by Black, C. I.
“Easily said. If I die, you die.”
A hint of frustration flittered over her, before he forced his presence back to calm authority. It felt like he was keeping himself from her, hiding away who and what he really was. From his reaction, she knew he wasn’t some projection with an essence outside of her. He was stuck in her head. That meant there was no way he was human. He may have been human at one point, but he certainly wasn’t that now.
Which was ridiculous. Impossible. Crazy. That was it, she had to be crazy.
Her throat tightened and her eyes burned with tears she refused to shed. She didn’t want to be crazy. She was already dying, couldn’t God or fate or whatever was out there be satisfied with that?
You’re not crazy. His voice was soft, filled with warmth, but there was an undertone, a concern, on the edge that she couldn’t put into words. It’s just that the situation is complicated.
“I’ll say.” She reached for the dead woman, uncertain if the impetus to move came from her or the man in her head. Pearl, her name was Pearl. Certainly Pearl’s name had come from him. It didn’t matter. Her options were limited. She could try and carry on and hope no one else came for her because of the man. She could go to the police, but she didn’t think they’d believe her. Or, she supposed, she could re-attempt her suicide, but her heart wasn’t in that idea any more, although she couldn’t figure out why.
It’s great that you’re thinking about this, but we don’t have a lot of time. If Pearl found us— He cut himself off.
She sensed he wasn’t sure who else would be after him, but was certain that there was someone else. Pearl wasn’t powerful enough to attack him alone.
“Pearl is merely a henchman... henchperson?” she asked in an attempt to confirm if the thoughts flitting through her head really were his.
Which is why I suggest we get moving.
“Fine.” She wasn’t thrilled with the idea. In fact she wasn’t thrilled about anything, but she didn’t see she had much choice. How could she? She had no clue what was going on.
* * *
If Hunter had teeth, or at least teeth within his control, he’d grind them. As it was, Anaea’s will was so powerful he was now the one trapped in his... her... their body. And damn, if he couldn’t get her to listen to him. Any suggestion he’d tried to put in her mind during the fight had been ignored. It had taken all of his will just to keep holding onto the medallion. It was a miracle he’d managed to put the words to activate it into her head.
Of course, now he had two souls to deliver to Regis and one heck of a mess to clean up. He could just imagine the look on Capri’s face when she heard she’d have to clean up the corpse in the hotel room. A dozen orchids and a lot of sweet talking would be in order.
All he had wanted was to grab his stuff from the hotel room and move on, since anyone at Court could find out where he was staying. And now he’d lost control of his body and couldn’t even physically vent his frustration.
Anaea worked at removing Pearl’s coat while Hunter worked at containing his thoughts. Now it was him, stuffed into the tiny box of his making, hoping as little of him as possible seeped into her consciousness.
He had no clue how much he should reveal to Anaea about her situation. Of course, dragon law stated he couldn’t reveal anything, but he didn’t think that was practical given the situation. Besides, with a will as powerful as hers and a thread to the earth’s magic already established, Regis would proclaim her a sorcerer. It didn’t matter how much she learned about him and dragons. Her execution was a certainty.
He clamped down on that thought, fast. That was definitely something he couldn’t share.
Even if she was only a mage, which was more than likely the case, and not a true sorcerer, Regis would still want her dead since the idiot was unable to see the distinction between the two. Which meant if Hunter didn’t want to kill Anaea, he’d have to break even more laws and keep her hidden. It was her only good option, although Hunter had a sinking suspicion she wouldn’t just accept it.
“So what now?” she asked, the coat in her hands.
He considered flashing into her mind what to do to save time. But that would break the thin wall he’d managed to erect between them and just as he would be able to read her thoughts and memories, she’d most likely be able to read his. Put the coat on. Does she have car keys?
She put the coat on and reached into the pockets. A set of keys was in the right pocket, along with a wallet. In the left was a cell phone.
Dump the phone, grab the duffel bag, ensure the ‘do not disturb’ sign is on the door, and let’s go. He concentrated on sounding commanding, while letting a trickle of urgency slip through. The short list of dragons who wanted him dead popped into mind, but he put it aside. There was no point in making her panic, as much as they really did need to leave—and five minutes ago, at that.
Anaea dropped the phone on the floor, took the bag, and opened the door. The ‘do not disturb’ sign hung on the handle. She glanced up and down the hall, looking for trouble.
Strong willed and smart. He could really get to like this woman.
“Which way to the exit?” she whispered, as she stepped into the hall.
Stairs to your left. Don’t take the elevator.
She rolled her eyes. “I wouldn’t dream of it. You’ve made it quite clear we don’t want to wait around any longer than we have to. I’d hate to meet your short list.”
He jerked away from her consciousness and threw up another layer of soul magic around his box. She shouldn’t know about the short list; he was slipping.
She strode to the end of the hall, eased open the stairwell door, and checked for trouble. All was quiet and she continued down the stairs.
“So I’m doing what you want...”
She was also persistent. He should have known she wouldn’t give up on the idea of knowing what was going on. And yet, there was no way she’d believe him.
Let’s put a little more distance between us and the body. And try to think what you want to say. Hopefully by then he’d have a chance to figure out what to tell her.
“Oh, no, you don’t.” She plopped down on the second-story landing and crossed her arms.
Fantastic. If he had eyes to roll—
Do you think we have time for this? There have been at least two attacks on your life already.
“Death—” She snorted. Death doesn’t scare me.
Of course it wouldn’t, what with her having terminal cancer and all. Just his luck he couldn’t use loss of life as a motivator. Unless he used the loss of his life. No, that wouldn’t work either. There was no way he could make anything, even the truth, make sense... not without a very long talk. Something he didn’t have time for.
Trust me when I say it’s just better you don’t know.
“I doubt that.”
All right. Then it’s easier for both of us if you don’t know. It’s a little difficult to explain. More than a little difficult and then he’d have to kill her. Although as it stood right now, he still probably had to kill her.
“Try me.”
I could just make you miserable for the rest of your life.
She snorted again.
Right. She thought her life wasn’t going to be that long and she’d already been miserable for the last year of it. If we just go to a friend of mine everything will be resolved and we can part ways.
“I don’t even know what will be resolved.”
Damn, woman. Would you please... just... An internal roar escaped, just a tiny one, but even that hint of his dragon self made her jerk up.
Shit, shit, shit.
Anaea sped to the bottom of the stairwell without question. She trembled, inside and out, as her thoughts grappled with what he’d let slip.
He wished he could take it back, soothe her, lie to her. But she didn’t seem to want lies. That made him like her even more and it stung to think that no matter what happened, the situation would end badly for her.
She paused a
t the steel side door. There was no way for either of them to know if Pearl had a partner waiting by her car, let alone what simply lay beyond the door.
They would just have to take a risk.
She eased the door open and glanced out. There were half a dozen cars in the parking lot and thankfully no people around. Anaea pulled the keys from her pocket and used the fob to flash the headlights of a Buick at the back of the lot.
She slid into the driver’s seat, put the key in the ignition, and started the car, but didn’t put it into drive.
Where to now?
Newgate.
“Newgate? That’s three hours from here.”
It’s not my fault your town is pretty much nowhere.
“And that’s where your friend is?”
He could feel her suspicion overriding her fear of him and her nagging thoughts that maybe she had lost her mind and he was merely a figment of her imagination. She didn’t like the situation. Well, he didn’t like it either. If she would just give him control of their body she could go to sleep and everything would be solved when she woke up.
If, of course, he could keep her hidden from Regis. There was still time for a transference before she suffered soul sickness, although things were now complicated by her becoming aware of him. If he wanted to make her forget, he’d have to involve Capri, the only dragon he knew who could manipulate a human’s mind. And a part of him didn’t want Anaea to forget.
“Fine,” she said.
He’d waited too long to answer her and now she didn’t even believe that going to Newgate would solve her problem.
“At least tell me where we are so I can get us to the highway.”
Turn left on Maple. The highway is a few blocks up.
She put the car into gear and pulled out of the parking lot.
Once they were on Route 62 and headed in the correct direction, he gathered his mental shield around him, thickening it to allow only a sliver of consciousness out. He needed to figure out what the hell was going on, and the less Anaea knew, the better.
The medallion was at the center of the problem, and he was getting tired of every dragon’s political maneuverings surrounding that piece of jewelry. Twelve hundred years ago things would have been different. Then, there had been seven medallions that could absorb a dragon’s soul in preparation for rebirth. Each one had been created by the Handmaiden and they ensured a balance of power among the dragon coteries. Over the centuries, however, the medallions had changed hands, were stolen, or lost until only two remained, the one in the arena and the one controlled by the Royal Coterie. But there were also any number of other dragons, not just Zenobia or Nero, who could be responsible for this mess. Anyone could be vying for greater power. And he’d be damned if he was going to be collateral damage.
First order of business was to get the medallion to the Handmaiden for the rebirth ceremony. He’d collected Saber’s soul more than twelve hours ago and needed to get it into the stabilizing magic of Court so it didn’t lose cohesion. But that meant he had to put off getting a replacement body and would have to show up as a woman.
He was never going to hear the end of it.
Unlike some drakes, he’d never been a woman and never felt inclined to learn how the other half lived. Some dragons had changed bodies yearly, like fashion. That was before they’d discovered how dangerous frequent body-hopping could be. Dragon law now banned body-hopping, so even more questions would be asked if he arrived in Court as a woman and then returned a few days later as a man.
Shit. He was going to have to be discreet. Avoid everyone save the Handmaiden. And if he could avoid her, too, even better.
He made a crack in his mental defenses and checked on Anaea. They were moving steadily along the highway and she was concentrating on driving. Snow dusted the windshield, melted, and was swept away by the wipers.
He had no idea how he was going to explain that Newgate wasn’t their final destination, but he’d deal with that when they got there. They were actually going to an anchored, magical gate in the city leading to an inter-dimensional sphere. Centuries ago, the Handmaiden had discovered the sphere, inaccessible from anywhere on earth save through magic. She’d used her massive power to shape the caves and passages within it into an underground city, the Dragon Court. It was supposed to have been a sanctuary. A place to protect dragon-kind from humans. But as the pain of the Great Scourge faded, Court felt like a prison to more and more dragons. Particularly as laws grew more and more restrictive in an attempt to protect dragon-kind.
Which led back to his current predicament: caught in the middle of political maneuverings.
Hunter couldn’t really blame them. He didn’t like Court or Regis’s rules either. Sure, he kept a suite at Court, but it wasn’t home. Some dragons, like earth drakes, enjoyed being surrounded by all that stone, but Hunter ached for sky.
He ached to fly.
Which would never happen again and, like every other dragon, he’d just have to live with it.
At least there was one small blessing in this situation. Anaea’s body had connected to the earth’s magic and in record time, since it usually took days or even years for the connection to awaken. Thank the Mother of All. He didn’t understand how earth magic worked, something about the innately magical spirit of a dragon awakening a dormant connection to the earth’s magic within a human vessel—so dormant that a human hadn’t connected with the magic without dragon assistance for two thousand years. But he wasn’t going to look this gift horse in the mouth.
Even better, her magic seemed strong enough to activate his private gate. Which meant he wouldn’t have to face the humiliation of having to ask the Gatekeeper for help. Particularly for Newgate’s gate, since Jade, an ex-lover, minded it.
Anaea’s magic actually was surprisingly strong. She hadn’t needed power words or gestures like most dragons and she could call fire. In most cases, a dragon’s magical ability was small, like seeing auras. But about twenty percent of dragons developed something significant as well, like lightning, or wind. Hunter’s old body had had null magic. But he was gone, and earth magic changed with each new vessel.
It stung that Anaea could call one of the rarest magics, fire.
He dipped into Anaea’s mind, searching once again for her thread to the earth’s magic.
It was nowhere to be found.
Hot panic raced through him as it had before. The thread had to be there. She had called fire and activated the medallion. That could only be done by earth magic.
He searched harder, looking for a weak or inconsistent thread, and found a fluttery connection. Which didn’t make any sense. It should either be there or not. Not there one minute and gone the next. The only time he’d heard of a connection feeling fluttery was if the human body was somehow actually dying. But Anaea was very much alive. The wounds, ice-shot and otherwise, were healed, as was the hypothermia from her swim in the river, and now all of his soul magic was focused on eradicating the cancer from her body. She’d be cured by the time they reached Newgate. Which was information he buried as deep as he could within his consciousness. It would be cruel for her to learn the accident that cured her would result in her execution.
And the risk of that had just increased. If he couldn’t open a gate by himself, he couldn’t sneak into Court. He was going to need help getting in, and that meant going to the Gatekeeper.
Jade was going to revel in ridiculing him about his new female body, likely announce his arrival to Regis, and cause an entourage to meet him in the receiving hall. The gossip would spread like wildfire.
To top it off, he’d have to be overly cautious, since Jade was one of two dragons who could see multiple souls in a single body. But if he asked another drake, even a friend, to open a gate, more questions would be asked and that friend could be put in danger—and he wasn’t going to do that to a friend. Which meant Jade was his only option and he’d just have to pray he was too useful to Regis to be reborn when he body-hopped to a new
male vessel later.
Now he really needed Anaea to hand over control.
CHAPTER 8
Anaea parked the car on the top of a six-story garage on 3rd Avenue and turned off the engine. She still couldn’t believe what was happening. But her acceptance, or not, of the situation didn’t stop anything. Of course, how she could explain the man in her head and the attempt on her life was beyond her.
Grab the bag and head to the stairwell.
She did as instructed. There wasn’t anything else she could do. Well, she supposed she could go running to the closest psychiatrist. She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t. Perhaps she could beg Mark for help since she was now in Newgate. But the voice in her head hadn’t tried to take control of her body since the hotel room, three hours ago. She didn’t even know his name.
It’s Hunter.
She jumped and sucked in a slow breath, trying to still her racing heart. God, how intrusive. Listening to her thoughts. Of course, he was in her head and might not be able to help himself. But still no excuse to act on what he overheard. She was going to have to be careful what she thought about.
That made her snort. Sure, she could control what she consciously thought about, but not any of the unconscious thoughts.
Hunter, huh? she asked, dragging herself back on topic. Is that a name or a title?
She felt what she could only describe as a shrug in her mind.
Both.
I see. She concentrated on him, trying to find more meaning in that single word. If he could hear her thoughts, maybe she could hear his. But his answer was ambiguous and so was any sensation that came with it.
Dropping the keys in the garbage bin by the door to the stairwell, she took the concrete stairs down to the street. It wasn’t fair that he could keep his thoughts from her and yet hers were an open book.
More like a megaphone announcement.
“Would you stop that?”
Don’t speak out loud.
She bit her lip. So now what?
Now we visit a friend of mine. Turn left here.
