“I do not have your skill, especially as you choose not to share it,” Erik said in old-speak. His irritation was clear, but Sophie’s smile never wavered.
“Listen,” she bade him in old-speak, the single word resonating in Rafferty’s chest. She murmured a chant. It was short and wordless, either a string of sounds or a language forgotten. It sounded old to Rafferty. Potent.
She repeated it, and Erik echoed the sound. She nodded approval and beckoned to him. Erik leaned over the Dragon’s Egg at her urging and the two of them chanted in unison.
Then Sophie blew on the dark globe of stone. The golden lines disappeared immediately, as if lines blown from the sand, and a woman’s face came into view. It was as if she swam to the surface of a lake, her hair streaming back and her eyes closed.
Then she opened her eyes and looked directly at Erik. Even from his position, Rafferty could see that her eyes were a glorious blue. The hair that flowed around her face was wavy and chestnut brown, and billowed as if she were underwater.
When she simply stared at Erik, the Wyvern blew on the Dragon’s Egg again.
“My name is Eileen Grosvenor,” the woman said, her words clearly enunciated. She paused, as if to think. “At least, that’s what they call me this time.”
She lifted a fingertip toward Erik and he lifted a talon, seemingly against his own volition. When his talon was over the Dragon’s Egg, a spark danced between it and the woman’s finger.
He recoiled in shock. “Louisa!”
“Yes,” the woman murmured, as if remembering something she had half forgotten. “Yes, I have been called that, too.”
Erik stared at the Dragon’s Egg in shock and took a step back.
Untroubled by his response, the woman smiled a brilliant smile, one that lit the Dragon’s Egg from within. Then she seemed to take a deep breath, closed her eyes, and disappeared as if sinking to the bottom of a lake. Her hair flowed around and over her before the ends flicked out of sight.
Erik gave a cry and seized the Dragon’s Egg just as the moon peeked out from the earth’s shadow. The stone turned black again, reverting to its usual smooth orb of obsidian stone.
“How can this be?” he demanded of the Wyvern.
Sophie straightened and smiled as the Pyr shifted back to human form around her. She gave Delaney a hard look, then nodded once at Sloane. “You are half done,” she said. “Do not falter.”
By the time Sloane had nodded agreement, Sophie had turned and walked to the lip of the roof. She lifted her arms over her head, laughing as the wind teased her skirts, and leapt.
Rafferty was the first to reach the edge. Even having guessed what he would see, he was still surprised.
Far below a white dragon soared, her feathers flowing behind her. She glinted in the changing light, reflecting and refracting the hue cast by the moon, like a dragon carved of crystal. She ascended and turned a tight curve over the roof, leaving the Pyr staring after her with awe.
She flew straight up, then abruptly disappeared. The sky was clear and there was nowhere for her to be hidden. She had simply vanished, as suddenly as she had appeared.
“I hate when she does that,” Donovan muttered. Rafferty didn’t agree, not this time. No matter how often he saw her, he found that Sophie’s appearance gladdened his heart. He realized what a gift it was to have her among them. He felt as though there was a greater force on their side, on the side of right, and he was touched by her beauty, as well.
He found Nikolas beside him, the other Pyr’s dark eyes wide with astonishment. “She is real, then,” he whispered. “I thought that I had dreamed her presence before.”
“She didn’t stay long enough to be introduced. Her name is Sophie,” Rafferty said. “She is the Wyvern, a prophetess who has skills far beyond our own.”
“I know who she is,” Nikolas murmured, seeking some sign of her presence.
“Her prophecies only count if you understand them,” Quinn noted, and Sara smiled.
Nikolas nodded though, his awe undiminished. “If we do not understand, then we are not worthy of the prophecy,” he said stiffly. “Praise be to the Great Wyvern that such beauty exits.” He put his hand over his heart and bowed his head in an attitude of prayer.
Erik was still staring into the Dragon’s Egg, his features pale. “Louisa,” he whispered, raising his gaze to meet Rafferty’s. “It can’t be true.”
But Rafferty knew that it was, no matter how Erik might wish for it to be otherwise. He decided then that Erik might need his help.
“Stay with me in my lair in London,” he said. “We’ll find your firestorm together.”
In the burn ward of a major hospital, the patient known as John Doe felt the tug of the eclipse, as well.
He awakened, stiff and groggy, his body determined to heed the ancient call. He knew what would happen instants before it did, knew that the sedative would keep him from effectively controlling his primal urges. He tore bandages from his hands and the IV needle from his arm, flinging himself off the bed in the nick of time. No sooner had his bare feet touched the cold linoleum than he shifted shape.
Mercifully, he had arranged for a private room.
With a swing of his mighty tail, he shattered the tinted window. Before the nurses could arrive, he launched himself through the broken glass and took flight over the city. He had not recovered his full strength, but Boris Vassily had learned to make the most of whatever he had.
He whispered to the wind and the sky and listened to the tales they told. He asked one question of the moon and heeded its response. Anger boiled within him as he understood with perfect clarity who would feel the firestorm this time.
There would be no happy ending if Boris had anything to say about it.
And he did. The ruby red and brass dragon he became was less splendid than he had once been. His trailing red plumes were gone, his body as scarred in dragon form as it was in human form. He could not bear to look at himself, for he had once been the jewel of his kind.
He knew where to lay the blame. The Pyr responsible for his scarred self was none other than Erik Sorensson, none other than the Pyr whose firestorm would not proceed without interruption.
The time for recovery was past.
The time for vengeance had arrived.
But there was one small detail to be resolved first. Boris sought the address he knew so well, the address where the payments had gone. He wheeled through the sky toward the luxury condominium, and his nose told him that the plastic surgeon he had retained—the one bribed to overlook any physiological oddities in his anonymous patient—was home.
What a perfect night for a house fire.
Boris landed on the terrace that overlooked Lake Michigan and confronted the good doctor thought the sliding-glass door. The doctor put down his glass of champagne and turned at the sound of Boris’s arrival, alarm and disbelief mingling in his expression.
Boris reared up, letting the doctor see his scars, willing him to make the connection. The surgeon’s eyes widened in horror; he dropped the glass and backed away with his hands held high.
That was when Dr. Nigel Berenstein understood that he would never collect the bonus payment for successful completion of the surgery.
Boris laughed, kicked his way through the sliding-glass door and loosed his dragonfire.
He took great pleasure in the way the plastic surgeon’s skin crackled as it burned, inflicting damage beyond the ability of any human doctor to repair. He let the doctor experience the fullness of the pain, let him see what he had become, then fried the life out of him.
Humans were such a feeble species.
Boris left the apartment ablaze, knowing the fire was his ally in destroying signs of his presence. Pesky details resolved, he turned his attention to a matter of greater import.
He was going to enjoy thwarting Erik’s firestorm.
It would be the credential he needed to ensure that Magnus didn’t steal the leadership of the Slayers.
In a London hote
l, Eileen Grosvenor awakened with a start. She sat up and looked around the bedroom, shocked to find it exactly as it should be.
Instead of filled with water. She’d dreamed of swimming underwater, swimming so far underwater that she might have been a fish. It had been wonderful; she’d felt strong and agile, the muscles in her body moving in perfect concert.
There had been light. A warm light, like that cast by a candle. She’d moved directly to it, unable to resist its allure.
She closed her eyes and again saw the face of the man who had been bent over the surface of the water, looking down at her. She remembered raising a finger and seeing him reach out with one hand. She saw again the spark that had leapt between their fingers, illuminating the surface of the water.
There was something in his eyes that melted her heart. A memory of pain, or of some old injury. Eileen had been sure that she could heal him, even though he was beyond the water and she was beneath it.
Maybe it was a portent. Maybe she was finally going to meet a man worth the trouble. She’d certainly know him again if she saw him. She focused on his image, sharpening it in her thoughts. Oh, yes, she’d recognize him anywhere.
Maybe it was just a silly dream, brought on by the stress of being away from home.
The dream made Eileen happy, though, made her feel strong and sexy and optimistic. She had a strange, irrational conviction that she was going to meet the man of her dreams, so to speak.
That didn’t sound like Eileen, the ultimate pragmatist. She scoffed and got out of bed for a drink of water. Eileen was standing in the bathroom, drinking, when she saw in the mirror that her hair was wet.
And there was a piece of water lily tangled in the ends.
But Eileen didn’t swim; she never had. She had a fear of the water, one she’d struggled to overcome because it was without any basis in her history. She certainly didn’t swim in hotel rooms that didn’t have ocean access.
Eileen met her own gaze in the mirror, seeing her surprise and confusion. If her hair was wet, then it couldn’t have been a dream, could it?
What had just happened to her?
And why?
About the Author
Deborah Cooke has always been fascinated by dragons, although she has never understood why they have to be the bad guys. She has an honors degree in history, with a focus on medieval studies, and is an avid reader of medieval vernacular literature, fairy tales, and fantasy novels. Since 1992, Deborah has written more than thirty romance novels under the names Claire Cross and Claire Delacroix.
Deborah makes her home in Canada with her husband. When she isn’t writing, she can be found knitting, sewing, or hunting for vintage patterns. To learn more about the Dragonfire series and Deborah, please visit her Web site at www.deborahcooke.com and her blog, Alive & Knitting, at www.delacroix.net/blog.
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