The Dragon Lady (The Dracosinum Tales)

by Angelique S. Anderson

  “Now you’re allowed to tell me things?”

  “This is different. It's been an unbalanced night, and this is the last step in the program, sort of the last cog in the gear you might say. Besides, I am not crossing any lines or I wouldn’t be able to say anything. Now hurry. He will be headed here shortly. He’s just received word of his daughter’s death and has murder on his mind. Better deal with that before it gets out of hand,” he cautioned her.

  “Yes, yes! Right away.” She wiped the tears from her face, and grabbing both Dracosinums, she transported herself to Lord Jameston’s house.

  Standing outside on the step, she heard slamming of doors and shouting from inside. She knocked heavily on the door.

  “What!” Lord Jameston had flung the heavy teakwood door open, and when he saw her face, he pulled out a large double-barreled pistol and aimed it at her. “You! You did this!” He cocked the trigger back and aimed it at her chest.

  “Before you shoot me, I have some information about who murdered your daughter.” The admission stopped him in his tracks.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, Lord Jameston, I saw it happen as I was there.” She pulled the Dracosinum that belonged to him out of the pocket of her father’s frock coat.

  “This is yours, I believe? A family heirloom?” He froze.

  “Where did you get that?” he hissed.

  “How about you put down your gun, and I mean way down? Put it somewhere you can't use it right away. Offer me some tea, and you and I will have a nice friendly talk. Unless, of course, you’d rather I hang onto this for you?”

  He scowled and shook his head.

  “Hildreth, be a dear and get our houseguest some tea. Oh and take care of this while you’re at it.”

  Hildreth came bustling in from the kitchen, a look of surprise on her face when she saw Wylie. She looked from Lord Jameston to Wylie several times before she took the pistol from his hand and hurried to the kitchen to make tea.

  “We’ll take it in the parlor,” he called after her, then led Wylie through to a luxuriously decorated room. The parlor screamed elegance and class, and she found herself surprised but delighted.

  “Come, let us sit, and you can tell me what you know.”

  The chairs were high backed and covered in red velvet. After the stress of the past few days, it felt heavenly to sit on something so softly padded.

  “Lord Jameston, I know what you are. I have come to offer you a peace treaty.”

  He shook his head. “You’re going to have to explain yourself better than that. You are headed for the gallows in a few short hours. How did you escape?”

  “Oh, I’ll get to that part. Just let me finish,” she said.

  “Well, you’d better hurry. I have a murderer to find and your death to look forward to.”

  Wylie pulled out her Dracosinum and placed it and Lord Jameston’s side by side.

  “Here is the truth, Lord Jameston. I thought that the Siapheg was you, and I wanted you dead. So I challenged the Siapheg to a battle last night. I killed the Dragaleth by tearing out its throat. So giddy was I that I had defeated you that I was devastated when I found out it was Lady Judith instead. She was my best friend, more like a sister really. So now, you have not only taken my home from me, and nearly my virtue, but also my best friend, and almost my life. So, I have one thing to say to you.”

  She stood up and stared him directly in his eyes.

  “Since you are the Siapheg once more, I order you to give back the homes to my people. Call off the police from myself and Adrian, and then you will leave town. If you do not keep the peace and do as I say, I will find you and I will kill you. It is your job, oh aging Lord Jameston, to do evil but not here.

  “I understand, that is who you are… but your time in this town is over. If you so much as breathe on this part of London again, you will not live to see another day. I loved your daughter like family. But you, I have no concern for. I will make your death slow and painful. You have until tomorrow.” She nodded her head at him and stormed out of the house, slamming the front door so hard it rattled the windows.

  When she was out of sight of the house, she took out her Dracosinum and transported to Lord Adrian’s. The front door was open, and a police wagon was parked outside. Worried that Lord Jameston had already started to come after Adrian, she ran inside the house.

  “Adrian, Adrian!” she screamed.

  “Wylie?” He jumped up from the settee and ran to her. “You’re out of jail? How did you manage that! We heard you’d been sentenced to be hanged.” His face, which moments before had been pale, now flushed with color. “I thought I had lost you too, I just can't take any more loss,” he said as he pulled her to him.

  In the room they had enjoyed a meal in the day before, many men and women were standing around somber-faced.

  “Judith has been murdered.” Lord Adrian spoke softly. “I am so sorry, Wylie.”

  “I know Adrian. I have just come from Lord Jameston’s house.”

  “You what? Is he the one who freed you?” Adrian asked.

  “Not in the slightest, just give me a minute.”

  Lord Jameston appeared at the door just then, his normally kempt appearance somewhat awry, his shirt tail hanging out, shirt collar undone, and his frock coat flapping open sloppily. He smelled strongly of alcohol, but as he stumbled into the house, he looked Wylie straight in the eye.

  “I’m out of here. Lugwallow now belongs to the people.” He tossed some papers on the floor. “There’s everything you need. I was on my way to speak to the lieutenant, but I just got word that he was murdered last night as well. So I am off to settle some debts at the station. Then I’m leaving town.” He stumbled out of the door, and everyone rushed to see him climb into his personal carriage, his driver taking off before he had even got seated properly.

  Wylie rushed over to grab the papers from the floor.

  “This declaration states that Miss Turpin owns the property located at...” Wylie thumbed through each paper, every family had their name on their property, and the Vicar himself had signed it.

  “How did he manage this so quickly?” Wylie stared at Adrian in disbelief. She had only just left his home, not less than an hour before.

  “I imagine that a man with the kind of money Jameston has can do almost anything he wants, in any time frame that he wants.” Wylie remembered the quick transportation that came with the Dracosinum and realized that Lord Jameston had embraced his duties again, and was using the Dracosinum to fulfill her demands as quickly as possible.

  Good. It’s time that monster of a man did something positive for once.

  Chapter Twenty

  Wylie soon found out that rumor on the street was that Lord Jameston knew who killed his daughter and the police lieutenant and that he’d left town to go after the guilty party. Of course, Wylie knew better. She had not laid a finger or a talon on the police lieutenant, but it was no small victory that her best friend Judith’s last horrific act had been to kill and eat parts of the very lieutenant who had tried to take Wylie’s virtue from her.

  Fate had no doubt stepped in. Among other kindnesses, Lord Adrian graciously paid to have Wylie’s father’s body relocated to his family cemetery where his own father’s remains were interred. He also ordered several bouquets of roses and placed them in honor of Lady Judith and Nicholas Petford, the two people that Wylie had loved so dearly. He made sure they were both given funerals fit for royalty. Lord Adrian had truly surprised her in many ways.

  It would take them some time to fully recover, but the people of Lugwallow were so overjoyed to be back in their homes, that it hardly mattered that Lord Jameston’s men had ransacked them.

  Shortly after moving back into their homes, Lord Adrian arranged to help them clean up their small parish.

  Through his generosity, the people of Lugwallow Parish were able to restore Lugwallow to its former glory
. Wylie’s love for Lord Adrian grew, though she thought it imprudent to act on it too soon after the death of her friend.

  Wylie continued to work for Lord Adrian for the time being. She did, however, refuse his offer to live in his house, or even in the servant’s quarters. “I have a home of my own,” Wylie protested. Adrian continued to plead with her to make the move, pointing out that she would be far more comfortable than her own home and she wouldn’t have so far to walk to work. She made many excuses, but her primary concern was preventing Lord Adrian from finding out what she really was. “No, I’ve lost a lot of things, but I still have my pride,” she argued.

  “How can I let you live this way? Surely, you can’t expect me to be okay with this.” He indicated her surroundings. Wylie feigned insult and sent him on his way that evening.

  He apologized later and never brought it up again though he didn’t promise not to keep trying.

  On another day, in another conversation, Adrian said, “Wylie, I love you, and I want nothing more than to have you near me and under my protection.”

  “Adrian, you know that I love you, but the people of Lugwallow still need me. When the time is right, we will be together.”

  Wylie had read nothing in the journal or the notes that Thaddeus McCollum had left behind, that spoke of love, or marriage, or families. She didn’t feel right about all of this yet, not that Lord Adrian had actually asked for her hand in marriage. As winter approached, and men came in and out of town helping to make the necessary repairs, Wylie awoke one morning to a gentle tapping on her door.

  “Lord Adrian.” She smiled from ear to ear, when she answered the newly installed mahogany door, the soft smell of the wood teasing her nostrils. Wylie was grateful that his visits had become more frequent since the whole ordeal, and the door was an expensive gift to prove his affections.

  “Do you remember the first time I came here?” he handed her a bouquet of lilacs before stepping inside.

  “I certainly do. Totally inappropriate. Not that I’m completely innocent of that day.” She laughed softly, remembering the look on the widow Turpin’s face when the woman had questioned her about her gentleman caller.

  “Oh come now, Wylie. You can’t tell me that you didn’t know we would end up together.”

  “Well, we aren’t quite together yet, are we?” she teased.

  “Yes, a fact that has haunted me day and night from the moment you left my home to return here.” His face grew somber. “I want you to come home with me. I want you to live in my manor as a lady of the house of McCollum.”

  “Oh, is that so?” She raised one eyebrow as she walked to the small table he had provided her and laid her flowers on it. Then she turned to face him, hands on hips.

  “Yes, that is so,” Lord Adrian grabbed one hand from her waist, held it in his, and knelt in front of her. His top hat slid forward as he searched his pockets for something. She took his hat off with her free hand, to prevent it from falling to the floor and placed it on her head.

  Her action made Adrian laugh, and struggling to compose himself, he held out a small black velvet box.

  “I had this made for you, in hopes that you would honor me by becoming Lady Wylie McCollum.” He took the ring out, and set the box on the floor, took her hand and slipped the ring on her petite but calloused finger. “It's perfect.”

  “Adrian, if I say yes… there will be consequences. You have to know that.” He took the hat from her head and placed it back on his own.

  “Would those consequences include stealing my hat?” he joked with her.

  “No, I just… I have so much to tell you.”

  Adrian stood up, and grabbed her right hand in his, “Does this have anything to do with…. with… the dragon thing?”

  Wylie gasped.

  “How do you know?” The color drained from her face.

  “Don’t worry, I haven’t said a word to anyone. I suppose I always knew there was something different about you. Chaos doesn’t respond so favorably to many people.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean, that dratted horse is even temperamental around me, and I’ve had him since he was a wobbling little foal. Around you though? He’s always been a bit of a puppy dog.” Adrian laughed. “You think he lets me nestle him the way you do, arms around him, and all?”

  Wylie smiled wide, “No, I suppose I haven’t ever seen the two of you interact that way. I’ve never really thought much about it. I thought he just understood me.”

  “Oh, I have no doubt he does to an extent. I think it’s more than that though.”

  “So that’s how you knew?” she questioned.

  “No, not that. It just always struck me as odd. I’ll be brutally honest with you, even though you may not like what I’m about to say.”

  “I’m sure there is nothing you can say that will be equal to the things I have done or what I need to tell you.” Her gaze was intense, and she wondered how long he would stay around once she confessed to him.

  “Well, the next clue that something was a little off…” Little beads of perspiration were forming on his forehead, his face reddening.

  Is he… embarrassed?

  “I assure you this is not how it sounds.”

  “Out with it, Adrian,” she urged.

  “A few months ago, the night Judith died, when your neighbors took up temporary residence at my estate, I found myself having yet another sleepless night. I was worried about you and was trying desperately to figure a way to get you out of jail. Typically, at times like that, I get up and go work on the carriage, but that had already been completed, and I had nothing else to take my mind off things.

  “Wanting desperately to see you, or at least assure myself that you were safe, I went to your room. I knocked as if you were inside, and the door swung open under my touch. Your bed was empty as I’d expected, though it broke my heart. I had hoped that the horrible events of the day were all a dream.

  “Realizing that I was possibly never going to see you again, alive, I sat on the edge of the bed. A lot of thoughts ran through my mind that night, Wylie… and they weren’t good thoughts. If you hadn’t run Lord Jameston out of town, I’m not sure I wouldn’t have done something to him myself.” Storm clouds invaded his eyes, just then, and she wanted desperately to kiss them away.

  “He’s gone, my love, he’s never going to bother us again.”

  “Yes, I know, but I can’t help wondering whose life he is ruining now?” Wylie shrugged and brushed a stray hair from his forehead.

  “Anyway, the whole situation was too much. Losing you, the thought of you being hung to die at daybreak, it tore me apart. I sobbed like I’ve never sobbed before, the thought of a life… without you?” he leaned forward and kissed her forehead.

  “Let’s just say that I had a lot of dark thoughts that night. Then, in the middle of that… as I sat in the darkened room, with not even moonlight to highlight the shadows… I heard the window lock jiggle. Worried that someone was breaking into the room, I rushed downstairs to grab my pistol and hurried back as quickly as I could.

  “When I entered the room the second time, someone was lying on the bed. I pointed the gun at the stranger, wondering how they got into my house, then I heard a noise at the window again. The curtains were open then, moonlight streaming in, so I rushed to close it, my mind still not processing anything that was happening. As I closed the window, I saw something I would not have believed had I not seen it with my own eyes.

  “A dragon, a little green dragon, was flitting away, and as it flew away, it grew in size until it nearly blocked out the moon. It disappeared into the clouds, and I just stood there like a dolt, staring after it until I realized there was a stranger sleeping in my house. Forgetting to close the curtains, I hurried back to the bed and shook the stranger who was fast asleep.

  “Wake up! I demanded, but the stranger didn’t budge. I grabbed an arm and flipped the person
over, and it was your beautiful face I found myself staring at. So help me, I wanted to lift you up and kiss you. I wanted to beg you to tell me how you’d escaped and ask if you’d seen the dragon? Was it all a dream?

  “I wanted to ask you how you got back, not realizing it was the dragon who had brought you. I did something completely imprudent at that moment, and so far out of character for me.”

  “What, Adrian? Tell me…” her heart had begun to speed up, and the slightest hint of fear nibbled at the back of her mind… surely he hadn’t?

  “The moonlight was streaming in through the window, and it cast the most delicate glow across your face. You looked so beautiful, I just had to...” Adrian hung his head in shame. “I had no control of myself, it was like I was in a trance. I sat next to you on the bed. Your tangled hair framed your face so perfectly, you looked angelic. You didn’t stir, and all I could think about was how beautiful you would look in a wedding gown. I wanted to whisk you away then and there, and carry you to the nearest church and demand the vicar marry us, hell be damned for what Lord Jameston would do to me.

  “I knew you would have a story to tell when you awoke, and I wanted to make preparations in case Lord Jameston came after you in the morning, as I am sure he planned on doing as soon as he found out you’d escaped. So I kissed your face and left the room, shutting the door behind me. As I hurried about the house looking for anything that would help me get the comeuppance on Lord Jameston, the vision of the dragon hit me again.

  “I had seen a real, live dragon, the stuff of fairy tales. The stuff of imagination. Had I lost my senses? Then I thought about how your return coincided with the dragon, and my imagination got the better of me. I came up with all kinds of theories. Maybe the dragon was an angel, and the gods knew how much I loved you, and they returned you to me? Maybe your father died and became a dragon, and that was him rescuing you?” he laughed.