by J A Campbell
“True,” Darien agreed. “My people expected to have to pay some ransom to her. She may yet come to collect more, but so far all she wants is for them to kill the mages sent to imprison them once more.”
“That would be us,” Hagatha said. “Will you help me save Elise and Melanie?”
Elise burned inside her skin. The tiny space sealed with her shields was unbearable with winter clothes and another person sharing it, even if that person was child-sized. She’d never been particularly claustrophobic and now was not the time to start, but if she didn’t get out of that confessional, she feared she might lose control and kill them both.
The serpents’ mating was at a lull, but if they followed form, they’d be at it again very soon. They lay in a multi-colored bejeweled Celtic knot of coils, sleeping. Occasionally one would snore and another’s tail would slap the offender into silence. Soft contented purrs emitted from the throats of several of the females.
The scent of pheromones was heavier than a mall’s perfume counter and even more eye-watering. Her mouth had gone dry, and her knees went weak at the first sniff. She wondered if the stuff had power over them as well.
Melanie looked up at her, her blue eyes shining. That look was scary. It generally meant trouble. Right at this moment, Elise didn’t even brace when she saw it. She bared her teeth in what she hoped was a smile and nodded.
Melanie’s lips curved in a smile and she mouthed.
“Idea.”
“Do it.” Elise mouthed back. She didn’t care if the plan didn’t work. She didn’t even calculate that—based on Melanie’s previous track record—the odds were good that whatever it was, it would not succeed.
If they had to, they could blast their way out. She didn’t like the odds of that working, with so many dragons in evidence, but they had swords, and one thing Melanie was proving quite adept at was mayhem. She could blow them into dragon stew if she had to, and perhaps she should.
Melanie swallowed a couple of times. Her voice poured out in a lullaby that filled the space with peace. Despite herself, Elise relaxed when the fae girl broke from their shared cocoon and moved to a spot where her voice would carry. Hagatha talked about Melanie’s voice in terms of range, but what Elise heard was sheer beauty, clear and sweet as bird song on a cool winter morning.
The beasts’ lambent eyes opened and focused on the petite singer. She continued singing. Slowly the dragons’ eyes closed as she wove her spell on them, wishing blessed slumber and dreams of clear blue seas and endless treasure, a rookery full of beautiful eggs.
Elise marveled. Melanie was making up the words and possibly the melody as she went, creating soothing verses specially targeted for the beasts who opened their eyes, offering them their deepest desires, soothing them into submission and sleep.
One serpentine head dropped back to the pile. Then another.
Soon, they were all coiled loosely on the floor, their heads down and not-so-gentle snores emitting from their massive nostrils.
With a smooth gesture similar to an orchestral conductor, Melanie gestured Elise to move from their hidey-hole. The gold’s head rose at the vibration of her footfalls on the heavily scarred, ancient marble flooring, but Melanie quelled her with a look and another verse extolling the creature’s beauty as being far more exquisite than the most valuable and rare of the treasures they’d amassed.
Elise struggled to make her muscles, which were locked tight with fear and non-movement, convey her across the space to her companion. Her own mind felt muzzy and heavy with the need to sleep. She blinked, trying to resolve a clear route to reach Melanie without stepping on some part of a dragon.
Why the hell hadn’t she asked the girl for a lullaby when she was half-mad with exhaustion before? That would have solved so many problems. Maybe if she’d gotten more sleep, she’d have reconsidered the idea that just the two of them could to try breaching a dragon stronghold. Why was she so set on proving herself to Marcus, anyway? He’d never criticized her for her performance when she’d been on his team. He had started her out with junior-level tasks and slowly assigned more difficult magic as she proved herself in the field. In retrospect, his actions made a good deal of sense for someone teaching a new recruit. Elise stopped herself from shaking her head at her own folly and overconfidence, and struggled to stay awake and move as quietly as possible around the dragons, who tossed and turned in their slumber.
Melanie continued singing as she chivvied Elise out in front of her. The tail of a sleeping dragon shifted and struck her foot. Just the casual blow disrupted her careful balance and nearly sent her sprawling into the pile of intertwined serpents.
Elise froze, scarcely able to breathe. Her hand rose to slap herself awake, but she knew that’d be a huge error.
Melanie continued singing, urging deeper sleep on the beasts. Elise felt the pull of Melanie’s gaze as the girl made a slow, careful gesture to show her the right path.
Elise felt naked. Her shield had dropped. She stared at Melanie, who pointed at the door and mouthed “Go!” as she took a breath to sing once more.
Elise reached for her shields, but she couldn’t concentrate with the lullaby commanding her to sleep as well. Her mouth opened in a yawn. She forced it shut, nearly clacking her teeth. The music addled her brain, confusing her sense of balance and direction. All she wanted was just to lie down and sleep. She hadn’t had enough sleep in days.
“Come shield me, friend, from terror and pain,” Melanie sang.
That compulsion jolted her upright and moving again.
Too fast! Blue’s head rose, and her teeth flashed.
Again, Melanie soothed the beast.
They stood in the threshold while Melanie sang one final verse and chorus.
“Run,” the fae whispered, her voice hoarse.
They hastened from the space and across the still-working Way to face Darien, who was standing by the Fiat with Hagatha.
“You’re one of them.” Elise readied her power to strike, fueled by wrath and the sheer frustration of being stuck for hours while the beasts made yet more ruthless monsters they didn’t know how to deal with. Hagatha poised to step in between them, her hands rising.
“Wait!” Darien raised his hands in mute supplication. “I’m human until I reach the sea water.”
“Listen to him.” Hagatha shifted subtly to place herself in the line of fire. “I believe the dragons abandoned their young.”
Melanie stepped in front of Elise, her eyes emitting a fiery blue glow.
“We’re not having this argument while I am freezing my bum off,” she announced; then she got into the car, set the keys in the ignition. “I’m going. If you’re not in the car in five seconds, I’ll leave you, and you can all take a nice cold hike to cool down and settle your differences.”
“One.”
Elise opened her mouth to countermand her.
Melanie narrowed her eyes and hummed a couple of notes. She made a peace sign with two fingers.
Three fingers.
Elise suppressed a growl and got into the back seat beside Darien. She groaned inwardly. She’d managed to get the rear passenger-side seat and earlier she’d rolled the front one back nearly as far as it’d go to accommodate her long legs in the tiny car. Now she either had to spread her legs like a man, tuck them up to her neck, or twist to face Darien.
If she didn’t know better, she’d suspect that her two companions had worked it that way. Melanie focused on the road, which was a good thing; the snow had come down in buckets. Hagatha, for once, looked straight ahead. Elise caught a glimpse of a grin in the rearview mirror and subtly kicked the back of her seat. Not too hard. She had a feeling Melanie was near the point of losing her temper. She hadn’t seen it, but the SpecOps guys who worked for her at Grayson Security called her “Mel on Wheels” for some reason, and she knew they didn’t give out nicknames the person hadn’t earned.
“I’m a hatchling,” Darien said. “So are the friends I share a house with. The d
ragons kicked us out once they were free, and we’ve been trying to live on our own ever since. The light green female, my mother, actually told us to take the stuff they’d caught up in their nets that they didn’t want. That’s how we have things to sell and money to pay the rent and get food.”
Elise almost wished she’d stayed outside and maybe thrown some snow on her face and down the front of her shirt to cool off. What Darien said started to penetrate the thick wall of exhaustion and anger and make sense.
“You heard what they have planned for the hatchlings,” Melanie said from the front seat.
“Don’t try to protect me,” Darien said calmly. “Part of the reason we left is that we know they have eaten our siblings when the females go into heat and there’s not enough room.”
Elise bit back an oath and forced herself to think.
“The females are in heat now. That’s what held us in the church. We were stuck in hiding while they mated. I hate to admit I am in over my head, but we need to go to the JM and get help.”
“Yes,” Melanie agreed from the driver’s seat. “I tried to call Marcus before and couldn’t get through.”
Hagatha chimed in. “Same here when you two didn’t come back before nightfall. I’m grateful Darien was here to come with me. I am sorry and ashamed of myself, but I couldn’t face the water alone. And earlier today Darien saved me from the Mob. Two big goons were harassing me, so he took off running and they chased him instead.”
Elise let out a gusty sigh. “Okay, ladies, let’s do it.”
“Ladies, are we ready?” Melanie looked at her two companions.
She was coming to dread every engagement with the Justicariate Magus. At her first encounter, they’d grilled her regarding every aspect of Grayson Security, doing their best to hold her responsible for the abuses of mages committed by the deceased former owners before she’d ever inherited half of the place and agreed to straighten out the mess it was in.
If possible, the second part of the hearing was worse. She’d just discovered her fae heritage and the inherited bonus of magic she couldn’t control. They’d offered her three options for mandatory training. Go to their school with a bunch of kids. Hagatha and Elise had advised her against that course of action. They’d managed to get themselves purposefully expelled before a bully did them in and she had helped clean up the mess when one of their old teachers had opted to start his own magical breeding program on a secluded ranch in Oregon State. Go to school in Faery, which would mean staying in Faery or returning to an uncertain time in the past or future. Get engaged to the Lord of a House so she was a member of the House and could receive training from them. She had a choice of two volunteers: Lord Clarion, who made her uncomfortable at first meeting, and Marcus Macrow, who might have made the offer because he saw her distress at the thought of Clarion. Truth, she hadn’t made the choice of her betrothed as much as running to the man she trusted most, though she did not know him well personally. Betrothing herself to a stranger like she was property was the most acceptable of unacceptable options offered by a society that apparently still thought females were commodities. She wondered what part of her they’d want her to sacrifice next.
“Business attire, check.” Hagatha grumbled.
“Speech prepared, check.” Melanie said. “And you both look smashing.” They did, actually. They’d spelled up black business suits with fashionable military styling. Hagatha had even managed to tame her unruly hair and find a pair of spectacles, which made her look like the degreed professional woman she was.
“I need a nap.” Elise, who was normally the prepared and positive one, looked grim.
“Let’s get this over with,” Melanie said. She knew every single one of them would rather slide naked on ground glass than admit they needed help. “The sooner, the better.”
Hagatha took a breath and opened a Way. The three looked into the portal and found nothing amiss, aside from the fact that it looked like they’d be walking through a clown orgy, and sallied forth. They stepped out into the lobby of the Justicariate Magus, in a suitably elegant and pretentious building that almost no one in the world even knew existed because it was hidden underground, beneath a hill. A village full of cursed Spanish witches resided above the buried complex. Elise led them forward to clerk at a desk that was big enough to accommodate at least four office workers in the modern world of cubicles. She quietly inquired which one of the Council members was available to assist them.
The woman, who could be either eighty or eight-hundred from her prodigious wrinkles, consulted an immense leather-bound volume.
“Lord Clarion,” she announced, after a pause for effect.
Melanie caught Hagatha’s indrawn breath and felt for her.
The Justicariate Magus Council had nine members chosen from the Lords of the various magical Houses. What were the odds that the one man who was intransigent, arrogant, spiteful, and generally a roadblock to accomplishing anything of use would be on duty?
Worse, why had he spelled that emerald to cause spite and dissension between the three of them? Was he deliberately trying to wreck her training? Or was it some plot against House Macrow itself?
“We don’t have a lot of choice,” Elise said.
Melanie pasted her brightest smile on her face and followed behind the clerk to Lord Clarion’s private chambers. Scents of a rich, musky cologne and pipe smoke greeted them when the woman opened the massive ironwood doors. If the reception desk was huge, Lord Clarion’s appeared to have twice the cargo room of Melanie’s SUV, which she used to haul a keyboard, drum kit, and standing bass. She noted there were no guest chairs arranged in front of that desk, either. Clarion could sit at his leisure and make them stand there like grade-school kids at the principal’s office.
The man himself reposed behind the desk in a high-backed chair of gleaming leather with polished studs, which put Melanie in mind of an ancient throne. If she could guess his age, she’d put him in his mid-fifties from the touch of gleaming silver in his rich, dark wavy hair at each temple.
“What brings you ladies here?” Clarion asked, his voice low and flavored with his native Italian. He laid his hands on his desktop and for a moment, Melanie wondered if the man intended for them to kiss his ring, a massive gold piece with the largest blood-red ruby she’d ever seen outside of the Tower of London. She could somewhat understand why Hagatha might fall for the man’s redoubtable charms, but since she herself had made the mistake of an Italian boyfriend, he had about as much appeal as slightly out of date low-fat yogurt.
“Lord Clarion,” she said with a bow of her head. “We are here to petition you for assistance with our Justicariate Magus assignment in Greece, which led us to a submerged church in Curon Venosta, Italy.”
“What seems to be the problem, ladies?” Lord Clarion looked down his aquiline nose at them, clearly indicating he’d hoped for better, but expected to be disappointed.
“Well, first of all, the coordinates the JM gave us to take a Way put us out in the Mediterranean Sea in the middle of the shipwreck at night.”
“I’m sure that was a calculation error on your navigator’s part,” Lord Clarion said, pulling up a computer and displaying a map that clearly showed a dot on green land. “Perhaps whoever it was should have had better schooling?”
“Those aren’t the coordinates we were given,” Melanie said, reciting them.
“Do you have the paper to prove it?” Clarion tapped the computer screen.
Melanie considered her answer, then shook her head. “The ocean has it. However, you are well aware I have an eidetic memory. You can test if I am telling the truth.”
“You were also confronted by the Mafia, I understand.” Clarion’s smile was like a snake’s waiting to strike. “But I believe that was due to your past assignations…”
Melanie’s teeth set on edge. She hated that word, and she suspected the man knew it. He’d used it to describe her relationship with Marcus Macrow the first time she’d appeared before
the JM. Then he’d looked at her like she was a piece of meat. She bit back the urge to ask just how many “assignations” he’d had. That would only have hurt Hagatha and accomplished nothing.
She glanced at Elise, wondering whether she should even mention the attack on the Ways. When Elise shook her head, she felt a sense of relief. Clarion might well have known about that, too.
“Do you know what has caused the shipwrecks yet?” Clarion tapped a gold pen on his desk impatiently, his dark eyes menacing.
“Dragons,” Melanie answered succinctly. “They apparently have the ability to shift to humans.”
“You have found the dragons?”
“Yes, Lord Clarion,” Melanie answered wondering if he had known the cause of the shipwrecks when he made their assignment, and why that information hadn’t been provided in their brief. “They are residing in Curon Venosta, beneath St. Catherine’s church, which was flooded sixty-plus years ago to provide electricity for the village.”
“And you have the ability to destroy them, every single one?” Lord Clarion looked at her with eyes darker than midnight.
“Yes, milord,” Melanie answered, fairly certain that her petrify spell would work if Elise or Hagatha didn’t have anything. “We have also learned that the dragons were set free by Valonna Macrow. We are asking for assistance with a writ for her arrest and detention… And by the terms of Justicariate Magus law concerning non-human mages who may not be acquainted with human society, we are asking for the dragons to be tried and rehabilitated if possible.”
“I repeat, you can destroy these creatures?”
“Yes, milord,” Melanie replied evenly. “But there is the JM Code we are supposed to operate beneath, and there are other issues related to their—”
“Then do so at once before another ship is destroyed!”
“Milord...” Melanie still had points to make, including dealing with a historically-significant community church and the hatchling refugees, but the man clearly would hear no other discussion from them.