“I think you live long enough because you don’t actually risk your lives for the people who provide you with air conditioning or the ingredients for these fancy drinks.” She held her glass up to emphasize her point.
“Which is precisely why I wanted to have this event for Lady Hall,” Goldenrod interjected. He looked nervous. Clearly, he was concerned about the conversation and probably envisaged the night as a whole slipping away from him.
“I see nothing noble in risking one’s life unnecessarily,” the green dragon replied rather snootily.
“I agree,” she said and earned a raised eyebrow from him. “But risking my life to protect the men and women of this city is definitely not unnecessary,” she finished icily.
He twitched his mustache in contempt, excused himself, and vanished into the crowd.
“Cheers!” Beanpole said, his voice ever so slightly slurred. “To making enemies who could obliterate us if they weren’t so proper.”
“Indeed.” Goldenrod nodded. “It’s considered quite poor form to eat a human when there are so many well-cooked hors d'oeuvres floating around.”
Hernandez raised her glass. “I’ll drink to that.”
The team clinked glasses, then drank—after being reprimanded by Goldenrod for not making eye contact. Apparently, he’d spent a few centuries in Europe and still found the American habit of toasting while staring at one’s glass instead of looking into the eyes of one’s friends quite pointless.
The drink was—quite simply—the most incredible liquid Kristen had ever consumed. The first taste was the sweetness of molasses, but that brightened fairly quickly as alcohol and cinnamon battled for dominance on her tongue. It warmed her entire body when she swallowed, and a slight spicy burn lingered in her mouth to finish the effect.
From there, the team split up again.
Goldenrod followed her for a while, asking her questions about living with people and what it felt like to defend them. Even his questions seemed odd to her. She still thought of herself as human so defending people seemed natural, but as the night went on and he called for more drinks—the dragons seemed to be able to get the attention of the servers in a way the humans could not—her head spun and she began to feel less and less human.
The first thing she noticed was the auras that poured off the dragons. They didn’t use them to affect each other, not in the way they used it to affect the behavior of mortals. Instead, they used it to underscore points in conversation.
As she moved from conversation to conversation, she felt different shades of disgust directed at her—this aura often came from those who tried to politely tell her to stop wallowing with the humans. Others, however, simply found her fascinating. Goldenrod wasn’t alone in his interest in her. Many of the dragons were equally curious about her and their auras betrayed only that.
The worst encounter of the night came after a few hours and a few drinks, and she later wondered if the offensive dragon had planned it that way.
Kristen had separated from Goldenrod and stood near the edge of the room in conversation with Butters and a fairly short female dragon with a Spanish accent and an amazing ruffled orange flamenco dress.
They talked about travel and how the airplane might never have been invented without dragons to inspire flight—or, at least, the dragon in the orange dress held that opinion. Butters argued that people had been inspired not by dragons but by birds because most people saw birds every day of their lives, while few people ever saw dragons.
The woman obviously disagreed but she was polite enough about it. Kristen was about to pull herself from her drink-inspired haze and intervene when someone pushed through the crowd.
“Please, not now,” Goldenrod called from behind them, but the person would not be deterred.
A man—a dragon in man form—emerged from the crowd. He wore a slate-gray suit and an eyepatch, of all things. He strode toward Kristen over the continued protests of Goldenrod and came to a stop, swaying as he did so.
“Admit it. You’re a damn fake,” he said bluntly.
“Pardon me?” She turned to him, suddenly painfully aware of how far above the streets of the city she really was.
“Pardon the interruption, Lady Hall. This is Sir Thomas Ironclaw.”
Ironclaw raised the eyebrow above his normal eye and brandished a fist at her. It turned to iron—the dark, light-sucking black of cast iron.
“Sir Thomas believes—”
“Shut the hell up, Goldenrod, before I knock your damn jaw off. I can speak for myself.”
“Can you?” Butters asked mildly.
The newcomer faced him and his aura swept like a tidal wave. She realized that she was supposed to feel fear—no, terror—at being in the presence of this dragon. His purpose was that she would be so frightened, she would want to throw herself from the rooftop rather than face the ire of the god-like being in front of her.
Kristen, of course, didn’t feel that at all, and before Butters could react to his aura, she flexed her own. She’d never done that before but after being surrounded by dragons the entire night, she felt she had some idea of how it worked. Until that moment, she’d blocked their auras with her own sense of confidence so she simply tried to expand that feeling into her teammate.
It worked perhaps a little too well.
The sniper set his jaw and took a step toward Ironclaw. “I do believe you owe Lady Hall an explanation.”
A crowd hadn’t gathered—the dragons were obviously much too polite for that—but they didn’t ignore the exchange either. Every eye that could discreetly glance at the two dragons did exactly that, and every eye that couldn’t watched the faces of those who could.
“You’re a fake,” he reiterated.
“A fake what?” she asked and transformed her entire body into steel.
“You’re some mage’s little project let loose, or you have a piece of tech the humans invented. You’re not one of us. You’re not a dragon.”
“And yet, for some reason, I feel like my steel body would still beat your metal hand in a fight.”
Ironclaw threw his head back and laughed loudly enough to silence what little conversation continued. A chill nipped at her as a cold breeze cut across the rooftop. A few of the floating golden globes flickered while a couple of the threads of flame were extinguished.
“You wish to fight, girl? Fine, let us fight.”
Kristen raised her fists.
He laughed even harder. “Do you think I’ll fight you in this pathetic form? What will you do when I lift you from this roof and let you fall?”
“You couldn’t knock me off,” she said rather lamely. She lacked confidence because it had started to rain—only lightly, but enough to slick the surface and cause her hair to slump. Her and Hernandez were the only women whose hair was affected by the drizzle.
“You may weigh more with your shiny little shell but my wings have pushed my iron claw to such speeds as to make gravel out of stone mountains. I helped the Mongol hordes smash the great wall of China, girl. Do you think you can stand against me because you have stood against bullets? Only one dragon has ever been killed by a bullet, and it wasn’t the pathetic variety you humans so love to hurl at each other.”
A blinding flash sizzled when a bolt of electricity struck the lightning tower at the top of the skyscraper they all stood on. The crack of thunder was powerful enough to shake the rooftop and shatter glasses.
“I think that’s quite enough, Thomas,” a man said as he stepped from the crowd. He was difficult to see as the globes closest to him had all gone out and he wore a black suit that drank what light did fall upon it.
“Sebastian—please, I have this quite under control,” Vincent Goldenrod protested.
“I disagree. Thomas has seized the night and offended our guests in the process.” He was much taller than anyone else at the party and broader too and his large frame made even Drew seem slight. His black ponytail and goatee were the same midnight-black as his suit
. As he approached, lightning struck another building and for a moment, he was fully illuminated. The only color besides his tanned skin was the blood-red of his silk shirt, tie, and highlights on his black gloves. Kristen had the sense that he was at least partly responsible for the lightning. Ironclaw’s scowls at the weather seemed to confirm her suspicions.
“Don’t tell me you feel differently now, Shadowstorm! When we spoke earlier—”
“I played devil’s advocate, you fool,” the dark dragon growled. “This is uncivilized, especially in front of humans. You owe our guest an apology—a proper apology.”
There were gasps at that, and she had the sense that simply saying sorry would fall far short.
“You insult me,” Ironclaw protested and wings unfurled from his back to the sounds of chains and gears clanking.
“You insult yourself. You challenge this young woman to combat despite knowing full well that might does not always equal right. Or shall we replay the events of the American Revolution?”
“Your actions weren’t sanctioned by the council. And the battle you fought wasn’t clean.”
“I don’t know. I think history and I tend to see things differently.” Shadowstorm winked on the same side of his face that the other man hid behind an eyepatch. Kristen didn’t think that was a coincidence.
“We fight, brother,” Ironclaw roared.
Lightning seared the sky again and blinded her. In the darkness that followed, Shadowstorm moved in front of Ironclaw and snaked one hand around his neck. She couldn’t tell if he had run there using his dragon speed or had moved somehow with the darkness.
“Kneel, brother, and beg forgiveness of our guest.”
“Never!” The other dragon spat in his captor’s face.
In response, Shadowstorm simply lifted him by the neck, caught his cummerbund, and threw him off the side of the building and into the strengthening rainstorm.
He plummeted for perhaps forty stories before a sound like a steam engine coming to life preceded a dragon’s sudden appearance in the rain. Ironclaw’s wings caught the air and he flew into the city and demolished the smokestack of an abandoned factory with his iron claw as he moved.
The party began to break up. The rain hadn’t actually made anyone wet but it had turned the floating hors d'oeuvres to mush and doused the strings of flame.
“Oh, dear, I do apologize,” Sebastian Shadowstorm said to her and bowed deeply.
“You have nothing to apologize for,” she said.
“No, I do, really. For you see, I was talking to Thomas earlier about the peculiarities of your powers and he must have taken my curiosity too far.”
“And then, of course, there’s the rain,” Goldenrod added. He frowned at the other dragon.
“Yes, indeed, and I fear that losing my temper has caused the party to break up. Let me see if I can…” Shadowstorm closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. When he exhaled, great gusts of biting wind blew across the roof. So he could control the weather. She had never really wondered what dragons could do but now, she found it was the only thing her brain wanted to know.
The wind didn’t cause her still-steel body to stumble, although she was relieved it was Butters who stood with her near the edge of the skyscraper and not Hernandez.
Still, it was too late. Goldenrod was right in that the ambiance was ruined.
At least for some of the more well-behaved dragons.
A pixie flitted over to a small table she hadn’t noticed, put on some headphones, and began to spin records while he pounded out a deep bass beat.
“This is crazy,” Keith said as he staggered up to them, a drink in each hand. “Suddenly, I can get service!”
Kristen smiled. That was hardly surprising. More than half of the party had either retreated to the elevator or simply leapt from the edge of the building. Dragons of different colors flew away in every direction. She had never seen so many in one place. There must have been close to a hundred!
Drew and Beanpole arrived a moment later. The team leader looked moderately amused—which meant he’d had two drinks, the most she had ever seen him have—and Beanpole weaved a little.
“Give me back my fucking shoes, you damn pixie!” Hernandez screamed. “I need those to walk home.”
“Like, on the ground?” the pixie replied in a high, buzzy voice and tossed the shoes from the rooftop. It began to fly around and dance to the music with a few other pixies. Kristen didn’t think it was an accident the pixie stayed well above the woman’s reach.
Dragons joined the pixies on the dance floor—although they didn’t float above it—and soon, the rooftop was no longer a dinner party but a rave.
“Whatever. Those damn heels were killing my back anyway,” Hernandez grumbled and her wet feet slapped on the roof as she approached the group.
“Thank you for your help, Sir Shadowstorm,” Kristen said to the towering man.
“It was nothing. Ironclaw and I have been at each other’s throats for centuries. Really, I should thank you. I haven’t had an excuse to fling him from a building in decades. And please, call me Sebastian, Lady Hall.”
“Kristen’s fine. And…thank you, really. If he had knocked me from the building, I don’t know what would have happened. He’s right, you know. I still can’t transform into a dragon.”
“I’m sure that myself, Goldenrod, and half of the guests here would have thrown ourselves after you in a race to see who could be the dragon that saves the damsel in distress.”
Goldenrod nodded in affirmation but before he could speak, Hernandez hiccupped and spoke.
“Damsel in distress?” The woman laughed. She was drunk as well, that much was obvious. “How ʼbout we call her that instead of Red?”
“I’m so glad that you’re all still enjoying yourselves,” Shadowstorm said. “But neither flight nor transformation is something that comes easy for a young dragon. It’s true, most of us spend our first decades in their dragon form rather than human, but the process of changing shape is the same either way. I’d be honored to help you with it.”
“It’s not hard,” Goldenrod said and flicked his hair back. By the time his golden mane had settled on his back, he was a dragon and shook his tail to the beat.
“Nor is it easy, Vincent,” Shadowstorm said. Kristen had the sense that he could tell Goldenrod was drunk as easily as Kristen could tell Hernandez and Keith were.
“I don’t know how long you intend to stay. These parties can run fairly late, but please take my card and call me if there’s anything you need.” The dark dragon proffered his card. It was as black as his suit with his name and a phone number printed in dark red and nothing else.
“Thanks, yeah. I will.”
“Now, shall we dance?” He extended his hand like they were about to waltz to something composed by Mozart instead of the dubstep that pounded them with drums and bass.
She shrugged and took his hand.
Chapter Thirty
After dancing, Sebastian led the steel dragon to a lounge area and gestured for one of the mages to dry the sofas and bring them drinks. The mage obeyed hastily, blew hot wind over the seats, and bowed to him exactly as the little runts were supposed to.
“That was great,” his companion said and smiled at him.
He smiled indulgently in response. It was nothing short of amazing. This woman had unraveled months of his work. She’d almost unmasked his alias as Detroit’s hidden crime lord, Mr Black. He’d ordered men to shoot her with sniper rifles, machine guns, and even a rocket launcher. There was no person who’d done more to hinder his plans, and he now plied her with alcohol. But she wasn’t a human, was she?
“I thought that since…well, you know, you’ve been around for a while so this kind of music wouldn’t be your thing.” Kristen laughed.
But she was so very human. There she was, talking to one of the most powerful dragons in the western hemisphere—at least according to his own calculations—and she asked about his dancing? If the
discovery that she was a dragon was an act, it was a very convincing one.
“Honestly, staying up to date on music trends isn’t the forte of many of my brothers and sisters, but—living in Motown—I find it enjoyable as well as essential to understanding the people who live here. Plus, it's easy. Simply ask the pixies what they listen to. They have the attention span of children so only like the newest musical groups.”
“Band,” the steel dragon said—Kristen, her name was Kristen, he reminded himself.
“Pardon me?” He didn’t know what exactly she was talking about. He accepted a drink from the mage and took a sip, hoping to feign intoxication.
“Musical groups are called bands…oh, never mind, it’s not important. Can I ask you a question?” She plucked the levitating drink from the air and actually thanked the mage for bringing it over. It was so quaint it was almost cute.
“Of course you may ask me a question—with the caveat that you will, in turn, tickle my curiosity.”
“That seems fair.” She sipped her drink. “This is good.” She smiled broadly. Ferreting out this enigma of a dragon’s secrets would be all too easy. “Are they all really your brothers and sisters? And if they are, does that mean I am too?”
“All dragons are brothers and sisters in that we’re equals, but our family tree is as complicated as humanity’s. Calling them brothers and sisters is merely an expression, I fear, and yet it does bring me directly to my question.”
“And that is?” she said after he paused. It was good to make people want to answer questions. It helped to assuage suspicion.
“I must admit, I’m terribly curious about how you came to be the Lost Dragon the media has gone on about,” Sebastian said casually. Guests had hopefully pumped her for information all night and she wouldn’t think anything of another dragon asking about her past.
“You and me both!” she blurted and giggled. The drink after their time on the dance floor had gone straight to her head.
“What do you mean?”
Steel Dragon (Steel Dragons Series Book 1) Page 23
