Me and My Shadow

by Katie MacAlister

  A muffled voice sounded over his sigh. “I will be right there. Mayling, I must go. I’m being called to tend a survivor. I know it goes against your grain to do something without a reason, but please trust me on this—stay away from Kostya at all costs.”

  “He wouldn’t—” I started to say, but Gabriel cut me off with a sharp word.

  “Kostya was seen leaving the scene in Paris. Do you understand? He was there, May. He was seen. Get my mother and Maata and the others, and get out of Drake’s house. I must go. I will call later, when I can.”

  The phone clicked off as I stared with unseeing eyes at an official police notice pinned to the stair door.

  “Ms. Northcott?”

  It took a few minutes for me to realize that the detective inspector was saying my name. I dragged my mind from the abyss of confusion that had claimed it, and rallied my scattered wits. “I’m sorry?”

  “I asked if you were unwell. You look distressed.”

  “Just a little family issue, I’m afraid. Did you have more forms for me to sign?”

  “No. I would, however, request that you take your husband home. He is perilously close to being charged with assault.”

  I hurried back into the office to retrieve Magoth, who sat perched on a female police officer’s desk, openly leering down her blouse.

  “You promised to behave,” I said as I grabbed his arm and pulled him away from the poor woman.

  “Have I mentioned I love it when you get dominant?” he purred, following me out to the lobby. “And I am behaving. I didn’t once mock the mortals as I wished. I didn’t tell them who you really were, or what your scaly boyfriend was. I didn’t even correct their mistaken impression that our house was blown up by a gas line.”

  “It’s Gabriel’s house, and our deal is off. Where’s Cyrene and Jim?”

  I looked around the busy lobby, but my twin and the large demon weren’t anywhere to be found.

  “I am a prince of Abaddon,” Magoth said, straightening his sleeve. “I am not a diviner.”

  “You’re a pain in . . .” I stopped before I got caught up in another argument. “Stay here while I look for them. Maybe she went to the ladies’ room.”

  I don’t know why I expected Magoth to actually do something I asked. He didn’t let me down, following me into the restroom, much to the chagrin of the women in there. Unfortunately, Cyrene wasn’t one of them.

  “She probably saw something shiny, and the magpie in her demanded she go see it,” I said, tight-lipped with annoyance as I emerged from the building to see the street lined with fashionable shops. “Great. It’ll take at least an hour to ferret her out.”

  “She always was easily distracted,” Magoth commented, following as I headed for the nearest shop. “I have no idea how you put up with someone who is so easily—oooh, leather!”

  “I’m going to check out this side of the street. You can do the other,” I told him. I’d just reached the shop door when I heard my name being called. I spun around, catching sight of a furry black tail disappearing into a small pub. I dodged pedestrians to cross the road, pausing for a moment as I entered the bar to let my eyes adjust. “Jim?” I said, squinting a little bit.

  There were only a couple of people in the bar, none of whom was Cyrene. There was also no sign of Jim.

  “I’m sorry to disturb you, but have you seen a large black dog?” I asked a couple who were sitting at a table. They sat stiffly, as if uncomfortable. “He came in just a minute ago.”

  “Jim is in the back, along with your twin,” a smooth voice said behind me. I froze as the Italian accent filtered through my brain. The couple at the table rose to face me, and I noticed immediately that they weren’t humans—they were dragons.

  Blue dragons.

  I turned slowly. Fiat held a businesslike black gun, unfortunately pointed at my forehead. “I’m sure they will both be delighted to see you.”

  “You do know I’m a doppelganger, yes?” I asked. “Not only am I immortal; I can slip into the shadow world, where you and your bullets can’t harm me.”

  “But they can harm your twin, can they not?” he asked smoothly.

  “She’s a naiad. All shooting her would do is make her very angry, and you can take my word for it that you don’t want to be in a confined space when she’s angry. She tends to get a bit elemental, if you get my drift.”

  Before he could answer, Magoth strolled into the bar, clad in a black leather vest and matching skintight pants . . . ones without the seat.

  “Assless chaps, Magoth?” I asked, distracted enough that I just had to ask him.

  He posed so I could see the muscles of his behind flex. “They are made of the softest bull-scrotum leather.”

  “Yes, but . . . assless chaps?”

  He flexed a couple more times. “The mortals in the leather shop liked them. They offered to tattoo my arse, as well, but I showed them the curse on my cock and they said they couldn’t match that, so I just took the clothes and left. What are you doing here?” He sniffed a couple of times. “Bah. More dragons. Who is he, another of your lovers? Why is he holding a firearm on you? Are you having potentially lethal foreplay without me?”

  The questions were asked of me, but directed to Fiat, who, I was amused to note, looked somewhat disconcerted when Magoth marched over and put his arm around me. Normally I wouldn’t have tolerated such an embrace, but I figured there were times when the devil you knew was better than the dragon you didn’t.

  “Who are you?” Fiat countered.

  Magoth gave him one of his superior looks, the kind he reserved for wrath demons belonging to other demon lords. “I am Magoth, prince of Abaddon, and this is my consort. I ask again—why are you pointing a firearm at her? If you are planning on using that to have sex with her, you’ll have to include me, as well.”

  Fiat dragged his bemused gaze to me. “You are consort to a bisexual demon lord?”

  “I’m not bisexual. I’m all-sexual,” Magoth said, buffing his nails and preening a little. “I’m an equal-opportunity demon lord.”

  Fiat considered this for a moment before asking me, “Is it now mandatory that all wyverns’ mates have some tie to Abaddon?”

  “Could be Aisling and I are starting a new trend,” I said agreeably, elbowing Magoth when his fingers tried to slip down into my shirt. “I don’t suppose you’d like to explain why you’ve apparently kidnapped my twin and a demon?”

  “No,” Fiat said simply, and gestured toward the back of the bar. “Go.”

  I toyed with the idea of refusing and shadowing, but both Fiat and I knew that although he couldn’t kill Cyrene with his gun, he could damage her mind enough that she would not recover her faculties. It was a threat that all immortals lived with—a body that lived on while a mind was destroyed—and we tended to take such threats seriously.

  “Alas, I cannot accompany you,” Magoth said, eyeing the reflection of his bared behind in a mirror next to the door. “I have appointments that must not be missed. I assume you will deal with this dragon and be at your bed at the appointed time?”

  “I wouldn’t count on her being in her bed any more than I would count”—Fiat gestured toward two men who sat near the door; they rose and took up positions in front of it—“on you making your appointments.”

  “Perhaps a tattoo of myself during my film days on the left cheek,” Magoth murmured before Fiat’s words sank in. He stopped admiring himself and turned a chilly glare on Fiat.

  I stilled, noting that although Magoth was almost powerless, he still had a little corona of blackness around him that, when he was riled, snapped out at the unwary.

  “You dare to defy me, dragon?” he asked, his voice as slick as ice.

  I knew that voice. I knew that look in his eyes. What I didn’t know was whether Fiat would respond to the threat that suddenly soaked the very air around us.

  Fiat leaned forward and smiled at Magoth. “Gossip flies quickly in the Otherworld. I have had word of you, and kn
ow that you have been expelled from Abaddon without your powers.”

  Magoth’s gaze shifted to me for a moment, and I froze solid, terrified he would do or say something that would bring attention to the fact that I now had his powers. “My consort has initiated an appeal. My reinstatement should be forthcoming soon, a fact you would be wise to remember lest I seek payment for the insult you do me.”

  Magoth was lying through his teeth about the appeal, but no one but he and I knew it, and I certainly wasn’t going to correct him. He would never go to Gabriel of his own accord and tell him I was in trouble, but when it became known that Cyrene, Jim, and I were missing, Gabriel would hunt down Magoth and get the truth out of him.

  Fiat made a mock sigh. “Everyone fights me. No one sees the sense in just doing as I ask. Renaldo?”

  One of the two blond dragons behind Magoth took a step forward, then whipped his arm around from where he’d been holding it behind his back. Before I could call out a warning, he walloped Magoth on the head with a weighted leather blackjack.

  Magoth’s expression turned to one of ecstasy for a moment; then his eyes rolled back and his body slumped to the ground.

  “Now he’s going to want you to do that every night,” I told the dragon named Renaldo as he and the other man picked up Magoth.

  Fiat poked me in the side with the gun. “You will come with me now.”

  “Looks like I have no choice,” I said calmly, and went down the passage he indicated, Magoth hauled behind us.

  Chapter Eleven

  The only thing that surprised me about the house was that it was so remarkably normal-looking.

  “Normal if you’re used to gorgeous Tudor redbrick mansions, that is,” I murmured to myself as we drove through the security gates and up a mile-long drive. The house sat on the crest of a gentle hill, framed by a semicircle of stately willow and lime trees along the sides and back of the house, beyond which I could see the glint of water—probably a large pond or a small lake.

  “What are you talking about?” Cyrene asked.

  “Nothing. What did you ask me to do?”

  “Uh-oh. You’re not hearing voices, are you? Ash started doing that, and it turned out really bad,” Jim said, covertly wiping its mouth on Fiat’s shoes.

  Cyrene shot a glance toward Fiat, moodily looking out the window, before she leaned in close to whisper into my ear, “Don’t leave me alone with him.”

  I let my gaze feast on the house. It truly was superb: a lovely example of Tudor architecture at its finest, all stone quoins, parapets, and a solid, sturdy square center that rose three stories. I’d seen some lovely houses during the last few months with the dragons, but this one made my mouth water. The parkland rolled away from it like green velvet pouring down toward us, the right side ending in what looked to be a yew maze, while the left was a formal garden, right now abloom in a riot of bronze and orange and pink flowers. I fell madly in love with the garden, the grounds, and the house at that very moment.“It’s so perfect. So exquisite. I wonder if Gabriel would like it. It’s very earthy, don’t you think? He likes earthy. I’m willing to bet he likes velvety green lawns, and lovely flowers, and hedges and trees, as well.”

  I caught a glimpse of the look Cyrene was giving me just as Jim said, “Great. May’s mind has snapped. Gotta be the voices.”

  Fiat continued to ignore us, so I addressed Cyrene and Jim as I gazed with wonder out of the window as we approached the house. “My mind is perfectly sound, thank you. Merciful deities, is that a folly in the distance? Could this property be any more perfect?”

  “Mayling!” Cyrene nudged me hard in the ribs. I dragged my gaze off the white iron filigreed structure in the distance, beyond the flower gardens.

  “What?”

  She glanced significantly toward Fiat. I looked at him. He stared out of the window as if we bored him to death. My gaze slid past him to the sight of a silvery stream that curled around the yew hedges and disappeared around the back of it. “A stream. Of course. Not too deep, but deep enough to splash around in on a long, hot summer afternoon. Just before you stroll behind the yew maze and take a refreshing dip in the lake.”

  “Stream? Lake?” Cyrene was momentarily distracted enough by the thought of freshwater sources to shove me backwards so she could peer out of the window. “It does look like a very pure stream. It probably feeds into the lake. I bet the water isn’t too cold to swim in. . . .” She paused and gave me a dirty look. “You did that deliberately. Stop trying to divert me.”

  I sighed and made sure Fiat was still ignoring us before I answered in a low voice, “I told you that it’s me Fiat wants to use as a bargaining chip. I’m sure he has some evil plan under way that requires the use of me as hostage to get Gabriel to do whatever it is he wants done. OK? Happy now? Good. Are those mullioned windows? Oh, my, they really are outstanding. Fiat’s taste certainly has improved from that house in Italy. I wonder if he’d consider selling?”

  “He wants to steal me for his mate,” Cyrene whispered as we pulled up outside the front doors. I whimpered softly to myself at the sight of the fluted white columns and cut-glass panels on either side of the doors. I wanted this house with an overwhelming need that was almost alien to me, and yet was so familiar I wondered why I’d never felt it before with anything but Gabriel.

  Fiat’s two blond bodyguards leaped out of the front to open the car door.

  “May!”

  The worry in her voice filtered through the house lust that held me in its grip. I shook images of myself strolling through the house from my head, and focused on my distressed twin. “Cy, we’ve been over this several times already—you’re not a wyvern’s mate.”

  “I am mate lite. I told you that! And besides, if I wasn’t, why would Fiat want to steal me away from Kostya?”

  “Gotta pee. Back in a mo. Don’t go completely wacko until I’m back to see it,” Jim said, leaping out of the car and heading for a shrubbery.

  Fiat exited the car. Magoth, still unconscious, rolled off the seat and onto the limo floor, his head thumping like a ripe melon on the floor.

  “I can just about guarantee you that Fiat isn’t going to try to steal you for his mate,” I said, patting her on the arm. She was truly worried about such a possibility, I knew, which didn’t ease my exasperation with her, but it did let me temper my voice so it wasn’t quite so obvious.

  “That’s what you say,” she said with a dark look at me. “But you haven’t seen the way he watches me! He wants me!”

  “Of course he does. You’re very pretty—a lot of men want you.”

  “Not that way,” she said, watching him narrowly through the opened car door as he spoke to his bodyguards. “He wants me for his mate so he can take over the dragons.”

  I wasn’t quite sure how her reasoning went from stealing another wyvern’s mate to control of the weyr, but I didn’t have time to indulge my curiosity. Instead I simply said, “Stop worrying. I won’t let him take you.”

  “Come,” Fiat said, turning toward us and holding out a hand. Impatience was evident in his voice, so evident I half expected him to snap his fingers at us. It was on the tip of my tongue to say something that I was sure I would regret, but I remembered in time that the house was his, and if I wanted any chance at all of calling it mine, politeness would be the order of the day.

  I pushed aside the question of why I was suddenly possessed with the desire to own the house. No, “desire” wasn’t the right word—I had a deep, buried need to have the house. “It had once been a home, and it will be one again,” I said on a breath.

  Cyrene gave me another odd look, but it was nothing to the confusion I felt over my statement. What on earth had I meant?

  “Come!” Fiat said more forcefully, and this time he did snap his fingers.

  Cyrene bristled at the gesture, but I grabbed her arm and hauled her out of the car after me, determined to be polite and persuasive. “This is an absolutely stunning house,” I told Fiat, allowing him
to assist me out of the car, my eyes drinking in the glorious sight of the front of the house. The afternoon sun caressed the warm red stone, slid along the freshly painted white trim, and settled itself to glitter on the numerous leaded windows, winking little flashes that mesmerized me.

  Fiat looked over the house with a critical eye and shrugged. “It is tolerable.”

  Tolerable? My mind shrieked at the word, so profane was it when applied to the house.

  “I prefer something more modern, but I suppose it is in a pleasant setting. Please remember that your twin will be at my mercy should you try anything.” A smile lit his eyes, but it wasn’t at all friendly. “And mercy is a quality that I particularly lack.”

  We entered through the doors, and passed through a reception hall. I breathed deeply the heady scent of furniture polish and lemons, closing my eyes for a moment to enjoy it before feasting on what I knew would be an outstanding interior.

  The staircase was a work of art, all dark wood with Corinthian newel posts, an elaborate balustrade, and matching dark paneling on the walls. Tapestries covered much of the walls, some vibrant, but most faded with the passing of time. I stopped before one that looked vaguely familiar, gawking when I recognized a name. “Is that . . . that isn’t William the Conqueror, is it?”

  “It is,” Fiat answered.

  I squinted closer at the tapestry. It was protected by a wall-mounted conservation case, the kind with special lighting that would not fade the treasure within. “It looks just like something out of the Bayeux Tapestry.”

  “It is the Bayeux Tapestry.”

  I spun around both at the words and the voice. It wasn’t Fiat who had answered me, as I had thought—the man who stood next to him with his arms crossed had dark brown hair, not blond, with a pronounced widow’s peak, and ebony eyes that glittered like the windows. “Hello again, Baltic. What are you doing with the Bayeux Tapestry?”

  He strolled past me to admire it. “It’s only part of the tapestry: William’s coronation. It pleases me to display it, since it reminds me of a happy time.”