And so he flew on, telling himself that if he never accomplished another thing in his life, he had to save this man.
The voyage went by quickly, interrupted only briefly as a commercial jetliner flew at him out of a dense cloud, Graeme tucking his red body aside so that the plane’s wing just barely missed his own.
In the strange rectangular windows he thought he saw faces with round eyes staring out at him, and then the giant metal bird was gone. Inside he allowed himself a brief chuckle and wondered if airplane passengers were allowed to drink alcoholic beverages. He hoped so.
He wondered, too, if he would acquire Lilliana’s gift for leaping through time and space, and much as he loved flight, he found himself yearning to be able to teleport.
This was taking too long.
* * *
Merriman had disappeared to the kitchen on a mysterious errand, leaving Lily alone with their patient. She was quickly realizing that everything about the older man was mysterious, including his motives for helping them in the first place. Who was he, really?
He had told her the previous day to perform the Ritual; but surely he knew the risks, and surely he wasn’t trying to kill Conor. He must have known what he was doing. Among his odd set of skills was a sort of Sight that seemed even more powerful than Conor’s own, after all, and therefore he must have known that Conor could survive all of this. Even if he hadn’t said it, something in him must have known the future.
That was, if he was a true ally to the three. Lily hated to question his motives, and yet how could she not? Here was her lover, near death, and Merriman had encouraged the very activity which had put him here.
She pondered all that had occurred: the attack in the London pub; the strange trio made up of Xin, Asta and Duncan. And now, Mrs. Fitzpatrick and Merriman. It was a sort of blind faith that had led them to believe in these people.
No, not blind. Conor was the least blind person she’d ever met. He saw far beyond what she did, to the good and the bad in others, and to their very thoughts. He had trusted in the plan, uncertain though it was, and so she should as well.
Lily was sitting on a wooden chair by the bed when the old man returned to the room. Her hands, which seemed never to stop moving, stroked Conor’s hair, then his cheek, as though to confirm that he was still feverish. At least his heat was a sign of life.
One thing had changed: the young man seemed to have grown since the previous day. His shoulders, which had always been broad, seemed even more so now, each muscle rounder, more pronounced. His mass continued to heave in a rapid series of breaths, but the movement seemed to have slowed a little.
“I can see that his body continues to adapt,” said Merriman, watching intently as he laid a damp cloth on Conor’s forehead. The sodden fabric looked as though it had been soaked in white liquid, which Lily assumed was meant to cool the raging fever.
“Do you mean that this is normal? That he’s getting better?” she asked. There was, for a moment, a good deal of hope in her voice.
“Unfortunately I don’t mean that, no. He is trying—but it doesn’t mean that he will succeed. Though I suspect that the strength of you is keeping him going.”
“I’m not strong,” said Lily.
“I don’t mean that; I mean your presence, your very existence. His knowledge that you exist at all, and that you and he are now parts of a whole. It is enough for a man, sometimes, to feel love. He will do anything in his power not to allow it to be stolen from him.”
Lily looked down at Conor’s face; the grim, expressionless features which didn’t seem to recognize her or anything else. Did he love her? Was it possible?
“I don’t know how he feels. But I do know that I would do anything for him,” she murmured. “And if I lost him, I feel like I would die.”
Merriman put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You have bonded with him now, and with Graeme,” he said. “You’re different, even, from yesterday, though perhaps you can’t see it. Conor is not the only one who’s changed.”
“What do you see in me?” she asked as she looked up at him, a tear streaming down her cheek.
“Strength. Affection. Fear. All things multiplied. The need of a dragon to protect what is rightfully hers. These men are yours in flesh and blood now, and you, like this man here, would do anything to keep your mates safe. To keep them yours.”
“I suppose that’s true,” said Lily. “But why do I feel so helpless if I am so powerful?”
“Because it’s up to him, not you, to survive. Because you cannot make him fight. The blood inside him is changing, straining against his veins. He is evolving from within a body that was never meant to evolve. It is weakened by generations of humans who moved away from their roots as shifters. Their bodies are not as strong as ours, by a long shot. But even so, he is exceptional, Lilliana. Try to remember that.”
Lily leaned forward and kissed Conor’s damp cheek as his breath strained against his throat, rasping inhales and exhales a horrible cacophony that rang in her ears.
“I just want him back,” she said. “I just want him…”
“I know,” said Merriman. “You want him forever, and that’s how long you should have him. Life can be cruel.”
For what felt like hours Lily sat, a hand always on Conor, always making certain that he could feel her presence, her affection, her need. The old shifter sat opposite, his eyes also fixed on their patient, watching for changes.
“Merriman,” she said after a time.
“Mmmm?” He seemed deep in thought.
“What are we fighting?”
“What do you mean, child?”
“I mean, who is this enemy of ours?”
“Ah. Well, while there are physical enemies, it is not necessarily one man that you fight. Oh, there will be a leader, of course; there always is, after all. But if he is taken down, another might rise up in his place.”
“So if it’s not one man that we’re up against, what is it?”
“Cruelty, ambition, greed. It comes with many names. You may think that it is simply one entity, controlling many. But it’s never so simple. As you know well, shifters cannot be so easily controlled, except for those who are weakened and corrupted by the creatures within them. Some déors are more easily manipulated than others. A snake is less empathetic than a wolf.”
Lily thought about her previous worries about Graeme’s dragon and how it had at times seemed to dominate his human side. But he was so fallibly human in other ways—so charming, so flawed. Naïve, adorable. These were not the traits of a fire-breather.
“So we’re fighting an ideology?” she asked.
“More or less. It’s an old story, Lilliana: Good versus Evil. It goes back to the beginning of time. As does our kind.”
“I must admit that I’m curious about you, Merriman. They say that you’re…forgive me…very old.”
“I am,” he said, letting out a quiet, bitter laugh. “It’s not a dirty word, that. It’s a fact. You’d be hard-pressed to find one older than me. But I have some miles left in me yet.” He raised a bushy eyebrow as he uttered the last few words.
“Oh, I didn’t mean that,” said Lily, a hand still on Conor, whose state hadn’t altered. She took this as good news, if there was good news to be had. “I meant that you’ve had experience. And I have to tell you that I’ve wondered more than once what your déor—your other form—is.”
The briefest of smiles took up residence on Merriman’s face. “My other form, yes. I suspect that you’ll see it soon enough,” he said. “And not for the best of reasons. It too is old, but more powerful than the frail body before you. Our déors—and yes, of course I know that word—remain young far longer than our humans do. An odd contrast to humans and animals, don’t you think? Most animals live for only brief lifespans. And here I am after many, many centuries.”
“Did you…that is, did you have mates?”
“Many. But only one was the love of my life. The first of them.”
; 3
“Who was she?”
Lily was now making a deliberate effort to distract her mind from the ailments of the man who lay before her.
She willed Conor to improve, to breathe normally, to come to. And she knew that her own worrying would do him no good, and so a story from Merriman’s past seemed a decent compromise; words from that era could perhaps help her to draw out the future. With each breath that Conor took there was hope, and hope was the one thing she wished to hang onto now.
Merriman seemed to understand. Under normal circumstances, of course, a young woman would never ask such questions. But he knew her mind, and all that she was going through during those painful hours.
He had suffered loss more than once over the course of his long life, and he knew the excruciating pain of it as well as anyone who’d ever lived.
Love itself hurt. It could sear like a blade slicing through flesh even before a first kiss had ever occurred. But losing a lover, a mate to whom one was bonded in flesh—that was pure cruelty on the part of fate.
And so he knew what it was that Lilliana feared. To lose this man would mean a life of regret for every thing she’d never had a chance to say during their brief time together, every flower they’d never seen together, every child who had not been born. Every minute that she had not had him next to her as a comfort, a guardian, a lover. It was like death, only worse, because she would have to keep on.
But if Conor survived, she would have a chance at the sort of happiness that no human ever understood—that comes with the bond between their kind. There were no words for it, this joy. The closest that Merriman could ever think of was “completion.” He had once felt complete, and he knew that joy as well. Life could be perfect, if only for brief moments over the course of its many years. Perfect, beautiful, but with a pain that came with the knowledge that it might one day come to an end.
“When I was young,” he began, his voice settling into an intimate depth, “Now, we’re talking about a very long time ago, long before you were born into your era, Lilliana,” he smiled slightly. “I met a young woman. In those days, the world was much as it is now. Shifters were a terror, a legend used to frighten small children. And so it was difficult for us to find one another, you see.”
“You were excluded from society?”
“Excluded. Ostracized, banished, driven out, whichever words you like. Yes. If anyone discovered us, we were cast away like lepers. So most of us kept our skills hidden. But of course, a shifter has difficulty concealing his nature at the best of times. And, as you know, when you meet the person—or people—you’re meant to be with, it’s as though a bolt of lightning smashes through your chest and penetrates you. Not so much through the heart as the stomach, mind you—the heart comes into it later.”
Lily nodded, recalling the first time she’d seen Conor, and the first time she’d set eyes on Graeme. Each different, but each causing an explosion of some sort within her.
“And you met someone who did that to you…” said Lily.
“I did.” Merriman’s smile seemed filled with melancholy. “I loved her more than myself,” he said. “Believe it or not, I think it happened the moment I set eyes on her. If there is such a thing as love at first sight, there it was, defined for all time.”
“Did you have children?”
“Yes. We two, and another mate. A male, of course. He was a good man. I’ve always held that shifters are better evolved than humans, that we provide two men for one woman. Humans have it all backwards.”
Lily managed a smile of her own just then. But a moment later it faded, as Conor seemed to gasp for air.
She held onto his hand more strongly, and for a moment thought that he squeezed back. He seemed to settle a little, and Lily told herself that she had only imagined his brief response. Hope was messing with her mind.
“What happened to the other man?” she asked, still trying to keep her worry at bay, to pretend that all was well and normal.
“He is still alive, ancient like me,” said Merriman. “But he loved her too, you see. And when we lost her he lost his will to live as a shifter. Where I continued, bred, did my duty, he did not. He could not, and I don’t blame him for it.”
“I understand.” The weakness that seemed to overcome her in waves: that was what he meant. It could cripple a shifter who lost a mate. If Conor died, she too might become a walking ghost.
She shuddered for a moment and then squeezed Conor’s hand once more, hoping to transfer her remaining strength to him.
* * *
“Where are Graeme and the doctor?” she asked after a time, her patience fading alongside her energy.
“They will be here soon, Lilliana. I feel it,” said Merriman.
“What else do you feel?” she asked, terrified by the question. Whatever answer he provided would not help, she knew: he could tell her that all would be well, but she’d worry about false hope. Or he could tell her the worst, and she would collapse in a heap.
“I feel that the world is meant to progress a certain way,” he said. “And it will, as it has always done. Life can be cruel, Lilliana. But it can also be the most beautiful thing imaginable. Be strong. You would be impressed by the power of affection.”
She had seen it all her life, in her parents’ relationship. Through conflict and joy, they had supported one another in astounding ways. The abundance of love in their family had been something that she and her twin, Rohan, had never taken for granted. But now, for the first time, she was beginning to understand what it might feel like to have a loved one ripped away.
A vast shadow passed over the floor just then, blocking out the dim light that made its way into the room from beyond the clouds which still lingered as though to conceal the house as best they could. Lily stood and ran to the window to see the red dragon landing hard in the back garden. A figure slipped off his back just as Graeme transformed, and the two dashed for the house.
She waited—she still couldn’t bear to leave Conor’s side—and thirty seconds later, Dr. Evans charged into the room. Lily stood aside then, silently studying his face as he examined Conor quickly.
“I’ve seen this before,” he said. “Though admittedly only a few times. There is no name for it—but it’s a disease of the blood, when two different sorts are at war within the human body. Right now, the shifter in his genes is fighting the human for supremacy, and winning. But it could use some help. You were right to call on me—he would remain like this until his body gave out.”
“Is there any hope, Doctor?” asked Lily, for the first time daring to think there might be.
Dr. Evans smiled. “What a question. Of course, Lilliana. There’s always hope. And short of that, I brought something that will ease his transition.”
“Oh, thank God,” said Lily, slumping back into a chair, her legs unable to bear the weight of her worry. She felt it, too—that he meant the words. His mind was more open than Merriman’s, and told her that he was simply doing a job and knew the likely end result.
“Don’t lose your faith in him,” he said. “He’s a strong one. I can tell already, even if Graeme hadn’t told me so. The disease hasn’t advanced beyond its early stages.”
The doctor was administering some sort of liquid in a syringe and Lily watched, her breath seeming to deepen. She hadn’t registered just how much she’d needed those words of reassurance.
After a few minutes she stood again, making her way for the first time away from Conor, as confident as she could be that she was leaving him in good hands. She had another mate, after all, and he hadn’t made an appearance. Perhaps he needed her now as much as she needed him.
It was down in the kitchen that she found him sitting at the table, the clothing that he’d removed that morning half on, not entirely done up. He was far from his usual dignified self.
“Are you all right?” she asked. “Graeme, I…”
His eyes didn’t rise to meet hers. Instead, they remained fixed on his hand, which see
med to be playing the table like a piano keyboard in quick, nervous strokes. Slowly he turned to study her own eyes, and Lily saw evidence of tears, bringing a reddish hue to the white surrounding the light aqua of his irises.
“I’m…all right,” he said. “I suppose. As all right as I can be. Something’s happened, Lily.” His lovely Scottish accent caused his Rs to roll in a way that she’d grown to love, but the words were coloured by sadness and pain. Lily felt that she was looking upon a wounded fawn instead of a powerful dragon.
“What?” she sat down across from him and took his agitated hand. “What is it? You can tell me.”
“I don’t know. I’ve just never felt like this. As I flew to get the doctor and back again, I became more and more worried, agitated. As though a part of me were dying. I felt…loss. Beyond loss. It was so grey, so foreboding.”
“You feel it too,” she said. “You feel the bond with Conor.”
“So you know what I’m talking about?” Graeme’s shoulders seemed then to descend, as though the tension in his body had held them in a tightly elevated position.
“Yes. I do. I’ve felt it all day—as though I will die if he does. As though he’s now a part of my skin, my organs.”
“Yes. That’s exactly it. It…terrifies me. I’ve never once in my life felt vulnerable. Never. What has happened?” His voice, so deep and strong, reminded her of a small child, terrified at one of life’s awful moments of disillusionment.
Lily squeezed his hand and he held hers in turn, their warmth mingling.
“Your humanity is growing just as Conor’s déor is doing,” she said. “You are learning what it is to be connected with others.”
“Well, it’s bloody awful,” he said, smiling at last. “I’m not at all pleased with this whole ‘love’ affair.”
“You’re stuck with it now.”
Dragon Flight: A Dragon Shifter Menage Serial (Seeking Her Mates Book 3) Page 2