by Sara King
“Don’t frighten the poor fool,” ‘Aqrab said, crossing his arms over his chest. “If you’re going to eat him, it’s best not to get the adrenaline flowing. Makes the meat sour.”
The dribble of urine on the floor heralded a steady babble of affirmations that no, the compound did not have a basement, and yes, the man was a priest—a theologist working on his masters degree in Bible Studies, and he had had premarital sex in college with a woman in the bathroom of a bar and he was so sorry for that, and he’d been trying not to look at those nudie magazines that Herr Drescher had left in the café, but they helped him get his rocks off and he promised he’d never hide those pictures in his Bible ever again because that was evil and totally wrong and he had regretted it ever since.
Half in human form, the dragon lifted a scaly silver eyebrow at the man. “What do you think, djinni?”
‘Aqrab grunted. “Go send him in to watch TV with Thunderbird. He doesn’t know anything.”
Making a disgusted sound, the dragon grabbed the priest by the back of his robes and started dragging him down the hallway towards the cafeteria. When he came back, Savaxian had shifted back to his human form. “So what?” he demanded. “The priests in this place have no idea what the rest of them are doing?”
“They must not,” ‘Aqrab muttered, frustrated. “Let’s start cleaning out rooms. Someone here will know.”
In all, they emptied the compound of a little over a dozen people, most of whom had been congregated around a mass of computer screens, radios, and other electronics, and all of whom now shared uneasy seating with Thunderbird in the cafeteria.
“All right, we’ve tried every main door except the three that won’t open,” the dragon said, coming to stand in the crossway where two of them were easily visible, the third such door being tucked around the corner.
In the cafeteria down the hall and around the corner, Thunderbird was roaring, “That was a touchdown. Cheer you miserable mortals. Cheer!” Followed by the nervous, tepid shouts of a dozen people.
“Let’s try this one,” ‘Aqrab said, glancing at the closest of the three doors. It was made of a heavy metal material, and there was a glowing group of numbers and letters on the wall beside it. He shifted to the half-realm and stuck his head through the door. He frowned at what looked like a storeroom on the other side, filled with what looked like guns, helmets, body-armor, swords, goblets… “Storage,” ‘Aqrab said, yanking his head back and returning to the First Realm. He repeated the process with the next door. Several desks with computers. He pulled back, frowning. “Not there, either.”
“It’s the one around the corner,” a familiar female voice said behind him, “and you won’t be getting it open with anything short of a nuclear bomb unless you have the keycode. It’s made to withstand a Third Lander’s attack.” At the same time, ‘Aqrab started getting that odd tugging sensation, the feel of a hundred strings sliding across his skin, seeking purchase. Frowning, ‘Aqrab turned.
The Inquisitor was standing in a side-hallway, slumped over the shoulder of a slender, naked man with silvery-blond hair that cascaded halfway to his navel. He was watching the two of them with nervous blue eyes that seemed to have the depth of the ocean behind them, and looked…twitchy. Like he would bolt if someone sneezed.
For her part, the Inquisitor looked even more like a corpse now than she had the first time he’d met her. Instead of just having that dark-eyed, hollowed-out skull-look from before, now she was utterly pale and sweating, and it was obvious she was having trouble standing from the way she clung to her companion. “Tell me you didn’t kill all the technicians,” she said, giving them an irritated look, like they were children muddying up the affairs of adults.
The dragon stiffened and stepped between them, glaring at the newcomers. “Who the fuck are you?”
Ignoring the beast, the Inquisitor said to ‘Aqrab, “There is a young technician that can get you in, djinni. He’s going to have a broken nose. Is the Fury here?”
“She’s creating a distraction,” the dragon said, sniffing the air between them, frowning at the woman. “You smell like a fucking Inquisitor.”
“She is an Inquisitor,” ‘Aqrab said.
“Former Inquisitor,” the woman interrupted. “I…disagreed…with a few of the Order’s policies.” Back down the hall, Thunderbird shrieked, “No, go left, go left!” and she waited for him to stop yelling before she said, “You realize that everybody we free today is going to die.”
She said ‘we,’ ‘Aqrab thought, stunned. He cocked his head at her, the odd tickling sensation, the tugging reminding him of some distant memory of another time and place…
“How do you figure?” the dragon demanded.
“They’ve been drained. Blood-magics. They’re weak. A lot won’t even be able to walk. Even with the four of us, there’s no way we can get them all to safety in time.”
The dragon sniffed the air between them again, frowning at the naked, platinum-haired blond. “Who’s the dumbass who forgot to visit his dresser this morning?” He cocked his head warily and moved toward the young man, looking like he wanted a better look. “Wait a minute. He smells like—”
Even as the silver-haired man cringed like a scared rabbit, the Inquisitor straightened and stepped between them, scowling at Savaxian with none of the weakness she had shown only a moment before. “He is none of your business, dragon. Back off. Now.” The tugging sensation suddenly felt like a thousand bits of string sinking into ‘Aqrab’s soul, and the weave of the world began to yank around him, reforming…
“Oh shit,” ‘Aqrab said, realizing where he had felt that tug before.
But the dragon had pushed silver scales from his skin and was sneering. “Are you telling me what to do, mortal?”
“Leave her alone, dragon,” ‘Aqrab managed, his heart suddenly pounding.
Savaxian scoffed and stepped toward the woman—and slipped on the snow-wetted linoleum, face-over-heels, and landed on his back, staring at the ceiling of the hallway.
The woman turned suddenly pale and backed away, swallowing hard as she stared at the dragon on the ground.
Already, the dragon was getting back to his feet, a low growl rising in his chest. ‘Aqrab stepped forward, grabbed Savaxian by the shoulder, and bodily tugged him around to face him. “I need to talk to you. Now.” Before the dragon could object, ‘Aqrab hauled him down the hall and around the corner.
“A…Fate.” Savaxian peeked around the corner at the two standing in the hallway, then hurriedly pulled his head back around to face the djinni. “The skeletal one? You’re sure?”
“Positive,” the djinni said. “And she’s starting to unravel. Hence your somersault a minute ago. She didn’t want you to touch her friend.”
Savaxian chewed on his lip and peered around the corner again. The woman had collapsed against the wall and her companion was kneeling beside her, holding her shoulder. “She doesn’t look like a Fate. She looks half dead.” But the energy was there. He could feel it like a deep welling within, a dangerous mixture of power and potential that smelled oddly of ashes…and excitement.
“We should ask her to leave,” the djinni said, sweat rising on his brow.
Savaxian tugged his head back from around the corner. “That’s a Fate. You’re sure.” He was already beginning to feel a little bit of a thrill, the love of a good gamble. He could think of a dozen different ways to expand his hoard with the proper suggestive hint…
“I know what you’re thinking,” the djinni said. “It is not worth it, dragon. One missed thought and you’re dead. Hell, she almost killed you just now. She’s going to screw everything up. I’m going to go ask her to leave.”
Savaxian caught the djinni by a big shoulder, frowning up at him. “She caught me off guard, okay? I’m a dragon. She can’t tug my strings if I don’t let her. Besides,” he reasoned, “The Fates don’t randomly show up, do they? If she’s here, it’s for a reason, right?”
The djinni gave him a
flat look. “The reason is not to expand your hoard.”
Savaxian narrowed his eyes. “My collection has nothing to do with this. All I’m saying is that maybe this is what she’s supposed to do, you understand?” The seeping of power around the corner was…intoxicating. He’d never felt anything like that before, and the sheer pull made him want to go bathe in it. Like a sunbath, but better. A magic-bath. Already, his own stores were replenishing, siphoning off a tiny bit of the massive quantities of energy the woman was radiating, refilling his power-well, rejuvenating his body and mind.
The djinni stared at him for a long moment, then shook his head and muttered, “Like a goddamn moth to the flame.” He jabbed a big finger into Savaxian’s chest. “You are not going to try to take that one home with you. Got it?”
“Oh sure,” Savaxian said distractedly. The magic was seeping into his chest and torso, making him feel warm and fuzzy.
The djinni grabbed him by the shoulders and swiveled him around. Dragging his face up to meet his, he snapped, “Got it?”
“Yeah, whatever!” Savaxian waved him off. “Maybe she can Fate her way into the basement.” And into my cave. To have that kind of power at his disposal was…alluring.
The moment he thought about his cave, however, Savaxian experienced a wave of nausea and had to bite down a sudden urge to vomit all over the djinni’s massive black chest. Fucking Thunderbird. He should’ve wished him featherless and stupid. Well, at least featherless, he thought, as the rain god started screaming, “Did you see that?! That was a foul! A foul!” down the hall. He was pretty sure he already had the stupid part covered.
“I don’t think she’s got any control,” the djinni said. “It feels too random.” He was again giving the hallway a nervous look. “Goddess, but I don’t want to be in the same room with that thing.”
Ignoring him, Savaxian ducked back around the corner to get a better look using his second sight. Immediately, the whole world became a glowing, throbbing mass of multicolored strings, tendrils, lines, and pulses of energy. Sure enough, the Fate looked like a massive tangle of wadded-up string, every strand a very neutral silver, nearly gray. But the power… He had started walking towards it before the djinni grabbed him by the shirt and yanked him back.
“Listen, you flaccid camel penis,” the djinni snapped. “Any dragon with any sense would be running scared for the woods right now, not staring at a Fate like it’s a pretty new toy. You’re young, aren’t you?”
Savaxian shook the djinni off of him, glaring. “I’m not young.” Four hundred years old was not young. Just because his uncle could count hundreds of thousands of years on each finger didn’t mean that he wasn’t just a freakishly long-lived outlier, completely beyond the normal range of dragon lifetimes. Well, mostly. Just because they could live that long didn’t mean that they did. And, hell, four hundred and thirty-seven years was ancient to a mortal, so he wasn’t young. That was ridiculous.
The djinni gave him a long, hard look, then said, “Fine, but you take it away from me and my magus, understand?”
Savaxian considered how he was going to go about the capture. The poor thing looked so bad-off that he got the uncomfortable feeling that hitting it over the head would kill it. He could try putting it to sleep, but if it had any abilities as a magus at all, it would be able to sense that coming a mile away…
Then, once he had it, an even more important question was what to do with it. He couldn’t take it back to his cave unless the djinni gave him another wish, which seemed unlikely because the infernal asswipe was being selfish and petty. Sure, Thunderbird got a cure, but not him? That was low.
Then a new thought occurred to him. If a Fate didn’t want him to have claustrophobia, would he randomly find a cure? He began to plot out ways to gain its pity.
The djinni gave him another long look, then shook his head again with a disgusted sound. “You aren’t long for this world.” He turned and, giving the skeletal woman on the floor a nervous look, skirted past the hallway and down to the last unchecked door, vanishing to the half-realm.
“Dragon.”
The strained word made Savaxian flinch and turn. The Fate was seated on the ground, staring at the ground between her legs. Savaxian felt the strings tug at him again and decided it felt rather like a massage. A magical massage. Clearing his throat, he strode up to her and peered down, resisting the urge to kick the naked fool out of the way so he could better see.
“There’s a room nearby,” the woman said. “Down that hall, six doors down, last one on the end of the hall. It’s Zenaida’s room. She’s a Second Inquisitor, so she was given a survival package from Rome. In it, there’s going to be a small bottle of unicorn blood. It’s in an opaque plastic vial, sealed in a metal lockbox.”
The unclad imbecile squatting beside the Fate flinched, his tiny brain obviously stunned by the idea of dragons and unicorns.
“The room,” the woman went on, “is going to be heavily warded, but if anyone can get in, it would be a dragon.”
“All right,” Savaxian said, crossing his arms as he sensed an advantage. “What will you pay me to get it for you, Fate? Since you obviously can’t get there by yourself. Shall we say…a contract of service?”
The woman lifted her head to shoot him an irritated glance. “It’s not for me. It’s for those we’re about to save.”
Savaxian winced. “Oh.” He glanced at the hall where the djinni had disappeared. In his heat-sight, he could dimly see the Fourth Lander’s big shape moving under the floor. Under the floor? “Well,” he said, switching his vision back to the color-spectrum, “looks like the djinni made it to the basement.”
The woman on the linoleum shook her head. “Freeing them isn’t going to do you any good unless we have a way to heal them after we pull them off the rack. Otherwise, you’re just inviting a slaughter.” The tugging pull on the fabric of the world was almost dizzying in its intensity, and Savaxian relaxed into the feel of the magic strings, twining around him, caressing, kneading. He felt his eyes easing shut in bliss, reveling in the energy radiating from the thing.
Yes, he had to get this back to his cave.
“You’re not paying attention.”
Savaxian jerked. “Huh? What?”
The Fate was scowling at him. “The blood,” she growled, pointing with a skeletal finger, “is in the room. Go get it, if you want to succeed. Try not to die on the way there.”
Grunting, Savaxian glanced at the hallway she had shown him, then back at the Fate. He wondered if the skinny little simpleton beside her would try to make off with his reward for this day’s adventure, if he left her too long alone. He did not like the way the effeminate prick was crouched beside her, concern written into his baby-blue eyes.
Even as he watched, the unassuming pervert placed a slender hand upon her brow and caressed it delicately, then murmured something about ‘needing rest.’
Yes, the wardrobe-challenged femboy would have to go. Savaxian wondered how he could separate the two. Maybe he could drop the man down a glacial crevasse by ‘accident’ as he flew them to his cave. Yes, he thought could put up with the priss’s feminine asscheeks on his neck for a couple hours if it meant he had her cooperation. Then Savaxian could be the shoulder to cry upon, the understanding listener as she mourned the loss of her mate.
Now to figure out how to get her to agree to go to his cave.
“Are you going to get the blood,” the Fate demanded, “or are you just going to stare at me?”
Savaxian hadn’t been staring at her, but at the intricately-knotted cords of energy surrounding her, as beautiful as Celtic knot-work, but he wasn’t about to argue the point. “I wasn’t staring at you.”
The Fate narrowed its eyes at him. “I swear to God, if you hurt him, I will hunt you down and end you, dragon. From the grave if I have to.”
Savaxian flinched, unnerved that his plan had been so visible. “Uh, yes, well…” He laughed nervously. “I’m going to go find that blood. You tw
o plan to be here awhile?”
She gave him a long, dangerous stare. “If he disappears, I will know where to look.”
Hmm. It seemed as if the femboy would be harder to ditch than he’d thought. Maybe if the djinni would give him another wish…
“Go!” the Fate shouted. “We don’t have time for you to plan how to kill me. You want me dead, we’ll talk about it after we rescue those people. Just go.”
Kill her? Savaxian blinked at the Fate in bafflement, having been lulled into a near-slumber by the feel of magic. He glanced at the skinny twit crouched beside her, who was looking up at him with nervous blue eyes. Wait… Did she think he wanted the femboy? Why on Earth would she think he wanted the femboy?
Then he saw the look the Fate was giving him, felt the twitch of strings dancing at the edge of his consciousness, felt the fabric of the universe start to warp, and decided to go down the aforementioned hall before an unseasonal blast of wind slammed the hallway door open and shoved him toward his destination.
The femboy. Why did she think he wanted the femboy?
Savaxian found the door she’d described and reached out for the knob.
“Are you stupid?!” the woman shouted at him down the hall. “Check it for spells!”
Savaxian rolled his eyes. With all but the dragons exterminated, whoever this Zenaida was, despite whatever smoke and mirrors she used to dazzle the small minds of the mortals, he sincerely doubted he was dealing with a true magus, because aside from the dragons, the true magi were dead. Besides. Dragons were like the Djinn of the First Realm. They were its rulers. They did not succumb to the magic of fumbling Inquisitor idiots.
Still, Savaxian sighed and used his magic-sight to examine the lock. Better to humor the creature if he planned to take it home with him. Less struggle that way. Immediately, he froze, fingers poised over the metal latch. There were the black cords of death-magic woven into the lock itself, emanating through the latch, black and pulsing. Strong enough to kill a dragon. The seiðr of a grandmaster.