Love in the Time of Dragons ld-1

by Katie MacAlister

  “You bared your breasts to the demon, too?” Baltic asked with outraged eyebrows.

  “No, of course I didn’t! I’ve told you several times now that I have no desire, fantasy, or other urge to bare anything to anyone, least of all my breasts. I have never, ever deliberately showed my breasts. So please stop insisting that’s all I can think of. It just doesn’t happen, OK?” Pavel, Jim, and Baltic all eyed my cleavage.

  I looked down, swore, and hiked up the neckline yet again. “Gah!” “We are going to have a long discussion regarding these sexual fantasies of yours,” Baltic told me, tugging me toward the house.

  “I do not have an exhibitionist fantasy!” I yelled.

  “What’s an exhibitionist?” I heard Brom ask Jim.

  I spun around and sent the demon a look that had it grinning. “It means someone who likes shopping at small boutiques,” it said.

  “One step out of line, demon, and I’ll… I’ll…” “Or you’ll what?” it asked, tipping its head to the side.

  Before I could answer, Baltic paused and shot laser beams from his eyeballs. Well, all right, not really, but the effect was the same. Fire blossomed in a circle around the demon, causing it to dance and yelp.

  “Cool,” Brom said, looking with speculation at Baltic.

  “All right, all right! Call off your wacko boyfriend! I’ll behave!” Jim tried to blow out flames that licked up its tail. “Not the package! Anything but the package!” “See that you do behave,” Baltic said, extinguishing the fire with a flick of his eyes. He turned to Pavel and spoke in a low tone of voice, the latter casting periodic glances my way.

  I sighed to myself and pulled out my cell phone as we all entered the hall. “I suppose I should tell Aisling that you’re with me, Jim, and all right. It wouldn’t be fair to make her worry you’d been kidnapped by someone who meant to destroy you.” Jim made a face. “Yeah, well, about that…” “What?” I asked when its voice trailed to a stop.

  “Normally I wouldn’t worry, because as soon as Ash realized I’d been demon-napped, she could summon me back to her, but she’s not going to realize I’m gone. Well, she is, but not. If you get my drift.” “Not in the least. What are you babbling about?” Jim sighed. “My ride to the airport was due when you showed up. Suzanne probably thought that’s where I went. I told you I was supposed to go to Paris.” “Ah, well,” I said, not too worried about Jim’s missed trip. “I’m sure you can go another time.” “I don’t want to stay here,” Brom suddenly said, giving the hall a good long look.

  “Why not?” I asked, worried that he had gotten the wrong impression from Baltic’s possessive hold on me. Or rather, the right impression, but without an explanation that would help him understand the complex relationship that even I wasn’t sure I completely grasped.

  “I want to go back to Gabriel’s house, where I have my lab set up.” Baltic whirled around. “What is this? My son does not prefer the house of the silver wyvern over mine.” “Gabriel told Brom he could use a room in the basement to perform his experiments. He likes to mummify things.” “I’m a mummologist,” Brom told Baltic.

  “The silver wyvern gave you a room?” Baltic’s eyes narrowed. “You are my son. I will give you…” He thought for a moment. “I will give you an entire building. There is a barn to the north — you may use that.” “Cool,” Brom repeated; then his face fell. “But all my stuff is at Gabriel’s house. My natron, and my dehydrator, and my dead fox, and everything else.” “I will give you new things. Better foxes, better natron.” I raised my eyebrows. “Do you even know what natron is?” I asked him.

  “No,” he said, blithely waving away the question. “But the natron I give to my son will be the best quality.” “If you want to dump Gareth for Baltic, I wouldn’t mind,” Brom whispered to me, clearly enjoying Baltic’s determination to outdo what he thought of as a rival.

  “Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind,” I told him with a little flick of my fingers to his ear.

  Pavel made a little bow to me. “I am pleased to see you again, Ysolde. It has been a very long time. You have not changed at all.” Baltic said something in that language I didn’t understand.

  Pavel looked a bit startled, shooting me a look that I had a hard time deciphering as I answered, “It certainly has. And thank you.” Pavel gave Baltic a little nod and took off into the depths of the house.

  “Brom, why don’t you and Jim go outside and look around,” I said.

  “OK. We can look at the barn. I wonder if there’s anything dead in it… ” “Weird kid you got yourself there,” Jim said over its shoulder as it followed Brom out the front door.

  “Just see that you mind your manners,” I warned it. “And don’t try to escape, because you won’t like how Baltic deals with pests.” “There is some business I must attend to,” Baltic said, pulling out his phone.

  “What sort of business?” I asked somewhat suspiciously. “Dragon business? Because if so, I want to talk to you about that.” “No, mundane business.”

  “You mean human-type business? I had no idea dragons did that sort of thing.” He shrugged. “Most of my fortune was claimed by others when I died. It takes some time to rebuild that, and since I will need a good deal of funds to restore Dauva, I must deal with business affairs.” “Oh. I wish I could give you some money, but I don’t make very much as an apprentice, and Gareth funds us from the yearly manifestations. So I’m pretty much broke.” “I do not seek fortune from you, mate. Only your love.” I glanced down the hallway as Pavel crossed from one room to another. “Er… does Pavel live here with you?” “Of course. He is my oldest and most trusted friend. He survived when the others did not.” Baltic paused in checking his phone messages and slid me a glance. “Are you sure you do not lust after him?” “Dammit! How do you know what I’m thinking? Are you a mind reader, too?” He sucked in a huge breath, approximately a quarter of all the air in the house. “You do lust after him!” “No, I do not! For heaven’s sake, Baltic! I don’t give a hoot about him, not in that way. I was just a bit curious about whether or not… oh my god! You didn’t! Oh! You did! I can see by that expression, you did! You told him about me and my fantasy about guy-on-guy action, didn’t you!” Mollified, Baltic ceased seething at me and punched in a number on his phone. “Yes. He said you could watch the next time he has a male lover over.” “Oh! I can’t believe”—I whomped him on the arm—“I can’t believe you told him that! I am going to die of embarrassment! I will never be able to look him in the eye again! I’m never going to forgive you! How could you do that to me!” Baltic just looked at me, waiting.

  “Do you think he’s going to have a guy over soon?” I couldn’t help but ask.

  He frowned. “I don’t know. You shall have to satisfy your lustful ways upon me until he does, and even then, you may watch only, not participate. And you will not bare your breasts to Pavel or anyone else.” I gave him a look that should have shriveled his testicles. “I have no desire to have an orgy! All I said was that sometimes it was a bit interesting!” “So you say,” he muttered darkly, heading for a room I assumed was his study.

  I swore under my breath at the obstinate, jealous, infuriating man, and wondered which of my male acquaintances I could hook up with Pavel.

  Chapter Twelve

  The day was as dark and damp as my mood, the smell of snow heavy in the air. Bright Star, my mare, moved restlessly beneath me as we waited at the foot of the hill, watching as a line of men and horses wound its way in and out of the woods, moving toward us like a massive centipede.

  Baltic rode at the lead, as he always did, without a helm, his hair lank from the misty rain, straggling over his mail like inky fingers.

  “What are you doing out of the keep?” he yelled when he emerged from the last of the forest that surrounded Dauva.

  “I came to greet you.” My gaze passed from him to count the number of dragons who followed. It was a much smaller number than had set off, no more than a quarter returning. Sorrow, these
days a constant companion in my belly, gripped me painfully. “You did not stop Constantine?” “No.” It was just one word, but in it was the full measure of despair that bound Baltic so tightly. His eyes were as bleak as his expression, flat, and without any hope. His shoulders were bowed, as if he were yoked to a great weight. “He comes for you, chérie. He is only a day behind me, less if he did not rest at night.” I shook my head, unable to believe it. “Why is he doing this? He knows I love you. He knows I want only you. I would never remain with him even should he take me from you.” He reached me, his stallion’s head hanging as low as my spirits. The horses and men looked exhausted, clearly at their limit of strength. I knew Baltic would have pushed both hard.

  “Why?” Baltic gave a hoarse bark of laughter. “He believes he can sway you, turn you against me.” “He’s wrong,” I said, urging my mare around so that we rode into the bailey together.

  “He has sworn that if he cannot have you, I shall not.” I glanced at him, startled by the pain lacing his voice.

  “Yes, my love,” he said, taking my hand in his. His gauntlets and bracers were stained brown with blood. “He has threatened to kill you if he cannot steal you from me, this one who professes his great love for you.” “He is a fool,” I said grimly, the dull thud of hooves on the dirt the only sound.

  Baltic noticed the silence. He lifted his head, glancing around. “Where is everyone?” “I sent them away.”

  He looked at me for a moment, his eyes so stricken I wanted to crush him to my bosom and comfort him. Slowly, he nodded. “Why let others suffer for my folly?” I said nothing until I had him inside, arranging for the two remaining maids to bring water for a bath. Pavel, silent and filthy with blood and dirt, helped me remove Baltic’s armor.

  “I’ll send one of the maids to help you,” I told Pavel as he gathered up the discarded mail.

  His lips twisted in a wry half smile as he bowed and closed the door quietly behind him.

  “It’s over, chérie,” Baltic said, slumping into the chair before the fire. “Constantine will win. He will take Dauva, take you, and I will die.” I knelt before him, my hands on his knees, sliding up his legs to take his hands in mine. “Then I will die, too. For I will belong to no one but you.” “I would rather you lived,” he said, a faint smile coming to his lips, but there was no humor in it. “I would rather we both lived.” “There has to be a way we can stop this, stop Constantine. He has all but destroyed this sept.” “There are only eighteen of us left,” Baltic said in a voice stripped of emotion.

  “Dauva is strong. We will survive,” I said, refusing to give in to the despair that tainted the air around us.

  “It is strong, but with time, Constantine will find a way in. We can hold it only so long with only a handful of men.” Suddenly, he lifted his head and looked about the chamber. “Where is Kostya?” “Er… about that.” I rose and opened the door for the maids, who lugged in four leathers of water. I waited until they were gone before continuing. “I realize that now is not the best moment to break this news to you, but… well… I’m carrying… that is to say—” “You’re with child again?” Hope flared to life for a moment in his eyes. “Chérie, how can you think I would not be pleased with that news?” “No, I’m not going to have a child. It’s something else I’m carrying,” I said, sick with the knowledge of what I had to say. I took a deep breath and said quickly, “While you were fighting Constantine, I went to Paris. There I met with Kostya and a green and a blue dragon. I told you that I was going to use the phylacteries to re-form the dragon heart, and so I did, only… I failed. It wouldn’t allow me to re-form it, and when it broke into the shards again, instead of going into the Choate Phylactery, it… it went into me. Into my body.” Baltic stared at me as if he’d never seen me. “You would use the dragon heart against me?” I marched over to him and slapped him, not hard, but shocking him enough that he leaped to his feet. “That is for even thinking that I would do such a thing.” Fury roared through him in the form of his dragon fire, a fury that spilled out onto me, twining around my legs, climbing higher and higher until I was alight with a spiral blaze. I welcomed the heat from it, merging it with my own, taking it into me and burying it deep into my soul.

  For a moment, I thought Baltic was going to explode with anger, but amazingly, his fire banked and his lips quirked. “Ah, my love, what would I do without you?” “Be wholly and utterly miserable,” I said, pleased to see the life come back into his eyes. “And probably rut with every woman with two legs.” His hands slid around my waist. “You are the only woman I know who would dare greet her wyvern with the news that she now bears a piece of the dragon heart. We shall have to give you a name, now.” “I have a name,” I protested.

  “Phylacteries are always given names. If you are now the phylactery for the Choate shard, then it shall have to take a different name.” “We’ll worry about that another time. What I need to know is how to get it out of me.” He shrugged, watching as the maids made another trip in with more water. “That I do not know. No dragon has ever been a phylactery before.” “Wonderful.” I wondered if there was some learned person I could speak with, someone familiar with the dragon shards and heart.

  “You did not say where Kostya is. He came back with you, did he not?” Baltic asked as he pulled off his thin linen shirt.

  I knelt again and helped him with the crossties on his leggings. “Actually, he didn’t.” “He left you to travel from Paris to Dauva alone?” he asked, frowning down at me.

  I gestured toward the bath and went to a chest for the soap. “I wasn’t alone. My personal guard went with me.” “So I should hope.” Water splashed as he got into the tub. “Where is he if he is not here?” I took a deep breath, watching as the maids poured in the last of the hot water. When they were done and we were alone again, I dampened a sea sponge and swirled it around on the soap I made especially for Baltic. It was scented with frankincense and myrrh, his favorite. He watched me closely as I knelt next to the tub and began washing him.

  “My mother would never let me wash anyone,” I said, wishing to avoid the pain I knew was coming. “I see now why she did so. It’s very sensual, this spreading of soap on a man’s body.” Baltic, distracted by the feeling of my fingers stroking across his skin, slippery little trails following each of my fingers as I lathered up the soft hair of his chest, glanced downward. “I am filthy, and riddled with fleas and lice, chérie. If you continue to stroke me that way, you will end up sharing the bath, and will not thank me for allowing my vermin to visit you.” I smiled, enjoying the hard muscles that lay in smooth ropes beneath his satiny flesh. Reluctantly, admitting the truth to his statement, I soaped up the sponge again and handed it to him, rising to fetch clean clothing as he briskly washed himself.

  “Now you will tell me what you have wished to avoid,” he said, washing the long ebony lengths of his hair, leaning forward so I could rinse the soap off with one of the remaining leathers of water.

  “Kostya has forsaken you,” I said simply, grabbing a linen cloth when he leaped to his feet, wincing as soapy water streamed down into his eyes. I mopped off his face, toweling his hair, and saying quickly, “He believes what all black dragons believe — that you seek to control the weyr. He refuses to be a part of it any longer. It was he who summoned me to Paris. I told him of my plan to use the dragon heart to stop the war, and he arranged for the other septs to loan me the shards so that it could be done.” “I wondered how you had arranged that,” he said in a deceptively mild voice. I wasn’t fooled — he was beyond angry, beyond furious, his fire barely contained.

  “Sit back down and finish bathing. I do not wish to share my bed with your friends any more than I would a bath,” I said wearily, pouring him a cup of wine.

  “So he has acted at last,” Baltic said, slowly sitting down, absently washing his body as I retrieved a fine comb and a paste made from white bryony and honey that would kill the head lice. “I suspected he would, although I had not thought he
would involve you.” I said nothing for a few minutes, rubbing the paste into his hair, then combing it over and over again until I was satisfied.

  “You do not leap to his defense?” Baltic asked as I washed the paste out of his hair.

  “What is there to say that I haven’t already said?” I asked, pouring the last leather of water over his head. “He believes you to be a madman, willing to throw away the lives of everyone in the sept in order that you might rule supreme over the weyr. I don’t blame him for leaving you — if I were he, I would do the same.” He shot me a look that sought reassurance. I leaned forward and gently kissed him, taking his breath into my mouth as my lips caressed his. “I am not Kostya, my love. I will never leave you.” “If I can’t stop Constantine, you will not be left with the choice.” “There is always a choice,” I said, holding up a cloth for him. “We just need to find it.” The heat of the fire melted away, easing into a different sort of warmth. Sunlight poured over me as I sat on the stone front steps of Baltic’s house. I blinked as my mind was once again returned to the present, no longer disconcerted by the ease with which I slipped in and out of the visions.

  “Whatcha doing?”

  I looked up from where I had been hugging my legs, my chin resting on my knees, and moved the pad of paper upon which I’d been making a list before I’d slipped into the vision.

  Jim plopped its big butt down next to me.

  “Making a to-do list. I thought you were out with Brom.” The demon made a face. “He found a dead mouse and is looking it over to see if it’s too far gone to mummify or not. Kid’s a little weird, Soldy — you have to admit it.” “ ‘Eccentric’ is, I believe, the term you meant to use,” I said with a gimlet glance. “He is very intelligent. He has interests beyond those of lesser children.” “Whatever. What’s on your list?” It peered at the tablet. “ ‘Call Aisling.’ You better put on a pair of asbestos earplugs, ’cause she’s going to be Miss Pottymouth of 2010 when she hears what you did to me.” “She seems like a reasonable person,” I said with complacence I did not feel. “I’m sure I will be able to explain.” Jim snorted. “That’s not a word that’s often applied to her, but you’re just going to have to find that out for yourself. What’s next on the list? ‘Call May and apologize for disappearance.’ I like May. She feeds me.” “That is an excellent pointed look, but it is wasted on me. I’m sure you already had breakfast, and it’s not lunchtime yet.” “You think this fabulous form stays looking this way without any help? Nuh-uh! I gotta give it all sorts of vitamins and minerals and fresh, lightly grilled cuts of beef.” “I’m sure you’ll survive until lunch.” “I wouldn’t count on it. Number three… oooh. That’s going to be a doozy.” “Yes, it is.”