You touch it and that’s the end, Billy! You’re gone. And not in a pleasant way.”
She ran perpendicular to the aisle where Anna stood.
“My husband wakes up. He will bring you food,” Anna called.
She’d take care of the talon. The Burners wouldn’t touch it.
Rysa ran along the inside wall of the building, following a yellow stripe on the floor she suspected was there to help forklift traffic. But she didn’t know. She couldn’t read anything in the what-was-is-will-be. Not how she got there, or who the “Emperor” who brought them there was.
It all just buzzed around inside her head.
Somewhere nearby, a door slammed against a wall. Light momentarily flared into the warehouse’s gloom and a familiar masculine baritone rang through the building. “Rysa?”
“Yes!” In front of Rysa, a concrete wall jutted out into the warehouse.
Ladon walked around its base. “Your seers?” He stood in his battle posture, legs ready for a burst of speed and arms ready to snap a neck. “Do you see what must be done?”
He watched her with his piercing, battle-ready stare, as if someone spoke to him. And taxed his limits.
“You and Anna talked before she came in, didn’t you?”
Information whipped between the man and the beast. Ladon’s shoulders slumped. “Sister believes using the Burners to hide from Fates may have been prudent while you rested, but we have your talisman and it no longer matters. She believes the best way to keep you safe is to move you home, to the cave.” He glanced at Billy. “I agree.”
The area suddenly filled with Burner stench. Billy ran up the aisle behind her, stopping where he was supposed to. “Tell her she’s not to do that.” He bent over as if winded. “Okay? I can’t watch over her if I can’t see her.”
“Dragon will rip the heads off these Burners if they threaten you.” Ladon turned toward the door. “Derek will bring you food.”
“I’m hungry, too!” Billy yelled.
Ladon swung around and pointed a finger at Billy. “You may swear on the life of your Progenitor and swear a stream of promises, but if I catch any of you killing, I will deal with your nest. I do not trust you.”
Deep in her gut, Rysa knew they were in the middle of another intricate weaving of events. One that needed to stretch into the what-will-be in a particular way, or the end product would pucker and pull when it finally draped over their what-was.
Or perhaps it was the same weaving that started in Minneapolis two and half weeks ago, when Billy chained her with burndust-laden shackles.
Either way, a sense of difficult lay ahead of her. Difficult in a “taxing Ladon” kind of way.
Ladon glanced up at the roof as if asking the universe why it continued to pee on them. “Rain comes.”
He was right. The universe peed on them. “Then we go when the rain stops.”
“Can I come too?” Billy bounced on his toes. “The princess needs me.”
Ladon ignored Billy’s question. He turned away again; he stopped at the edge of the concrete wall, but did not turn around. “I have failed to protect you.” He paused for a moment. “My failure continues to put all of us at risk, including Sister’s mate.”
Rysa’s past-seer suddenly burped out of the white noise an unintended moment of drama between Ladon and Anna: His sister told him about a fight. Derek stood up to a Burner, but she worried. She wished everyone to be within a location she could defend easily, to allow Ladon to rest.
Anna had not meant to burden her brother.
“That’s not what AnnaBelinda meant!” Rysa found herself defending the one person she never thought she would defend. His sister had accidently snared one of Ladon’s nagging worries. One that had coated her past-seer burp like the skin on a bubble—or the residue of a bad dream.
I also explained to Human that he overreacts, but he will not listen, Dragon signed.
Ladon’s shoulders tightened. “Does it matter? It will not happen again. We will fix this, Rysa. No more threats will get by Dragon and me. You will be safe.”
“Damn it, Ladon!” Rysa yelled from her position thirty-five feet away. “Just because you’re a man doesn’t mean you’re immune to your problems!”
Ladon’s woman ranted about his mental health when she needed healing, not him. His behavior had nothing to do with being a man. He was a Progenitor. The Progenitors did not need help. Perhaps rest. Maybe a little relief, but he would get the peace he needed when this was done. Not now. Not while his beloved faced danger.
Rants like Rysa’s were why Ladon long ago learned to not talk about his moods. Speaking of such things worried women.
She tripped slightly when she walked toward him, as if her knees hurt. Is she okay?
Dragon peered down at her from his place on the ceiling. I see no difference. I need to be closer.
A Dragon-memory slapped at the back of Ladon’s mind. When he could not be close enough to Ladon’s women to read their bodies, bad things happened.
Very bad things.
Ladon fought the tightening of his chest muscles. He would not show anxiety. Not while Rysa ranted.
A haze dropped into his mind—the same filtering of his mood the beast had been doing since Ladon scraped his scalp clean of hair with a steak knife. Dragon would not tolerate distractions from Ladon.
“I must return to patrolling.” Ladon leaned against the wall. His touch had not helped while she was unconscious. Nor had Dragon’s. So he did what he could—he watched for other threats.
“Your sister can’t patrol? Why do you have to go back outside?” Rysa bounced on her toes.
Sister grows fatigued. The ceiling groaned as the beast moved across the beams. The dragons seemed to be able to move closer to Rysa, if they stayed above. Her calling scents spread horizontally, like a dense mist, and did not rise up as if carried on updrafts.
“Sister-Dragon did not benefit from your touch after we left Branson. She needs sleep. We do a better job.”
“Fine.” Rysa turned her back to Ladon.
“Not good, mate.” Billy shook his head. The damned Burner stood too close to Rysa. He pulled a marker from his pocket and flipped it between his fingers. Every time he rolled it back and forth across his knuckles, he tapped the frame of the warehouse rack he leaned against, sending a discordant, arrhythmic snap echoing through the space. “You know nothing about woman-speak? ‘Fine’ ain’t fine, my friend.”
He used to be a musician. Now Dragon grumbled.
The Burner looked up but didn’t stop twirling the pen.
“Be quiet.” I am going to pop him right now. Ladon’s neck tensed. Though it had been tense since he woke up. Maybe ridding the world of a few Burners might help.
Rysa paced. ‘Anxiety’ dominated her calling scents and she was alone with that damned Burner.
You will not pop the Burner. He is useful.
Rysa pointed to where Dragon hung from the ceiling. “I saw that! For goodness sake, how is imploding Billy and blowing up the warehouse going to help us?”
The Burner stood up straight, his attention pulled from tapping his marker against the boxes. “Hey! Since when am I the bad guy here?”
“Shut up, Billy!” Both Ladon and Rysa yel
led at the same time.
Rysa twirled around again. “We’re already an old married couple!” She pointed at Ladon. “And we’re not even married!”
No, they were betrothed. In the Old World that meant married, but not technically. Either way, she was his mate and everyone better treat her as such.
She pressed her fists into her hips. “I don’t need my seers—or Dragon tattling—to know exactly what that face means!”
Ladon squared his chest to his woman and crossed his arms, but didn’t respond. He saw no reason to. His thoughts were truth.
“When this is done, you and I are going to have a nice long talk about that face. I’m not a doll and I’m not precious! I can handle myself with these Burners.” Rysa spun around again.
“They’re ghouls. And not to be trusted, no matter how much Hadrian pays them.” At least only two were inside at any given moment.
Billy did a little tap dance. “You two going to teach your kids to be Burner-bigoted? Because that’s not nice.” Distracted by his marker again, he drew on his fingernails.
The box found its way into Ladon’s hands before he realized he’d picked it up. It sailed through the air, directly at the Burner’s head. The ghoul dodged and the box clanked across the floor, whatever it contained obviously shattering.
You passed out, Rysa. Ladon signed. He stopped yelling. The Burner couldn’t read American Sign Language. After days of not sleeping. How did you think I would respond? Take her to a hospital again? Leave her out in the open like that, more vulnerable than she was before?
Dragon climbed onto the rack and hung over the Burner’s head, much closer to Rysa than he should be.
Billy cranked his neck and spun around like a top, watching the beast carefully. He shuffled into the center of the aisle, his garish shoes two bright spots on the concrete, and continued to look up. “I will never hurt the princess, Great Sir. I won’t forget.” He held up his arm. “See?”
Rysa waved her hand at Ladon. Dragon was right to take you outside. You need to run around the building more than I do.
“We leave soon. I no longer need to patrol. We will prepare the van.”
The music of her seers played over his mind, first her sweet oboe of her past-seer, then her present-seer flute, then her future-seer piccolo, all still drunk. Still random.
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