by Jane Kindred
“No! For God’s sake, no.” Ione swallowed. “It was right after.”
“So just after he—?”
“Yes.”
“Was there, um...fluid exchange?”
“We used a condom. And I am really uncomfortable talking about this with you. And in front of the dragon. Not that it seems to be able to understand me.”
“So how did the two of you get together? You and—what was his name?”
“Dev Gideon. And, yes, he’s hot, if you must know—because I know you’re going to report back to your partner in crime.”
Theia grinned, and Ione couldn’t help elaborating just a bit.
“Really, it’s almost cruel how hot he is. You have no idea.” She sighed wistfully. “But we didn’t exactly get together. Honestly, I’m pretty sure he loathes the sight of me, so this is going to be pretty awkward if and when we manage to get him back.”
“Why would he sleep with you if he loathes the sight of you?”
Ione sighed again, this time loathing herself. “He didn’t know he was sleeping with me. Exactly.”
“Wait, what?”
Ione buried her face in her hands and spoke to her palms. “I went out in a glamour and picked him up at a bar.”
“What?” Theia sounded baffled and incredulous at the same time. Ione wasn’t sure if it was what she’d said or the fact that she’d mumbled it into her hands.
She moved her hands into her hair, combing her fingers through it, annoyed to find knots. She probably looked like hell.
“I used a glamour. It’s a spell to change your physical appearance.”
“I know what a glamour is. I’ve seen The Craft.”
Ione pulled her hair back and tied it in a knot at her nape as she looked up. “You know that movie was total crap. That’s not how any of it works. There’s no ‘Manon.’”
“Yeah, yeah. Go back to the part where you went to a bar pretending to be someone else to get the Covent assayer into bed with you.”
“That is not how it happened.”
Rhea threw the door open, back with the steaks. The explanation would have to wait.
“I bought ten pounds of top sirloin. That should tide us over if it takes a few days to figure this out.”
“It cannot take a few days.” Ione rose and took the bag of steaks to the kitchen. “What am I supposed to tell the Leadership Council?” She opened the butcher paper, grimacing at the sight of animal flesh, and got out a frying pan while she spoke. “You shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble. This had to be expensive.”
Rhea leaned against the doorway of the kitchen. “Yeah, well, it was your card.” She handed Ione the credit card she’d apparently swiped on her way out without Ione even noticing. “You don’t need the pan. He’ll want it raw.”
“How do you know?”
“He’s a dragon.” Rhea tossed one of the thick cuts onto a plate and took it back to the living room to set it on the carpet.
Ione’s mouth dropped open as the creature flicked out its sizable tongue and devoured the raw meat like a chameleon scooping a bug from a leaf.
Rhea grinned. “So that was an appetizer, I guess.” She went back to the kitchen and piled on a few more steaks, which the dragon made short work of in the same horrifying manner.
“He looks a little better now.” Theia stroked the dragon’s muzzle. “But he feels warm.”
“Maybe that’s just the temperature a dragon is supposed to be.” Ione shuddered as Rhea tossed the last of the steaks in front of it and they disappeared into the somewhat toothier mouth than she’d been imagining.
“I don’t know. He’s still losing a steady supply of blood.”
“That’s all I’ve got, big guy.” Rhea opened her hands to show they were empty when the dragon sniffed the air with a hopeful look. “We’ll get you some more later.”
Ione frowned. “There can’t be a later. We have to do something.”
“I could read the tattoo like I did with Phoebe to find Rafe when Carter abducted him.”
“I thought that only worked if you were the one who’d done the tattoo.”
“For the shared visions, yes. But, recently, I discovered I could get something from other tattoos. The images aren’t the same as the sort of visions I get with my own work. They’re just...sort of impressions. I found out while I was giving a guy a touch-up. Unfortunately.”
Ione picked up the plate to take it to the kitchen. “Why unfortunately?”
“The image was of what he was picturing doing to me. I hadn’t even started yet. I was just assessing it and, boom, creepy guy being creepy on display in my head. And he wasn’t aware of it at all. No shared vision. I just got a front-row seat to what was going on in his head. Needless to say, he did not get his touch-up.”
Ione shuddered. “I guess it’s worth a try. But be careful.”
Rhea crouched in front of the dragon, extending her hand and placing it gently on the scaly chest over the vague pentagram shape. She closed her eyes and her brows drew together in concentration.
“Anything?”
“Shh.” Rhea’s eyes moved back and forth behind her eyelids as though she was watching something intently. “There’s something, but I can’t quite... Kur.”
“Kur?” Ione and Theia repeated it together.
Rhea was quiet for a moment, still concentrating, and then opened her eyes and dropped her hand. “That’s the dragon’s name. Kur. I could sense the man inside, but I couldn’t get any images from him, except that he was...caged, I think?” She glanced up. “But Kur seems to like you, Di. I think he’d prefer to stay, but he seems to know that whatever magic is acting on him is harmful to him in this form. I got another image of a cage from Kur himself, and an older man he called the Sorcerer binding him inside it.” Rhea frowned as she stood, putting her hands on her hips. “I think this other guy bound Kur and your Dev together. And it seemed to involve a lot of...” Rhea grimaced. “Torture is the only word I can think of.”
“Torture?” Ione glanced at Kur, who didn’t seem to be taking much notice of their conversation.
“Beatings, and burning and ‘sharp’ things. Those were Kur’s mental images. Along with him apparently tearing the guy’s throat out as a thank-you.”
Ione swallowed. How close had she come to having her own throat torn out? “So if the magic is harming him, how do we stop it?”
“Well, you seem to have started it.” Rhea took a step back when Ione whirled on her. “I’m just saying.”
Theia looked thoughtful. “Maybe Rafe will know what to do. He’s used to shifting between human and quetzal form.”
There were enough people in her living room. Ione was putting her foot down.
“We’re not bringing Phoebe and Rafe into this. Everyone in the world doesn’t need to know I picked a guy up at a bar and accidentally screwed him into being a dragon.”
“You picked him up at a bar?” Rhea looked impressed. “What else are you hiding?”
“I’m not hiding anything—” Ione paused as the doorbell rang insistently, looking from the door to Rhea.
“Yeah, that’s Phoebes. I already called them while I was out getting steaks.”
“Rhea!” Ione clenched her fists at her sides and counted to ten in her head before she went to the door. Phoebe and Rafe looked like they’d just climbed out of bed. But not from sleeping in it. Both of them wore hastily tied ponytails, Phoebe’s clipped from the underside and fanning out in a perky waterfall and Rafe’s dark curls poking out messily from the short stub.
Ione shook her head as she held the door wide. “Come on in. Everybody else has.”
Phoebe stepped through the entryway onto the cream carpet without taking off her shoes. At least Rafe was observant, taking his off after glancing at th
e rack of discarded shoes by the door and the state of everyone else’s feet.
“Jesus.” Phoebe gazed up at the dragon. “He’s magnificent!” Her kid sister’s obvious approval was oddly gratifying. It wasn’t as if the dragon was her date.
“Ione picked him up in a bar,” Rhea offered helpfully, ducking out of Ione’s way as she made a menacing grab for her.
Kur’s stance stiffened at the appearance of two new people, muscles rippling beneath the scales, the ridged tail uncurling and moving slowly back and forth. He sniffed the air, nostrils flaring, and emitted a sort of warning puff of steam as Rafe entered the living room.
Ione moved closer to the dragon. “It’s okay. Rafe’s a friend.”
Rafe kept a respectful distance, sizing the dragon up. “Impressive. I thought Rhea had to be embellishing a bit, but that is definitely a dragon.”
“Do you think you can help—put him back?”
“I take it his transformation came about as a result of your unique chemistry.” Rafe gave the tiniest sexy wink in Phoebe’s direction. “You Carlisles should come with a warning label.”
Rhea helpfully offered one. “Dangerous when wet.”
Both Ione and Phoebe let out the same mortified groan.
Theia balanced her twin’s irreverence with her usual pragmatism. “We think the pentagram tattoo on his chest is a magical ward intended to keep the dragon suppressed. Now that he’s out, the magic is working against him, making him sick. His blood isn’t clotting and he has a fever.” She paused and shrugged. “At least, I think he has a fever.”
Rafe rolled his shoulders as though warming up for something, but Ione suspected he was actually triggering his own tattoo to activate his wings, though they were still invisible, somehow contained within his shirt.
The dragon growled in warning, emitting twin plumes of steam through its nostrils that glowed as if fueled by something molten within the beast.
Rafe went down on one knee and bowed his head. “I’ve come to help you, my friend. Peace.”
The growl came again and the dragon rose slightly on its limbs.
Ione stepped toward them. “Rafe, I don’t think this is a good idea.”
“It might be best to get everyone else out.”
“Rafe—”
“If we’re going to bring Gideon back before this magic kills the dragon and Gideon with it, we need to do it fast, and we don’t need an audience.”
Phoebe sighed behind her. “He’s right, Di. We’re all just gawking. We’ll wait outside.”
Ione pressed her mouth together in a thin line and turned to follow as the twins and Phoebe headed out to the driveway.
“Not you, Ione,” Rafe clarified. “I need you in here. You walk out of this thing’s line of sight and I’m pretty sure he’s going to go for my throat.”
“Sorry. Right.” Ione came back to where he knelt. “The dragon’s name is Kur, if that helps. Rhea got the name by reading his tattoo.”
Rafe nodded, unbuttoning his shirt. “Kur.” He trilled the “r.” As he dropped the shirtsleeves from his arms, the wings took shape like colors formed of smoke before coalescing into the brilliant solid plumage of the quetzal.
Kur’s head lowered but not in submission, his back rippling with tension.
Rafe kept perfectly still. “Ione, I need you to touch the tattoo.”
Ione stepped between them, veins flooding with adrenaline. She met Kur’s eyes, the glowing gold now almost a molten orange within the vivid green scales, and held the beast’s gaze as she lowered herself into a crouch and put her hand against the dragon’s abdomen.
“Take the knife off my belt,” Rafe said from behind her.
Ione turned her head. “Do what?”
“Keep your hand on Kur but reach back and take the knife out of the sheath on my belt. I’ve unsnapped it but I don’t dare put my hand on it myself.”
“Do you know what you’re doing?”
Rafe flicked his eyes up briefly to meet hers. “I’m winging it.”
“God, everyone in this family is a smartass.” She reached carefully for the sheath and closed her hand around the handle and felt the growl in Kur’s throat beneath her other hand. Ione turned back to face him, holding the dragon’s gaze once more, fumbling the knife out by feel. “Got it,” she said as she pulled the knife free, though Rafe obviously knew she had it. “Now what?”
“You’re going to have to give it your blood.”
“What?”
“The Lilith blood is what brought the dragon out. It’s the only thing that’s going to put him back in.” Rafe spoke calmly. “Move your hand from the tattoo and make a shallow cut on your palm—preferably on the thumb pad, because a cut in the center of your palm like you see people doing in the movies and TV is going to burn like hell when your hand sweats, and you won’t be able to use the hand for days. I speak from personal experience.”
Ione scrunched up her face to steel herself and drew her hand away from Kur to make the cut.
“That’s plenty.” Rafe stopped her before she went too deep.
“This is why you’re not in the coven anymore.” She said it lightheartedly to steady her nerves, but really, blood magic was the sort of thing the Covent frowned upon.
“Now you have to cut the dragon.”
Ione spun to face him. “I am not going to stab him.”
“I said ‘cut’ not ‘stab.’ We just need a similar shallow cut in the center of the sigil, and you have to do it fast so you don’t give the dragon time to react. Then you press your palm to the cut so your blood will activate it.”
“And what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to talk him down so he doesn’t take off both our heads.”
Fantastic. So this is how I die. Ione took a deep breath, the knife trembling in her hand, and looked into the dragon’s eyes. “I’m sorry.” She sliced the blade against the center of the tattoo, and the dragon reared up in surprise, a bellow of fury and a blast of steam belching out of it.
“Give it your blood. Quick.”
“I’m trying!” Ione reached for the dragon, but it had risen onto all fours, and she had to stand, stretching toward it on tiptoe. Tripping and falling against the creature most likely saved her life. With her hand outstretched, the bleeding palm landed just outside the tattoo, but close enough that the blood running from the dragon’s cut dripped onto hers. She dropped the knife and clung to the dragon’s bumpy protrusions with her free hand.
Rafe was chanting behind her. “By the power of Mictlantecuhtli and Mictecacihuatl, I bind you, Kur. By the Lord and Lady of the Underworld, I return you to the place where you are bound to Dev Gideon.”
Kur was roaring and steaming, and Ione’s feet were off the ground. She wrapped her legs around the dragon’s foreleg, sliding her palm up to cover the tattoo and holding her hand in place with all her might.
“Return this body to Dev Gideon,” Rafe insisted. “You don’t belong within this plane.”
“Kur.” She hoped the dragon could hear her trembling voice. “You need to go back. I won’t let anyone hurt you. I promise.”
The dragon stilled, snorting and huffing like a spooked horse, and Ione instinctively stroked the scales and bumps she gripped to try to calm it.
“Let the dragon rest, Gideon.” Rafe shrugged the quetzal wings back into place as if to demonstrate.
With a shudder, Kur’s wings retracted and, as the dragon seemed to fold into itself, Ione tumbled to the ground on top of him. But it was no longer the dragon. It was Dev, crumpled naked on her carpet, his arm ensconced in a pile of bloody towels.
Chapter 9
Ione sat back on her heels. Dev’s back was scored with blood, as if the dragon’s claws had somehow raked his skin. And there were older marks. Doze
ns of scars, suggesting he’d been through this transformation more than once, along with an unusual gnarl of flesh, like the scar tissue from a burn but with an oddly specific shape, just above his glutes. She tore her gaze away. It was entirely inappropriate to be noticing how incredible those glutes were right now.
“Dev?” His body had begun to tremble. Rafe came up beside her with a cream-colored throw from the couch and laid it over him. And there went the last thing in her living room that wasn’t covered in blood. “I don’t think he’s conscious. Do you think he’s in shock?”
“His body is probably experiencing some major adjustments, but his bleeding seems to have stopped, and his temperature feels normal.” Rafe moved the towels out of the way, looking over the wound on Dev’s arm. “We should probably get him to bed to sleep it off.”
Ione nodded. “Maybe if we both take a side we can get him on his feet.”
“Ione.” Rafe smiled and placed his hand on his chest. “Quetzal.” He scooped Dev into his arms and headed up the stairs as though it were effortless. Lucky Phoebe.
Ione followed him up and bit back a protest as Rafe laid Dev on top of the clean duvet. When they covered him with some extra blankets from the closet, he stirred and moaned but didn’t wake.
“We can stick around if you want,” Rafe offered. “Or we can get out of your hair.”
“I think the less people here when he comes around, the better.” It was going to be awkward enough that Ione was here, and it was her house.
Rafe nodded. “Gotcha. Just give us a call if you need anything.”
“Thank you, Rafe.” Ione shivered and rubbed her arms as they headed downstairs. “I think you saved his life.”
Rafe smiled, pulling on his shirt. “Least I could do. You saved mine.”
“Yeah, and I nearly killed him.” Ione shook her head. “I am definitely going to be kicked out of the Covent.”
Rafe squeezed her hand wordlessly. He glanced at the shattered wall as he buttoned up. “I’ll come back later and board that up. First thing Monday, I’ll send some of my guys over to fix the frame and replace the glass.” Diamante Construction and Excavation was his family’s business. His, now that his father was dead—courtesy of Carter Hamilton.
