It was the middle of the afternoon on a Saturday, a sunny day that had warmed the air a bit. It was still chilly and Lila was glad of her down-filled coat. She was trudging through a concrete wasteland with Nyssa, and totally out of her element. There wasn’t a drop of water in sight, except the glimpses she caught of the Hudson River between the buildings. Lila lived on a remote island, with her own company and sometimes that of the seals: Manhattan didn’t even feel like an island to her and it was jam-packed with humanity. How did Nyssa survive in such a place?
“Time for a change,” Lila said lightly, choosing not to tell Nyssa all of the truth. Her sister-selkie was notoriously indiscrete, as well as in possession of passionate urges of her own. “Plus most of the seal pups have been delivered by now, and the count is even higher than last year.”
Lila was a marine biologist in human society, which gave her the perfect excuse to remain on a remote windswept island in the middle of the sea and study her distant cousins, the grey seals. Each fall, the seals came ashore at North Rona Island to bear their young and she managed the count of new pups. Nyssa was right: Lila never left the ocean without good cause, but too many nights of burning with unsatisfied desire counted as an excellent reason.
Lila spared a glance at Nyssa, remembering her manners, and saw the small shadow on her aura that she should have anticipated—and would have, if she hadn’t been consumed with the idea of a certain dragon shifter. “I was sorry to hear about Aquinas,” she said softly, referring to Nyssa’s long-time partner and mate. “My condolences.”
Nyssa winced. “Thank you, but I wish it upset me more.” She sighed. “I miss him, of course, but he was so much in love and it was never quite mutual. I liked him, but I always knew I was disappointing him. I don’t miss that.”
Nyssa was nothing if not honest.
And there was a reason why selkies were reputed to be cold-hearted. In Lila’s view, her kind had a gift for star-crossed love. She’d made that mistake herself, and she knew Nyssa yearned for someone other than Aquinas, who had adored her. No wonder they all avoided emotional entanglements. Romance was always unsatisfactory for selkies.
Lila was well aware of all the people looking at them—mostly men, checking them out—but Nyssa was as oblivious of her surroundings as ever.
Or maybe it was just humans she ignored so well.
Maybe that was how she managed to live amongst them so easily.
Nyssa shook her head, which made her dark hair flow around her shoulders as if it had a life of its own. “And Nereus let you leave,” she said. “That’s incredible!”
Lila bit her tongue with an effort. She hadn’t told Nereus, the King Under the Seas, about her trip, the plan being that she’d be back on North Rona before he noticed. The leader of their kind could be a bit tedious about his insistence on knowing everything about his subjects. Lila didn’t think her personal life was his business, and she doubted he’d approve of her seducing a dragon shifter, given his persistent pursuit of her in the past.
“Isn’t it?” she said instead of revealing the truth.
“He’ll decide he doesn’t approve,” Nyssa said, laughing a little. “He’ll decide that you’re defiant and he is outraged.”
“Probably.”
“The ocean will roar, the waves surging toward the sky as he vents his wrath.” Nyssa flung her hands toward the sky. “Ships will be tossed and turned, coasts will be deluged...”
She was joking, but not really. Nereus did have a temper and he did hold the trident that caused earthquakes.
“He’s not that bad,” Lila protested. “But he can be a bit overbearing.”
“He doesn’t have enough to do,” Nyssa said with a shake of her head.
“Give him some more children,” Lila suggested. “He always wants to increase our numbers.”
“You first,” Nyssa replied. “Hasn’t he been in love with you forever?”
“I don’t want to talk about that.”
To Lila’s relief, Nyssa changed the subject.
“I’m glad you finally did leave that island, even if I need to help you find dragon shifters. What do you want with them anyway?”
“Just curious,” Lila lied, bunching her hands in her pockets. The wind suddenly felt colder to her, and she suspected it was because she wasn’t coming clean with Nyssa. She wanted as few people as possible to know about the firestorm. “You said they’d come to the meeting of Others and I’ve never seen one.”
“You’re not likely to see one at the bottom of the ocean, or on a remote island north of the Orkneys,” Nyssa ceded. “Still, it’s a long trip for the sake of curiosity.” She gave Lila a hard look that was difficult to hold.
“Don’t you think it’s surprising that you saw them in Manhattan?”
“Nothing surprises me in Manhattan anymore.” Nyssa rolled her eyes. “But I didn’t get a good look at them at the Halloween meeting. They hurried into the back.”
“Why?”
“Because other dragons had showed up previously, on a night when no one expected them, and then everything went to hell.” Nyssa reached for the handle on a steel door, then winced as she corrected herself. “Not literally Hell. Just Fae. And not everyone—just four of the dragon shifters and the bartender.”
“I knew what you meant. Four dragon shifters?”
Nyssa nodded. “They went into Fae.”
“Did they come back?” Lila asked with alarm. She’d worried that her dragon shifter had been captured by Maeve, but what if he’d willingly entered Fae? Maeve would demand something of him in exchange for leaving her realm—if she let him leave at all.
But surely she was burning for him because he was back. Lila didn’t really know. She hoped she didn’t have to endure this need forever.
“I don’t think so,” Nyssa said with an indifference that Lila didn’t share. “It was different dragon shifters who came on Halloween, and they conferred with Murray and Caleb and the vampires. I didn’t get to hear.” Nyssa pulled open the door and Lila realized they must have reached their destination.
If this was a restaurant, it didn’t look very inviting. Lila glanced up and read the sign. Bones. She guessed they served meat. Too bad. She was hungry but only ate fish and vegetables. She looked up and down the street and couldn’t imagine there was a lot of clientele in such a rough neighborhood.
Meanwhile, Nyssa had opened the door and stepped into the darkness beyond. Lila smelled something burning that wasn’t food and heard power tools. She narrowed her eyes against a flurry of sparks on the opposite side of the dance floor and resisted her urge to flee. Buildings were bad enough and paved streets crowded with vehicles, but tools and motors were not her thing at all.
The shooting sparks made her think of her dragon and her mouth went dry.
Let him be in Manhattan.
“They’re only installing the steel wall now?” Nyssa asked of the hostess. “It’s been almost two weeks!” They obviously knew each other.
The hostess had black hair, black eyeliner and black lipstick. She was dressed all in black, with multiple tattoos on her arms. Lila got a whiff of Other and thought she might be a Medusa. If so, she apparently didn’t want to talk about old times or the Isle of the Blessed. Maybe she was too young to remember. Her aura was pale and youthful.
She rolled her eyes at Nyssa’s question. “You know Murray. He has to find just the right person for the job. Besides, the wizard can’t come until tomorrow.”
“Why does he need a wizard?” Lila asked Nyssa.
“Because that’s a portal to Fae,” the hostess said, matter-of-factly, then nodded at Nyssa. “You eating or just drinking?”
Lila tried to hide her shudder and didn’t look at the wall in question. She didn’t like any suggestion that the Dark Queen or her powers were close.
“We just want to talk to Murray,” Nyssa said. “We’re looking for a dragon shifter.”
“Aren’t we all?” the hostess said, then smiled and sh
ivered. “Did you see them?” She made a growling sound in her throat then rolled her eyes and Nyssa laughed.
Lila didn’t say anything because she totally agreed. It was all too easy to remember that red dragon, the way he flew and bore down on her, the way he sliced through the ocean—the way he shifted shape to a gorgeous man then kissed her until she couldn’t remember her own name.
That kiss. What would satisfying the firestorm be like? The best sex ever, she had to guess, and was impatient to find him all over again. She pushed her hands deeper into her pockets, trying to hide that golden glow.
“Hey, Murray!” the hostess turned and shouted across the virtually-empty restaurant. “Nyssa’s looking for the Pyr.”
A short stocky man covered with tattoos, his brows furrowed, left the workmen installing the steel barrier and came to meet them at the bar. A dwarf. Of course, he would be fastidious about hiring the right craftsperson for any job, regardless of how long that might take. Dwarves were more inclined to focus on practical concerns. He’d probably gotten at least three competing bids and checked their previous jobs before deciding. A selkie would have had that wall faced with steel in no time flat.
His aura was a deep blue that hinted at his reliability. It was intact, so he had no injuries. Lila suspected his loyalty would be as robust as his health. It also had a taint of grief, though, a deep shadow that spoke of a devastating loss.
He surveyed Lila with suspicion then inhaled. “Friend of yours?” he asked Nyssa, even though his wariness had diminished.
“Sister,” Nyssa said, which was the easiest explanation if not precisely the truth. Lila and Nyssa were probably third or fourth cousins. Selkies weren’t fastidious about keeping track of such details.
Murray nodded, unsurprised. “Why the Pyr?”
“Lila’s never met one.”
“Some people would be good with that situation,” Murray said.
“Maybe she feels like playing with fire,” the hostess said, then laughed at her own joke before she went to set tables.
Nyssa leaned on the bar. “Do you know who any of them are in real life?”
“Well, the one who introduced himself the first time was Theo Stephens, but he’s the one who’s missing along with Mel.” Murray flicked an apprehensive glance at the wall being faced with steel. “He didn’t tell me the names of the others who showed up with him later.” He gave Nyssa a look. “The ones who went through the portal.”
“But there were three different ones who came on Halloween,” Nyssa reminded him.
Murray nodded agreement again, then counted them off on his fingers. “Drake Stephanos, Arach Knight and Balthasar Marino. Stephanos lives in Virginia but I don’t know about the other two.” He folded his arms across his chest and looked stubborn. “And I don’t know how to get a hold of them either.”
Lila wasn’t sure about that. His attitude made her suspect that he knew more than he was prepared to tell. “What about the ones who went into Fae?” she asked. “Did they get out again?”
“That was the thing,” Murray conceded with reluctance. “On Halloween, Drake figured out that they were still alive, and went to find out more.” He drummed his fingers on the bar. “He read their names out of the book, but I don’t remember what they were.”
Nyssa sighed.
“The book?” Lila asked.
Nyssa looked left and right, then whispered. “Her book of beasts. It’s an inventory. Or a To Do list, depending how you look at it.” She grimaced then shivered. “We’re both there.”
Lila grimaced. She knew the Dark Queen intended to eliminate all of the Others, but not that there was a list of outstanding creatures to annihilate.
It was so easy to despise Maeve.
The dwarf cleared his throat. “There were more who were added to the list. Seven, I think. They figured out that the book updates itself and that Maeve was trapped in Fae.” Murray mused for a second then snapped his fingers. “But another one called yesterday and left a message, saying they were okay but didn’t know any more about Mel yet.” Murray tapped a finger on the glossy black bar. “He had a Scottish accent.”
Not her shifter.
“That doesn’t narrow it down much, Murray,” Nyssa said, then pointed at Lila. “My sister has a Scottish accent.”
“Right.” Murray went around the bar and picked up the receiver on the phone there. He punched in a code and Lila guessed that he was going to access the message in the voice mail. He tapped a code again, then put it on speaker.
The man did indeed have a Scottish accent. “Hi, Murray. This is Alasdair MacEwan. We met briefly on the night of October 28th. You might recall my friends leaving...rather abruptly with your bartender.” Lila smiled that he didn’t specify their destination. He cleared his throat before continuing. “I wanted to let you know that all but one of them are safely home. We’re still trying to get in touch with Theo, and I hope that he’s with your bartender. I’ll stop by on Monday to bring you up to date on what we know.” He paused. “We all hope they’re both okay.”
Her dragon wasn’t trapped in Fae. Lila was relieved.
“He didn’t leave a number,” Nyssa said with disappointment.
“I didn’t need him to,” Murray said. “It’s displayed right here. He was calling from some fancy restaurant down in Tribeca. Everyman Epicure.” He grimaced. “Sounds like one of those snotty places where you get a quail egg, a lettuce leaf and a raspberry on a huge plate for twenty bucks.” He widened his eyes and nodded, as if trusting them with a secret. “It’s organic, though.” Then he frowned and shook his head. “I guess you can come back on Monday to find out more.”
Nyssa was already looking up the restaurant on her phone. Lila would have done the same if hers hadn’t turned into an expensive paperweight as soon as she’d entered U.S. airspace. She traveled so seldom that she hadn’t thought to buy a connection package. Nyssa turned the phone to show the website for the restaurant, which featured one hot chef with his arms folded across his chest looking straight out at the viewer.
Lila caught her breath and smiled. She would have recognized her dragon shifter anywhere.
“That’s one of them,” Murray said. “He went through that wall into Fae.”
“So, he’s one of the ones who came back?” Lila demanded and Murray shrugged agreement.
The chances of success had definitely improved.
“Didn’t you say you were hungry?” she asked Nyssa.
“Starving,” she agreed.
Lila wasn’t hungry for a quail egg or even a lettuce leaf. She wanted fiery hot dragon and she wanted him all night long.
“Then let’s go,” she said, looping her arm through Nyssa’s. “I’m buying.”
“Thanks, Murray!” Nyssa called as they headed out the door.
The Pyr gathered in the clearing between Kristofer’s house and his barn. Kristofer’s parcel of land was shaped like a great broad bowl, with the house at the very bottom. They were surrounded by fields dusted in fresh snow and a mixed forest that rose to the summit of the surrounding hills. A long winding drive led through the forest from the secondary highway a good distance away. A lively stream splashed down from the north, cutting a path through the fields, then continuing alongside the drive. It also ran through the closest town, and had been used to drive the mill there for over a hundred years. The sun was setting: the sky was streaked with orange in the west, and Rhys could already see the stars in the darker eastern sky. Except for the line of parked trucks and cars, they could have been in another time.
It certainly seemed like a scene from another era when Quinn, the Smith of the Pyr, shifted shape. He stood beside the jeweler’s forge he had brought with him, blew the flames so they danced higher and sent sparks into the darkening sky. He shimmered blue around his perimeter, then shifted to his dragon form, rearing back and breathing a plume of dragonfire into the sky in a celebratory gesture. Quinn was sapphire and steel in his dragon form and the firelight was refle
cted in his scales like a constellation of flickering orange stars. His mate, Sara, had come with him, along with their five sons, and Rhys noticed how closely the eldest, Garrett, watched his father.
He would be the next Smith.
Kristofer shifted shape next, becoming a sleek dragon of peridot and gold. There was a new ruddiness behind his scales, a burgundy hue that had never been there before and that made his scales look more brilliantly green. He was missing a scale on his lower chest and the skin was exposed there. He coiled his tail around Bree protectively as he faced Quinn and she smiled up at him.
Drake was there with Ronnie and her two sons: the older one, Timmy, was by her first husband and the younger son, Eric, was the result of her firestorm with Drake. Drake had been the leader of the Dragon Legion and was considered by Rhys and his fellows to be their primary commander. They’d worked together to defend Drake’s mate, Veronica, during their firestorm, as well as her son Timmy. Timmy had to be fifteen by now, Rhys thought, noting how tall the boy had grown. Drake shimmered blue around his perimeter, a precursor to the change, then shifted into an obsidian dragon of great power. Rhys saw Veronica run an admiring hand over him before he stepped toward Kristofer and Quinn, his eyes glinting with pride.
The leader of the Pyr, Erik Sorensson, shifted shape next. He’d come alone, leaving his wife and daughter in Chicago. Rhys admired Erik, seeing him as a kindred spirit in many ways. Erik was pragmatic and decisive, even though he had the gift of foresight. In his human form, he was wiry and tall, his dark hair touched with silver at the temples, with a British accent that became more crisp when he was annoyed. In his dragon form, he was onyx and pewter, and fearsome. He, too, breathed dragonfire at the sky, his green eyes flashing as he surveyed their surroundings for potential predators or observers. He began to breathe a protective barrier of dragonsmoke and it glittered as it unfurled.
The five Pyr who were closest to Kristofer shifted shape next and did so in unison. The blue shimmer of their pending transformation was blinding in its brilliance. Alasdair became a dragon of hematite and silver while Hadrian was emerald and silver in his dragon form. Arach was dazzling as a dragon scaled in aquamarine and silver. Balthasar’s dragon form was citrine and gold. Rhys himself summoned the change and roared with satisfaction as he took his dragon form, proud of his garnet and silver scales.
Dragon's Heart (The DragonFate Novels Book 3) Page 3
