Malcolm reared in the middle of the ruins, eyes and nose closed against the debris, blood coating his hide in crimson streaks. But he was whole, alive, upright, and furious. The globes in the cavern had shattered, but lights from the tunnels above still functioned, lending an eerie spotlight effect to the twenty tons of black dragon glimmering in the middle of the room.
"Malcolm?" Saba said softly.
His eyes opened. Rage made his voice ice-cold, so cold she was surprised the air didn't freeze around him.
"The entrance to the archive is gone," he said. "We cannot get out. Saba, you must open a door to your world and use the magics to get us through, or we will be sealed in here forever."
* * *
Chapter 10
Saba stared back at him. His witch was so small and vulnerable, but power radiated from her like blue light shot with rainbow streaks.
"As easy as that?" she demanded. "I know you're all right, because you're encouraging me to do the impossible."
Malcolm shook his body, dislodging pebbles and shards of crystal that clattered to the pile of rubble beneath him. "Not impossible for you."
The white dragon had plotted very carefully to get Malcolm here, to seal him into the archive of which Malcolm was so fond. As soon as they entered the place, the white dragon must have triggered the program or spell or whatever it was to bring down the cavern.
The basalt slabs raining on him had hurt, but his dragon hide, as hard as the stones .themselves, had allowed him to bear it with only minimal damage. He'd need healing, but he was not in immediate danger.
Malcolm could eventually dig out the tunnel enough to permit them to escape, but that would take time, even with his dragon powers. The white dragon obviously wanted him to stay put. But the white dragon hadn't counted on Malcolm having such a powerful a witch at his side, more fool he.
Saba still had no inkling of the power that lay inside her. It came out when they made love, that beautiful aura of magic that made her so special.
My witch. Mine.
"You have the ability to make a portal," he said to her accusing eyes. "Draw your energy from the magic of this place. And from me. There's plenty to spare."
She glared at him, her anger ten times greater than her size. She couldn't know how absolutely beautiful she was.
"Let me remind you that the last time I tried to make a door for you I nearly killed myself."
"You have become much stronger since then," Malcolm said. "I know this. We must return to your world, quickly."
"What about Metz?"
"Don't you be taking any magic from me," Metz shouted. "I need it."
"I meant, do you want to come with us?" Saba asked, an edge to her voice. "You're trapped here, too."
"No, I am not. I have work to do, cleaning up this mess, and who will guard the archive if I go gallivanting off? Any road, I know secret ways out so small only I can use them."
"He'll stay," Malcolm said. "He is right."
Saba looked around the rubble-strewn cavern. "The white dragon might have put other traps in here."
"I'll risk it," Metz said. "I ain't leaving, and no witch can make me."
"Fine," Saba said tightly.
"Too right," Metz answered.
Saba turned away, deliberately not arguing farther.
She said she thought Malcolm asked the impossible, but he also knew she could do it. Last summer when she'd attempted a door to Dragonspace using Lisa's magic to assist her, the door hadn't worked, Lisa had gotten hurt, and the backlash had nearly killed Saba. She'd survived only because Malcolm had healed her.
But that had been last year. Saba had grown in strength and ability and this time she stood in a place of enormous magic. Malcolm was a powerful dragon, despite his "fading," and Metz, too, radiated magic. Even if he didn't use magic, Metz was magic, his aura firm with power. Add to that the magic that had created the archive plus the millions of texts that lay under the vibrant light of the gemstones.
He knew Saba could feel it. Even reaching out to touch the tendrils shot tingling magic through his body.
"All right," she said. "I'll try. Mostly because I want to get out of here, too." She pointed her finger at Malcolm. "But if I die, I'll haunt you forever, I promise you."
"You won't die," Malcolm said. He nuzzled her body. "I won't let you."
Malcolm tasted Saba's worry as she faced the computer chamber, instinctively orienting on the most powerful area of the archive. He wove the threads of his thoughts through her, not enslaving her, but anchoring her and lending her power.
She brought her hands together and closed her eyes, and he sensed her trying to ground herself with the mountain beneath her feet. Saba did her best witchcraft when connecting with the earth, she'd told him, drawing the strength of rocks and stones. She drew a long breath, reaching to the center of herself and fusing that with the basalt below her.
She stayed still for a long time, and Malcolm felt her reach for the steadiness of the mountain. Then she began to raise her circle of power.
Last year Saba had refused to work any magic without drawing a circle in salt and calling on the Goddess and God to protect her, wouldn't spell without consecrated tools and salt and crystals. She had no tools now, and she used the cavern itself as her circle, mentally lifting a nimbus of blue-white light to encompass it.
Once the glowing and pulsing light surrounded them all, Saba opened her eyes. Malcolm felt the energy building around her, infusing her with a field of shimmering blue. She placed her hands, palms together, in front of her, pointing her fingers toward the tunnel.
He sensed the calm that flooded her in earnest, power that brought strength and confidence. The calm filled her with magic, which began to flow from the gemstones in the floor, from the seams of gold that ran warm and hard beneath the mountain, from the globes of crystals straggling to light the cave despite the dust, from Malcolm himself.
Magic seeped from Malcolm in swirls of light, and he gave it willingly, though he knew he'd be spent when he reached the other side. Power even flowed from Metz, who grumbled and growled at being caught in the magical field.
The power built until the very air crackled, tendrils of electricity snaking from the top of the nimbus through the niches, the gems, the globes of crystal, through Malcolm and Metz. Magic swarmed through the tunnel that led to the archive computers, increasing in capacity every second. The power built like a man bringing himself to orgasm, rising and pulsing and tightening, waiting to climax until the very last, unbearable moment.
Saba very slowly raised her hands, still pressed together, and brought them straight down. As she did, she released every bit of energy trapped in her body, focusing that energy on the slit she drew through the air.
The slit took form. It widened, bright light pouring through, a rift between the worlds through which only the most magical beings could pass. Saba braced herself, feet apart, and faced it.
She held the line as the slit widened and the light grew unbearably bright. Behind the light Malcolm could just make out familiar shapes of furniture in his living room, far away in San Francisco. He felt the portal drag at his body, wanting to pull it inward and downward and crush it into the form that could exist in the human world.
She was doing it.
The power jerked at him, and he found himself being sucked toward the slit and flattened as he passed through. This was different from the way the dragon's tears opened the door, or the way Lisa opened the door. Those he'd simply stepped through and became Malcolm the man; this rift dragged him in and commanded him to become human, not giving give him the choice.
He relaxed, letting his dragon limbs become human. The living room drew him into its welcoming arms, a wind wailing through it from Dragonspace. The phone was ringing, an odd, ordinary sound among the drag of the magic, and then the answering machine clicked on with Saba's sensible voice asking the caller to leave a message.
The slit began to close—with Saba still on the Dragons
pace side. Her face contorted horribly as she struggled to maintain the opening, but the magic was fading, weakening her. He saw her lips form his name, but he could hear nothing over the roaring of the wind.
"Hi, Saba," said the answering machine. "This is Mamie. Missed you at lunch today and wondered if everything was all right. You know with… him. Call me." Click.
Malcolm reached back through the slit, grabbed Saba around the waist and jerked her through just as the portal snicked shut. They tumbled together to the carpeted floor, Saba on top of him, where they lay together, panting. The wind died abruptly and the whirl of dust that had followed them in hung for a second in midair, then showered to the floor.
They lay quietly for a long time, Malcolm's skin gritty with sand and streaked with blood, Saba breathing hard, her body shaking. At last Saba lifted her head. Her face was lined with exhaustion, her eyes half-closed.
"Malcolm," she said, her voice barely a whisper. She touched the end of his nose with a shaking finger. "Don't you ever, ever ask me to do that again."
Saba woke cradled in Malcolm's arms in the Japanese-style tub in Malcolm's cavernous bathroom. The bottom of the tub was gritty with black pebbles from the cave, and Malcolm's skin was covered with bloodred scratches.
"You're hurt," she mumbled.
"Saba." He peered at her, intense eyes showing relief that she was awake.
She touched one of the abrasions on his arm, closed now, but raw. She remembered the ton of rocks that had fallen on him, and her grieving panic when she thought him dead. "Are you all right?"
"It is trivial." He shrugged. "You were more hurt than I."
"I feel all right now." Floating in warm water wrapped in Malcolm's arms was a fine place to be. "I think."
"You were close to death."
Saba swiveled her head to look up at him. "How close?"
"Your heart stopped."
She glanced around the bathroom that looked the same as always. No blood, no defibrillators, no anxious EMTs, no doctors in white coats.
"Why am I not in a hospital?" she asked, alarmed at how weak her voice was. "Or at least an ambulance?"
"I healed you."
She looked into his dragon eyes that were so cool and confident, although she saw something flicker behind his usual maddening calm.
"And that's that? My heart stopped, you healed me, and now I'm all better?"
"Black dragons have great healing magic," he said in his reasonable tone. "You are better than if I'd taken you to one of your hospitals. Healing there is primitive."
"And taking a bath with me was part of the healing?"
"Yes. You needed to be washed."
She was fully aware of his naked body under hers, his thighs cradling her backside, the strength of his torso supporting her. His large hands gently smoothed the wet hair from her temple.
"What about you?" she asked. "Ten tons of rock fell on you."
He gave her a whisper of a smile. "Dragon hide is tough."
"I'm sorry about your archive. Will Metz be all right?"
"Metz will enjoy himself putting everything back together. Don't worry about him."
"And then there was your computer virus." Things came back to her slowly. "I'm positive it was the same one that struck Technobabble last year, set by the same person: Rhoda." She sighed. "If I could think better right now I'd know exactly how she did it and why."
"Later." Malcolm stroked her shoulder. "We'll decide why the white dragon is so interested in witches who work for your database firm. Technobabble's owner bears my mark," he mused. "He should have known a white dragon had coerced one of his employees."
"Not his fault, Malcolm."
"It might have been. I'll question him."
Saba felt faint alarm behind her exhaustion. Malcolm's "questioning" could be terrifying, and her boss, a gentle computer geek, didn't deserve to be bullied.
"Leave the poor guy alone."
He looked down at her. "You feel compassion for him."
"It's just my way."
His lips grazed her hair. "It is a good way."
She sank down, reassured that he wasn't going to manifest into a dragon and chomp down the best employer she'd ever had. Not that he'd truly do that, she knew. Malcolm could possess a gentleness incongruous with his cold dragon eyes and calculating ways. This was the second time he'd saved her, dragging her from the brink of death with his healing power. He hadn't needed to—like the white dragon, he could have discarded Saba and searched for another witch to help him.
And none of that seemed to matter right now. All that mattered was sitting here with Malcolm, his arms around her, his lips in her hair. Real life seemed far away and inconsequential, despite white dragons, witches, imps, sprites, and inky darkness.
She could bask in the heated water, scented with bath salts, relaxing on Malcolm's lap for a long time. No job worries, no database problems, just pleasant heat and Malcolm holding her. Her fingers looked a little pruney, so he must have been sitting with her for a while, which was fine with Saba.
Except… she lifted her head. "What time is it?"
"Five thirty-six post meridian," he rumbled. "And twenty-two seconds if it's important."
"Five…" She had no clocks in the bathroom. "How do you know that so exactly?"
"I looked at the time when we entered this room and calculated the minutes from there."
"You mean you guessed."
"There is only a point-zero-zero-zero-zero-two-six-percentage margin for error."
It was a most bizarre feeling to have an incredibly sexy man sharing your bathtub and calculating the time to exact seconds with a very low error rate. Even stranger to have certainty that he was not even a nanosecond off.
"I hope you're right because I have a tea ceremony lesson at seven tonight. If, in fact, today is still today."
"It is the same day we left for Dragonspace, yes."
Saba put a reluctant hand on the edge of the tub. "I should start getting ready."
Malcolm hooked his arm around her and pulled her back to his lap. "Given the travel time from here to Nihon-machi plus the time you will need for me to towel you off and help you dress, we have forty-eight minutes in which you may continue to rest."
His touch, plus the mention of him toweling her dry, zapped the last of her strength. Her head sank to his shoulder. "You're better than a day-planner, did you know that?"
His lashes were black and damp, clumped with water against his bronzed skin. "I wish to savor every one of those forty-eight minutes with you."
Her heart warmed and fluttered at the same time. "The bathtub's dirty."
"We can adjourn."
"I don't know. It's so warm in here."
"The bed will be equally as warm."
Definite fluttering, accompanied by heat between her legs. "You said we only had forty-eight minutes."
"Forty-six-point-two-five, now. There are a number of ways in which we may share that allotted time."
She raised her head again, wondering if he'd suddenly grown a sense of humor. "Do you have in your head the precise timing of each and every sexual act two people can do?"
He returned her look without a flicker. "I can if you like."
She started to laugh, shaking the bathwater and sending a few trickles over the edge. "I've never had a boyfriend like you, Malcolm."
His brows drew together. "This word… boyfriend… and its counterpart, girlfriend—these are not intimate enough for what we have."
"What would you prefer? I don't know what else to call this, except maybe a weird relationship."
"Lovers." His arms tightened around her. "I like that word. Dragons do not have lovers."
"But you have mates."
"That is different."
"Of course it is." She laid her head on his shoulder again. "How much time do we have now?"
"Forty-four-point-five minutes."
"Then we'd better start figuring out what we're going to do with it."
> "I know precisely what we will do with it."
He rose to his feet, catching Saba under the arms and bringing her smoothly up with him. One wet arm went around her from behind at the same time he reached to the pile of towels on the shelf next to the bathtub and pulled one around her.
He proceeded to prove that they did have enough time for certain things. Saba found herself still damp on the towel on the bed while Malcolm licked his way from her breasts to the honey that was flowing hot for him. Then he entered her and took her with an intensity that left her even more exhausted than before.
Malcolm's calculations must have been a little bit off because by the time Saba scuttled into the practice room near the Japan Center, the other students were already there, and Sensei Kameko was regarding Saba's empty place in sorrow.
During the Cherry Blossom Festival in the spring, Saba would hostess a real tea room, which would be traditionally decorated with tatami mats, low tables, and an alcove with a flower arrangement she had prepared. She would dress in kimono, and she and her guests would speak in hushed whispers.
Very different from the church meeting hall Sensei had finagled for practice. Saba let the door bang closed behind her. The other tea hosts and hostesses, in street clothes, already knelt on mats, practicing laying out their accoutrements. Only Saba's mat was empty.
She hurried across the echoey room, out of breath, Malcolm striding behind her. "Gomen nasai, Sensei-sama," she said to Kameko, then folded her hands and made an apologetic bow.
Kameko nodded graciously, but her gentle eyes held annoyance. She believed lateness to be the height of rudeness.
She looked with much more interest at Malcolm. Kameko was a small, delicate lady who had been born in Japan and moved to San Francisco when her Japanese husband was transferred here by his company to work. Kameko professed to love America, despite having to put up with people who were tardy.
She was a flower of Japanese womanhood—petite, graceful, artistic, polite, and soft-spoken. She attended the Japanese classes she conducted in kimono and possessed an iron will that could make the hardest businessman pale.
The Black Dragon Page 13
