by Shana Abe
It is our duty to remain here.
We protect the earthbound: the young, the women, the weak.
We are drákon. Duty to the tribe above all.
Rhys and Audrey and Joan-even Kimber, who at least got to leave to attend a proper school-moved through the hours as if there could be nothing finer than what had been placed before them. Their lives were planned out, their hopes and futures would be forever confined by the boundaries of their land. They were born there, they would find mates there, and they would die there. To them, the world beyond the mist and bracken was of little consequence.
Lia understood why her mother had run away, all those years ago. If she thought for an instant she could truly do the same-
But she couldn’t. She wasn’t Gifted like the rest of her family. She couldn’t Turn to smoke, much less to dragon. She wasn’t beautiful, she wasn’t brave, she wasn’t any sort of reflection of the magnificence of her kind. It had taken all her meager resources just to get this far, and Lia knew her time here would be short. They’d find her soon.
There were only two things about her that set her apart from the rest of her tribe-two dark, disturbing things. And one of them was seated before her in this chamber.
Zane had not stirred from his chair. The lamps were bright and the shadows were harsh; he was sketched in charcoal and light, studying her with a half-lidded gaze she recognized from years of watching him pretend to relax at Chasen Manor, every line of his body casually elegant, his coat unbuttoned to drape the cushions, his waistcoat a satin gleam of pewter and taupe.
His eyes were paler than amber. His hair was very long and thick, honeyed brown. He was poise and muscle and as tall as her father; Joan and Audrey used to keep her awake at night for years in the nursery, just giggling his name, until at last she was old enough to realize why.
Because of this. Because of his hands, so strong and tanned. His fingers, gently tapping the wooden arm of the chair in an easy, steady percussion that belied the wolf-watchfulness of his gaze. Because of his jaw, and his brows, and the handsome curve of his mouth. Because when he stretched his legs and crossed his ankles and lifted his dark lashes to fully see her once more, she was as pinned as a deer in a dragon’s clear yellow sights.
The flames from the lamps smoked oily black. Outside the shuttered window, the eastern song softly murmured.
She remembered the blind dream of him. She remembered the stroke of his voice-
“Forgive me if I interrupt your contemplation of my cravat,” he said now, in a very different tone. “No doubt it’s adorned with all manner of fascinating stains, as I’ve been out the past two days and nights straight, searching every inn and tavern and coach yard in the city for one thoughtless, wayward miss. I find I’m a shade impatient with all these heavy silences. Why, pray tell, have you landed in my parlor?”
Lia blinked. “You-you were searching for me?”
“Your father seemed to require it.”
“Oh.”
“Yes, oh,” he repeated, this time clearly mocking.
She took a breath. “If I tell you something, will you promise not to mention it to anyone else?”
“No,” he said bluntly.
“What if it’s important?”
“In that case, absolutely no. Look,” he said, leaning forward to prop his elbows on his knees, “if it’s something so dire you can’t share it with your parents, then I want nothing to do with it. I’m not courting that sort of trouble. Sorry, my heart. That’s the way of things.”
And tonight, my heart?
“Do you think,” she asked carefully, “that it is possible to-to tell the future?”
His eyes narrowed. “What, like tinkers and star-casters, that sort of thing?”
She shrugged. “Or like dreams.”
“Certainly.”
“You do?”
“Aye. In fact, I’ve a carnival soothsayer on payroll who’ll read your runes and spin you as fine a future as you could wish-especially if you’re so accommodating as to leave your reticule unguarded.”
“I wasn’t jesting!”
“Neither was I. He’s bloody good at what he does. Only been locked up twice. Much better average than most of my blokes. But then,” he added mildly, “I suppose he’s able to see just when the constables will be turning the corner.”
Lia crossed the rug to stand before him. She felt calm, removed, after all the days of worry and heat and dread, rocked to sleep and awake in that wretched excuse of a carriage, the stench of people and old horsehair clogging up her nose. She felt a thread of her dream-self, smooth and mysterious, flowing through her veins.
With Zane still seated, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to his.
When she drew away again, his eyes had taken on a harder glow.
“Passable,” he said coolly. “Feel free to try it again in about ten years. Until then, don’t waste my time.”
“Oh, dear,” came a light, feminine voice. “Am I interrupting?”
“Not in the least.” Zane rose from the chair; Lia was forced to step back. In the parlor doorway stood a woman, hooded and cloaked, the slit in her mantle revealing skirts of dove silk and a stomacher of white threadwork and moonstones.
With a turn of her wrists, the woman pushed back her hood. Red hair, gray eyes; her every movement carried the fresh scent of night.
Lia felt a flush of exquisite shame begin to creep up her throat.
“Who is this?” asked the woman, sounding amused.
“No one. Merely a little lost lamb.”
“A lamb,” said the woman, still smiling, entering the parlor. She touched a gloved finger to Lia’s chin, lifting her face. “With those eyes? I think not. Rather more a windstorm descending.”
Amalia pulled away. She glanced up at Zane-wolf-eyed, stone-faced, despite his languid tone-then grabbed his hand and held it hard.
“I want you to know,” she said quietly, “that I will do anything to protect my family. Now, or in the future. I’ll do anything at all. Remember that I warned you.”
His mouth flattened into a smile. “How charming. Perhaps you’d care to inform your father as well.” He disengaged their hands. “I believe that’s him at the window.”
And the locked shutters blocking the broken pane began to rattle and shake.
CHAPTER TWO
September 1773
Five Years Later
Before his eleventh year on this miserable planet, the street urchin known simply as Zane would have scoffed at anything that even hinted of the supernatural. He was a being of bones and flesh; so was everyone else. It was what made them so vulnerable. It was what had left him flat on the cobbles in a welling pool of his own blood one cold, cold winter evening, a knife wound to his ribs and the world pulsing blue and gray and snow, his back warm, his face numb.
By all rights, he should be dead. He’d known plenty who’d died from less, and good riddance.
But then, that night, Rue had found him. And the urchin had lived after all.
He’d never had a family, not that he remembered. For a precious few years, he’d had only her.
She sat comfortably on the settee, the sunlight from the tall windows behind her picking out the silver in her chestnut hair, her hands slim and steady as she poured tea into the paper-thin china cups that they used, for some reason, here in the deep countryside. She looked relaxed and perfectly at home in the magnificence of the room, at one with the delicate furnishings and velvet draperies, the crystal chandelier silently sparkling just over their heads. She did not look at all like what he knew her to be.
“Sit down,” the marchioness said, without glancing up from her pouring. “You’re making me jittery. You pace like a cat.”
“As if you would know.”
“Touché. Sit.”
But he didn’t. He went to the windows instead, gazing out at the view that rolled and spun autumn forest and hills as far as he could see. Empty forest. Empty hills.
Darkf
rith had no wild animals. It was perhaps the detail that bothered him most about this lush and cloudy shire. There were no hidden burrows in the woods, no small lives struggling for survival, celebrating the dusk or the dawn with mating or tussles. There were insects, and a scattering of birds. Once he had spotted a lone gray mouse skittering nervously along the edge of the stables. But in all the years he had been visiting the Marchioness of Langford and her husband, Zane had seen naught beyond those few pitiful creatures.
Little wonder. Even the smallest of beings surely sensed what dwelled in this place.
So Darkfrith was shining and barren. It was occupied purely by a people who moved without brushing the air, who watched him from shadows with gleaming eyes, who smiled with sharp teeth and bowed in false acquiescence. He felt the creeping chill of their looks every moment, every second he stayed in this place.
If it weren’t for Rue-and what she offered-he would never come.
“Lemon?” she asked, into the silence.
“No.”
There was a flock of sheep speckling a nearby hill, an effective decoy for anyone truly curious about the affairs of the farms or fields. A pair of young boys were loping toward them, slowly but steadily; the sheep bunched, then scattered like minnows into the trees.
“Sugar?”
“No.”
“Acquire anything of interest lately?”
He smiled to the glass. “Nothing to interest you, my lady. A few baubles here and there.”
“From anyone I might know?”
“You might,” he said, and left it at that.
“I heard a rumor the other day,” the marchioness continued, serene. “It seems the Earl of Bannon is preparing to sell his collection of Trojan gold. Do you know the one I mean? Coins, diadems, I believe even a sword said to belong to Hector, as it were. The entire set should fetch a tidy sum.”
“Have you an interest in Trojan coins, my lady?”
“I have no interest in anything beyond my family and my simple, humble life here, as you know,” she answered smoothly. “I understand that the earl, however, plans to use the monies to purchase a mare. A very fine one. I believe he intends to breed her.”
Zane cocked his head.
“He beats his horses,” she said, casual. “I’ve seen it. Beats them raw. His maidservants too,” she added as an afterthought.
He turned. “Is that why you summoned me here?”
“No. It’s merely a bit of information I thought you might wish to have.” She took a sip of tea. “I would certainly never mean to imply that someone should go and relieve the son of a bitch of his gold before he has the chance to profit from it.”
She smiled at him over the rim of her cup.
“Ah, Lady Langford. Sometimes I do miss your wisdom.”
“I am gratified to hear it.”
He accepted the drink she offered, taking his seat in a chair. Rue Langford leaned back against her silk-striped cushions, both old and young, ever lovely in her dark and glittering way.
“And how is the family?” Zane asked.
“Excellent. Rhys and Kim are off examining wheat fields and rye. Audrey’s with her sister-you missed the wedding, that was very bad of you. Joan was looking forward to having you there.”
“Was she?”
“I believe she rather hoped you’d ride up on your stallion and sweep her from the altar.”
“I haven’t got a stallion,” he pointed out.
“More’s the pity,” Rue sighed. “It definitely would have livened up the affair.”
They shared another smile, this one far more wry. Even if he had been so inclined-which he definitely was not-the mere thought of a romantic entanglement between a daughter of the leader of the drákon and a human male would send these animal-edged creatures into a frenzy. Zane knew their boundaries and respected them, if for no other reason than he preferred his hide intact.
The tea in his hand was hot, aromatic. He gazed down into the steam. “And Amalia?”
“Amalia,” echoed Rue, in a slightly less easy voice. “Yes. She’s in Scotland.”
He raised his eyes, astonished.
“I know,” said the marchioness. “It took a great deal of effort to convince the council to allow her to go. But she wanted it very badly. She’s at the Wallence School for Young Ladies, in Edinburgh. It’s most respectable. We go up and visit thrice a season.”
He set the tea aside. “After what the council did to you for leaving-”
“Yes,” she interrupted, hard. “After that, you may be certain I took good care that my daughter would be well protected from them.” Her nails clicked against the china cup, restless. “But she is Giftless, so she matters to them less. I suppose the odds were at least one of my children would be. My own Gifts came late, but Lia hasn’t displayed even the most rudimentary signs of the drákon, not strength, not heightened senses or stealth or any hint of the Turn-” She broke off, drawing a slower breath. “It’s not so unusual for a female of the tribe to be born without Gifts. These days, it’s rather more normal than not.”
Her skirts rustled. She shifted on the settee, and he realized she was not quite so comfortable as she first appeared.
“We thought it best if she got to have a taste of the world before being fixed in her place back here. This is her final quarter, in any case.”
“I’m sure it pleases her very well,” he said, after a moment.
“Yes,” agreed Rue, composed again. “French and Latin and court manners. I’m sure it does.”
He did not hear the double doors behind him open-the footmen here were as silent as the rest of them-but the air grew cooler, and the chandelier sent out a fresh rainbow of sparks.
The marquess entered, golden-haired, unsmiling, walking to his wife and bowing over her hand; he slanted Zane a shorter look.
“Langford,” Zane greeted him, without bothering to rise.
Christoff Langford inclined his head. If Zane had a surname, no doubt the other man would be pleased to snarl it, but as it was, they only ever exchanged nods.
“Have you told him?” he asked his wife.
“Not yet. I was waiting for you.”
The marquess dropped down beside Rue, draping an arm around her shoulders, examining Zane with a banked, green-eyed hostility.
“Pilfered anything recently?” his lordship inquired, freezingly polite.
“Yes. Abducted anyone?”
“We’d like you to take a journey,” said Rue, as if neither of them had spoken. “A rather long one.”
“To where?”
“To the east.”
“East of what?” he asked.
Rue rose from the settee, crossing behind it to the expanse of windows. She wore a gown of blossom pink seeded with pearls, a French train that hissed, very faintly, against the maple floor. With the bright, wide panes of glass stretched beyond her, she seemed very small and slight.
“Somewhere out there,” she said, lifting a hand to the glass, “east of England, east of France. Somewhere as far east as you can imagine is a stone. A diamond, we think. A very powerful one.” Rue turned her face to his; the backlight devoured her expression. “We need you to go and get it.”
“One diamond,” Zane clarified.
“Yes.”
“How big is it?”
“We don’t know.”
“Where is it?”
“We don’t know.”
“To whom does it belong?”
Rue smiled, apologetic. “We don’t know.”
“Well,” said Zane, “won’t this be jolly fun.”
She stepped forward from the shadows, pink and white again. “About two years ago the first of us began to hear it. Just a few of us. It sounded like something from a daydream back then, soft and lovely. Nearly not there. When you tried to listen too closely, it would vanish entirely.”
“Back then?” He lifted a brow.
“Yes. It has…changed. Grown stronger. More compelling. More of us hear i
t now too, nearly every member of the tribe.” She lifted her hand once more, made a small, almost helpless gesture. “It’s difficult to explain. You know we connect to stones. You know how we are. This one-calls to us. It’s insistent and very clear. We need it.”
“Why not go fetch it yourself? Send one of your vaunted hunters out to the wilds? Surely it would be quicker.”
The marquess and marchioness exchanged a fleet, laden glance.
“It is impossible,” said Rue finally. “The council will not permit it.”
She was lying. She did it well, unflinching and cool and without the barest hint of regret, but he knew her well enough to register the tiny, tiny rise in her voice. And at the same time: the subtle shift in Langford’s bearing; even seated, he became more taut, more hostile, if that was possible.
Interesting.
Zane fully believed that the council of old men that helped govern their so-called tribe would forbid a journey beyond the Channel; the deep distrust the drákon held of anyone beyond themselves wrapped tight as python coils around this place. What he did not believe was that Rue Langford-or her grim-jawed husband-would let that stop them if the matter was vital enough. She’d broken all their rules, all of them, for years, just because she could.
But she wasn’t going. And she wanted to. It was clear as daylight across her face.
Zane looked past her, out the windows again, blue sky, bright clouds, the woods dying off in a glory of crimson and pumpkin and gold.
“You want me to travel to a place unknown, to find a diamond unknown, and secure it from a person, or persons, unknown, all at the edge of winter.” His gaze drifted back to Rue. “And if this person does not wish to sell me his unquiet stone?”
She regarded him in silence, her lips gently curved.
“I see.” He returned her smile. “Don’t misunderstand. We’ve had some pleasant dealings in the past, highly profitable, by and large aboveboard. But I am surprised. In all these years, you’ve never asked me to steal anything for you.”
The marquess spoke at last. “You will be paid sixty thousand pounds sterling.”
Zane felt the air leave his chest. He felt his hands go cold. Out of instinct, out of survival, he held absolutely still until his senses lined up again.