by Shéa MacLeod
Prologue
Previously...
I watched in horror as a huge hole opened up in Inigo's chest. Blood spilled down the front of his shirt, soaking his clothing in seconds. He crumpled to the ground.
"No!" I sank to my knees on the cold marble floor, reaching toward the water, but with another wave of the queen's hand, the image went dark. "No, no, no!" I screamed until my throat was raw, pawing at the water as though I could slip through it back to my own world.
"Why?" was all I could get out past the agonizing tightness of my throat. I could barely see the queen for the tears that welled in my eyes and spilled down my cheeks. All I could do was lie on the icy floor as agony burned its way through my chest.
The smile she gave me was so far from human, I could hardly comprehend it. "For the death of a Sidhe, there is always a price, Morgan Bailey."
Chapter 1
My legs had gone to sleep. That was the only thing that saved my life.
One moment I was kneeling on the bitterly cold black marble of the Other World staring at the dark pool of water, willing it to work again. To show me that copse of trees in the high desert where my friends waited. To show me Inigo.
The next, I was collapsing sideways as my legs gave out. Pins and needles shot through me from toes to mid-thigh. As I teetered to the left, a large axe buried itself in the floor beside me with a clang, metal biting into smooth stone. If I hadn't fallen over, it would have been buried in my skull.
"Holy sh... "
My legs mostly useless, I wriggled around the edge of the pool like a snake, the slick marble easing my way. Another clang of metal against stone. I turned to stare at the axe, which had missed my foot by an inch. What kind of metal could damage marble like that? For that matter, how the heck had someone gotten metal into the Other World? The Sidhe hated metal and prevented it from entering their kingdom. My knives never came through with me. The axe couldn't possibly be Earth metal.
I scrambled out of the way as the axe's wielder yanked the weapon free. My brain tried to make sense of what I was seeing, but it was having trouble catching up. The axe-man was huge, at least seven feet tall, and had muscles that would have made The Rock weep with envy. Thick legs were encased in leather pants, and silver-studded leather straps strained across his massive, tattooed chest. But the thing that really caught my attention was that he had the head of a boar.
Not like a cute little pink pig from a farm. A freaking boar with enormous, curved yellow tusks dripping with saliva. Head, neck, and shoulders were covered in grayish brown bristles. He glared at me with hateful red eyes and let out an angry squeal that had my stomach doing panicked flip flops. I had no doubt he intended to kill me.
"Morgana!" I shrieked, praying that, despite what she'd done, the fairy queen would hear me and send help. "Morgana!"
There was no answer. The giant boar man kept coming, swinging that wicked axe, and here I was without a single weapon and no access to my Atlantean powers. For whatever reason, they didn't work on the Other Side.
But you are still a hunter. Act like one.
Wrapping my fingers around the edge of the pool to anchor myself on the slippery marble, I lashed out with both feet, slamming them straight into the creature's right patella. He dropped to the floor with a crash and a pig-like scream, deadly axe skittering across the smooth surface.
I had to get that axe.
I staggered to my feet and charged awkwardly around the pool toward the weapon. My legs were finally working again. Sort of. I still had that funny pins-and-needles tingly feeling and I definitely felt off kilter, but adrenaline lent me speed if not agility.
Close up the axe was enormous. I wrapped one hand around the wooden shaft, which had to be at least double the length and diameter of a normal axe. My fingers barely went all the way around it. The head reminded me of those Viking war axes they always showed in the movies, except it was double-sided and a hell of a lot bigger.
I yanked hard, but the axe didn't move an inch. It was so heavy, I hadn't even managed to shift it. Definitely not Earth metal.
"Holy shit, what is this thing made of?"
Wrapping both hands around the shaft, I tried to lift. This time, I managed to get it off the floor by a whole inch. Even with my extra hunter strength, this baby was going nowhere, and the man boar thing was getting to his feet. I swear I could see puffs of steam coming out of his ears.
So I did the only thing that came to mind. I started dragging the axe across the floor toward the pool. If I couldn't arm myself, I could disarm my opponent. Maybe.
The axe head made a gods-awful shriek against the stone, scratching a deep furrow in the black marble. What the nine hells was this thing made out of? Some kind of Asgard metal? The man boar swiveled his head in my direction, his tiny red pig eyes glaring at me, massive shoulder muscles bunching. He let out a squeal that sent a chill down my spine.
Lowering his head, he charged straight at me so fast I barely had time to drop the axe and dance out of the way. The creature seemed surprised he'd missed as he stumbled to a halt and shook his head. He let out another one of those bone-chilling squeals; clearly, I'd frustrated him.
Not waiting for the next charge, I grabbed the axe again and gave another good heave. Closer this time. I had no idea how deep the pool was, but hopefully deep enough Pig Man couldn't get to it easily. One more heave, and it would be in the water.
Too late. The beast charged again, and this time he didn't make the mistake of giving me time to get out of the way. Instead, he tackled me, grabbed me around the waist and knocked me off my feet.
Fortunately for my spine, the tackle drove me backward before I went down. I braced myself for the marble, but instead I hit water.
I plunged into the fairy pool with Pig Man on top me. Holding my breath as the dark water closed over my head, I waited for the jolt of hitting the bottom, but I just kept sinking.
* * *
I was falling through cold black water, desperate for a breath of air, and then all I could see was endless blue sky. The icy winter air chilled me to my bones as I drew it in. Then I hit the frozen ground. The air rushed out of my lungs, leaving me struggling to draw my next breath.
With a gasp, I finally sucked air into my lungs. I needed to move before the boar man fell on me, but my arms and legs didn't want to work. I stared up at the cloudless sky and wondered vaguely why the Other World looked just like Earth. And also why I wasn't getting squished by a monster pig man.
Spots danced in my vision, and my skull felt a little tight. I was going to have a gods-awful headache. My clothes were still dry, which I found odd. Shouldn't I be sopping wet?
"Morgan." A face appeared above me, swimming in and out of focus. Short, sun-streaked hair. Ocean blue eyes.
"Jack?" It came out as barely more than a squeak. I hadn't quite gotten my breath back yet.
Another face popped into view. "Oh my goddess, Morgan. Are you okay?"
I squinted, trying to bring Kabita's features into focus. I could make out her warm cinnamon skin and curly black hair, but everything else was blurry still. "Uh, yeah, I think so. You didn't happen to see a man boar?"
Kabita and Jack exchanged glances as if to say 'She's off her rocker again.' The cold was seeping through my clothes, making me shiver, but sitting up was beyond me at the moment.
"Uh, no. Where the hell did you go?" Kabita demanded. "One minute you were here, and the next you vanished into thin air."
I ignored her. I only had one thing on my mind now that pig man was gone. I needed to know what the queen had done. "Inigo. Where's Inigo?"
Another glance passed between th
em. I could tell by their faces something was very wrong. Not that I needed them to tell me that. I'd seen it for myself, thanks to the fairy queen and that dark pool of water.
She'd flicked her finger, and a hole had opened up in Inigo's chest. I'd been helpless as the man I loved crumpled to the ground, lifeless. And then Morgana, the Queen of the Sidhe, had walked away as if it meant nothing.
"Help me up," I demanded, holding my hand out. Nobody took it. "I said, help me up."
"Morgan, you fell. You could be injured... "
"I didn't ask for your medical opinion, Jack," I snapped. "Help me up, or so help me gods, I will rip you limb from limb."
He helped me up. I doubt it was because he was afraid of me. Jack was about as immortal as they came and a hell of a lot stronger than I'd ever be. But now that I was back on Terra Firma, my abilities had kicked back in, which meant any damage I'd sustained during the fall had probably already healed.
The minute I was on my feet, I realized we were only about a hundred yards away from the copse of juniper trees that had been the final battle ground against the would-be fairy king, Alberich. The same place I'd watched from the Other World as the fae queen took the life of the man I loved.
Kabita laid her hand on my arm. "There's something you should know."
"I already do." And with that, I took off, running across the uneven ground, dodging scraggly sage brush and crushing tumbleweeds under my boots. I darted between the trees and into the center of the copse, where I came to a dead stop.
The man standing there, waiting for me, was hauntingly beautiful. He smelled of chocolate and campfires, and his eyes glittered with gold and mysteries. The smile he gave me was so full of sadness, it broke my heart. What was left of it.
"Drago." It was the only thing I could get out past the tightness in my chest.
"I am so sorry, Morgan."
Then and only then did I break down and cry.
* * *
He lay crumpled on the ground, skin pale as death. Around him the grass, now dry and brown with winter cold, waved gently in the chilly breeze that rustled the juniper boughs. I wiped away hot tears as I ran to him.
"Oh, Ingo," I whispered, kneeling beside his still form. "I'm so sorry. I couldn't stop her." I brushed a stray lock of dark blond hair away from his forehead. Someone had removed his glasses, or maybe they'd fallen off when he'd... when the queen... Fuck dammit.
My throat felt like someone had taken a hot cigarette lighter from a car and jammed it down in there, a huge lump that choked and burned and made me want to throw up. The blood covering his chest was dry, not that I cared. I lay my head down next to the gaping wound as though I could still hear his heartbeat, but there was nothing. Only the sound of the wind and the gentle distant murmur from my friends.
Arms wrapped around me, too big to be Kabita, too gentle to be Jack. "I'm so sorry, Morgan." Trevor Daly's voice was soft in my ear. "It happened so fast. There was nothing we could do. We don't even know why... "
"It was her," I told my brother. "Morgana. It was the fairy queen's revenge for killing Alberich. She made me watch." I choked on the sob that rose in my throat.
"Oh my god." Trevor's arms tightened around me as I pressed my face against his leather jacket. The horror in his voice almost undid me. So much sorrow and anguish flooded my soul, I thought I might actually die of it.
I felt another hand on my shoulder, and I knew from the scent it was Drago. "It's time," he said, as if I should know what that meant. I pulled against his hand, refusing to leave Inigo. I would stay here with him until...
I squeezed my eyes shut. I hadn't seen his soul leave his body like I had Zip's. Of course, I could have missed it, being in the Other World. It was ridiculous, but I was afraid to leave in case he was still trapped in there somewhere.
"Come on, Morgan." This time it was Trevor who tried to pull me away from Inigo's body.
"What? No." I resisted his gentle tug. "I'm not going anywhere without Inigo."
"I'm sorry, but you must." Drago's voice held an edge of authority that rubbed me the wrong way. Yes, he was Inigo's half-brother and a king, but they had only met a few months ago. Inigo and I had been friends for years. More than that, he was my boyfriend. My rock.
Trevor pulled a little harder. I jerked away from him.
"Why is he here?" I snarled at my brother, glaring at Drago as though this were all his fault.
"I called him."
My eyes widened. "What?"
Drago knelt down to my level. His inhuman eyes stared straight into mine, as though he could will me to understand. "Listen to me, Morgan. If we are to save him, you must let me take him now. Before it's too late."
It was as if he was speaking Chinese or something. I could hear the words but they weren't making any sense.
"I don't understand." I lay my palm against Inigo's chest where his heartbeat should be. It was so still. "He's... " I couldn't say "dead." It might make it all real. "Gone."
Drago laid his hand next to mine. I noted vaguely that his tanned skin shimmered slightly in the weak winter sun, as if there were a little gold embedded in it. A wry smile twisted his full lips. "Not quite."
Hope, that cruel little devil, sprang up inside me. "What do you mean?"
He stood and offered me his hand. "We're dragons, remember. We are not that easy to kill."
Chapter 2
Icy water slid through trails of thick, green slime to pool at the base of the rock walls. Torchlight glittered off a billion tiny crystals embedded in the stone. The air was cold and wet. Not at all what I expected from a dragon cave.
Cordelia’s sister Sandra—now calling herself Tanith—walked beside me in complete silence. She’d explained to me that once we entered the caves, we were not to utter a single word. The only reason the dragons were allowing us to visit one of their most sacred places was because Sandra - I mean Tanith - was their Dragon Child. The first in centuries. As for me, I was the Fire Bringer. I still had no idea what that meant, but it was important to the dragons and allowed me a certain leeway. Believe me, I was taking advantage.
Drago hadn't wanted me with him when he took Inigo's body back to dragon land, deep within the Scottish highlands, but I hadn't been about to take no for an answer. I think he might have been worried that, if he left me behind, I'd just get on a plane and follow. So, he'd given in and ordered one of his beefy bodyguards to take me on his back.
The first time I'd flown to dragon lands had been on Inigo's back. It had been exhilarating. In dragon form, Inigo wasn't much bigger than a horse, which made for a fairly comfortable ride, and his mind-speaking talents made for all sorts of fun. Drago's bodyguard was substantially bigger, which made staying on his back a challenge. Either he didn't have mind-speak, or he didn't deign to use it, which was fine by me. It was a long, miserable journey made worse by bone-deep sorrow and the gaping hole inside me created by Inigo's loss warring with the smidgeon of hope he could still be saved.
Tanith was the first person I saw once we'd landed. She hadn't said a word, just folded me in her arms and let me cry right there in front of the gods and everybody. Nobody'd seemed bothered by my show of grief, and a few even joined me in shedding tears.
Tanith had led me to a room within the dragons' main citadel, where we waited for Drago to finish performing the ritual that would put Inigo in stasis. That was one thing about which the Dragon King would not budge: no humans allowed. While we waited, Tanith forced food and drink down my throat this was possibly the first time in my entire life I wasn't hungry and explained how she'd chosen to change her name to Tanith, in honor of the Phoenician goddess of love and beauty. And dragons, apparently. She'd even tried to get me to sleep, but while I obediently lay down, my mind refused to shut off. The image of Inigo dropping dead at the hands of the Fairy Queen played over and over in my mind.
I felt a hand on mine. The procession of dragon kin had stopped in front of a pair of simple wooden doors. Tanith squeezed my fingers,
and I sucked in a deep breath, forcing myself back into the present as the doors swung slowly open on creaky hinges.
The procession moved forward, and Tanith tugged on my hand. We passed through the doorway, two of the honor guard staying back to swing the doors shut behind us.
Here, the air was warmer, drier. The walls were smooth and shiny, as if the surface had been melted instead of rough hewn like the first part of the tunnel. It began to widen, from side to side and top to bottom, so the path was less like an alley and more like a broad avenue.
We moved deeper into the mountain, and I tried not to think of the tons of dirt and rock above my head just waiting to crush us all. I've never been a fan of underground places.
The top of the tunnel was so high, I could no longer make out the ceiling. The path curved left, and my eyes widened at the sight in front of us: two enormous doors, at least twenty feet high and coated in shimmering gold. Across the doors in bas relief was the image of a massive fire-breathing dragon.
* * *
Two of the honor guard peeled away from the rest of the group. Between one blink and the next, they'd shapeshifted into their dragon forms. It made sense. The only being strong enough to open those massive doors would be a dragon.
Each dragon grasped one of the rings in the center of a door with a claw and slowly pulled them open. Once again, we passed through a doorway, and once again the doors banged shut behind us. I ignored my lizard brain, which gibbered in fear. I was a guest of the dragons, their Fire Bringer. They would not harm me. As if sensing my thoughts, Tanith squeezed my hand again and gave me a sympathetic smile. I forced myself to focus on the fact that somehow this could all save Inigo.
At the head of the procession, Drago stopped in front of a small brazier. He carefully touched his torch to it. A flame sprang to life. For a moment, it danced there as if waiting, then it leaped, racing via a trough running along the outside wall of the massive cavern. More braziers sprang to life, one after the other, joining in the dance until the fire had nearly circled us, leaving only a narrow pathway through the flame.
