The theater technicians backed off and extinguished fires instead of chasing the elemental around the stage.
Ember sat down, cross-legged, near the bottle. It was a good thing she’d worn slacks that day. Besides, no use wearing a skirt to work if Cai Wyvern wasn’t going to be there to admire her legs.
Ember rested her wrists on her knees and drew a deep breath, settling and centering herself.
Okay, wild elementals were just like tamed elementals. They were just friends she didn’t know yet.
Ember released the anger and anxiety with a long exhale, allowing worry and anger to flow out of herself. Another inhale, and then she opened her soul. Calm energy flowed out of herself and over the stage.
The fiery whirlwind tottered and slowed, watching her.
She had its attention.
Ember lifted her hands into the air and twisted her fingers into complex positions that she had learned from her grandmother’s grimoire. With her hands forming the arcane shapes and held in just the right places, Ember’s body turned into a lens and magnified her usually shaky magical powers. With her next breath, Ember blew her magic at the bottle, forming a magnetic vortex from its mouth like a funnel.
The vortex would not suck the fire elemental into the bottle. The fire elemental had to choose to enter the vial.
Ember began to hum. The song was a hymn from her childhood, from when her mother used to drag her to church constantly. It didn’t matter what the song was, only that Ember imbued the music with her magic and with emotions that would convince the fire elemental to allow itself to be tamed.
Her focus on the fire elemental sharpened.
The chaos of the stage—with the technicians running around to extinguish small blazes that had popped up in the elementals path and the non-supernaturals freaking out and screaming about ball lightning or a demon, not that any of them knew what a real demon looked like—faded away from her senses.
Within seconds, the fire elemental became Ember’s whole world.
Slowly, the flaming, whirling dervish settled, feeding off Ember’s magic and serenity. The fire elemental ceased its restless wandering around the stage and hovered on the other side of the bottle from Ember.
Ember unspooled more calming magic into the fire elemental, soothing its anger. Before she had gotten there, they’d been doing all sorts of things to it, trying to frighten it away or kill it. The poor thing, no wonder it was so upset.
With her magic and her music, Ember enticed the fire elemental into climbing into the magnetic vortex and containing itself in the bottle.
She leaned forward without breaking her song or her concentration and gently dropped the stopper into the bottle’s mouth.
The vial bobbled and then stilled.
Ember blew out one last breath, and the arena and stage slowly came back into focus around her.
Cai Wyvern was standing near her, his phone in one hand by his side as he watched her. His phone squawked, and a face moved on the screen. His eyes were still full of green fire when he looked at her.
Cai asked her, “Is everything okay now?”
She nodded, still a little blissed out from emptying herself to gentle the fire elemental. “Yeah. He’ll be fine now.”
“I needed you,” he said, and then he shook his head.
“Well, I’m glad you had an elemental witch near. Where did this guy come from, anyway?”
“He? It’s a he?”
“Definitely a he.”
“He just popped up. The show we were loading in swears that they had nothing to do with it, but they didn’t say it very convincingly. I think they were using elementals instead of pyrotechnic effects. Luckily, only a few people got singed.”
“Oh, yeah.” Ember picked up the bottle and held the warm metal in her palms, still sending soothing vibes to the fire elemental. “Captured elementals can break free and wreak havoc. It’s dangerous to use them like that, especially if they’re forced to perform. They’re much happier in bottles.”
“Let me take you to lunch, Ember,” he said.
She glanced at him. “I’ve heard that from you before.”
“I promise I won’t turn chicken and run away.”
“From what I’ve heard, the turning-chicken flu is going around.”
“What?”
“Nevermind. My lunches have already cost you enough.”
“I thought it was funny,” he said.
She braced her fist on her hip. “You thought a fifteen-thousand-dollar lunch was funny?”
He laughed. “It was! It totally served me right.”
“We have nothing in common,” Ember told him.
“I’m sorry for running out. It seemed like the right thing to do at the time.”
“What on Earth could have happened to make that seem like the right thing to do?”
“Nothing to speak of. Let’s get lunch.”
Her stomach growled. She dropped the fire elemental’s metal bottle in her bag to cover up the sound. “I’m okay.”
“Come on. I know a great restaurant.”
Free Lunch
CAI led Ember up the elevator to the restaurant at the very top of the casino. The wide windows surveyed all of the Las Vegas Strip and dusty lots along the street, and the desert painted in swaths of bleached sage, umber, and gold stretched to the horizon.
The round booths against the walls and square tables filling the restaurant were empty. Silence hung in the dining room. They hadn’t turned the music on yet. He’d have to check on that.
Ember asked, “Should we be in here?”
A woman wearing a black sheath dress toddled out of the kitchen on very high heels. “I’m sorry, we’re not open—oh, it’s you, Mr. Wyvern. I’ll be back with menus.”
Ember turned to him, her lovely eyes wide and questioning.
Cai shrugged. “I’m a VP. When vice presidents want to eat in the restaurant, we eat in the restaurant.” His phone chimed in his pocket, buzzing against his thigh.
“I’ll pay for my lunch,” she said.
“I owe you for taking care of the fire elemental.” His phone chimed and vibrated again.
She looked around, turning her oval face to the ceiling and walls. “This place looks expensive. I mean, there’s a lot of crystal hanging from the ceiling.”
“Opening this restaurant is cheaper than leaving you alone with a room service menu.”
She nodded. “That’s probably fair.”
They sat in a booth in the far corner of the room, away from the strong Nevada sunlight streaming in the windows, as they were an hour or so late for lunch. Ember hurled her enormous, rattling purse into the booth and then scooted in.
Cai’s phone chimed three times in quick succession. He wrenched it out of his pocket and squeezed the side button, powering it off.
“Are you sure you shouldn’t get that?” she asked.
“I don’t care what it is,” Cai said. He really didn’t.
As the screen went dark, he caught words from texts.
Shifter Valentine threatening—
Urgent—
Where the hell are you—
He shoved the phone back in his pocket. “I wanted to apologize for last week.”
Ember shook her head, her black curls falling around her face. “It’s okay. It was weird at the time, but it’s not the first time a guy has kissed me and run screaming out of the room.”
What? “It’s not?”
She grinned. “I’m kidding. It was totally the first time that’s happened. I’m okay, though. I’m an elemental witch. I get hot when I’m mad, but I cool off and then I’m done.”
“It wasn’t you. It’s me,” Cai admitted. “There’s something going on with me.”
“It looked like you’d been bewitched and the spell broke.” She chewed on her full, lower lip. “It looked like something changed, and you didn’t want to be there.”
“It was me. Not you. You’re wonderful. You’re amazing.” Other adj
ectives flooded his mind: sexy, alluring, enchanting, overwhelming, desirable, luscious.
Mine.
Cai really couldn’t say that last one out loud.
Instead, he tapped his temple and said, “Something clicked up here.”
She stared down at her hands, intertwined in front of her on the table. “So, you weren’t the victim of black magic?”
“No,” he said. “Of course not.”
She blew air out like she was releasing pent-up worry. “Okay. I’ve heard that a lot of black magic goes on here in Las Vegas, that you can’t pull a slot machine lever without elbowing a witch practicing the dark arts.”
“No, it was just a thing. I’d forgotten a thing I was supposed to do.” Or not do.
He’d forgotten not to fall into mating fever.
It had been so much easier than he’d thought it would be.
She unwound her hands and stretched her delicate fingers on the table. “Did you get it done?”
“Nope, it caused a problem, and that was why I hadn’t called you yet.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. “But I texted.”
“Yeah, you did, and we need to talk about the jewelry.”
He waved off her comment. “Trinkets.”
“Dude, I can Google. Those are not trinkets. Those Tanzanite earrings were Tiffany couture. They don’t even list the price on their website. How much did they cost?”
Cai shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”
It didn’t matter. He didn’t care about the prices at all.
Every time he’d walked by the Tiffany store in the casino’s lower shopping level, he’d been dazzled by the jewelry. His dragon liked shiny, pretty rocks anyway. All dragons hoarded gems and precious metals. Even having a Tiffany & Co. store in the casino had been a bone of contention among the DDi board because gems and gold tempted dragons too much. It was just a dragon thing, and he’d never thought twice about it until he’d gone to college and learned that other shifters and naturals didn’t have a glittering, shining pile of wealth hoarded in a mountain somewhere. Most dragons who’d had their parents watching over them during their late adolescence evidently had safety-deposit boxes in banks instead of a cache in a cave.
Except now, he desperately wanted to see gemstones and gold shining on Ember’s skin. He wanted to pour diamonds over her stomach and breasts. He wanted to drape her with gold. He wanted to take the thick, gold necklace out of his pocket and lay it around her neck.
She said, “It matters. It’s too much.”
He said, wincing at the lameness of it all, “But, I did text.”
“Not enough.”
“But some, and I texted this morning.”
“Yeah, because you needed a favor.”
“Yeah, I needed a favor.” Until the consequences of not calling her had exceeded the consequences of doing so. Mathonwy would have chewed Cai’s butt ragged if the casino had burned down so close to the gala opening. “So, we’re okay?”
“Yeah,” she sighed. “We’re okay. Just as long as you realize it’s kind of weird.”
“I realize it.”
“And you should cool it with the jewelry.”
“What, you don’t like it?” Oh, that could be bad in a dragonmate.
Not that he was thinking about making her his dragonmate.
Except when he was.
Which was every second.
“Yeah,” she said, “I like it. But it’s too much. It’s too expensive. It’s like you want something from me.”
“I don’t,” Cai said, even though he did. He wanted her skin under his fingers and her body to rise up under his breath. “I just wanted to apologize.”
“Okay. Apology accepted.”
“Excellent.”
Ember’s fingers were resting on the table, inviting him to hold them, to pick them up and kiss them, to drag her toward him and haul her over his lap and sink his fingers into her hair and kiss her as deep as her soul.
He needed to stop thinking things like that. His rationalization for taking her out to lunch was to apologize for being a dick and then to flee again. If he didn’t hang around her, maybe this damned mating fever would go away.
But he knew better than that. Mating fever never went away. Cai was just engaging in some deep denial.
If he did hang around her, though, he knew the mating fever would progress more quickly.
And he didn’t know what to do about that.
For now, he really wanted to be okay with her. If she were walking around in the world out there and mad at him, he would feel awful.
Now that Ember had said she was okay with him, Cai really should stand up and leave her here to reduce his exposure to her. It would be the smart thing to do.
Leaving her alone might increase the time until mating frenzy settled in.
The hostess dropped the leather-bound menus on the table as she went by.
Cai pushed one toward Ember. “I always have the hamburger, protein-style, with sweet potato fries. Take a look.”
Ember perused a menu for a second, and they ordered from the hostess. Cai had a vague impression of blondeness in the hostess’a direction, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of Ember.
When the hostess left, Cai said to Ember, “That was amazing, the way you corralled the fire elemental.”
She shrugged. “Some people think I’m weird because I’m an elemental witch.”
“Oh?” Her fingers were sitting right on the white tablecloth, well within his reach. He could casually fold his hand over hers, and it would seem completely natural.
He.
Did.
Not.
Do it.
. . . Yet.
Ember continued, “Elemental magic is considered a little—” she paused, biting her lush, lower lip, “—a bit of a sort of—” she toyed with her water glass, turning it on the table, “—shadowy.”
“Shadowy?” he asked, smiling a little and waiting.
“It tends a little toward—black magic.”
Cai sat back in the booth. Black magic. Running out on a black-magic witch had been stupid, but he didn’t think Ember was vindictive.
His limited time left in this dimension might have been significantly more itchy.
Or feathered.
Or inside a deep, dark hole.
But she hadn’t done anything to him.
He asked, “Do people consider that to be a problem?”
Ember’s dark eyes widened, and she nodded. “Oh, yeah. Some people have a big problem with it. When it became apparent that my magical abilities ran toward the dark arts, I was worried that even Bethany and Willow might not be able to handle it, and we’ve been friends since kinder. They handled it fine. They know I’m an elemental witch and all that entails, but they’re still my buds.”
“I’m sorry. That must have been hard for you.” Cai knew how to talk to the ladies: listen to what they said and try not to mansplain their feelings back to them. It was easier than it sounded.
Her lips parted, almost saying something, but she pressed them back together and looked down.
“Yes?” Cai asked.
“There are essentially four categories of magic,” Ember said slowly. “Black, gray, white, and clear. I never liked those names. Why is black magic always the bad one?”
“Yeah, that doesn’t seem fair.”
“It’s just one more thing, all the time, you know?”
He shrugged. “Why are they colors at all? They should just be good, neutral, and evil.”
“Too judgmental,” Ember said. “Nobody’s going to admit to straight-up evil magic.”
“Or jasmine, carnation, and rose magic, if you wanted to name them for scents.”
She lowered an eyebrow at him. “No one would be able to tell which one was the bad one.”
“It’s the roses. Roses are the bad one. I’m allergic to roses, so if I get to make the scale, roses are the evil one. An ex-girlfriend tried to kill me by sending me two dozen specimens of
blood-red revenge. Nice vase, though.”
“Not judgmental enough,” Ember said. “People wouldn’t care.”
Cai thought about it. “Then, maybe red, yellow, and green, like stoplights.”
She wobbled her head a little. “That’s pretty good. But in the meantime, elemental magic is considered a gray area in the black-to-clear continuum, and sometimes, it’s closer to straight-up black magic.”
He twitched one eyebrow. “I hadn’t heard of clear magic. Maybe there should be four new color codes. Red, yellow, green, and blue.”
“Yeah, we’ll up-end a thousand years of grimoire classification systems to change the colors of magic to pretty, kindergarten crayons. Do you know many witches?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Not really. There was one girl in grade school, the little sister of one of my friends who turned out to be a witch instead of a dragon. My mother is a natural.”
And a psychopath, but Cai didn’t mention that.
“She isn’t a dragon?” Ember asked.
“Most dragons don’t mate with other dragons,” he said. “My father was the dragon. Most dragonmates are supernaturals—witches and mages, fae, other shifters, occasionally vampires. Natural dragonmates are rare, but sometimes it happens.”
“I would have thought that it would be easier to marry another dragon. I’ve never known a dragon shifter, except for Bethany’s and Willow’s husbands. But before that, never. You guys tend to keep to yourselves.”
“Have you met those guys?”
“Math and Arawn? No, they’re like, shy, or something.”
“Dragons can be introverts. Not me, but others.” This was getting too close to the subjects of Cai’s parents and fated mates. He hoped Ember hadn’t talked to Willow and Bethany too much about that last subject. He asked, “So, gray magic?”
“Oh, yeah. Well, some people have some misconceptions about keeping elementals. It’s gotten a bad rep. They’re sentient, see? Some people are conflating it with—” she ducked her head, “—some very, very bad, pre-Civil War, historical practices.”
Dragons and Fire Page 9