city of dragons 02 - fire storm

by Val St. Crowe

  I glared at him. “He’s got Fletcher’s god damned surf board. Did you ask him about that? I mean, he’s got to be guilty this time.”

  “You asked him about that.”

  “So, what the hell did you ask him about while I was in the car being forced to take off my clothes for him, exactly?”

  “I… damn it, Penny, it was really hard to concentrate.”

  “You didn’t ask him anything?”

  “He confirmed that he took Fletcher home. He said that he and Fletcher were friends. That they had met while surfing, and that he took him home that night. Said that when he left, Fletcher was fine.”

  “Oh, of course he did,” I muttered. “That doesn’t add up at all. He doesn’t surf, damn it. He hates the ocean.”

  “He has no motive, Penny. Why would he have killed Fletcher?”

  “I don’t know, but that’s hardly important, is it? Don’t we have enough for a warrant? That surf board is physical evidence.”

  “Well, we don’t know if it’s Fletcher’s,” said Lachlan. “Alastair says it’s his.”

  “Can’t we call Fletcher’s family and ask if his surf board is missing?”

  “Yes,” Lachlan said, and he still sounded sulky. “But all of this shit makes it worse. How can we be investigating Alastair? Say it goes to trial. His lawyer is going to talk about this little love triangle and make us out to be biased.”

  “It’s not a love triangle.”

  “You took off your damned shirt for him!” Lachlan pounded the steering wheel.

  I sank back into my seat. “I know,” I whispered. Why had I done that? He’d looked deep into my eyes, and— “No,” I murmured.

  “No?”

  “He compelled me,” I said. “He used magic on me.”

  “I thought you said magical creatures couldn’t be compelled?”

  “We can’t,” I said. “But he did it anyway. And that night when he came to see us, his magic was so strong.” I remembered the way he had made my magic dissipate. I’d never felt anything like that before.

  “So, what does that mean?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe he’s got a really powerful amulet or something? Something that’s boosting his magic? Whatever the case, we have to be careful. I know we’re biased, Lachlan, but we can’t turn Alastair over to people who aren’t magical. He will eat them alive.”

  * * *

  “Well,” said Connor from behind the front desk, “he’s being a big idiot.”

  “I know he is,” I said.

  “But I guess it would be tough to deal with for anyone.”

  “You’re not taking his side, are you?” I was strongly considering breaking out a bottle of wine for this conversation. It had been quite a day, and I needed something to take the edge off.

  “No,” said Connor. “I’m just saying to think about it.”

  However, I knew it wasn’t cool for me to wander around the lobby drinking wine. What would the guests think?

  As if on cue, the door to the lobby opened and a female gargoyle toting three gargoyle children of various sizes came through the front door. The little gargoyles were so cute. They had teeny, tiny stone wings. I wanted to pinch their cheeks, but I held back.

  Yeah, having wine was not going to help my situation.

  The female marched over to the front desk. “It’s under Capallan,” she said.

  “I just need to see your credit card,” said Connor.

  She handed it over.

  He took it. Staring at the computer screen, he said, “I see we’ve got you booked for both suites.”

  “Half the clan’s here,” she said, sighing. “You know how it is.” Gargoyle families were matriarchal, with the children all staying with their mother through adulthood. Even though there was mating, they didn’t pair bond.

  Connor nodded. “Sure do. Madhouse.” He grinned at her, handing over her keys. “Enjoy your stay.”

  We watched her leave with the kids.

  “Do you ever miss it?” I said. “Your family? Your mother?”

  Connor shrugged, not meeting my eye.

  Stupid question. Of course he missed it. He hadn’t left his family by choice. He’d been shunned, put out, because he was gay and would never sire children. To his grandmother’s way of thinking, he was useless otherwise. Gargoyles favored women over men, anyway. But men who weren’t potential mates or fathers? They were nothing.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

  He raised his gaze to me. “It’s okay. I’m grateful to have a home here. I never felt accepted amongst my family. Here, it’s better in a lot of ways.”

  I went around the counter and gave him a hug.

  He hugged back. “About Lachlan. How would you feel if it was the other way around? If he was still attracted to his ex-wife?”

  I shrugged, pulling away. “He probably is in some way, even though she hurt him.” I allowed Connor to change the subject from his family, sensing he didn’t want to talk about it any further.

  “But not like you and Alastair. What if it was like that? Wouldn’t it bother you?”

  “I mean, I wouldn’t like it,” I said. “But it’s not as if he didn’t know this about me all along. I think he’s being irrational about the whole thing.”

  “Well, it’s not rational,” said Connor. “He probably can’t help it to some degree.”

  “Okay, I guess I get that,” I said. “And some part of me enjoys that he’s a little possessive. But it feels as if he’s blaming me for the way I react to Alastair, and that’s not fair, because I can’t help it.”

  The door opened again.

  Another guest?

  I turned to see that Ophelia was coming inside. “Finally,” she said to me. “You’re here.”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Connor. “Becky left a note that Ophelia was looking for you.” He peeled a post-it note off the computer screen and handed it to me.

  I arched an eyebrow. “Thanks for giving me the message.”

  He grinned. “No problem.”

  I glowered at him.

  Ophelia crossed the lobby. “Are you busy this evening?”

  “Why?” I said.

  “It’s about what we talked about earlier. The power.”

  “Right,” I said. I had forgotten about that. Hell, if Lachlan and I were so powerful, why couldn’t we do anything against Alastair earlier? I came out from behind the front desk. “What’s up?”

  “I wonder if you’d come with me to meet someone. A very ancient mage in my order. I called her to ask questions, and she asked me to bring you to her.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Okay, I guess. But you seem pretty serious, Ophelia.”

  She nodded, her eyes full of concern. “I think it is serious, Penny. I’m sorry.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Ophelia’s mage colleague lived in a big, stone house all the way up near Bethany Beach in Delaware. It was a bit of a drive, and then the house itself was tucked away inside a grove of trees and bushes and vines—hidden from the outside world. There were turrets on each of the four corners, and gargoyles perched there, peering out into the night sky.

  “They’re well-compensated for their work,” Ophelia said to me, noticing I was watching the gargoyles. “Don’t worry.”

  “It’s only that it looks like something from the 1800s is all. A mage fortress, complete with gargoyle slaves as sentries.”

  “My order has never kept slaves,” Ophelia said fiercely. “We have always employed gargoyles, never exploited them.” Ophelia’s order was descended from a group of slaves, who had been freed by their plantation-owning dragon master upon his death. He’d also left them access to his body and the bodies of his ancestors, as he’d had no heirs. It was a paltry gesture if his intention had been to atone for owning other human beings, but it meant that Ophelia and her ancestors came by their magical artifacts honestly.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to sound as if I was makin
g accusations.”

  “It’s all right,” Ophelia sighed. “Truthfully, Esther is very old, and she can be…” She sighed. “Well, I would never have a gargoyle servant, paid or no. I feel gargoyles should be free to find their own paths and purposes, no matter what they were created to do. But she is what she is. Still, we must be polite to her. She has the answers we seek.”

  I didn’t know if I was going to like this Esther lady. I chewed on my thumbnail.

  We were greeted at the door by more gargoyles. They were men, both dressed in nothing more than loincloths, their gray skin oiled and gleaming. Wordlessly, they held out their hands to us.

  “They want any talismans we may be carrying,” Ophelia said.

  My hand went to my own talismans, which hung around my neck. One was formulated to dampen the effect that Alastair had on me—fat lot of good it had done, and the other was for general protection. I didn’t want to take either of them off.

  Ophelia pulled a long chain from over her neck and let it pool in the palm of the gargoyle.

  I shook my head. “I can’t take them off.”

  “You have to,” she said. “They will be kept safe and returned to you.”

  I felt sick to my stomach. But I did as she had done, removing the talismans and handing them over to one of the gargoyles.

  He closed his fist around them, staring straight ahead as if he really were nothing more than stone.

  It was creepy, and I didn’t like it.

  Inside, the house was dimly lit, mostly by clusters of candles that sat on every available surface. Several cats were sleeping on the spiral red-stained wooden staircase that ascended in front of us.

  Ophelia moved forward and started to climb it.

  I followed suit.

  The cats stretched and rolled over onto their stomachs, mewling. They didn’t get up.

  Ophelia stepped over them.

  I did too.

  At the top of the steps, we emerged into a drafty room with a cold, empty fireplace on one wall.

  On the other side of the room, by the window, sat a woman with long, silver hair that curled at the ends. “Dragon,” she whispered. It was a curse, an indictment.

  “Esther,” said Ophelia. “This is the one I spoke to you about.”

  “Yes,” said Esther. Her voice was a croak, but yet it still had a musical undercurrent. “Come closer.”

  Ophelia led the way and I followed.

  Esther was dressed in a shapeless shift of a dress. It had fringes at the edge of the sleeves and the bottom of the skirts. When we approached, she stood up and held out her hand. “I must touch you, dragon.”

  I started to move my hand up to allow her to take it, but I hesitated.

  “Give me your hand,” Esther ordered in an imperious voice.

  I put my hand in hers.

  Her palm was calloused and leathery. She sucked in a slow breath. “You do not approve of me,” said Esther, and barked out a laugh that ended as a cough. “It is the gargoyles.”

  I tried to pull my hand back. “One of my best friends is a gargoyle.”

  She wouldn’t let go of me. “I have no quarrel with the gargoyles. And they are grateful to me. I give them purpose. They were created to serve mages. They were formed so that the women were self-sufficient and didn’t need the men. So that the men would guard and fight in the service of a master. Now, the gargoyles are freed, and the women are the same as they ever were. But the men have no reason to exist. So my gargoyles are quite happy to be here. They are useful, and they need that.”

  I didn’t agree with her assessment, but I was filled with horror that the mages had designed the gargoyle’s matriarchal structure to make them better slaves. Disgusting.

  But Ophelia was shaking her head at me.

  I didn’t say anything else. I did my best to put all thoughts of it out of my head. It seemed that Esther was telepathic. It was a skill that dragons didn’t possess, but some mages could do some limited reading of surface thoughts. It seemed to be an inversion of the compulsion skill that we dragons possessed. I didn’t want to think anything else that Esther might be able to read.

  Esther’s fingers stroked my own. “You are right, Ophelia. This one has power. This one has made a blood bond.”

  “What?” I tried again to pull my hand away, but I couldn’t get free from Esther’s grasp. “I haven’t made anything. No bond.”

  “Yes, you have,” she said. “It is uncommon—even more uncommon now, in these modern times when there are no wars between the dragon clans.”

  I sort of knew what she was talking about. Warring dragon clans had been behind most of the major conflicts on earth for hundreds of years. They influenced humans to fight for them, sometimes outright compelling them, sometimes simply with the promise of power and riches.

  But most dragons were peaceful these days. There hadn’t been a war with different dragon clans on opposing sides since World War II.

  “But it is still done, a dragon binding himself to one of the bloodsuckers to create something monstrous and powerful.”

  I pulled my hand away successfully this time. “I didn’t bind myself to him.”

  “He has drunk your blood?” said Esther. “You have promised yourself to him. Given yourself to him?”

  “I…” I shook my head. “He’s my boyfriend.”

  Esther laughed again, a harsh sound. “What that means these days, I hardly know. But there was a vampire-dragon pair in Prussia when I was young.”

  Prussia? Young? How old was she? How long had it been since they called it Prussia?

  “A woman dragon, like you, and her vampire consort. The dragon’s mate wasn’t pleased with it, claimed the vampire had supplanted his place, taken his woman. Didn’t matter. She and the vampire had him killed. They were bloodthirsty. Razed villages to the ground with her fire. Plundered the riches. Declared themselves king and queen, and any who opposed them were swiftly put to death. They were so powerful, it took ten dragons to stop them.”

  I licked my lips. “I’m not… I don’t want to burn down villages.”

  “What do you want to burn down?” said Esther. “I smell smoke when I touch you, see flames on the ceiling, people running in a scattered pattern, frightened.”

  The Dungeon? Was she talking about The Dungeon?

  “You made the bond when you lay with the vampire,” said Esther. “I assume you are doing that, even though you are mated to another.”

  “It isn’t like that,” I said.

  Esther gave me a hard smile. “I don’t like dragons as a general rule, I’m afraid. Always thinking so highly of yourselves because an accident of birth gave you magic.”

  “I don’t—”

  “While we toil away learning the trade just to protect ourselves. And still, there is no protection from the flame. When I was a girl, I saw my mother burned right before my eyes, alight with dragon flame.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” I said. “But my kind is hunted and killed for our magic. Your skill you toil over is stolen.”

  “Penny,” said Ophelia. “Maybe we should go.”

  “Maybe so,” I said. I turned on my heel and stalked out of the room. I kept going down the steps, over the sleeping cats, and down to the gargoyles.

  I stopped there, hand out. “Talismans,” I spat out.

  The gargoyle who’d taken mine for me wordlessly handed them back.

  I stalked back out to Ophelia’s car.

  The car’s doors were locked. I stood outside waiting.

  Eventually, Ophelia appeared. She unlocked the doors by pressing a button on her keys.

  I opened the door to get in.

  Ophelia stopped me, putting her hand on my shoulder. “Is that what you really think of me?”

  I turned. “What?”

  “That I steal magic from your people?”

  I shook my head. “No, you’re different. The magic was given to you. And I don’t understand. How is it that she’s part of your order?
She’s from Prussia? She’s not descended from African slaves. She isn’t even black.”

  Ophelia gave me a look.

  “What?” I said. I was angry. I threw myself into the car.

  Ophelia came around to the driver’s side and got in next to me. “I was not there at the formation of my order, but I understand that some older mages were brought into the fold to teach my ancestors how to do spells and make talismans and channel magic from dragon artifacts. She is one of those mages. She is very respected. She is a leader, a teacher.”

  “She uses magic to prolong her lifespan,” I said. “She hates dragons. I don’t like her.”

  Ophelia sighed.

  My shoulders sagged. “I’m sorry. I know you were only trying to help. It’s only that I’ve been through a lot today, and this idea that Lachlan and I have some kind of bond? I just…” I shook my head. “We had sex and it created a magical bond? How can that even work?”

  “Sex can be very powerful,” said Ophelia. “That kind of energy, properly channeled, can work all kinds of magic.”

  “Just my freaking luck,” I muttered. “It’s not enough that I have a dragon mating bond. Oh, no. I’ve got to go and get myself some kind of weird blood bond as well.”

  * * *

  When I got back to the hotel, I decided that I needed to go and take a flight to clear my head. I waded into the ocean waves and let my dragon form overtake me. Then I flew out of the water into the sky, shooting for the stars.

  Up here, wind in my face, air currents beneath my flapping wings, everything below me seemed small.

  I half-wished I could fly away from everything.

  But it wasn’t to be.

  After about an hour up there, I knew I needed to come back. Lachlan deserved to know about this bond, whatever it meant. I wondered if it would make him feel better about everything between Alastair and me or if it would just make things more complicated.

  I dove back into the water, shifted back, and climbed back onto the beach, where I had left a robe to put on. Then I walked up the steps to my balcony and back into my apartment.

  The door was unlocked, which was weird, because I had specifically brought the key so that I could let myself back in. Or at least I thought I had. Feeling around in my robe pocket, I couldn’t find it.