“I like my eggs scrambled,” I said.
“I like my cupcakes by the dozen,” she retorted.
I laughed. What the hell, hey? This wasn’t any crazier than my life usually was.
CHAPTER FOUR
Bryn, my full-timer, showed up for her shift early. After giving Warner an eyeful, she was happy to oversee the bakery setup and the last of the baking. I was fairly certain she thought Warner had spent the night, and she seemed to accept his leather getup with nothing more than a saucy grin.
Kandy grabbed a tray of her birthday cupcakes — Sass in a Cup, chocolate blackberry cake with dark-chocolate blackberry buttercream icing — and hustled Warner out into the bakery storefront to wrestle coffee out of the espresso machine while I hightailed it upstairs to change. I seriously hoped the werewolf didn’t break my La Pavoni Bar-Star, because the purchase of it had badly dented my business credit card last spring. The swanky new machine featured a copper boiler with an auto shut-off and two group heads — yep, I had no idea what that meant, except it was a classy red and crazy expensive. My espresso wizard, Todd, insisted it was the best, and totally kiboshed the idea of trying to buy a refurbished unit.
I dashed into my bedroom, where I pulled a royal-blue ‘Zombie Survival Plan’ T-shirt over my tank top, swapped out my PJs for an older pair of Seven jeans, and laced on my 7th Heaven 8 Eye Fluevog boots. I opted for flats, not knowing if I should expect to be attacked every time I went into the nexus now or not. Branson had been pretty huffy yesterday, so he might be giving me the silent treatment … again.
I grabbed my satchel and headed downstairs to get the map from Kandy. The green-haired werewolf distracted Bryn while I pretended to slip out the back door into the alley, but actually tugged Warner into the pantry instead. He covered his confusion at this maneuver pretty quickly. But then, all the chocolate the pantry held usually distracted me as well.
“That’s not for you,” I snapped as he reached for a two-pound box of 75 percent single-origin from Tanzania that I used in my gluten-free chewy chocolate cookies. He snatched his hand back as I opened the door to the basement, then looked pissed at his own reaction.
Yeah, that tone — completely ripped off from Gran — totally worked with Drake as well. But then, the fledgling was fourteen years old, not over five hundred years old like Warner. Though I was a little fuzzy on whether he should count the years in ‘stasis,’ so maybe he was actually much younger. Now really wasn’t the time to ask.
I’d be prickly about waking up a few hundred years in the future as well. What if all my favorite things no longer existed? I shuddered at the thought. My needs might be basic — family, chocolate, and fabulous, functional shoes — but they were necessities.
We descended the stairs and hit the dirt floor of the basement storage room. Not that I actually used it for storage. I didn’t bother turning on the single bare bulb that hung from a wire in the middle of room. We weren’t staying.
“Why are we here, alchemist?” Warner asked.
“You wanted a portal,” I said.
He glanced around the concrete-patched brick walls, as if he couldn’t see the portal sleepily thrumming away on the east wall. He was slightly hunched, his head just clearing the concrete ceiling. I could see him by the light of the pantry. He hadn’t closed the door behind him. I sighed and climbed the six stairs to pull it shut.
Turning back and descending again into the dark, I reached out to the magic of the portal and willed it to open for me as I brushed by Warner. Golden light flooded the tiny room.
He grunted in surprise. “Well hidden,” he murmured, intrigued.
I wondered if Pulou would be pissed at me for bringing Warner through this way. I got that the portal was some sort of secret, but when a mysterious dragon shows up, mystically transported — according to him — from another time, and his magic doesn’t feel malicious … well, I couldn’t think of what else to do but take him to the nexus. I wasn’t driving eight hours to the Sea Lion Caves outside Florence, Oregon, just to use the next nearest portal.
That was pack territory, and I didn’t want to ask Desmond — aka my-alpha-status-makes-killing-your-sister-okay — permission for anything. Plus, I was never, ever setting foot in that cave again. Ignoring the fact that I’d used it last January when Desmond had dangled Blackwell in front of me. I had thwarted destiny once — the vision that Chi Wen had shown me of Sienna’s death by my hand hadn’t come to pass — but I wasn’t going to play with fate … well, not willingly.
Assuming that Warner didn’t need his hand held, I stepped into the golden, pure magic of the portal. I felt that moment of suspension, a brief but blissful hesitation of step, before my forward foot hit the white marble floor of the nexus on the other side. The crossing was effortless for me now.
It took Warner longer.
The dizzily gilded circular room was empty, and the other eight doors firmly closed. I couldn’t taste Drake’s or Branson’s magic anywhere near, though that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to be attacked at any moment. Drake moved particularly fast, especially for a fledgling dragon. I got the feeling that even the other guardians saw something special in him, though I hadn’t met many other fledglings. None of the other guardians had selected successors, as far as I knew.
Interestingly, after my last face-to-face with Suanmi, I found the normally brain-warping magic of the nexus easier to handle. Perhaps I’d inadvertently absorbed some of the fire breather’s magic into my necklace. I had felt her intense power settle around me to a bearable level, and the necklace naturally functioned as a portable personal ward, so that did make some sense.
Warner stepped out of the portal behind me just as Chi Wen the far seer wandered into the room.
Ah, damn. I’d been trying to avoid destiny today.
Chi Wen, the eldest of the guardians, appeared to be an ancient Chinese gentleman. He loved to smile. As in, constantly. I wasn’t sure he was capable of any other expression. All gray hair and wrinkles, he came up to my collarbone, though he wasn’t particularly wizened.
As best as I’d guessed, he wielded oracle and telepathic powers. The oracle magic was like calling 911, except he was the only operator sifting through visions of disasters and pending worldwide destruction. He then tasked these imminent catastrophes to various guardians depending on their particular power sets. I wasn’t completely sure about the telepathic part, but I was fairly certain he could at least communicate with the other guardians without vocalizing his thoughts. Which was probably a good thing, because I rarely understood a word that came out of his mouth. And that had nothing to do with his heavy accent.
Chi Wen grinned at me like I was his own child safely home from the demonic wars … and in his mind, maybe I was. I curtsied with much more reverence and grace than I had for Suanmi.
I always tried to clear my mind in the far seer’s presence, but today I found myself repeating Please don’t touch me, please don’t read me in my head. The far seer scared me way more than any of the other guardians. Sure, they could all end my very existence with a single glance. But Chi Wen could show me my future, and that was utterly terrifying. Completely soul shaking.
Warner stepped up beside me. He wasn’t a stand-just-behind-my-shoulder-person like Kett, or even Kandy. With him being a mighty dragon — with obvious prejudices against my heritage — I was surprised he didn’t stride completely past me.
“Hello, dragon slayer,” Chi Wen called cheerfully as he shuffled toward us.
Warner cranked his head to look at me, actually taking a step away as he did so.
“Don’t look at me,” I said. “The far seer was obviously addressing you.”
“Yes,” Chi Wen said agreeably. “Every blade needs a solid hilt.”
Err … yeah, I had no idea what that meant. But I kept my mouth shut and tried to not flinch when Chi Wen patted my shoulder as he passed.
As he touched me, I suddenly realized I was drowning —
and had been drowning for some time — surrounded by crushing water. I started to panic, to thrash, to die — but then I broke the surface, my mouth full of salty water and the warm sun on my face.
I gasped for air, realizing I was in the nexus — that I’d never left — as I filled my lungs with as much oxygen as they could hold.
Chi Wen was gone.
Warner was looking at me like I was a ticking time bomb.
“What?” I asked, as snarky as I could be to cover my near drowning in the middle of a waterless chamber.
“What did the far seer show you?” Warner asked.
Well, that was a rude question.
A jet-black cat sauntered through the far archway. Its casual gait was insufficient cover for the cunning betrayed by its yellow eyes. Its sleek fur shone among all the gold of the decor, not a hair out of place.
Warner, still frowning at me, followed my gaze. Then he went utterly still and pale.
“A black cat in the heart of the guardian temple,” he murmured. He reached for a weapon that he didn’t actually have, then held his hands before himself, wary. “Doom crosses our footsteps.”
I snorted out a laugh. “What century are you living in?”
Spicy dragon magic — all apricots and smoky syrup — gathered around the cat along with a haze of golden light. The creature transformed amid a wash of intense magic, as the shapeshifters did. Then Bixi — doing her best Cleopatra impersonation — stood before us. White dress, gold armbands, heavily kohled eyes and all. She obviously didn’t have to stash extra clothing everywhere like Kandy did when she changed back from her wolf form.
Logically, I knew Bixi wasn’t actually Cleopatra, since she was supposedly only around seven hundred years old. But still, I wondered if there wasn’t some deep ancestral connection going on with the guardian of North Africa. And again, when did ‘seven hundred’ become an ‘only’? It was also interesting that the guardians seemed to decide what physical age suited them best. Suanmi was technically younger than Bixi but appeared to be a youthful forty-five. Bixi looked to be about my age at the most. My father Yazi, the third-youngest of the guardians, appeared to be thirty-five.
Warner dropped into a deep bow beside me.
“Hello, warrior’s daughter,” Bixi said, completely ignoring Warner.
“Hello, guardian.”
“What earthly delight have you brought with you this time?”
Warner started coughing — no, choking — beside me.
I reached into my satchel, fished around, and pulled out a simple yet modern, yellow-papered Sirene chocolate bar. As far as I knew, this was the only bar that the newly established company produced out of Victoria, on Vancouver Island. It consisted of a tasting pair made from 72 percent Ecuador and 67 percent Madagascar cocoa. It was a new purchase I’d acquired downtown last weekend at Xoxolat — a mecca of earthly delights that carried a vast selection of single-origin chocolate bars from around the world. I hadn’t even tried a single square of the Sirene yet, and I’d really been looking forward to it. Normally, I tried to distract chocolate-questing dragons with cupcakes or cookies, but in my haste to get Warner sorted out I’d forgotten to pack a box.
Bixi came just short of snatching it out of my hand. “I enjoy your visits, alchemist,” she said. Then, pressing the bar to her nose and smelling it through its wrapper, she sauntered off in the direction she’d come. Her thin, gold-strapped sandals made no sound on the stone floor.
Dragons had a strong sense of smell and great taste in chocolate. Though regrettably, they never seemed to have any around.
Warner straightened as she left, and stared after her long after she’d gone.
“You’ve never met Bixi?” I asked.
“No.”
I wasn’t exceptionally skilled at math, but if the Jiaotu I knew was four hundred years old and Bixi was seven hundred, there should have been room in there for Warner to have crossed paths with the guardian of North Africa. Though I didn’t know how old Jiaotu had been before assuming the mantel of guardian of Northern Europe. I didn’t know how long Warner’s mother had been gone. The dragon had whispered ‘four hundred and fifty years’ when Kandy had told him what year it was.
In retrospect, I’d been pretty heartless telling Warner his mom was flat-out dead. That hadn’t been my intention, but …
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“What?”
“I’m sorry. All this must be confusing and sad —”
“It’s my job, alchemist.”
Right. Dragons and duty went hand in hand.
“Fine.” I shrugged. “I can mind my own business. I hang with an ancient vampire who doesn’t like to chat about his past.”
“If I was a vampire,” Warner said, somehow infusing his voice with utter loathing without actually sneering, “I wouldn’t want to talk about my despicable and devious life either.”
Right. Kett and Warner were so going to be bosom buddies. I’d almost forgotten how enlightened dragons were — not. I guess I’d been hanging out with the easygoing ones. Now that was a laugh.
Choosing to ignore Warner and get this party started before we ran into anyone who might try to kick my ass — which was a rather long list when I was in the nexus … or Europe — I slowly rotated to look at the nine doors surrounding me. They were all still closed, but I thought I might try Suanmi’s trick of simply calling to Pulou.
“Pulou? Treasure keeper? Ah … the alchemist attends you?”
Nothing happened.
“Err … Jade Godfrey paging Pulou the treasure keeper. Paging Pulou.”
“Irreverent behavior isn’t going to get you —” Warner began. Then the door carved with wolves and white-capped mountains clicked open a couple of inches. Golden portal magic spilled out from around its edges. Then it snapped shut.
“Northern Europe?” I mused.
Warner didn’t answer, but he did stare at the wolf-carved door for a long time. I wondered why he didn’t just walk through it and confirm that his mother had relinquished her guardian mantel. Except, of course, Europe was huge and he’d have no way of knowing — as far as I could tell — where Jiaotu was on the other side. Each door of the nexus could lead to many different portal exits, as long as you knew where you were going before you stepped into the golden magic.
Actually, now that I thought about it, I had no idea what special ability came with the guardianship of Northern Europe. What powers Jiaotu wielded beyond his dragon strength, agility, and invulnerability. I hadn’t stumbled across a guardian manual in the library yet. Or better still, a clearly outlined flow chart. Yeah, guardians were a cagey bunch about magic. But then, so were most Adepts. I opened my mouth to ask Warner, then quickly decided against it. I didn’t want to appear more ignorant than I probably already did. Plus, it was just plain rude to ask about an Adept’s magic.
I sat down in the center of the room, crossed my legs, and retrieved a second treasure from my satchel — a 75 percent Madagascar raw chocolate bar from Raaka Chocolate in Brooklyn. Oh yes, lovely. This was also a new treat. I carefully opened the package, attempting to preserve the paper as I always did. Then I promptly ripped it, as I always did.
“We just wait?” Warner asked.
“Usually.”
The sentinel kept his back to me, standing with legs spread wide and arms crossed. Settling in for the long haul, I thought, and definitely setting down a no-chatting zone. Fine by me. I had new chocolate to savor, and I wasn’t keen on sharing with grumpy dragons.
Just as long as I didn’t start feeling sorry about Warner being way out of his own time … and his dead mother …
“You want a piece?” I asked.
“No.”
Jerk.
I wasn’t going to ask a second time.
∞
Pulou didn’t make us wait long, though he seemed less jovial than usual. In fact, his welcoming smile disappeared and didn’t return the instant h
e assessed Warner. The sentinel had bowed as the guardian stepped through the portal from Northern Europe. I’d already curtsied too many times in the past couple of days, so I didn’t bother. I figured my deference from yesterday still stood.
“Treasure keeper,” I said. I stood and tucked the remains of my chocolate back in my bag.
Pulou nodded, though his gaze remained on Warner. Bowed head or not, something about the set of Warner’s shoulders screamed defiance. And oddly, I found I liked that about him.
“This is Warner, son of Jiaotu … well … the former Jiaotu. He says he’s the sentinel of the instruments …” I stumbled with the formal phrasing. “Oh, I don’t freaking know. He appeared in the alley behind my bakery last night in a blinding flash of ridiculously powerful magic, right after some shadow tried to grab me. He collapsed and I hauled his ass into the bakery to sleep the transportation spell off. He says he’s a sentinel, and he’s pissed you gave me the map.”
Warner shifted awkwardly after this less than proper introduction, but he didn’t look up. His hands were firmly clasped behind his back.
Pulou didn’t speak.
“Treasure keeper,” Warner finally said, eyes still cast down somewhere around Pulou’s feet.
“Sentinel,” Pulou said. “I do not know you, and have only heard of your kind. My predecessor put you on task?”
“Yes, guardian,” Warner answered. “In the mid-fifteen-hundreds by my best reckoning. Much time has passed.” He glanced at me.
I grinned, wickedly. Yeah, I imagined I was very different from women in the sixteenth century.
Pulou’s laugh felt quick and cursory. “The warrior’s daughter is unique, no matter what the time period. If she consents to your presence on her hunt, you are fortunate indeed.”
“So it is true?” Warner asked, looking Pulou fully in the face. “You have tasked a half-blood to hunt down the instruments of assassination?”
Shadows, Maps, and Other Ancient Magic (Dowser Series Book 4) Page 6