Darkfire Kiss

by Deborah Cooke

  “By destroying the Slayers?” Lorenzo asked.

  “Yes. If need be.”

  “And how exactly is that different from the Slayers’ quest to destroy the Pyr?”

  “They are wrong! Their hearts are stained with darkness….”

  Lorenzo lifted a hand, and Erik’s protest fell silent. “War does not create peace. It never does. Violence breeds only more violence.”

  Erik appealed to him again. “They are close to being eradicated. We are on the cusp of success, and if I can muster every Pyr…”

  Lorenzo laughed. “And what happens when they are eradicated?”

  “Then we live in peace.”

  “No. We are by nature adversarial. If we have no foe, we will invent one.”

  “I don’t believe that for an instant.”

  “We will become our own worst enemies.” Lorenzo shrugged. “Or maybe humans will hunt us again, and, this time, succeed in exterminating us.”

  “I don’t believe that,” Erik argued, although he had his doubts. It had happened before, after all. And there was that blog post from Melissa Smith. He knew there would be repercussions from that, and they might not be positive for the Pyr.

  “Doubts?” Lorenzo asked. “I’m not surprised. We can’t exist in this world in the old way any longer, Erik. We have to adapt.”

  “Adapt?” Erik eyed his old friend. “By becoming conjurors? You use your powers as a parlor trick, to beguile humans into believing the illusions you create.”

  “It works beautifully, and to our mutual benefit. They are entertained, and I live in the style to which I have been accustomed. I find it much more congenial than warfare.”

  “But each of us can be a target….”

  “No. I won’t be targeted. They don’t realize where I am or what I am.”

  “It could still happen. I found you.”

  “My lair is not undefended.” He smiled again. “Do you really imagine you could attack me here and live to tell about it?”

  Erik snatched at the reflection he’d been addressing, just to prove his point, only to have his hand slip through nothing.

  “There is an advantage to living in a house of smoke and mirrors,” Lorenzo commented.

  Erik pivoted, choosing another version of Lorenzo to address. Which one was real? Were any of them real? “What if you have a firestorm?”

  He saw the glint of desire in Lorenzo’s eyes, flashing in a thousand eyes around him, before it was hidden. “I’ll call you if I need help.”

  “But I need your help,” Erik appealed one last time. “I need every Pyr at my side….”

  “Not so,” Lorenzo argued. “You let Quinn slip away for centuries.”

  “I have to balance the needs of the individual against the needs of the group,” Erik said gruffly, feeling very much on the spot. There was something about Lorenzo’s voice, something melodic and persuasive about it, something that made Erik say more than would ever have been his own intent. “He needed time to grieve and to learn, so that he could become the Smith of the Pyr. I couldn’t have forced that role upon him sooner, and we had the time—at least I believed as much. I didn’t expect him to be able to disguise himself.”

  “You didn’t expect to lose him.”

  “No.” Erik was embarrassed that he had confessed so much. He knew that on some level, Lorenzo was beguiling him again. He turned his back on the other Pyr, only to be confronted by another knowing reflection of him.

  “And what of Drake and his fellows?” Lorenzo asked. “Where are they?”

  Erik was shocked to realize that he did not know. He couldn’t sense Drake or any of the Dragon’s Tooth Warriors. Not anymore. His eyes widened and Lorenzo chuckled.

  “Some kind of leader, to lose an entire batallion.”

  “You have no right…” Erik began, only to have the other Pyr interrupt him

  “And what of Brandt?” Lorenzo asked softly.

  “I owe you no explanation.”

  “I think you do.”

  Erik gritted his teeth, trying to hold back the words and failing to do so. “I know exactly where he is,” he said with impatience.

  “Yet you do not collect him.”

  “Not yet. It is too soon.” Erik frowned, and another confession slid over his lips. “I fear it will always be too soon for Brandt, although I hope for the day I have something to offer him in exchange.” He pivoted and chose another reflection, one that looked brighter than the others. “Stop this! You cannot force me to betray the Pyr!”

  “Oh, but it seems that I can,” Lorenzo said with a thread of laughter in his tone.

  “This is no joke! If I say too much, they will be in danger.”

  “They are in danger anyway, given your record of leadership.”

  “No!” It was a horrific implication, one Erik found dangerously compelling. Was he failing the Pyr?

  “It’s the darkfire, you know,” Lorenzo said with confidence.

  “There is no darkfire!”

  “And you’re the one with foresight.” Lorenzo chuckled. “See? Darkfire challenges every expectation, just as foretold.” His voice dropped low. “What about the Cantor’s last charm? What will you do, Erik Sorensson, when the Sleeper awakens and demands his rightful due?”

  What was the Cantor’s last charm? Who was the Sleeper? What was his due? Or was Lorenzo simply toying with him? “You are only entertaining yourself in disorienting me,” Erik charged. “Think of the others!”

  Lorenzo laughed at the notion. “No more parlor tricks, then?”

  “No!”

  Lorenzo snapped his fingers and disappeared.

  As cleanly as that.

  There was no sign of him in the room. Erik turned in place, wondering how he had disappeared so quickly, and the lights subtly changed.

  He was standing in a room, a room with walls covered in mirrors. They reflected him precisely as he would have expected, the images remaining around the perimeter, and leaving him alone in the center of the space. It was no trick.

  But Lorenzo was gone.

  “Did you summon the darkfire?” Erik shouted to the room.

  There was no answer, although he thought he discerned a low laugh. Why? Because Lorenzo had summoned it? Or because he thought it funny that Erik could imagine his power to be so great?

  A door opened behind Erik, the mirror latched to its back angling as it opened into the room. A servant stood there, his hand on the knob. “Mr. di Fiore asked me to show you out, sir.”

  No illusions. Lorenzo was gone, and his answer was clear.

  So be it.

  Erik marched out of the room, through the foyer, and into the midday sun’s heat. He got into the car and glanced back once at the house. “I ask you as a friend,” he said in old-speak, making one last plea.

  “And I decline you as one,” Lorenzo replied immediately.

  Erik started the car and squealed the tires as he drove away. The gates opened automatically for him and closed behind his car with a resolute clang.

  All he could see in his rearview mirror, though, was the cloud of dust raised by his departure.

  And within that dust, he saw the dead, crowded behind his vehicle, himself in their midst.

  Was the vision real?

  Or another illusion of Lorenzo’s?

  Erik was already shaken, but that vision had him pushing the car to its limit in his haste to get back to his family.

  Alex rushed home at Donovan’s mysterious summons. Just the fact that he’d called her at work and asked her to come home quickly, with no further explanation, meant something was up. There had been an eclipse the night before, so Alex had an idea what it was.

  Donovan wasn’t visible when she entered the house, but she heard movement in the kitchen. She smiled at the sound of their son, Nick, chattering to his father.

  Her smile faded when she glimpsed the packed suitcases in the doorway of the bedroom. She’d been right.

  “Where to?” she asked, noti
ng that the kitchen was perfectly clean and organized.

  “Flight at three,” Donovan said, his manner terse. “Chicago first. Then London, then Cardiff. After that, we’ll drive.”

  Wales. They were going to Wales. Alex guessed whose firestorm it was and couldn’t hide her smile. “Commercial flights?” she asked.

  “It’s too far for me to fly us all.”

  Alex understood that the truth was he didn’t know what to expect when they arrived. He wanted to be wellrested. Alex’s hand slid over her still-flat stomach.

  Donovan’s gaze followed her gesture and his lips tightened. “I’m sorry. Centuries ago, I made a promise, and today is the day it must be kept.”

  “What kind of promise?”

  “To defend the Sleeper, if and when he awakened.” He winked at her. “Although I still need to protect you. That’s why we’re all going.” Donovan checked his watch, then scooped up Nick. “I think I got all the essentials. Could you check? The cab will be here in ten.”

  “But who’s the Sleeper? Whom did you promise? And why does this Sleeper need to be defended? I thought this was about a firestorm!”

  “It is. I’ll tell you more on the way.”

  Alex stepped into his path. She’d had a rough first trimester and wasn’t up for puking in strange places if it wasn’t entirely necessary. “Tell me something now.”

  Donovan flicked a glance between Alex and Nick. “The Sleeper is under Rafferty’s care. I promised Rafferty to help if the Sleeper ever awakened, but that’s only supposed to happen when there’s darkfire. I never thought the darkfire would burn.”

  “Darkfire?”

  He grimaced. “A really ominous kind of firestorm. And it’s Rafferty’s firestorm.” He met her gaze steadily. “He needs our help.”

  “Not fair!” Alex protested, that explanation completely committing her to the cause. “Rafferty gets the rotten kind of firestorm? How unreasonable is that?”

  “He might be the only one who can turn darkfire to good,” Donovan said softly. “We have to have faith in the wisdom of the Great Wyvern, Alex.”

  Right. Alex had never been much for religion, and she didn’t share the Pyr’s admiration of their deity. But she knew when to shut up. And she knew when to hurry. It was entirely possible that she’d be able to help Rafferty, too.

  “Okay,” Alex agreed with a nod. “Nine minutes to departure.”

  She was ready to go in seven point five.

  Just as the cab pulled up in front of the house.

  Sloane felt the prickle of heat from a distant firestorm. When he closed his eyes and let himself sense the firestorm, he could see it was tinged with a strange blue-green light.

  Like a chemical reaction.

  And in a way, darkfire was just that. The blue flames indicated a mythic firestorm, one that changed everything before it was subdued. Surrendering to the sexual demand of the firestorm was less important than accepting the transformation it wrought. Sloane had heard a great deal about this possibility from his mentor, but he had never expected to see it in his lifetime.

  Tynan—Sloane’s mentor, father, and the Apothecary before Sloane—had yearned to see darkfire all his long life. He never had. Sloane shared his father’s awe, but not his expectation.

  Yet the darkfire had come.

  And it had come for Rafferty. It was fitting, in a way, that the member of the Pyr most interested in firestorms should have this special one. On the other hand, darkfire posed a challenge that could break a Pyr. Sloane hoped it wouldn’t destroy Rafferty with its demands.

  Sloane remained at his assigned post, defending the mate and child of the leader of the Pyr. He had breathed dragonsmoke, thick and deep, around the hotel. He had piled it against the door and windows, in the vents, in every access he could find.

  It felt inadequate, given that he knew some Slayers could cut smoke and pass through its barrier.

  The old ways weren’t as effective anymore. Would the darkfire change that, too?

  Either way, there wasn’t much else he could do. He remained alert, his keen senses attuned to the world beyond the suite, and he hovered on the cusp of change. The tickle of the firestorm already fed the power of his dragon side, making him feel both vulnerable and powerful. It was worse than the sensation of the eclipse; worse than the call of the moon.

  It must be the darkfire. What else would it change?

  Eileen stood at the window of the hotel suite, watching the parking lot. There was nothing Sloane could say to console her, nothing that would relieve her other than Erik’s safe return. Without the gift of foresight, Sloane couldn’t even predict that.

  Zoë played on the floor, happily stacking brightly colored plastic cylinders. When the pile was knee-high, she cheerfully hit the bottom one, laughing as the cylinders scattered.

  It was hard, in times like this, to believe that she truly was the new Wyvern—as Erik believed—and not simply a cute child. How could she be so indifferent to the burn of darkfire and the tingle of a firestorm? How could she not be troubled by the uproar in the earth? Sloane was vexed enough to prod her.

  “Do you feel it?” he asked her in old-speak.

  Zoë gave no indication that she had heard him. She crawled after the last red cylinder, then offered it to Eileen. “Mama?” she said, her voice rising in a question.

  Eileen smiled, her thoughts clearly elsewhere, and bent down. “Biggest on the bottom,” she said. “What’s next?”

  “Orge,” Zoë said, dragging out the soft g sound. She picked up the orange cylinder and placed it on top, her smile triumphant.

  “What do you know of darkfire?” Sloane asked, just as she was putting the orange cylinder on top of the red one. Did she waver for a second before putting it in place? Sloane wasn’t sure. He would have tried again, but found Eileen’s gaze upon him.

  “You’re talking to her in old-speak, aren’t you?” Eileen asked. Her disapproval was more than clear, and Sloane felt chided. Most humans disliked the notion of a conversation they couldn’t quite discern. Old-speak sounded like distant thunder to humans. “You needn’t bother.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Erik has been complaining that since Zoë started to talk, she doesn’t respond to his old-speak.” Eileen shrugged, and Sloane knew she wasn’t entirely displeased about this. “He’s not sure whether she can’t hear him or she doesn’t want to.”

  “When did she start to talk?”

  “Just a couple of days ago. She’s late with it, but maybe she didn’t have anything important to say.”

  “Mamamamamamamama,” Zoë supplied, intent upon her toys.

  “And here I thought you were your daddy’s girl,” Eileen said. “Her eyes have changed color too. They were blue when she was born.”

  Sloane had another look. Eileen was right: Zoë’s eyes had become green. Like Erik’s. “Maybe she’s not responding to old-speak because she’s not the Wyvern, after all,” he dared to suggest. Maybe she wasn’t the Wyvern anymore.

  Had Zoë changed? Or was this another price of the darkfire?

  Eileen met his gaze, her own steely. “Maybe being a smart little girl is good enough.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that it’s too much of a burden upon a child to have everyone waiting for her to become the next Wyvern. She needs to just be a child, and if it is her destiny to become the next Wyvern, that will happen of its own accord. Having all of you watch her like hawks doesn’t help. It’s not healthy for any child to bear such pressure and expectation.” Eileen exhaled after her impromptu lecture and visibly composed herself. “Not that my opinion has anything to do with it.”

  Sloane caught a whiff of an old battle, undoubtedly one between Erik and Eileen. Eileen might not be Pyr, but she had a ferocity and determination—particularly when it came to defending her daughter—that Sloane wouldn’t want to face.

  She averted her gaze with care, perhaps sensing that she had said too much. “What did
you say to her, anyway?”

  “I asked her what she knows about darkfire.”

  Eileen glanced up, her confusion clear. “What’s that?”

  “It’s a special kind of firestorm. It’s characterized by a bluish green flame and is said to change everything before it’s done. It’s supposed to come in a period of great trial for the Pyr.”

  “Why doesn’t that sound like fun,” Eileen murmured, bending to put the lime green cylinder in place on the stack. Zoë scattered the blocks again, unconcerned. Oblivious.

  Had darkfire stolen her fledgling gifts?

  Even Sloane could sense Erik’s agitation, and he was no Wyvern.

  He heard the tires of the Maserati only seconds before Eileen did. She was at the door in a heartbeat and opened it as Erik strode closer.

  The leader of the Pyr looked grim.

  Sloane understood that his meeting hadn’t gone well.

  “Lorenzo refused to join you,” Eileen said, no question in her voice.

  “Worse,” Erik said with a nod of agreement. “He compelled me to speak of things I had vowed never to reveal.” His intent gaze landed on Sloane. “You must go to Brandt.”

  “Brandt?” Sloane took a step back in his shock. “But I promised him….”

  “As did I.” Erik spoke tersely. “You will go.”

  “No.” Sloane frowned, aware that he was defying the leader of the Pyr, but knowing he had no choice. His honor was at stake. “I gave my word to leave him be.”

  “As did I.”

  “But I swore it in blood!”

  “I have inadvertently revealed him,” Erik acknowledged, every line of his body taut. Sloane could see that Erik was angry that Lorenzo had worked this information from his lips. He was even shimmering blue, on the cusp of change, so great was his agitation. “I fear Lorenzo’s intent, for I do not understand him.” Erik’s lips tightened into a hard line. “He hides his thoughts very well.”

  “He beguiled you again?” Eileen asked.

  “I don’t know what he did. I only know that I couldn’t keep from answering his every question.” He flicked an imperious glance at Sloane. “Go, now.”