by Carter, Mina
“Just popped out for some takeout,” the Red Cap jerked a crooked, misshapen thumb over his shoulder to the one behind him. He paused, mid-chew, to wave. “John was hungry.”
“John?” The question escaped before she could stop it. “That’s a bit of a normal name for….”
“One of us?” The Red Cap arched an eyebrow. “Well, we decided to move with the times and took new names. John back there was born Skullcrusher. I was Kneebuster, but I go by Karl these days.”
“Cool.” What the hell did she say to that? New names or not, they were still murderous little bastards. As if to emphasize that point, a red droplet detached itself from the front of Karl’s cap to splash wetly against his cheek. It ran down his skin, a bright streak of color easily discerned with her excellent night vision. “Always good to move with the times.”
“Yeah. Of course we do miss the good old days. Dragging humans off the road and dismembering them.” He sighed wistfully, ignoring the streak of red down his face but Chase couldn’t look away. Red Caps got their names because of their hats. Bright red. Kept that way with the fresh blood of their victims. If it dried out, the Red Cap died.
“Of course,” he brightened up, the vicious grin returning to his face as he gripped his pike. “Dismembering dragons is just as much fun, especially ones we find leaving a Warden’s shop.”
She froze. They knew. They’d seen her. Which meant she couldn’t let them get back to Sellers. He couldn’t know what she was up to. Tension and the potential for violence built in the alley as she looked at the Red Caps and they looked at her in a standoff that wasn’t going to last long.
The Red Cap by the dumpster moved first, and Chase launched herself into motion. Dissolving into shadows, she used the last of the corporeal energy from her shift to hit the puddle in front of her, spraying the dirty water up into the eyes of the two Red Caps rushing her.
The alley was dark and dank, two factors she used to her advantage. Spinning the shadows around herself, she materialized a lethally-edged claw long enough to rip out the throat of the first Red Cap to reach her. It stopped dead at the kiss of her claw. Blood splashed hot and wet against her scales for the second they were corporeal. She was already gone by the time the body fell, a gurgle rattling from the ruined throat.
She skittered up the wall, hiding her shadowed form in the darkness. A less salubrious part of town, the buildings obviously hadn’t been cared for. Each time she manifested claws to propel her faster, the old brickwork crumbled, forcing her to fight for her footing. She could understand why the Warden had picked this area though. More affluent, upmarket areas had video surveillance and while most magical creatures could fool the human eye, cameras were a different matter. They saw what was really there and recorded it for prosperity, or even worse, the internet.
Scrambling higher, she used the top of a rusty metal fire escape to coil around, her serpentine body rolling around like some kind of magical rollercoaster without rails. Even though she was barely visible in the darkness, her scales rustled softly with the movement, a sure fire way to track her if her opponent knew what they were doing. She could silence them, but would sacrifice speed to do so. Not worth it, not with Red Caps.
Letting go of the fire escape, she dropped out of the sky onto another of her opponents and wrapped herself around him, anaconda-like. He gasped and beat at her coils when they tightened. His bones cracked within his skin, the pop-pop-pop sound reminiscent of corn popping. Grinning with triumph, even though the wounds on her own ribs ached, she squeezed harder. Not a natural technique for a shadow-dragon, but, longer and more serpentine than the dragons depicted in human stories these days, their bodies lent themselves well to it.
His scream of pain bounced off the mold-covered walls around them. Karl and John danced around her, jabbing their pikes into the shadows that made up her form, trying to find the spot where her body shifted from shadow to reality. A spot which would hurt. Bleed. It wasn’t going to work. Concealing herself and the shift from shadow to corporeal had been one of the first things she’d learned as a warrior.
The rattling sound of her laugh covered the wheezing of the Red Cap in her clutches as he gasped for breath, and she turned her head to consider Karl. His war-cry was unintelligible, the sound loud to her enhanced hearing until she shut it out, and he thrust wildly into the darkness that surrounded her. She shook her head. Obviously he was going with blind luck to hit her.
The little bastard.
She pushed her jaw free of the darkness, opening her mouth as her throat reformed behind it and let loose a long pillar of flame. The sudden brightness lit up the alley, throwing nightmarish shadows over the walls. John stumbled back, covering his face against the heat.
The flames caught Karl’s cap, burning it to a crisp in seconds. His pike hit the ground with a clatter. All the blood drained from his face as he lifted his hands. They fluttered around his head and the charred cap. Not touching it. Scared to touch it. Fear and pain twisted his expression as he looked up at her. Then he disappeared in a puff of green smoke and a jangle of music.
“Nonononono,” John whined, backing away from her. He fell, but carried on, scrambling on his hands and butt, unable to get his feet under him properly. After a few feet he managed to get traction, flipped over and made a break for it down the alley. Only to run into a tall, broad-shouldered figure who stepped into the gap.
She started to yell a warning, but the stranger’s hand shot out and grabbed the Red Cap at the scruff of the neck. He lifted the creature in one smooth movement, disarming him in as neat a move as Chase had ever seen. She frowned. He seemed familiar, but she couldn’t place him.
He wasn’t one of the warriors who’d been placed under the sleeping spell to protect the princess. Since she’d never managed to get an answer out of Sellers about their fate, perhaps some had woken early and this guy was a descendant.
Music rang out again, and the Red Cap in her coils disappeared, the puff of smoke unpleasant against her scales. She wrinkled her nose and unwound herself, manifesting once more in human form to walk toward the man holding John at the end of the alley. She winced as she walked, pressing a hand to her ribs. Wet warmth met her touch. Great, she’d re-opened the wounds.
“I’d be careful.” She stopped a few steps away and nodded toward John, who flailed his arms and legs madly, trying to land a blow on his captor while spouting vile curses and promises of retribution in a reedy, high-pitched voice. “They’re vicious little bastards at the best of times.”
“Yeah, even more so after you’ve just killed three of its brothers.” The stranger chuckled, and the sound of his voice froze her to the spot. She’d heard that voice before. Less than an hour ago. In her mind.
“You…!”
Her mate had found her.
Chapter Four
“I’ll rip yer fucking heads off!” The Redcap Duke dangled by the back of his neck spat, struggling wildly get away. “Rip yer heads off an’ shit down yer fucking necks! I’ll carve yer livers out and eat ’em fer me dinner!”
One booted foot came perilously close to Duke’s groin so he twisted away, flicking a quick glance at the woman who’d been battling its friends.
“Do you need this one for any reason?” he asked, tightening his grip on the creature’s neck. Not as strong in human form as in dragon, he was still a hell of a lot stronger than most. The Red Cap shrieked as bone cracked.
“I’ll have yer kneecaps for earrings! Your eyeballs for a fucking snack! You’ll both end up a red stain on me cap!”
The woman shook her head, the only answer he needed. Reeling the foul-smelling creature into a deadly embrace, one swift jerk of his hands was all it took to break the thing’s neck. The sound of breaking bone filled the alleyway, followed swiftly by the chimes that announced the death of a magical creature. Duke grimaced at the feel of the green smoke that replaced the weight of the body in his arms.
“Crap, should’ve let go quicker,” he grumbled, befo
re looking up at taking his first proper look at the woman all his senses said belonged to him.
She was beautiful. More beautiful than he could have imagined, and Duke had a very good imagination. Even in the dimly lit alley, her beauty shone like the brightest star in the night sky, rendering him speechless.
Her lips quirked, giving him a half smile that blew his socks off, as understanding and empathy crossed her features. “Yeah, it’s sticky and rather unpleasant, isn’t it?”
He nodded dumbly, unable to do anything other than look at her. She was small, far smaller than he’d imagined given her gloriously powerful dragon-form. The top of her head barely reached his shoulder, and she was delicately boned, with slender curves that made his hands itch and his mouth water.
His gaze sought her face, needing to see her, to look into her eyes and ensure she knew who he was and who that made her. His mate, just as he was hers. If his ability to speak had deserted him at the sight of her form outlined against a stuttering street lamp, then his first good look at her face shattered his thought processes.
Blonde curls surrounded a face dominated by large, blue-gray eyes, their color so deep he felt like he looked into a velvet ocean. A shiver ran along his spine, the scales of his draconic form rustling at the thought. Velvets, satins, silks. He loved them all. The different textures…the way they felt against his skin. Sensual, erotic and comforting all at the same time. Something his human mind couldn’t explain but his dragon got immediately. They had been his treasures. Now the honor of that title belonged to the woman in front of him.
His gaze roved over her face, greedy for any and every detail as he committed her features to memory. Below the beautiful eyes that had stolen his soul as surely as she’d stolen his heart lay a button nose so cute he wanted to plant a kiss on it, and below that a pair of bee-stung lips he ached to taste. He couldn’t stop looking at her, ignoring everything around them—the stink of the dumpster and the copper tang of fresh blood the only reminder of the Red Caps—as his body and heart ached to make her his.
He was too experienced a security operator for him to be dazzled for long. Within seconds reality filtered back and he started to notice details. Like the clothing that she’d manifested to cover her human form looked old-fashioned, not just past hundred years but more middle-ages, feudal almost, and with a thick scarf wrapped around her throat, her blonde curls spilling over it and her shoulders.
Instinctively he knew she wasn’t like other women he’d met, not even those who worked for the Paranormal Protection Agency. She had a sharpness of gaze and a way of walking that reminded him of a soldier. He narrowed his eyes. No, not a soldier, a knight. Amusement hit him out of the blue. She was a dragon, so she’d probably have eaten the horse anyway. Scrub the horse. This woman arrived at her battles on the wing.
“Hi.”
As soon as the word left his lips, he kicked himself. Hi? Hi? What a dumb-fuck thing to say. He sighed, already hearing his brother’s snide voice in the back of his head. She’d think he was a fucking idiot if he kept this level of scintillating conversation up.
Clearing his throat, he tried again. “Hey sweetness, I’m Duke—”
He cut off. She wasn’t listening to him. Instead, her eyes had slid out of focus and she swayed on her feet. Pure instinct propelled him forward to catch her slender body as she fell, unconscious.
She landed in his arms, her human form too light for his liking, and he gathered her up close. To his, and his dragon’s relief, he could feel her heart beating strongly through their link, the feeling augmented by physical touch. Striding to one of the recessed doors, he cleared the area with his foot and set her down gently.
Even in unconsciousness her lips pursed as he let her go, a tiny complaint that boosted his ego. Even out for the count she sought his touch.
“Shhh, sweetness,” he soothed her, beating his concern to the back of his mind. No sense in panicking until he knew for sure he had reason to. “Let’s just make you comfortable and see what we have, huh?”
She didn’t answer him, but he didn’t expect her to. It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that she could hear his voice. That the sound soothed her as it seemed to, her discomforted protests quietened to let him examine her.
His jaw set in anger, he swept back his loose hair and he bent over her. She’d been hurt earlier, but he hadn’t been able to locate her. He’d thought he had, her weakness allowing him more access along their mental link than before, but she’d quickly rallied and shut him out. Not before he’d gotten an approximate location though, so he’d been in the area when he’d spotted the Red Caps. Little bastards were hard to miss and they were always up to no good.
Classified as a level four threat, it meant that every operative was authorized to kill the little blighters. No Judge. No jury. They were all that and executioner as well. It made things very simple. It cost the tax payer far less to pay organizations such as the one he worked for, the PPA, than all the people involved in a court case and bringing nasties like Red Caps to justice.
He opened her jacket and the scent of blood hit him. His growl of anger escaped before he could stop it. He knew it. She had been hurt. With careful movements, he peeled the fabric away to reveal a blood-soaked shirt. His mind switched to professional, and ignoring the curves beneath the shirt, he probed her side gently. Her small gasps of pain and the evidence of his eyes guided him.
“Shit, sweetness. What happened to you?”
Someone had worked her over real good. So well that even at least two shifts to dragon and back again hadn’t healed all the damage. Fury filled him. Who had done this? What kind of creature could do this, to a dragon, one of the hardest to kill creatures in the paranormal world? One of the most dangerous as well. If Red Caps were a level four threat, then dragons had to be level double-O-don’t-be-a-fucking-idiot.
As carefully as he could he checked the rest of her body for injury. The damage appeared to be confined to her side, at least two partially healed ribs and more bruising than he was happy about. Reaching up, he tried to undo the scarf around her throat but before he could touch the material, her hands latched around his wrists, stopping him with surprising strength.
“Sweetness?” He looked down into her clouded eyes. She wasn’t really seeing him, her expression unfocused and full of pain. Instinctive reaction, he figured. But to what?
“Shhh…. It’s okay. Just let me help you.” Her eyes fluttered shut and he managed to disengage her hands. Gently he unwound the material from around her throat, expecting to find more wounds. Most people went for a dragon’s throat, despite the fact it was probably the most armored place on their bodies. So if there was damage to her throat—he winced at the thought—then the pain would have to be indescribable.
The fabric fell away. Duke sat back on his heels in confusion. Her throat was smooth, no wounds as he’d feared. In fact the only thing remarkable about her neck was the collar wrapped around it.
He’d seen collars on women before, had a couple of friends who were into the BDSM scene but this didn’t seem right for that sort of collar. It wasn’t ornate enough. More like an actual dog collar that had been put around her throat. It didn’t fit, didn’t look right. He frowned. It rubbed her skin, an ugly sore mark at the side.
Reaching out, he was about to undo it but the instant his fingers touched the leather, pain flared up his arm. Yelping, he pulled his hand away.
“What the fuck?” He glared at the collar. What the hell was that? That had been magic. Opening the door between himself and his dragon, he pulled power and flicked his vision over to the dragons. Light flared, almost blinding him and he slammed his eyes shut quick before his retinas burnt out.
Shit. Okay, that wasn’t just magic. That was seriously powerful magic. And it just added to the mystery his mate presented.
“Okay, sweetness. Let’s get you out of here.”
Sliding his arms underneath her prone form, he lifted her as though she weighed nothin
g. In this form, she didn’t. Good job he wasn’t carrying her as a dragon. In her other form, she was nearly as big as him.
Striding to the end of the alley, he turned into a bigger side street, and, still holding her, let go of his human form. His body changed, the skin sliding and expanding as the bones within lengthened. Popped and cracked, breaking to reshape themselves and grow some more. Scales pushed out through his skin, pressing against the inside for a second before they popped free, then raced to cover his expanding skin with a rattle and rustle that was music to his ears. His hands around her changed to talon tipped claws that held her no less gently for all their increased size as his wings tore free of his back to beat at the air gently. He turned his muzzled face, considering her through one large eye.
Still out for the count. Pliant in his claws. Good. Even though she was a dragon, he knew he wouldn’t like to wake up mid-flight with someone else in the driver’s seat. It would freak him the hell out, so why should she be any different?
The dragon part of his mind pushed against hers along the link, crooning softly. The man blinked, surprised at the beast’s gentleness. As far back as he could remember he and the dragon had existed in an uneasy compromise. Two halves of a whole not really at peace with itself. Not unless violence was involved. There, they operated as one, and were all the more powerful for it.
He smiled, giving control over to the beast to launch them in the air, pulling the human intelligence to the back of their shared mind for the flight. It was nice to find that they had another area they agreed upon completely. Her safety.
***
It didn’t take him long to fly across the city. A pleasant night and good weather conditions meant he wasn’t fighting a head-wind and could ride the various thermals over the city to get where he wanted without too much effort or jarring for his passenger. Not that he needed to glide all the way, he was strong enough to fly for days in still air if required, but wing-beats would jerk his paws and jostle his mate. Unacceptable with an injured passenger.
