by Willa Okati
His lips were stained with Gina’s blood as he spoke, spitting savagely. “So. You have found your mage and your bodyman.”
My mage and my what, now? Bodyman? What’s a bodyman? Gina tried taking in a deep breath and found her windpipe was intact. “Didn’t see them coming, did you?” she brazened.
“Bah!” The dragon man flung himself away from Gina. He wiped his mouth as if he’d bitten into something disgusting -- and, for all Gina knew, the taste of human flesh might have been abhorrent. “They matter only a little in the long run. And this fight is far from over, Georgina. We will battle on.”
Gina struggled to her feet. “I have the men backing me. You have no one. I’m descended from the one who slew your ancestor. Don’t count on winning this.”
“Idiot child. You still have no idea what you pit yourself against.” The dragon man slithered back onto his throne. “Go back for now, and confer with your pitiful human help. If my dragon flame can no longer affect you, then we will see how you deal with a world gone mad.” He tapped his claws against the scales of his chest. “I sent the lust through you. I sent, through you, the anger that is infecting the world you inhabit. What, I wonder, will I send next? Do you think yourself capable of defending a city? You, one scrawny excuse for a woman?”
Gina straightened her shoulders. Oh, yes, she knew what the dragon man could do, but memories were flooding back. Never let them know you’re afraid. They’ll pounce like a cat on a mouse. “Do your worst,” she challenged. “The city belongs to me.”
“So you claim it?” the dragon man asked eagerly.
There was a moment’s hesitation, and then Gina knew the answer. “I do,” she said, her voice ringing out through the empty halls. “The city is mine. I’ll defend it against you if it’s the last thing I do.”
“And it very well may be, Georgina.” The room began to black out around its edges, a sucking sensation pulling Gina back up through the tunnel from which she’d been dropped. “If you live up to half your claims, this could yet be a battle worthy of me, after all.”
The lights went out. Gina’s last sight was of the dragon man’s malevolent eyes, savoring the bolt of tension shooting through her, and then he was gone.
* * * * *
“Gina?” The voice was soft and rough. “Gina, wake up. You’re bleeding.”
Gina’s eyes flew open. She stared up into Dakarai’s lean face, one that was becoming ever more familiar. They hadn’t known each other for even a whole day, but she was able to read him. Her vision seemed crisper, keener. A warrior’s clear sight.
He stroked her forehead. “You’re bleeding,” he repeated. “Where were you?”
Gina struggled to sit up.
“No, no, lie still.” Dakarai gently held her head in his lap -- his very naked lap. She could smell salt and musk and come, each odor sharper and more defined than it would have been before this most recent meeting with the dragon man, than anything she remembered. “Randall’s coming with a bowl of water and a cloth.”
“I’m here.” Randall, still nude as well, knelt by Gina’s side. He dipped a clean washcloth into the wooden bowl he held and squeezed out the water. “This might sting.”
Gina shook her head despite the pain of the movement. “Wait,” she ordered both of them. “I saw the dragon again. He attacked me.”
“The bite,” Dakarai murmured, touching the edge of it with one finger.
“He had me pinned, but he couldn’t take me. There’s something about the three of us together that put him off. He retreated.” Gina looked quickly from one man to the other, taking in the details of their faces with a battle-hungry eye. They were keen thinkers, strong in body or powerful in magic... and the dragon hadn’t been able to stand against their combination.
“It’s up to the three of us,” she said with certainty, lowering her head back into the hardness of Dakarai’s thighs. “He’s going to be coming, and it’ll be bad, but I swore to protect the city.”
Dakarai glowed with satisfaction. “Then you are a George. No more hiding?”
“None.” Gina reached out, imagining she held a weapon in her grasp. She could feel how the sharp blade would catch against hard dragon scale, then pierce through to the soft meat underneath. Blood would flow, none of it hers, and the city would be safe.
Dakarai’s hand clasped Gina’s shoulder. Randall laid his fingers on Gina’s stomach. With the three of them linked, Gina could feel the strength flowing back and forth in a chain that could not be broken.
“We’re the key,” she said, determined as if she had spear in hand and was ready for the final blow. “The dragon thinks he can bring each one of us down, but no.” She laughed, long and loud, as if the victory were already hers. “We’ll be the thorn in his paw. His Achilles’s heel.
“We, the three of us, will kill the dragon.”
Chapter Seven
“And we will kill the dragon,” Dakarai promised. “Does he now know you’re ready to stand up to him?”
Gina blinked. “He does. And I am. But how did you know I wasn’t before?”
“I told you. It’s my job to look after your well-being. Mine, and my father’s, and his father, and all the fathers before us. We are the line of mages who have assisted the Georges since the first, the Saint. For centuries, the Georges have refused to accept our help, first calling it ‘witchcraft’ and fearing us, then scorning us as shams.” Dakarai lightly touched the skin of Gina’s wounded neck. “I’ve been watching you for years.”
“You what?” Gina again tried to struggle up. Randall pushed her down despite her rediscovered strength, forcing her to lie flat. “How did you get through to watch over me? I had wards!”
“I never pried beyond the boundaries you set. Some mages did in the past, keeping tabs on every part of their George’s life. But my father taught me differently. Just because things had always been done one way didn’t mean it was the right path to take. All I did was monitor your aura.” Dakarai folded his hands. “I knew when you were afraid, and when you were blocking your past. I felt it when the dragon began his attack. I wasn’t...” He hesitated. “I didn’t expect him to assault you the way he did.”
“Who could have?” Gina lay still, the bite marks in her neck beginning to sting and burn now that her adrenaline rush was fading. She inhaled and exhaled a deep breath, glad the teeth hadn’t gone so deep as to damage the pathway to her lungs. “But you knew what to do.”
Dakarai shook his head. “Through sheer luck. The move he made was swift and possibly deadly. I wasn’t paying attention. Not as closely as I should have, anyway. Randall and I were--”
Gina laughed. “Yeah, I can just guess what you were doing.” Odd how the thought didn’t bother her. In fact, the memory of seeing them together still sent a tickle of excitement through her nerves.
“We were meditating,” Dakarai insisted. “Randall was the one to sense your disturbance. He is from the line of bodymen to the Georges, their right hands in battle. Some of your forefathers were too proud to want assistance in battle, and so the tradition was cast aside -- but the lineage of bodymen continued on, ready for the day when they would be needed again. Randall didn’t know anything about this when you were together before; he does now. And fate may have played a part in bringing you both together, then as now. I’ve watched over you, yes, but you’ve always been in his mind. He honed in on your distress.”
“Randall?” Gina turned her head slightly to look at him. Same old Randall -- or rather, the new Randall, aging just fine, with the look of caring concern on his face that she remembered seeing a hundred times. He gazed warmly at Gina, clearly reassuring her he was there, before dipping his cloth back into the bowl.
The gentle sensation of him cleansing the wounds felt cool and wonderful. Gina sighed with relief as the tackiness of drying blood was sponged away. “You always tried to take care of me,” she whispered. “What would have happened if I hadn’t pushed you away after that attack?”
Randall made a minute, dismissive motion. “The past is in the past, Gina.” He stroked her arm with his free hand. “I thought about you every day, but you’d made your choice.”
“You could have fought for me,” Gina persisted. “Why didn’t you?”
“Because I knew who you were. And I know how stubborn you can be.” Randall wrung out his cloth. “I had to let you do this your way. But I won’t lie -- I hoped you’d come back one day.”
“And look at us now. Bet you didn’t plan on this happening.”
Randall laughed abruptly. “Nope. I had pictured more of a chance meeting on the street, then sweeping you off your feet into a secluded restaurant, a café, somewhere cozy for two, and sweet-talking you into my life again.”
Gina’s eyes shifted to Dakarai. “Even with him?”
“It’s... complicated.” Randall looked embarrassed. “Dakarai and I are together, sure, but he’s always known about you. Known that I wanted you back.”
Confusing. Gina looked at Dakarai again, whose face was expressionless. “You didn’t want to keep Randall for yourself?”
Dakarai raised his shoulders. “Sometimes things are just as they are. He gave most of his heart to me, but I knew part of it still belonged to you. You were the one true lady love of his life. Besides,” he said, a cunning look developing, “who or what says either of us has to give up anything?”
Okay, even with what all of them had done before, the suggestion was still a mild shock. “You mean the three of us together on a permanent basis?” Gina knew better than to sit up, no matter how much she wanted to. “All of us?”
The mage gave another shrug full of possibilities. “We’ll see, in time. Right now our focus is on healing you.”
Gina reached up to touch the circle of bite marks. “You’ve already cleaned the punctures, and I’m up to date on my tetanus shots. I can’t exactly go to an ER, so what else is there to do?”
“You’d be surprised. Randall, hold her hand.” Dakarai got up and stood still for a moment, his face wrinkling as he concentrated. Gina heard a rattling, then the whooshing of air. A glass jar full of some gray, mossy-looking herbs shot into his grasp. “Dragonsbane. Not just a myth. We need to treat you with a decoction.”
“Decoction,” Gina said dubiously. “You mean like a paste?”
“Exactly.” Dakarai knelt to open one of the desk drawers. Gina could hear his hands rattling around inside. “Aha!” When he stood up, he had a wooden mortar and pestle, ancient-looking but shiny with use. “Lie still while I grind the herbs with water.”
Randall arranged himself closer to Gina’s side. She could feel his ambient warmth and automatically snuggled into it. His fingers came down to stroke her hair, twining through the strands.
“It’s all right,” he soothed. “I’m not going anywhere. Not again.”
Gina nestled her head against his thigh. The movement reminded her of days gone by and times when they’d just lain together, maybe looked up at the stars or made pictures out of clouds. Back when she’d been reveling in her power, confident enough that she’d sense an attack long before it happened and had had the leisure to take afternoons of downtime with her lover.
She butted her head against his skin. “There were moments that I thought about you. Wished things were different. Sometimes I let myself imagine the two of us together again. I dreamed about you and woke up...” She paused. “Well.”
Randall rumbled out a chuckle. “And I did the same with you. Even after Dakarai. Despite the fact that I’d decided to let you live your own life, I wondered. I dreamed. I hoped.”
“We wasted so much time,” Gina said softly. “Do you still have the scars? From the attack?”
He nodded. “On my other leg. Shiny pink skin without hair.” He laughed again. “You gave me a bald spot.”
Gina pushed at him. “I did not! That was the...” She faltered. “God. The thought of you after the dragon attacked. You looked so pale. You looked dead. I was so afraid.”
“Was it you who called for help?”
She nodded.
Randall tugged at Gina’s hair. “It’s all vague to me. I remember being carried away on a stretcher, asking about you. But you weren’t there, and I never did see you again.”
“I had to make sure you were safe.” Tears pricked at the corners of Gina’s eyes. She nestled closer to Randall. “Then I had to leave. I ran away and turned into someone else, a person who’d never ever heard of dragons.” She closed her eyes, breathing in the scent of his skin. “But I thought about you. Every night, for the longest time.”
Randall’s stroking of her scalp grew lighter, the faintest touch. “I missed you, too, Gina.”
“Enough of this.” Dakarai’s voice was clipped and bordering on impatient. Gina turned her gaze in his direction. He tapped the side of his pestle against the edge of the bowl he held. Thick gray sludge dripped down into the container. “As I’ve said, I’ve heard one half of this before, and I could sense the other part, even if I didn’t pry. The medicine is ready.”
Gina didn’t like the looks of Dakarai’s decoction. “I feel fine,” she protested. “My neck’s going to hurt when I turn it, but I think it’s just an ordinary bite. The dragon man was pissed off enough to act without thinking. If he’d wanted me to suffer, he would have--”
“Would have what? Gina, you know this is a reptile who claims a reputation for destroying people,” Randall chided. Professionalism slipped over his expression and into his tone. “Some bites take hours for their poison to spread. The cobra’s venom works so slowly you hardly notice it at first. Let Dakarai do his job.”
“Thank you.” Dakarai nudged at Randall with one bare toe. “Move aside, love? I need to get next to the wound.” He knelt, the muscles in his legs bulging as he bent.
Gina noticed, with a mild sense of surprise, he was still naked. All of them were. Yet the shame she’d felt earlier at being exposed was utterly gone. Somehow, it felt natural to be unclothed in the presence of these two men. Then again, after what they’d done together, Gina guessed modesty wasn’t much of a consideration anymore.
Randall bent to press a kiss to Gina’s forehead. “Promises to keep,” he whispered before drawing away toward her feet. He took one in each strong hand, rubbing his thumbs against her ankles. Dakarai cut him a slightly annoyed look -- jealousy? -- then shook his head.
He laid the mortar and pestle down beside Gina’s neck. Dipping a forefinger into the muck, Dakarai came up with a gooey fingerful of the gray sludge. “Randall, as long as you’re down there, offer her support,” he directed. “Channel your energies and focus them on Georgina.”
“Please. I’ve always just gone by Gina.”
“But you were born Georgina. Call yourself what you like, but never forget -- again -- who you really are. Now, hold still. This will hurt; it’s meant to draw the poison out of those punctures.”
“Hurt?” Gina asked warily. “It’s not like I’m a stranger to pain or anything, but on a scale of one to ten, how much are we talking about here?”
“Probably an eleven. Have you ever wanted a tattoo?” Dakarai looked thoughtful. “Maybe in your younger years; I can’t imagine your Mary persona walking into an ink parlor and asking for a skull and some roses on her thigh.”
Gina giggled. “Mary wouldn’t have dreamed of it, but I always meant to get some kind of design done when I was a kid -- maybe a dragon with a spear through it -- but the kind of classy work I had in mind takes more money than I could save when I was old enough to get it legally done.”
“Your family wouldn’t have supported you?” Dakarai sounded surprised. “Other mages have recorded brands, inks, other memorabilia marked into the flesh, all with the support of their loved ones.”
Gina squirmed a little. “Yeah, but after the dragon took dad, mom sort of had a different perspective on things.” It still hurt to think about her father, the memory of his trip to Wales to fight one of the beasts... and never returning. “She d
idn’t... you could say she wouldn’t have approved.”
“And so it began, all the way back then. Your father was a mighty George, and his passing was marked with sorrow.” Dakarai frowned at his dab of magical paste, then brushed it off in crumbling chunks. “Quiet, now. The medicine solidifies quickly. Breathe deep while I put it on you.”
Gina nodded and braced herself. All the same, when Dakarai touched a wet finger to the first of her punctures, she couldn’t help crying out. The gray mixture stung worse than the original bite.
“Gina?” Randall questioned, holding her feet tightly.
She gritted her teeth. “I’m good. Keep going.”
“You are strong,” Dakarai murmured, reaching for more of the dragonsbane. “Hold on to that strength.”
And she did, through each and every dab on her neck, and when she had to rise up for Dakarai to reach the teeth marks behind her shoulder. Sweat broke out on her forehead and her breathing grew labored, but she didn’t make another sound. Randall had his eyes closed, whispering words she couldn’t make out. Strength and power flowed from his grasp on her ankles up the length of her body. Gina grabbed at his help and clutched it tight, shoring herself against the cure that felt worse than the disease.
“Done,” Dakarai said at last, removing his bowl. He narrowly examined the first mark he’d applied his decoction to. “There was, indeed, poison in the bite. I can see the ’bane working already.”
Gina tried to peer down. “You can?”
“Oh, yes. Lie quiet for a bit longer. Does it still hurt? The worst of the pain should have passed by now.”
“It has.” Gina rearranged her limbs, rotating her shoulder. “Feels warm, now, like a compress.”
“Then it really is working.” Dakarai let out a sigh and stood, moving to put his bowl away. “I wasn’t sure. The recipe has been handed down for generations, and the records all show it was a success, but people have changed so. Antibodies, DNA... every little difference in a person’s makeup could affect the magic.” He set the bowl down and rested the pestle inside. “That’s the mark of a true mage, you know. Understanding how to work with shifting variables.”