His mouth was hot on mine, kissing a path upward, his tongue lapping fire at a spot above my eyes before he suddenly relaxed on me, my brain too stunned by the power of the orgasm I’d just had to do more than desperately try to get some air into my lungs, and hope my heart wouldn’t stop with the joy of it all.
“That ...” I was a bit surprised to hear a voice, then realized it was my own. I opened my eyes to find Avval draped across me, his breath steaming my neck. “That was the most spectacular orgasm of my life. Possibly that ever existed. If this is what it’s like to be a god, then goddess above, you are the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
He lifted his head, shifting his body so that he was propped up on his elbows, his eyes now iceberg blue, but they were anything but cold. “I would agree with your statement, but you would likely misinterpret why, so instead, I will simply ask if you would sing for me.”
I stared at him. “You want me to sing? But ... why?”
He brushed a spot on my forehead. For a moment it stung. “Because I like music, and yours comes from your soul. Will it displease you to do so?”
“No. I ...” I stopped for a moment, tears thickening painfully in my throat. “No one has ever asked me to sing for them. Oh, sure, plenty of people have wanted me to sing for their gain, in order to influence others, but no one has ever wanted me to truly just ... sing.”
He rolled off me, pulling me with him so that I was lying half across him. “I am not like the people you have met before. Sing for me.”
I sang. And it was almost as good as the lovemaking we’d just shared, just as intimate, but satisfying on a whole different level.
It wasn’t until I was drowsy and almost asleep that I remembered Jim’s words about the fate of demigods who entangled themselves with mortals.
Chapter Six
A horrible rumbling sound pulled the First Dragon from the edge of sleep. He lifted his head and looked down at his belly, unhappy with both the noise it was making and the hollow, needy sensation that accompanied it.
He was hungry. He disliked feeling hungry, and, in fact, felt somewhat helpless by it. In the days before when he had lived amongst the dragonkin, his mate fed him regularly. Maerwyn always saw to it that meals appeared just as his body was demanding sustenance, but now here he was, hungry.
He looked over at Charity. She slumbered beside him, her back to him, but her flesh pressed against his in a way that both comforted and aroused. How long had it been since he had taken a female? He thought, counting the centuries. Had it been so long since Maerwyn died? That sorrow seemed so ingrained in him that he had lost track of time.
He looked back at Charity, wondering what she would say if he asked her for food, but at that moment, he remembered the food that Aisling had promised to deliver. It was probably downstairs right at that moment, sitting there waiting to be eaten.
His stomach made the noise again. He grimaced and, propping himself up, leaned over Charity to murmur, “Food has been provided for us. Would you like to dine?”
“Mmm,” she said, sleep heavy in her voice. She burrowed deeper into the pillow. “Had some chocolate already.”
“I will eat,” he said, and stroked a hand down her naked back, wondering again at the silken feeling of her flesh. He’d forgotten just how delightfully different females’ bodies were from his, and he relished the sensation of reacquainting himself with all the intriguing nooks and crannies.
Charity made a purring noise, and wiggled into the blankets. He rose and tucked them carefully around her, pulling on his pants and shoes before making his way downstairs. The gatehouse had a small dining hall, a buttery, a solar, and two indoor privies. He made a quick visit to the last (reminding himself that dragons in the mortal plane had a lot to put up with), before going to find the food. He checked first the solar, but it was empty of food, as was the tiny dining hall. Finally, he entered the buttery—he checked himself even as he thought the word, and corrected it to the more modern word “kitchen”—where he found several packages of food that had been left.
This is a killer lasagna made with beef and lamb. Drake would eat a whole pan of it in one sitting if I’d let him, so I’m sure you and Not-Vicky will love it. Just peel off the plastic wrap and pop this in the microwave for ninety seconds to warm it up, read a note attached to one package. He pursed his lips, then said slowly, “Microwave.” He wondered if Charity would mind if he woke her up and asked her to ready his food, but decided that if Maerwyn’s reactions to such requests were anything to go by, Charity would likely mind it.
“I am the First Dragon,” he told the container of food, and with a glance around that would have been called guilty in anyone else, he breathed fire on it.
Unfortunately, the container was of an inferior quality, and it melted along with the lasagna that the green wyvern loved so much. The First Dragon was mildly annoyed by that fact, and was torn between a walk to the main house to ask for more and the growing need in his belly. He left the mess of melted container and food where it was and turned to the other container.
Just in case Not-Vicky is a vegetarian, here is a green salad. There’s a balsamic vinaigrette, and also a blue cheese dressing to go on it. Rolls are in the basket, and some pesto and smoked salmon are in the fridge. There’s some ice cream in the freezer in case you get a sweet tooth. Just call if you need more food.
He poked into the bowl, and wrinkled his nose. It was full of greens. The feeling in his belly demanded more than greens. He looked around the rest of the buttery—kitchen—and discovered a basket full of crusty rolls, of which he immediately consumed four. Then he found a small dish of butter, which made the next three rolls go down much easier. He opened cupboard doors, discovering various plates and cups and assorted containers, but it wasn’t until he opened a large cold cupboard that he found the other stores Aisling had mentioned.
He sat at the small table with his feast laid out before him.
“Pesto,” he said, spreading some of it on a roll,“is quite satisfying. Also the salmon.” He speared a piece of it and, after a moment’s thought, put it onto the roll with the pesto, then topped it all with a tangy white sauce that he found in the cold cupboard. “Mayonnaise. It sounds French.”
It took him some time to find something to drink, but he remembered a visit he’d made to his brother Osiris, and how Osiris had been insufferably smug about the running water he’d had installed at his palace in the Egyptian underworld. Sure enough, the gatehouse had a similar situation, and the First Dragon was able to quench the thirst that the consumption of twelve rolls had generated.
He took one last roll, put some pesto and salmon in it, and carefully carried it upstairs to present to Charity when she woke.
And that’s when he discovered that she was gone.
He stared around the room in which he’d spent such a pleasurable time, unable to believe his eyes. “Charity?” He looked in the bathroom, where she’d stood so delightfully unaware that he could see her entire naked backside, but she wasn’t in there. The bed was cool to the touch, indicating that she’d been gone for some time. Where had she gone? Had she returned to the main house, there to bespell his dragonkin?
He shook his head even as he thought it. She wouldn’t do that. He knew her heart wasn’t in the act she’d clearly been coerced into performing.
“She was abducted,” he told the salmon and pesto roll, and then ate it while considering what to do. If he were not bound by a promise, he would simply slip into the Beyond, the plane of existence in which resided, amongst other beings, demigods. There, he would use the full scope of his powers and locate Charity. But he’d made an oath to his dragonkin, an oath that could not be broken. Therefore, he must act as a dragon would who was bound to the mortal plane. A minute later, he stood at the door to the main house.
“Wha—First Dragon!” The kin who opened the door was one of the green wyvern’s personal guards. He had flaming red hair that was mussed as if he’d been roused
from his bed, which, the First Dragon mused to himself as he entered the home, was likely what had happened. “You do us honor to grace the home of the green wyvern, of course, but ... but is there something you need? Drake is asleep, as are all the wyverns and guests.”
The First Dragon eyed him. “What name have you been given?”
“Pál, First Dragon,” the guard said, bowing deeply. “It is my honor to be in service to Drake. And Aisling, of course.”
“Of course.” The First Dragon felt pleased with himself. Here he was, gripped in a sense of outrage and panic, and he made time to connect with one of his children. “Are you mated?”
An odd look passed over his face. “I ... I have ... she’s not a dragon ...”
“Ah. A mortal?”
Pal nodded.
“Thus are wyverns born,” the First Dragon said, and, after a moment, patted the dragon’s shoulder in a manner that implied that not all dragons were lucky enough to find a mate of the same species, but that he, the First Dragon, expressed admiration for the way that Pal bore up under that disadvantage. “The siren Charity has been stolen.”
“She what?” Pal’s voice rose on the last word.
“She was asleep, then she was gone. She would not have left of her own accord. Thus, someone must have stolen her away. Most likely the thieves who held her captive.”
Pal blinked a couple of times, then pulled out what the First Dragon—who tried to stay current wherever possible—knew was a mobile phone. “My apologies for waking you, Drake, but the First Dragon is here. No, she’s gone. Evidently really gone. The First Dragon believes she’s been kidnapped by her band.” He listened for a moment, then put the phone back in his pocket. “Drake will be down in a minute.”
Almost immediately there was the sound of footsteps, and Drake clattered down the stairs, buttoning a shirt as he did so. He made an abrupt bow when he reached the bottom of the stairs, and asked, “When was she taken? Did you see the band members? How did they escape the mortal police?”
“I do not know. I was feeding my belly,” the First Dragon answered. “Charity was upstairs sleeping when I left her, and when I returned with a roll for when she woke, I discovered she had been taken.”
“When you left—” Abruptly Drake’s teeth closed on what he had been about to say. He ran a hand through his hair, then swore softly under his breath when Aisling hurried down the stairs, tying the belt of a dressing gown.
“What happened to Not-Vicky? Is she OK?” Aisling asked, stopping next to Drake. Behind them, the demon dog thundered down the stairs.
“Her name is Charity,” the First Dragon told Aisling. “I do not know her status, but I have grave doubts that she went willingly.”
“Why?” Aisling asked, brushing back her hair from her face.
Drake donned a martyred appearance. “The First Dragon was ... er ... with the siren before he went to eat the food you sent over.”
“Yeah? So?” Aisling looked confused.
Jim sniggered and nudged Aisling’s leg. “Told you he had the hots for her. Guess it pays to be a demigod, huh?”
Aisling’s eyes widened. “You mean that you ... and she ... wow! That was even faster than I thought it would go, and I didn’t even get a chance to give her an embroidery kit. I can’t wait to tell the others. They’ll be as delighted as I am.”
Drake’s look of martyrdom increased, but he pulled out a mobile phone and quickly made a call. “It’s neither here nor there, nor any of our business. Bartholomew? Drake Vireo. I understand that Gabriel called you to take into custody the siren we found. It appears she’s been kidnapped by her bandmates, who have somehow escaped the custody of the mortal police, and we’d like you to track—what? I see. Yes, quite fortuitous.”
Drake’s green eyes turned to the First Dragon, who suddenly found himself impatient. That in itself was annoying, since he did not, as a rule, feel such emotions, but now he had the distinct desire to snatch the mobile phone from Drake’s hand and demand to know where Charity was.
“What’s going on?” Aisling asked, trying to listen in to the phone. “Is that Savian? Tell him to stop by. Does he have Maura with him?”
Drake covered the phone with his hand, and said with a slight bow to the First Dragon, “It would appear that a thief taker that we called now has the siren. He found her hitchhiking into town, and recognized her from the pictures Gabriel texted.”
“You called Savian after we told you not to?” Aisling looked furious.
Jim the demon whistled, and shook its head. “Dude. You know better than to cross one wyvern’s mate, and you’ve got three of them under the same roof. Ain’t nobody getting any nookie tonight. Well, except maybe Big Daddy.”
Anger fired within the First Dragon, another rare emotion that he would prefer not experiencing. “Who is this thief taker?” he demanded to know.
“His name is Savian Bartholomew, and yes, Aisling, I know you and the other mates didn’t want us to call him, but we cannot tolerate having someone so dangerous here. She has to be turned over to the Committee for protective custody.”
“You’d think after living with her for so long that he’d have a clue, but it sure doesn’t seem like it, huh?” Jim asked the First Dragon.
Fire blossomed at Drake’s feet, and crawled up his legs. He gave his mate a long-suffering look. “Aisling, you are making a spectacle in front of the First Dragon. Control the fire.”
“It’s not of my doing,” she snapped.
Drake looked aghast at the First Dragon.
He narrowed his eyes on the green wyvern. “I told you that Charity would be in my custody. No other was needed.”
“Someone’s up shit creek,” Jim said sotto voce.
The green wyvern looked stricken, and stammered out, “We didn’t think it right to impose such a burden on you.”
“That is seriously annoying!” Aisling said, spinning on her heel and flipping her hair over her shoulder in the time-honored fashion of annoyed women before marching up the stairs. “I am so going to tattle on you to May and Ysolde.”
“Aisling!” Smoke escaped Drake’s nostrils as he gave his mate a potent glare.
She paused at the top of the stairs. “There are times when I wonder how you dragons survived all these centuries being so pigheaded,” she snapped, and stormed off.
“I apologize for my mate’s rudeness,” Drake said, turning back to the First Dragon. “She has many excellent qualities, but control over her emotions is unfortunately not amongst them.”
“Yeah, but you secretly love that, don’tcha?” Jim asked, giving Drake a wink.
“It is not your mate who needs to apologize,” the First Dragon said, adding frustration to his list of unwelcome emotions. “I told you that I would be responsible for the confinement of Charity. For you to arrange to have her taken away by others is not acceptable.”
“If I have in any way offended you, then I apologize. Naturally, we could not—oh, hell.” Drake evidently remembered he had been on the mobile phone, for he put it back up to his ear. “Are you still there? No, I will not say hi to Jim for you, and you can accept Aisling’s invitation another time. We have a situation here in that we’ve had a change of heart, and if you could just—that is not acceptable, no. We hired you to—I don’t really give a damn about the L’au-dela, or what Dr. Kostich will do to your balls if you don’t bring her to him. Just get the woman back here or—bloody hell.”
“Uh-oh. Hung up on ya, did he?” Jim asked.
“Go help Aisling,” Drake ordered the demon before squaring his shoulders and facing the First Dragon.
“You’re not the boss of me,” Jim replied, covertly wiping its slobbery lips on the back of Drake’s leg. “Besides, she’s in one of those moods where she really fills the demon lord bill.”
“Then go blight someone else,” Drake snarled, glaring at the demon.
“Yeah? Whatcha going to do if I don’t—”
A green fire kindled in the wyvern
’s eyes.
“Fine, but if I miss any good bonking news, I’m going to tell Aisling you set me on fire again.” The demon shuffled up the stairs after its master.
“I’m afraid the demon is correct about one thing,” Drake said once it was gone. “The thief taker said he was en route to Dausen, where there is a portaling service. From there, he will take a portal to Paris, where the siren will be turned over to Dr. Kostich, the archimage who runs the L’au-dela.”
“An archimage.” The First Dragon’s lip twitched. He, himself, was a master of arcane magic, but it was not something that came naturally to his kin. “Charity would not like being with a man such as him.”
“No one would like to be with him,” the guard Pal said, then looked horrified that he’d spoken aloud.
“The thief taker must be stopped,” the First Dragon decided. “Then we can rescue Charity from him. How long will it take to travel through the mortal plane to reach her?”
Drake was on his phone before the First Dragon finished speaking. “I’ll bribe the portal shop owner to tell Savian the portal is down. That will force him to go into Budapest to find the only other shop in Hungary, which will give us time to track him down.”
Drake moved off to hold a conversation with the portal owner.
The sense of frustration grew within the First Dragon. He disliked feeling helpless. It was foreign to him, and it wasn’t something he intended on tolerating. “Do you have one of those machines?” he asked Pal.
“What machines?”
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