Night of the Dragon

by Webb, Peggy

  o0o

  Dragon studied the small ermine-wrapped figure on the stone bench. At last the truth would be his. His terrible dilemma was that he didn't want to hear the truth, a truth he already suspected, a truth he was almost certain Lydia would confirm. She was from another century, another time. Lydia was from the future.

  What cruel twist of fate was this? He'd spent all his adult years in service to the king in pursuit of truth, believing that the truth brought honor and freedom. At last he understood the double-edged sword Merlin often spoke of: The truth also brought misery and bondage.

  The woman sitting in front of him had stolen his heart, and she was on the brink of stealing his body and his soul as well. How could he hold fast a woman who belonged to the future? She would surely vanish as mysteriously as she had come, leaving behind a man with a shredded heart and half a soul.

  Even Merlin didn't have the kind of magic that could allow Dragon to transcend centuries.

  One question would confirm his fears. One wise question. But he would not, could not ask it, not yet. Instead, he asked a foolish one.

  "Who is Sherlock?"

  "Sherlock Holmes, a great detective."

  "Where does he live?"

  "England, but not really. You see, he's not a person, he's a character. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created him in eighteen—"

  "Enough." Dragon cut her off with a harsh command. He wasn't ready for numbers, wasn't prepared to hear the awful truth that would forever set them apart.

  He retrieved her possessions from their hiding place and reached into the bundle.

  "What is this?" He held the strange black box in his hand.

  "A disc player."

  "What does it do?"

  "It makes music."

  He would never risk his next move if he still had any idea that she was a witch. But he'd already eliminated that possibility, at least in his own mind. If she were a witch, she would long ago have proved her powers, and she would never submit to questioning in a dungeon.

  "Show me," he said.

  She unplugged the black wires, punched buttons, and horrible sounds came forth from the box, a cacophony that made his head hurt.

  "You call that music?"

  "Sorry. The volume is a little high." She punched another button, and the noise she called music got softer, but no less dreadful.

  "Van Halen," she said.

  Another name he didn't know. And if Van Halen, whoever he was, called that music, Dragon didn't want to know him.

  He took the box from her and inspected it. How it made music was still a mystery to him.

  "How do you do that?"

  She opened the box and took out a flat, shiny circle that made Merlin's crystal ball look dull by comparison. He prepared himself for smoke and fire, but instead Lydia explained how music could get transferred to a disc, then come back out from a small black box. Dragon was fascinated and would have spent another hour on that extraordinary phenomenon, but dawn would come quickly. He had to be finished with his secret business in the dungeon before the servants stirred.

  One by one he held out her possessions, and one by one she explained them, the shoes that glowed, the clothes that changed color, the little tube of wax. She demonstrated the tube she called a lipstick, and now she was looking up at him with lips blushed the color of roses. He had a hard time concentrating on the task at hand.

  "Is that all?" she said.

  "No, that's not all."

  Flame-lit, her eyes were as shiny as twin moons, the blue moons Merlin sometimes spoke of, the moons that made miracles happen. Enchanted, he watched as she flicked out her tongue to catch a small bead of sweat that dripped from her upper lip. The dungeon walls were thick, windowless, and the heat from the torches flushed her skin. Damp curls clung to her forehead, and as she tossed her hair, the ermine robe slid from her left shoulder, exposing the top of one rosy breast

  A comely wench, by far the most enticing he'd ever met, but Lydia was more than beautiful. The quality that attracted Dragon most was her indomitable spirit

  "You really didn't know what all those things were, did you?" she said.

  She was extraordinarily appealing. Too appealing.

  "Silence!"

  She flinched at his shout, and he felt as if knives had been thrust into his heart. The woman was making him soft, a dangerous condition for a knight. He stalked off, hoping a small distance would make a difference, but the sight of her still wrenched his heart.

  "I'll ask the questions," he said, moderating his tone.

  "Go ahead and ask me, then." She stood up, magnificent in her rage. "Ask me the question you've been dying to ask."

  The robe slid farther down her shoulders, and she stood before him, chin out, eyes shooting fire, a nymph in ermine, silky skin glowing in the torchlight, hair like flames.

  He tried to quell her with a look, but she would have none of it.

  "Ask it," she said, goading him.

  "Enough!"

  The question he would ask was redundant, the answer held in the palm of his hand.

  Suddenly the hunted became the hunter, the slave became the master as she stalked him.

  The robe parted to reveal her legs, golden in the firelight, beautifully formed, wondrous to touch. Dragon was torn asunder. Catlike, she came to him, eyes wicked and knowing, lips lush and inviting.

  "Ask it," she whispered. "Or are you a coward?"

  He captured her with the swiftness of a hawk. Burying his hand in her hair, he forced her head back, exposing her white throat.

  "I could kill you with my bare hands." With one hand he traced her slender neck, then circled it with his fingers. "It would be as easy as wringing the neck of a swan."

  "Then do it," she said. "Do it now and get it over with."

  Killing her would be the easy way out. She would no longer pose a threat to the king, and Dragon would have carried out his sworn duty of protecting the king and the kingdom. But at what price?

  He released her throat and loosened his hold on her hair.

  "I didn't bring you here to kill you."

  "Then why am I here in this cold, damp dungeon?"

  "To answer my questions."

  "I would have answered them in the relative comfort of my own bedroom." His scowl brought a smart salute from her. "Excuse me, your Dreadful Dragoness, your bedroom."

  He didn't know whether to kiss her or turn her over his knee and spank her. What was even worse, he had a hard time squelching his own laughter.

  Camelot was not a dreary place. In fact, with Arthur's reign there was laughter and merriment on every corner, but Dragon had never met a woman with such wit and humor, a woman who made laughter as appealing as sex.

  Almost, he amended, watching the bead of sweat that slid down her graceful neck and into her rosy cleavage. His loins stirred powerfully, and he slowly ran his fingers through her silky hair. Passion leaped between them, stealing his breath. A blush crept over her skin, and her breasts rose and fell with her agitation.

  He wanted her, wanted her more than he'd ever wanted a woman. Taking her would be as easy as piercing a deer with one swift arrow. Mounting her would be as easy as mounting the prancing filly he called Glory. She was his. In the dungeon no one would hear, no one would see, no one would know . . . except him.

  Slowly, tenderly he pulled her robe over her shoulders, then held it fast.

  "Tell me one last thing, Lydia, and I will let you go.”

  "Go where?" she whispered.

  "Back to bed ... for now."

  "If I answer this one question, you're still not finished with me?"

  "No, I'm not finished with you."

  She shivered, but didn't take her eyes off his. He pulled the fur closer around her throat, then with his forefinger traced her lush lips. Dangerous lips.

  "When?" he whispered.

  The tip of her tongue flicked out and touched his fingers. A brief touch. Erotic. Unbearable. Releasing her, he stepped back.

>   "When were you born?"

  "It's all right there for you to see . . . printed on my driver's license." She clutched the robe in a white-knuckled grip. "You don't need to ask that question, Dragon. You already know the answer."

  "I have to hear you say the date, Lydia. I have to hear the truth from your lips."

  "Nineteen sixty-eight." She drew a deep, shuddering breath. "I was born in the twentieth century."

  How had she come to him? And why?

  His heart could give answers, but in his mind he knew that the woman of his dreams belonged to another world, another time.

  "You will speak of this to no one," he said, and then, gathering her in his arms, he held her close briefly, ever so briefly, before he carried her back up the stairs.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Dragon stood high on a cliff that overlooked Camelot, predawn mists swirling around him, giving his castle and all that surrounded it a dreamlike quality. The ethereal atmosphere heightened his sense of being in the midst of a dream.

  A woman from the twentieth century lay sleeping in his bed.

  "Impossible," he said.

  "Not so." The mists swirled, thickened, then took form. Merlin sat on a gray stone outcropping, his robes giving off the scent of musk and ancient magical concoctions, his conical hat askew, and his pet raven clinging to his shoulder, looking ruffled and disgruntled.

  "Where did you come from?"

  "Everywhere, nowhere, somewhere." Though Merlin was slightly stooped and his white beard had grown thin, he had the laughter of a young boy. "You called me,” he said.

  "Perhaps in my mind."

  "The best and truest communication of all. It's called mental telepathy."

  "I know what it's called."

  Knowing of the necromancer's enormous powers, Dragon made his mind a careful blank, erasing all thoughts of Lydia and the wondrous treasures in her possession.

  "You wonder about the woman."

  "The woman, the woman," his raven echoed, and Merlin smoothed down his ruffled feathers.

  Dragon knew this game. Merlin didn't have perfect vision. Sometimes he made lucky guesses that startled his listeners into revealing everything the wizard wanted to know. Dragon remained silent.

  "God's nightgown!" Merlin's thunderous outburst caused the raven to almost lose his perch, and he squawked loud enough to set the roosters in the distant barnyard to crowing. A faint pearly edge appeared on the horizon, just beyond the sea. "Why did you summon me if you're going to be so damned stubborn? I've got better things to do than freeze my rump off on this godforsaken cliff."

  Dragon smiled. "What better things?"

  "I was in the midst of a spell to create the perfect woman ... for myself, if you must know. Magicians get lonely, too, every few hundred years or so."

  "What is the perfect woman?"

  "She's lying in your bedchamber now, her hair like fire."

  "You summoned her?"

  "Aha. I knew she was with you."

  Dragon had fallen neatly into Merlin's trap. But would he tell Arthur? With Merlin, you never knew.

  "Did you summon her?" The rest of the question, of course, was "Can you send her back?" but Dragon wasn't ready to ask that question.

  "No, more's the pity. The woman I summoned up was an old hag with her front teeth missing. I was trying to send her back when you called."

  "But how did you know about the woman?"

  "The dragon. You should know that. It's elementary. Dragons and wizards have always communicated. Same thing with unicorns. Have you seen one lately?"

  "No."

  "Neither have I. Two hundred years ago they were everywhere, and now it's a rare day when I see that starry white body and that golden horn."

  "Golden horn, golden horn," Archimedes chanted. Merlin took his hat off and plopped it down over the bird. Muffled curses came from underneath the conical hat, and then merciful silence.

  "He's pouting. Hell's bells, I should have left him with that old hag in my cave. There's no telling what she's liable to get into while I'm gone. Ask what you're going to ask and make it snappy, Dragon."

  "Why is she here and how did she come?"

  "That's two questions. I only answer one at a time."

  Of late, Merlin was unusually exasperating, and bore no resemblance whatsoever to the brilliant young magician Arthur knew to be knowledgeable and wise.

  "Why should I ask you anything? If you didn't summon her, then I already know more about her than you do."

  Merlin laughed. "Arthur chose well."

  Dragon acknowledged the compliment with a bow.

  "Sun's coming up," Merlin said.

  "It doesn't take a wizard to know that."

  "Yes, but it takes a wizard to know Lydia's mission and mode of travel. Go ahead, ask me, boy."

  There was no use pretending. Dragon had known from the beginning that Lydia wouldn't remain secret forever, just as he'd known that Merlin would surely be the first to know.

  "All right. Why is she here?"

  "Only the heart knows." Merlin's hands swept through the air and caught a golden wand, which he promptly poked into Dragon's chest. "Ask your heart, boy."

  "You're no help at all."

  "That's what the Wart used to say and look at him now. King of Camelot, the greatest king of all time."

  "How did she come?"

  "Time will tell." Merlin uncovered the bird who was still sulking, then plopped his hat on his head and dusted off the seat of his robe.

  "Wait . . ."

  "You have a dozen questions, but you already know all the answers." Mists began to thicken around Merlin, but though his body began to vanish, his voice remained clear and strong. "Lydia is from the future. She has knowledge of Arthur and Camelot that must not be revealed. The course of history is set. Woe to the man who tries to alter the course of history."

  "Woe, woe," the raven screamed.

  "But what about Lydia? Will you keep my secret?"

  "No time, no time." Merlin's voice was growing faint. "There's a woman waiting in my cave. She's got the body of a nymph and the face of a crone. I think I know a spell to change that . . . Nemity, blimity, hob- bledy ho! Snaggle tooth, warts, and wrinkles, all go!"

  A new sun as pink as a baby's bottom appeared over the horizon, burning away the mists, and Dragon was alone on the cliff, struggling with his confusion.

  What was it Arthur sometimes said while the knights were lounging around the Round Table, business completed, rumors of war quieted, goblets overflowing with wine? It was something Merlin had told him as a child about basic truth.

  Two things Merlin said I could always believe in: simplicity and love.

  Usually Arthur's comment was followed by a lively and sometimes ribald discussion about the nature of love. Nobody had ever defined it, and nobody had even attempted to define simplicity. What was simple to one man might be as complex as major battle plans to another.

  Dragon started down the cliff toward his castle. How could he find any simplicity in his life when he harbored a woman from another century in his bed?

  o0o

  The clothes that lay at the foot of her bed were different today, a silk dress the color of red roses, and a silk cape embroidered in exquisite patterns of gold and emerald. Garb fit for a queen.

  But the shoes . . . Lydia looked askance at the flimsy leather slippers. No support. No soles. No comfort. They were little more than protection from briars and brambles, and they were definitely not made for running. She wouldn't wear them another day.

  Lydia tossed them into a corner, then stood with her hands on her hips, glaring. Next she lifted her chin and marched out of her bedchamber, the wolf trotting at her heels.

  She found Dragon in the stables, his back to her, his face in profile, one hand resting casually on his stallion's flank, the other wielding a currycomb. Lydia lost her steam and her breath all at the same time. She caught the door frame and stood swaying, one hand over her heart, drunk with the sig
ht of him. Perhaps it was the way he tilted his head, the powerful set of his shoulders, the way the sun made his hair gleam, the way the dark hairs formed swirls along his forearm.

  Lydia focused on his hands. Those same hands had stroked her at night under silk sheets, under cover of darkness, applying salve to her wounds.

  But he'd done more, ever so much more. The wounds he had healed were wounds of the heart.

  Sensing her presence, the stallion whinnied, and Dragon gentled it with his hands. Suddenly Lydia knew why Victorian ladies had needed fainting couches. The mere sight of Dragon's hands made her want to swoon.

  Another realization came to her: Her rage was not over the loss of her shoes, but over the fear that the man who had awakened her heart to love again would never see her as anything except an oddity from the twentieth century. With the sunlight hot on her back and the scent of freshly cut hay in her nostrils, she wanted to race toward him and blurt out her discovery. She wanted to be held in his arms, to feel his hands on her once more, to feel his lips on hers.

  "Fools rush in," she whispered.

  Dragon's hands stilled, then he turned and one eyebrow quirked upward. So cool, so self-controlled, so distant.

  "I want my shoes." What else was there to say? She could never win his love, but she could certainly win his respect.

  He glanced at her bare feet, then up at the stubborn set of her jaw. His brows came together and his eyes glowed like hot coals, but Lydia stood her ground. Not only stood it, but inched closer, thrusting out her chest as well as her chin.

  "I'm sick and tired of being treated like a prisoner, and today I'm declaring my independence. Hand over my shoes."

  "You have shoes." Dragon turned his back to her and continued rubbing down his horse.

  "I don't care if you're a Knight of the Round Table or Gladys Knight and The Pips, don't you dare turn your back on me."

  "I don't know this Gladys Knight, and Pip is a stupid name for anybody."

  "Don't try to change the subject. First you keep me a prisoner in your bed with a wolf guarding the door, then you kidnap me in the middle of the night and haul me off to the dungeon, and now you won't give me my shoes."