Stormwalker

by Allyson James

  “No.” Nash’s face was lined with dirt, his eyes dead. “You were in my custody. It’s the biggest rule. Once the perp is subdued, you don’t touch them.”

  My mouth sagged open, and I started to laugh. The laughter had a hysterical edge.

  “You’re upset because you broke a rule? Never mind that you’re busy messing up relationships right and left, never mind that you kissed the hell out of me, never mind that my hotel is a wreck and you had to arrest an entire motorcycle gang. Oh, no, you’re upset because you broke procedure.”

  “It’s not funny,” Nash growled.

  “Yes, it is. Help me up. I can’t stand on my own.”

  Nash hauled me to my feet, none too gently. I started to dust off my pants, then figured it was useless. I was covered with dirt, blood, bits of Nightwalker, plaster from the hotel walls, and shards of glass from the broken windows.

  “What relationships?” he asked. “I’ll apologize to your boyfriend; he deserves that, but I don’t see anyone else out here.”

  “You’re hilarious, Jones. I meant you and Maya.”

  “I’m not having a relationship with Maya.”

  “No? What was that I saw this afternoon in her bedroom?”

  “Careful, Begay, or I’ll put you back in the cuffs, to hell with the rules.”

  “Why did you dump her?” I folded my arms, lingering. I didn’t really want to go back to my destroyed hotel. I didn’t want to see everything I’d worked for ruined, didn’t want to face the emptiness Mick would leave.

  “It was a long time ago and none of your business,” Nash said.

  “Fremont says Maya kept you riled up and that she argued about you running for sheriff. I think she’d be good for you—someone to challenge you. She’d keep you in your place.”

  “Damn it, if you don’t shut up about Maya, I really will lock your ass up. I said it’s none of your business.”

  “I just hate to see her treated like dirt. She deserves better.”

  “I thought you didn’t like her.”

  “She’s unreliable, sarcastic, and bad-tempered, and we don’t get along, but that doesn’t mean I don’t respect her. She’s smart, capable, strong, and can stand up for herself. But what’s worrying me a lot more right now is you, and the question of why you’re still alive.”

  “I’m tough.”

  “No one’s that tough. What are you, Jones? A dragon, like Mick?”

  The revelation about Mick still wasn’t processing. Dragons weren’t real. Gods, Changers, skinwalkers, Nightwalkers, sure. Dragons, no. This couldn’t be right.

  Mick had stood behind us looking completely normal again, the gunshot wounds gone. The look in his eyes had pierced me through the heart, and I wondered if I’d ever see him again.

  “I’m cutting you a break, Begay. If I were you, I’d go back inside and start making a list of damages for your insurance company. I have plenty of arrests to process, and a long night of work ahead of me.”

  Without saying good-bye, Nash pivoted on his heel and strode toward his SUV, now sitting alone in the parking lot. The rest of the cops and ambulances had hauled off my attackers; the curious had returned home. I was sure I’d be front page news of the Magellan Gazette tomorrow morning, but for now the townspeople had retreated.

  Nash’s truck started with a roar, and he peeled out of the dirt lot, tires squealing when they hit the pavement. I stood in the darkness, taking deep breaths of cool air, listening as the night sounds returned. The horizon to the east showed a light gray line, and mockingbirds started to call down in the wash.

  I made my numb way back to the hotel, feeling like I had a hole in my chest. It was just a building, I told myself as I walked in through the destroyed front door. Man-made brick piled on brick, temporal, unimportant in the grand scheme of the universe.

  But seeing my carved Spanish door smashed to bits, the newly painted walls scarred and broken, the window frames empty of glass, the pretty varnished bar in the saloon wrecked beyond repair, and the magic mirror a broken mess brought tears to my eyes. Blood spattered the walls and floor where the skinwalkers and Nightwalker had died, the vivid streak Mick had left now drying to rusty brown.

  I couldn’t look anymore. I went upstairs, trying to comfort myself that at least this part of the hotel had survived intact. I wearily climbed the next flight of stairs up through the third floor and to the roof.

  The breeze that sprang from the dying storm was cold. I sank down against the wall, my legs folding up in front of me. I ached all over. The magic had exhausted me, and even though Nash had drawn it off—somehow—I didn’t feel as cleansed as when Mick did it. Plus I had been knocked around, cut in a hundred places, and bitten by a Nightwalker. I rubbed my shoulder, wincing as I touched the bruised and abraded skin.

  I didn’t realize I was crying until I had to wipe the water from my face. I needed a tissue, and I didn’t have the energy to drag myself downstairs to see if I had any.

  I heard the door softly open, the quiet touch of bare feet on stone. Mick walked past, giving me a view of strong legs in jeans and a few strands of wiry black hair on the tops of his feet.

  He folded himself next to me, not touching me, not looking at me. He smelled of sweat and night air, of the scent that was Mick. His hair hung in a wild mess; he hadn’t stopped to bind it.

  We sat in silence, watching the desert. It was still gray, the light that would make it a colorful wonderland not yet strong enough.

  “Dragon,” I said after a time. I was still numb, too tired to put any inflection in my voice. “How long has that been going on?”

  “Pretty much all my life.”

  I glanced at him, but he kept his gaze on the horizon. His torso was bare, showing me solid muscle, black hair, and a flat stomach devoid of wounds. In the dim light, I couldn’t tell if he even bore scars.

  “You healed yourself.”

  He shrugged, shoulders rippling. “Human weapons won’t kill me as long as I’m able to assume my dragon form quickly enough.”

  I remembered when Nash had shot him in the shoulder, how he’d ignored my pleas for him to go to a hospital. He’d had me help him get the bullet out, then he’d sent me to sleep and disappeared. He must have gone off to turn himself into a dragon to complete the healing.

  “I don’t see any scales.”

  He flashed me his smile, but the usual warmth was missing from it. “The human form is completely human.”

  I touched the inked lines on his arm, his biceps firm under my fingertips. “So these tattoos aren’t just for decoration.”

  “They hold the essence of the dragon.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I tried to sound neutral, not hurt or petulant. “You know I’m not human, not fully. Didn’t you think I’d understand?”

  Mick still didn’t look at me, the eyes that had seen so much trained on the horizon. “Dragons are of this earth,” he said in a colorless voice. “They never existed Beneath. We were created inside volcanoes eons ago, even volcanoes in the depths of the oceans. Dragons are creatures of fire and water, earth and air. We’re connected to the land in a way no other creature can be. The earth gave birth to us, not gods. The earth itself shaped us, and it is to the earth alone that we answer.”

  I’d never heard him sound so serious, so devoid of emotion. “Why the history lesson?”

  “Most dragons are extinct now. A few remain in remote parts of the world, or in deep lakes or oceans.”

  “The Loch Ness Monster?”

  “Is a water dragon. I’m a fire dragon—I came from fire and burning rock. That’s why fire doesn’t hurt me, why I can wield it, and why I can absorb your power. Your storm powers are of the earth. They embody the fire between sky and ground and only make me stronger.”

  “I figured out a long time ago that my magic enhanced yours. I just didn’t understand how.”

  Mick finally turned his head and looked at me. His eyes had changed from blue to fully black. “The gods trappe
d Beneath hate the dragons. They crave our power, the greatest earth magic there is, and they hate us for helping gods like Coyote seal the vortexes to keep them in. Those gods still trapped Beneath need to stay there. If they emerge, the last of dragonkind will die—along with so many humans. We’ve always feared a sorcerer would come with enough Beneath magic to open the vortexes to let out the old gods, a key. That key is you.” His eyes burned me. “The dragons sent me to stop you.”

  I looked away, my heartbeat speeding. “So meeting me at the bar in Nevada wasn’t a coincidence.”

  “I’d been following you, waiting to get close to you. My mission was to take you somewhere alone, and kill you.” Mick stopped, and when he spoke again, his voice was tired. “I’m your enemy, Janet. I always have been.”

  My throat was so tight I could barely swallow. “I don’t plan to open the vortexes anytime soon. If the gods of Beneath are anything like my mother, I don’t want them up here.”

  “I know you don’t. I realized that once I started talking to you that first night. That’s why I let you live.”

  Coyote had said much the same thing. Ten points to me for being such a softie. I didn’t want to destroy the world, so I didn’t have to die right away.

  “So you took me to bed instead.” I didn’t have any tears left to cry, but I wanted to weep. It had been so beautiful, the two of us in that hotel room, Mick gently introducing me to the unrestrained joys of sex.

  “I fell in love with you,” he said.

  The blue returned to Mick’s eyes, making him look like the Mick I knew. He pushed back a lock of hair that had fallen across his face.

  “Is that why we had such a one-sided relationship?” I asked. “Because all those times you disappeared, you couldn’t say you were off flying around as a dragon?”

  “I convinced the dragon council to let me keep an eye on you and report to them. I had to return at regular intervals and restate the case for keeping you alive. I had to justify letting you live every single time.”

  My numbness crumbled, and my rage took over. “Damn it, Mick, why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I was forbidden to. The only reason I let you go off on your own in the end was because you were heading toward Massachusetts. I had to keep an eye on you, but as long as you didn’t return to the vortexes, I could let you think that you were on your own.”

  The words rained like blows to my gut. “So you’ve been watching me the entire time.”

  “Yes.”

  “Funny, I never saw a dragon hovering outside my window.”

  He didn’t smile. “I’m good at not being seen.”

  “And when I moved to Magellan, you decided to come back to me.”

  “The dragons wanted you dead as soon as you came within thirty miles of these vortexes. They would have killed you when you arrived, but I stopped them. They’re not happy with me, but they spared you on the condition that if you let loose what’s beneath the vortexes, the first to pay is me, with my life. First me, then you.”

  He regarded me with calm eyes, as though he hadn’t just told me he’d used his life as collateral for mine.

  “Why would you do that?” I asked, still angry.

  “I told you. Because I love you.”

  I closed my eyes, shutting out the growing light to the east. Everything I knew was overturning and falling, like a pack of cards thrown into the air. One reason I hadn’t believed in dragons was because I’d never seen one, never met anyone who’d seen one. They didn’t exactly hang out on street corners. I’d encountered skinwalkers, evil sorcerers, demons, Nightwalkers, Changers, and my mother. Never a dragon. Now I was learning that not only was my lover a dragon, but a council of dragons had sent him to kill me. And that the only reason I was still alive was because Mick had decided he liked me.

  “If you loved me, why didn’t you tell me all this?” I asked. “Why didn’t you warn me that your people wanted me dead? Or even what you were?”

  “It was part of the price of keeping you alive. You couldn’t know.”

  “And now?”

  “I revealed myself trying to protect you—Coyote couldn’t get me far enough away before the dragon part of me had to take over. The council already knows, but they haven’t yet decided what they’ll do.”

  I pressed my hands to my head, trying to make sense of it all. “Why didn’t the dragons try to kill me when I was a kid? Or kill the woman who bore me before she could?”

  “Because the dragons didn’t know about you until your true mother made contact with you for the first time. When that happened, when they discovered your existence, I was dispatched to waylay you.”

  “Waylay me. Is that what you call it?” My words tasted bitter. “I gave you my virginity, Mick. Did you know that?”

  “I didn’t realize until we’d started, but yes, I knew. You were so beautiful, so fragile.” Mick’s voice softened. “Gods, I was so afraid I’d hurt you.”

  “You knew damn well I couldn’t hurt you, didn’t you? You ate my magic like it was a snack. I’m defenseless against you.”

  “I wouldn’t say that.”

  I was working myself up into a fine rage. “I was lonely and naïve and scared, and you played me.”

  “For the first five minutes.” Mick looked straight at me, no evasiveness. “When you faced me down in that little motel room on the highway, I knew that I wanted to be with you, no matter what. I was glad of the excuse to stay with you as much as I could.”

  Gods, I wanted to cling to that hope. I wanted to believe that he really loved me, that of all the dragons that could have been sent to me, I’d been lucky and got Mick.

  “Couldn’t you have told me without the dragons knowing?” I asked. “Couldn’t you have trusted me? You expected me to trust you.”

  “I didn’t trust myself.” He gave a short laugh. “What if what I felt for you was you glamming me? What if you’d cleverly turned a dragon to your cause, or what if those from Beneath were manipulating you more than you understood? All I could do was make sure you were all right, that you stayed alive, no matter what.”

  I leaned my head back against the wall. “This is fucked-up. What do you expect me to say?”

  “Nothing. I love you, Janet Begay. Nothing will change that.”

  My heart lay like a dead thing in my chest. “Even with what you’ve just told me?”

  “Even if you want to stick your tongue down Nash Jones’s throat. It killed me to see you kissing him, but I won’t stop you if you want to be with him.”

  I got to my feet, hands balling to fists. “I do not want to be with Nash. I don’t want to be with anyone. I thought you were dead, Mick. I watched you shot up and bleeding, and I had no idea whether you would survive. I was grieving. It hurt. If you had told me before that you were a dragon, that the shots wouldn’t kill you, I’d have been spared feeling like someone ripped out my insides when I saw you go down. You expected me to open up to you and give you everything that I was, but you couldn’t give me the comfort of telling me the truth. So get the hell out of my life, Mick. I don’t need this kind of shit.”

  “No.”

  I stared. “What? Did you just say ‘no’?”

  “I’m not going anywhere. If you stay here alone, your mother will eventually drag you to those vortexes and get you to open them. Or the other dragons will kill you to make sure you never succeed. Either way, I lose you. I can’t let that happen. So I’m staying.”

  “This is my hotel,” I said, sounding desperate. “You only stay with my permission.”

  “I’ll sleep in one of the guest rooms. You can consider me your bodyguard.”

  “I don’t want to consider you anything. I want to throw you off the roof. Don’t you understand?”

  Mick stood. “You need to understand; I’m not leaving. This is too important to screw up because you and I happen to have gotten our feelings hurt.”

  I flung open the door, so angry I wanted to tear it from its hinges and throw it at
him.

  “Fine, I’ll stay away from the stupid vortexes. But you stay away from me. I don’t want to talk to you; I don’t want to see you. And once this is done, I want you out of my life.”

  I didn’t wait for him to agree or argue. I stormed inside and down the stairs. Going to my room seemed too tame, so I kept walking, out through the wrecked lobby door, across the parking lot and then the highway, and out into the desert to the west. Dangerous, yes, but morning was breaking, and nothing short of the gods of Beneath was going to mess with me when I was this angry. I kept walking and the sun rose behind me, breaking through the storm clouds in red and gold glory.

  By the time I returned, I was hot, stinking, and thoroughly exhausted. I barely saw the police tape all over the place, or Assistant Chief Salas and other Magellan cops picking over the scene.

  The lobby and saloon had been smashed up, shot up, or fired by my magic, Mick’s and Coyote’s. I saw Fremont drifting out of the kitchen with a resigned look on his face, and I wondered if it too had been wrecked while the main fight went on in the saloon.

  I ignored everyone, trudged to the back, and turned on the shower. I had water now without Mick’s help, because Fremont had finished hooking up the plumbing, but cold only because the electricity still wasn’t on. I didn’t care. Cold felt good to my sweaty, overheated body. I didn’t so much wash as stand under the stream of water without moving. Finally I halfheartedly passed soap over my skin, then turned off the faucets and leaned against the wall.

  I woke up sometime later with my neck aching from bracing my weight. I got out of the shower, dried myself off, and crawled into bed, still wrapped in the towel. I slept for who knew how long, but when I woke, the shadows told me the sun had moved west.

  Someone tapped on the door. “Janet? It’s me, Fremont. Salas wants to talk to you.”

  I didn’t answer. Talking took too much effort.

  “Janet? You all right?” The door creaked, and Fremont peered through a slit, as though terrified he’d catch me doing naked Pilates.