Nash remained in front of me, as did Mick, to absorb any dragon fire that might come my way. I wasn’t foolish enough to leave the relative protection of their bodies.
Colby took another step forward. Strange, I’d stopped noticing that everyone was without clothes except me and Nash. The dragons were so comfortable with their bodies, just as Mick had always been. They didn’t see the need to attach shame to bare skin.
“The defense has one more thing to add.” Colby glanced at Mick, and his grin grew broad.
Mick tensed, opened his mouth as if to speak, then snapped it shut again. Damned dragon trial rules.
“Micalerianicum came here today because honor mandated it,” Colby said. “He’d never skip out on a trial called by the dragon council. But you know damn well he’s here only to be courteous to you, and not because you can command him. He never uses his status for personal privilege.”
Colby turned to Mick again. Mick’s alarmed look had vanished to be replaced with mixed annoyance and anger.
“Micky was the dragon who won the battle for you against demons two hundred years ago, one that happened not fifty miles from here. If not for him, two of you good council members—Aine and Farrell—would be little dragon smears on rocks in the middle of the Sierras. Mick was decorated for valor and given the highest status a dragon can achieve: lord and general. One of the perks of this status is that it can be used to lessen any penalties levied against him by the dragon council. As humans would say, a Get Out of Jail Free card. Or almost free. The reason for this relative immunity from the dragon council ruling is that it’s thought a dragon lord wouldn’t be stupid enough to go against the council without a damn good reason. Or else, he wouldn’t be a dragon lord. Circular logic, but I don’t make up the rules.”
I stared at Colby with my mouth open. “A dragon lord?”
Colby winked at me. “One of the highest. Damned arrogant bastard.”
“This is your defense?” Aine asked in a freezing voice.
“Sure thing, your ladyship. If Micky decided that the dragon council was a triumvirate of idiots for wanting to kill Janet Begay, then he was privileged to make that choice. You can still punish him for doing it, of course, but you have to take his status into account when you pass your sentence.”
Colby gave them a bow and stepped back, finished.
“That’s it?” I asked. “They will still find him guilty, but because he’s a dragon lord they can pass a lesser sentence? So instead of certain death, it will be almost certain death?”
“Best I can do,” Colby said.
“Damn it.” I released the magic I’d been holding back, letting it ripple to the edges of the lake bed.
I was in the mood for destruction, but I wasn’t going to give the dragon council the satisfaction of confirming that I was the bad-ass evil being they thought I was. Instead, I brought all the boulders that littered the lake bed sliding rapidly to surround the three arrogant dragons.
“I’m not here to change your laws,” I said as they stared at me. “As stupid as they are. But as much as I am Mick’s mate, by your terms—so he is mine. If he dies, you answer to me. Is that what you really want?”
I had the satisfaction of seeing the three dragons look worried. I sensed their deep-seated fear that somehow I would destroy them, not to mention their power, their world, and everything they were.
And maybe I could. The magic in me was pretty damned strong, and I didn’t know yet what I could do with it. Dragons were powerful, but I was now more than the naïve Stormwalker that Mick had met all those years ago. I’d learned to master my storm powers, and I’d helped many people, as Nash had said. I’d grown stronger, more capable, less afraid.
Mick had been responsible for some of my growth, but much of it had been because of me, myself. I was Navajo, tied to this earth, but my spirit soared into the storms and tapped the magic of the world that created us.
I folded my arms and stepped away from Nash and Mick. Yes, I still believed the dragons could burn me to a crisp, but I was finished with being frightened of them. I was filthy, bruised, cut, and so tired I could barely stand, yet the dragons watched me in trepidation.
“Decide,” I said. “And hurry up. I want to go home, and I’m tired of being messed with.”
Bancroft gave me a nod, though his look was anything but approving. “We will deliberate.”
He and the other two turned their backs on me, and I could tell that it scared the piss out of them to do so.
Tweenty-seven
“Great assist, Janet,” Colby growled at me half an hour later. “I was hoping to go the hell home. But no, I’m stuck surviving Mick’s stupid sentence with him. Walking out of this place with you, no magic and no shape-shifting allowed.”
I wasn’t much happier, being already hot and thirsty. Mick’s arms came around me from behind, his body hard and warm and oh-so-good. “Janet just saved all our asses, Colby. As Ordeals go, it’s not a bad one, so suck it up. Besides, wasn’t it worth it to watch her embarrass the dragon council?” He chuckled and pressed a blood-tingling kiss to my neck. “I never thought I’d live to see that.”
Colby’s face relaxed, even as he wiped sweat from it. “Yeah, that was pretty good. Janet, sweetie, want to be my defense if I have to go to trial?”
“No,” I said.
Nash snatched sunglasses out of his pocket and shoved them on. “If you’re all finished with self-congratulations, we need to get going. That sun’s going to be pretty fierce.” He looked once at the glare coming over the mountains and then started walking.
The dragon council’s sentence, passed after about twenty minutes of heated argument, was for Mick and his counsel for the defense—Colby, me, and Nash—to walk out of the Racetrack and make it back to civilization the best we could. No shape-shifting and flying out, no magic. Just us, the merciless sun, and no water. One dragon trusted by the council was to accompany us to act as our watcher: Drake. To say he wasn’t happy about it is a severe understatement.
On a relative scale, it was a light sentence, a slap on the wrist. Mick, Nash, Colby, and Drake were in good shape, and we might well run into someone driving around out here. I held out faint hope, however, that the council would let us have it that easy. Remembering Bancroft’s horde of devoted lackeys, including his county sheriff, I imagined the council could ensure, by devious methods, that no one drove up these back roads. It was a twenty-five-or-so-mile walk across the desert and over steep hills on a dirt road. We could still die of dehydration and heatstroke, not a terrific prospect.
Nash led the way. He removed his button-down shirt and draped it over his head, the white T-shirt he wore beneath bright in the sunlight. He had sunglasses, but I had nothing with which to shield my eyes, and the sun beat down on me without mercy.
I trudged behind Nash, with Mick and Colby behind me, and Drake bringing up the rear. Drake was angry as hell, but with his stoic loyalty, I knew he wouldn’t simply say, Screw this, and fly off. He’d stay and die with us if that was what he had to do. It was that dragon honor thing again. I also knew Mick would obey the edict of no magic and no shape-shifting, and he’d make damn sure Colby obeyed it too. Mick must be one hell of a dragon lord. I was still adjusting to that.
I couldn’t use my cell phone, and neither could Nash, because both of ours were inexplicably dead. I had my piece of magic mirror, but using it to communicate with the outside was forbidden—that would violate the rule of no magic. The dragons had thought of everything.
I caught up to Nash, who was setting a swift pace. “Thanks for the things you said about me back there.”
“They were true.” His voice held no inflection.
“It was real sweet.” I couldn’t resist saying that. “I didn’t know you loved me so much.”
Nash’s glance, even through sunglasses, could have crumbled boulders into dust. “What I said about you being a pain in the ass with a smart mouth was true too. That and the fact that you cause trouble.�
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“I can’t deny it.” I shrugged as I strode next to him. “So, how are things between you and Maya? I saw the passionate kiss you gave her.”
“None of your business.”
I gave him a dry-lipped smile. “That’s all right. I’ll just ask her.”
Nash scowled. He picked up his pace to a quick-time march, his long legs eating distance. If I wanted to keep up with him, I’d have to trot, panting, at his side.
I dropped back to walk with Mick and Colby. Mick slanted me a smile that made me hot, even under the burning sun, and took my hand. I looked forward, in more ways than one, to getting home again.
Drake also gave me a look, but one of undisguised fury. I knew he blamed me for his being chosen to carry out the sentence with us. Would I have problems with Drake in the future? Probably. I didn’t have the energy to contemplate it right now.
Already I needed water, having drunk nothing since sometime the day before. I was going to be half-dead before we even reached the edge of the lake bed. The boulders stood innocently behind us, where I’d left them. I could imagine the geologists scratching their heads at the pattern they’d left, drawn from the edges of the lake to a circle in the center. It would give my ghost something amusing to watch when I was a pile of dried bones in the dust.
When we finally reached the narrow dirt road that led into a pass between the hills, there were no vehicles in sight. Any approaching truck or SUV would kick a thin spiral of dust high into the air behind it, but the sky remained a clear and bright blue. No one would come. It would be just the five of us traipsing across open desert under the blinding sun.
Colby said behind me, “If you get hot, Janet, feel free to take off your top.”
I ignored him, too tired to banter.
For the first mile or so after that, I was fine. The dragons had made it too easy, I thought. I finished the next two miles drenched in sweat, feeling a sunburn. What little shade the sides of the mountains had made in the pass vanished as the sun climbed overhead.
By mile seven, I was stumbling. My tongue was glued to the roof of my mouth, and my breathing was labored. We rested, taking our time, but it didn’t help much.
At mile ten, or at least I think it was mile ten, Mick picked me up and carried me. We’d seen no cars, trucks, SUVs, park rangers, hikers, campers, or anyone. The place was deserted, eerily so. I wondered how much Bancroft had paid off the park employees.
Mick carried me without complaint, his strong arms never faltering. But even Nash was slowing—twenty miles was likely not that far for him, but being without water, while the temperature climbed past one hundred degrees, took its toll. Talk had ceased, each of us saving breath and moisture for the journey.
A carrion crow glided overhead, on the lookout for fresh kill. I waved to it.
“Over here,” I croaked.
“Don’t invite it,” Colby said behind Mick. “It might want to get an early start on picking meat off us.”
The crow didn’t seem to see us. I dug into my pocket, and Mick had to put me down. Barely able to stand, I pulled out the piece of magic mirror. I couldn’t use it magically, but I could use it for what it was—a mirror, a piece of silvered glass. I moved it until it caught the sun, flashing a bright white star of light.
The crow saw it. It wheeled over us once, head cocked to investigate, then flew away into searing blue sky.
“What the hell was that about?” Nash asked.
“You never know,” I said.
“A harbinger,” Colby said, and then we all fell silent again.
Mick carried me again as we moved up another hill and walked down into the trough on the other side. I heard rattling like a metal shed in a windstorm, and I started to laugh.
“I knew she wouldn’t let me down.”
My words were unintelligible, even to me. Mick leaned to me. “What, baby?”
I didn’t answer. A battered white pickup crested the rise ahead of us, banging and clattering down the rutted road. It was full of people, three in the cab, a couple in the bed. Nash stopped, hands on hips, and waited.
The pickup pulled to a halt next to Nash, and a Native American man with a lined face leaned out and called to Mick, “Hey, what happened to your clothes?” He chortled. “Must have been some windstorm.”
Two grinning young men jumped out of the back, tossing pants and shirts at Mick, Colby, and Drake.
Colby caught them with an amazed look. “You carry extra sets of clothes, in case you meet naked men on the road?”
Inside the cab, the young woman—Beth, I remembered her name was—leaned around her father. “The crow, she told us what you’d need. She said Firewalkers didn’t have any sense of decency.”
That was my grandmother. Colby chuckled as he pulled on the worn pair of jeans. “She’s right. Whoever she is.”
Mick didn’t move to pick up the clothes or cover himself. He carried me around the other side of the truck and waited for Beth to open the door. “Do you have water?” he asked. “She’s dehydrated.”
“Sure thing.” As Mick set me gently on the seat next to her, Beth produced a thermos, poured out a trickle of beautiful water, and handed me the cup. She had to help me raise it to my swollen lips.
Sweet, clear, cool liquid filled my mouth. I wanted to savor it, but my needy body sucked it down, and I nearly choked as I swallowed.
“Easy,” Beth said. She poured me another cup.
I felt the truck list as the others climbed into the back. In my half-dazed state, I once again saw other beings superimposed on Beth and her father. White swirling lights, a hint of feather.
“Are you kachinas too?” I asked.
Beth’s father chuckled. “Nah. We’re similar, but we use a different term. Where you need to go?”
“Home,” I said. “Although, anyplace with a phone is fine.”
“That’s easy.” Beth’s father put the truck in gear and started to drive.
Beth glanced through the open back window at Mick, Colby, Drake, and Nash. “Hey, cute white sheriff,” she called. “I think we found your truck.”
Nash was at the window, ripping off his sunglasses. “Did you? Black? Ford 250? Arizona plates?” He rattled off the license number.
“Yeah, I think that’s it,” Beth’s father said. “Want me to take you to it?”
“Please.” Nash sat back. “Yes. Thank you.”
I drank more water. “He’s happier to find his truck than he is to get out of here alive.”
“Men and their cars,” Beth agreed. “But he still is cute.”
We banged and bounced over the dirt road for a very long time. Then Beth’s father turned a corner, and the road eased into the smoothness of pavement. The truck’s horrible jouncing died into sudden calm.
I closed my eyes as we glided down the restful highway. Before we’d gone far, Beth’s father turned off on another dirt road, this one wider and better graded than the one from the Racetrack.
We stopped, and I peeled open my eyes. We were on top of a little bridge that had been constructed over an arroyo, the bridge just high enough so that a mild rainstorm wouldn’t wash it out. Anything stronger, and this road would be flooded.
An intense rain had obviously come and gone. The bottom of the arroyo was filled with silt and loose brush, though much of it had piled over an obstacle upstream of the bridge. From this jetsam protruded a dust-covered black cab. Nash’s beautiful, shiny new pickup in which I’d ridden out here to search for Mick was now half-buried in white sand.
Tension drained, and a sudden wave of sleep hit me. The last thing I heard before I drifted away, smiling, against Beth’s comfortable shoulder was Nash Jones swearing and swearing hard.
Two mornings later I wandered out of my bedroom and sank into a leather couch in my lobby. It was quiet—guests had breakfasted and either checked out or gone off sightseeing. We had a few hours’ respite before lunch.
Mick came out of the back, hair wet from his shower, and sat next
to me, our bodies touching. He twined his fingers through mine.
“How are you doing?” he asked me.
“Better.”
He was silent for a while, just holding my hand. He’d done this a lot since we’d gotten home. The Shoshone had driven us to Furnace Creek, and Mick had somehow booked the two of us into the luxury inn there. Cool sheets, air-conditioning, gourmet food . . . It reinforced my belief that there is nowhere in the world so remote that someone won’t try to build a resort in it.
I’d slept for a long time, and Mick left me to it. I had no idea what had become of Drake, Colby, and Nash, but when Mick returned to take me to dinner, he told me that Nash had gotten park rangers plus the California Highway Patrol to help him rescue his truck. Apparently, joy riders had taken it while we’d been running around the mountains and then abandoned it in the wash. It had been hot-wired, the underside of the dash broken, and a nice torrent of rain had done the rest. Poor Nash.
“So what did Colby do to you all those years ago?” I asked Mick over a quiet table in the restaurant. “To make him your enemy, I mean?”
Mick looked uncomfortable. “Long story.”
“We have time,” I said, sipping my cool wine. No martinis.
Mick toyed with the frosted glass of his beer mug for a while. I waited. I wasn’t going anywhere, not while I was cool and fed and hydrated.
Finally Mick took a sip of beer and sat back. “He stole my mate.”
I blinked in surprise. “Wait, I thought I was your mate.”
“A long time ago. She was a dragon. I shouldn’t strictly say she was my mate—I was courting her, in the dragon way, and Colby decided to cut in. We fought. He won.”
“Colby won? But why is he so afraid of you?”
“Because he fought dirty, and he knows it. I stupidly clung to honor and the rules, while he went behind my back. He destroyed my lair, stole everything I had—and it turns out that this lady was looking for a mate based on his worth. I was young enough to think it was me she wanted. When I discovered her true colors, I withdrew from the contest and let Colby have her.”
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