Awaken the Dragon

by A. C. Arthur

  “Well, I don’t know about the two of you, but I’m ready to have some fun,” Ziva said before walking ahead of them.

  Theo looked over at Shola. “You okay with this?”

  He’d wanted to go to her room to talk to her privately before they’d left the Office, but Bleu had stopped him with more information on the vampires in Burgess. They hadn’t dealt with them much over the years, the species doing their business just like Theo figured he was doing his. It had been pure luck that their paths hadn’t crossed until now.

  “I am fine,” she replied.

  Theo smiled. Even though they were here on business and he needed to pay close attention to their surroundings in order to keep them all safe, he couldn’t help it. “Yes, you sure are,” he told her and lifted her hand to his lips to kiss. “You look really good in that outfit.”

  She blessed him with a smile.

  “We should get to work,” she replied, but squeezed his hand before he could release hers. “Thank you.”

  Theo didn’t want her gratitude. What he wanted—a fact that came to him via a powerful thud in his chest—was for her to look at him the way she was right now...every day.

  “Welcome to Twilight.”

  Theo dropped Shola’s hand and looked up at the sound of another woman’s voice.

  “You need a table or a booth? We’re pretty crowded tonight, so there might be a wait. Or there are some floor spots but you’ll lose your drink if you walk out there with it.”

  The woman standing in front of them was maybe five feet six inches tall, her hair was cropped short, her yellow gold eyes assessing and judging. She was a vampire, and considering she’d left her spot at the bar and walked all the way to the door to greet them personally told Theo she knew he was a dragon. That meant she knew Warrick.

  “Where’s Camden?” he asked her.

  “Did you have an appointment?”

  Even if he did, Theo knew she wasn’t going to let him see Camden.

  “Better than that,” Shola said, stepping between them. “I am his fiancée.”

  The beast pushed angrily against his skin, and Theo clenched his teeth at her words. Camden was never marrying her. Not as long as Theo lived. He was about to say something, make some clarification or whatever he could think of to get the vampire’s attention back on him, but he didn’t have to. The vampire knew who Shola was too. This one wasn’t trying hard at all to guard her thoughts or feelings. And normally, Theo couldn’t see either of those things, but this vampire was pretty transparent.

  “He’s not here,” she said with a less than appreciative look at Shola. “Maybe his fiancée should know where he is.”

  “Or perhaps his sidekick should,” Ziva suggested from where she now stood behind the vampire. She’d walked away from them and probably circled back when she realized they weren’t right behind her. Now she was blocking her path, should she decide to leave.

  The vampire turned slowly, and Theo watched with intrigue as Ziva’s expression changed.

  “Enes?” Ziva asked.

  “Ziva,” the vampire replied.

  They stood for a few quiet seconds while the bass thumped so loud Theo felt like the blood in his veins was pulsating to the rhythm. When another vampire bumped into Shola, pushing her up against Theo, he knew it was time to move this little meeting along.

  “Listen, we just want to talk to Camden. If he’s not available, maybe the four of us can have a private conversation, and you can deliver our message.”

  Enes didn’t return her attention to Theo, but Ziva did look up at him, nodding to let him know she’d heard him.

  “That sounds like a good idea,” Ziva said.

  “I’m busy,” Enes told them and attempted to push past Ziva.

  The vampire knocked against Ziva’s shoulder so hard that Ziva stumbled backward.

  Shola immediately stepped forward, but Theo beat her to the punch. He grabbed Enes by the arm and spun her around to face him. Upon turning, Enes bared her teeth and hissed at Theo. In return, he flashed his dragon eyes and let them heat until he knew she could see the inferno of flames in his irises.

  “Make the time,” he told her.

  She yanked out of his grasp and put her supersharp teeth away. “Follow me,” she grumbled and walked away.

  “You know her?” Shola asked Ziva as they fell in step behind Enes.

  “Yeah, something like that,” Ziva replied. “Long story, long time ago. Let’s stay focused.”

  Shola glanced over her shoulder, exchanging a look with Theo. He couldn’t focus on Ziva right now. He was too busy looking around while they made their way through the crowd. There were easily more vampires here than any other species. But Theo also spotted a few feline shifters, a witch and humans. Too many humans to risk any type of exposure here. Unless they were believers, which they could very well be, considering they were in this particular club at this time of night.

  They’d passed the thickest throng of people and came around the side of the bar where a brawny guy caught Enes’s glance.

  “Can I help you guys?” he asked when he came over to the edge of the bar.

  Theo looked at the new vampire directly, again with his dragon eyes, and snapped, “No.”

  Enes led them into the kitchen and through another door to what appeared to be their storage area, with boxes and supplies stacked on shelves.

  “What do you want?” she asked when they were all inside and the door closed behind them.

  “We need to see Camden,” Theo replied. “And if he’s really not here tonight, I want to set up a meeting with him. I’ll name the time and place. All he has to do is show up.”

  Enes rolled her eyes. “And be slaughtered by your kind. No dice, dragonboy.”

  “We were scheduled to have dinner tomorrow at someplace called the Royal Blood,” Shola said.

  Theo had no idea she was going to bring up the schedule that had been planned for her. His assumption was that they all knew the remaining items on that schedule were now null and void. However, they had discussed briefly who and what the Royal Blood was earlier, but he remained quiet and watched Enes for any reaction.

  “He’s taking you to the Royal Blood? Why?”

  Shola squared her shoulders and tilted her chin. “Because I am his fiancée.”

  Theo’s fists clenched this time. He wanted to put one through a wall or destroy that word from everyone’s vocabulary forever.

  “Why does she need an entourage? What is she, some type of shifter?”

  “She’s human,” Ziva told Enes.

  Theo watched Enes’s head turn quickly in Ziva’s direction. Even if he hadn’t overheard Shola questioning Ziva about Enes, he would have known that something had happened between the two.

  After a few moments, Enes returned her attention to Shola and frowned. “I’m not his personal assistant but I’ll—”

  Whatever she’d been ready to say was cut off by the sound of gunfire. Rapid, nonstop gunfire.

  “Shit!” Theo yelled and immediately grabbed Shola’s hand.

  He looked around the space only to curse again when Enes announced, “There’s no other door back here. We gotta go through the kitchen and out front!”

  “To where they are shooting?” Shola asked.

  Ziva pushed past them and headed for the door. “Let’s go! We’re sitting ducks back here.”

  They rushed through the door to where the people who had been working in the kitchen when they came through a few minutes ago were now either huddled in a corner, covering their heads under the work tables, or dead on the floor. Ziva kicked her way through the kitchen door with Theo close behind her, and Shola’s hand in his. Four men with guns stood at the front entrance producing a spray of bullets as they aimed recklessly throughout the space.

  Ziva looked back at Theo. “Cas
ualties,” she yelled and Theo knew what she meant.

  She was asking for permission. Theo answered by dropping Shola’s hand and pushing Ziva out of the way. Fire aimed straight at the ceiling would trigger the sprinkler system. Hopefully the water would cause a distraction, giving him enough time to run up on the gunmen without being shot. Not that bullets alone could kill him, but they would piss the beast off. He tilted his head back and began to open his mouth but before the spray of fire could escape he felt a cool blast from behind. Droplets of water fell on his face and arms just when he turned slowly to see Shola, her arms raised straight out in front of her, that white light he’d seen spark out of her fingers before, aimed like a laser toward the ceiling. Arcs of water spewed from each of her fingers, creating a waterfall throughout the entire front end of the club. It drenched the gunmen, who, instead of abandoning their shoot-a-thon, aimed their guns directly at Shola.

  Theo moved then. Faster than he ever had before, he was across the room in the blink of an eye using his powerful body like a bowling ball and barreling into the first gunman who in turn, knocked down the next one and the next one, until they all fell like dominoes. Ziva ran in that same direction, crushing wrists with her high-heeled boots and snatching guns. Theo had stood and grabbed the last two guns when he looked around to see Enes and the brawny bartender ducking out a side door.

  He lifted his wrist and spoke into his communicator. “Send enforcers and medical providers to Twilight! We’ll meet you back at the Office.”

  Water was streaming down his face. His clothes were wet. And the place they’d walked into, that not twenty minutes ago was booming with a party vibe, was now noisy with chaos while anyone who hadn’t been shot hurried out the door. It smelled of blood, gunpowder and violence. The water stopped and Theo saw Shola walking over to them. Her hands were at her sides, sparks dripping from her fingers.

  “I think this was payback,” Ziva said, coming up to stand beside him with a gun in each hand.

  Theo didn’t answer. He dropped the two guns he’d been holding, knowing the guys he’d taken them from weren’t going to try and reclaim them anytime soon because he’d cleaned their minds quickly while they lay on the floor. The cleaning would leave them asleep for at least fifteen more minutes. After that, they would be groggy and most likely hungry. Hunger could be an all-consuming thought, so it worked well just in case a stray memory tried to break free of the magick. Theo covered the few steps that were left between him and Shola and wrapped her in his arms. She shivered against him.

  “Help is on the way. We’re leaving,” he said simply and walked out the door they’d come in.

  Behind him, he heard Ziva kicking one of the guys again and then laughing as she too walked out.

  Chapter Nineteen

  They’d parked down the street and around a corner and walked quickly toward the truck after leaving the club.

  “Before you ask, she wasn’t a vampire when I knew her. She was human and naive and confused. I have no idea when Camden got his fangs into her,” Ziva said just before she turned the corner.

  Theo held Shola’s hand tightly as they turned behind her. He was just about to thank Ziva for yet another cryptic comment and demand more information, when they all stopped a few feet short of the truck because it was surrounded in cloudy smoke and thick metallic sludge puddled near the tires.

  “I could kill each of you right here and now,” a raspy voice spoke from deeper inside the dark alley. “But I only want what’s mine.”

  Theo moved until he was in front of Ziva and Shola. A look over his shoulder told Ziva that no matter what happened she was to protect Shola first.

  “Show your face, Camden!” he shouted into the darkness.

  “Give me what’s mine!”

  “I do not belong to you,” Shola answered. “I never have, and I never will!”

  Hundreds of bats came flying at them from the back of the alley. The sound of wings flapping and the cool air from the action breezing over them.

  “You will not renege on this deal!” Camden continued. “Only death and destruction will come if you do!”

  This time Theo didn’t hesitate; he opened his mouth and sent long blasts of fire through the alley, singeing the bats midflight. A foul stench filled the space as Camden yelled out. Theo ran into the darkness, following the golden eyes he could now see about twenty feet away standing behind a dumpster. It was a likely spot since the vampire was complete garbage, but when he came close, Camden laughed and shifted into a giant bat before taking to the night sky. Theo shifted right behind him—the dragon a much larger beast than the bat—the breadth of his wings and body crashing into the surrounding buildings before he could clear the space and soar through the air on Camden’s tail.

  * * *

  “Let’s go!” Ziva yelled and headed for the truck.

  Shola shook her head. She wasn’t leaving this spot without helping Theo. “He’ll never catch him,” she said and yanked her arm out of Ziva’s grasp.

  Ziva circled around to the driver’s side of the truck and opened the door.

  “You have no idea what Theo can do in that form. He’s—never mind, just get in!”

  But Shola was not convinced. She tilted her head back and looked up to the sky. Of course she saw nothing. Not the human-size bat that had just appeared or the massive dragon that had taken off after it. “Warrick is smaller. He will be able to hide better among the buildings. Theo cannot even get close.”

  “Get in!”

  Shola ran to the truck at that point, but before climbing in she lifted a hand, moving it in a circle. The air around them picked up to a strong breeze that whipped faster and faster. It was her hope that the quickened breeze would slow the bat down, while Theo’s larger, more powerful dragon would have no problem acclimating and even possibly excelling in the changed atmosphere.

  She was just about to climb into the truck when something wrapped around her ankle. It was tight, holding her to the spot where she stood. She looked down to see the metallic sludge lifting from the ground to twine around her ankle and up her leg.

  Cursing, she held on to the door and yanked her other leg into the truck. She rolled on to her side and was trying like hell to pull the trapped leg up with her, but it was holding her too tight.

  “What the hell is that?” Ziva yelled.

  “I have no clue, but in a minute, it will cut off my circulation!”

  “Oh no it won’t! Hold on!”

  Ziva slammed her foot down on the gas and the truck lurched forward before its tires screeched over asphalt. With half her ass on the seat, one leg inside the truck, and her fingers clenching tightly to the door, Shola was pulled in two directions like a horrible tug-of-war game. Ziva kept driving, and the sludge held its grip, until Ziva hit the corner.

  “Fuck!” Ziva yelled when Shola swung out of the truck, holding tight to the door, her legs flying into the air when the sludge finally released her.

  But Ziva continued to drive fast while Shola’s fingers kept their grip on the door that continued swinging away from the truck. It was when Ziva made a left turn that the door swung toward the truck and Shola was able to fall onto the seat, pulling her legs up tight beneath her. The door slammed and Shola’s head fell against Ziva’s arm.

  “I can’t drive with your head bobbing against me, Shola,” Ziva quipped.

  Shola adjusted herself in the seat and was about to give Ziva a snide remark, but she caught a glimpse in the rearview mirror and bit back a scream. That metallic sludge that had been wrapped around her leg had cumulated until it formed the silhouette of a person over ten feet tall and wearing a hood. It extended its arms revealing skeletal hands from beneath the sleeves of the robe and opened its mouth to release a horrific screech that had the windows of the truck exploding around them.

  “Shit!” Ziva screamed. “What the hell was that?”
r />   Shola couldn’t speak. Her throat burned, and her eyes remained fixated on the mirror even though the sludge man had dissipated after his angry cry. Her fingers began to shake, the rush of energy she usually felt at the expulsion of power not present. In its place was a weight so heavy that she couldn’t even lift her shaking fingers from her thighs where they’d been resting. Her shoulders trembled and recalled the feeling of her leg being pulled down, taken and restrained against her will. That sludge man wanted her.

  Warrick wanted her.

  And Shola just wanted to be free.

  In a startling second of clarity she realized she wanted to be free of this destiny, of the mandate to kill, of this entire existence that had more to do with someone else’s past mistake than her present happiness. It was unfair and unjust.

  It was her fate.

  * * *

  “We circled back just in time to see two vamps coming out of a side door at the club. Man and woman attempted to run to their car, but amazingly that vehicle was burned to a crisp right before their eyes,” Steele said with a haunting smile.

  “Did you burn their bloodsucking asses too?” Reece asked.

  “No,” Magnum answered. “I had some questions for them.”

  “But they weren’t in the mood to answer. Instead, they thought it might be nice to snack on us, so the woman made a dive at Magnum and went straight for his jugular. He tossed her so far down the alley she slid into a dumpster before being covered by some shiny metal liquid,” Steele said.

  Magnum agreed with his brother’s account of what had gone down and added to it. “The guy thought he had a better chance at hand-to-hand combat with Steele, but that didn’t work to his advantage. He was bleeding and cradling a chest full of broken ribs by the time he managed to squeak out the name Hoan. That’s who he said Warrick was working with. A demonic named Hoan.”