Dragon's Mate: A DragonFate Novel (The DragonFate Novels Book 4)

by Deborah Cooke

  It still felt risky to Rania.

  Balthasar had left earlier in the evening, hoping to locate the old mound where Hadrian’s father had entered the Fae realm. His reasoning that they should attack from as many points as possible was hard to dispute, but Rania felt that they were too scattered. She had two knives from her own collection, including the kesir that Hadrian had returned to her, and an old favorite, a fifteenth-century katar. The push dagger was small and easy to hide. She feared her entire collection wouldn’t be enough—not if Maeve starting casting spells.

  “You’re sure?” she asked Alasdair again.

  He grinned and that made him resemble Hadrian enough to make Rania’s heart tug. “Let’s go. Sooner started, sooner finished, as my father liked to say.”

  Rania took a deep breath, gripped his hand, and flung them into Fae.

  At least she thought she’d taken them to Fae. When the maelstrom of light stilled, she didn’t recognize their location at all. It was dark, darker than Rania remembered Fae to be. She realized that it wasn’t twilight anymore, even though it had always been twilight in Fae in her experience. There were still no stars overhead, though, and no clouds, and the heath spread from beneath their feet into the distance.

  Alasdair lifted a finger and pointed to the glow of light emanating from beneath a hill nearby. That music flowed from the hall, along with the sound of laughter and singing. As always, the eternal party was in full swing.

  She’d deliberately not taken them right into the court, wanting to have a sense of what was going on before revealing themselves. Except for the sky being darker, everything was as expected. She and Alasdair exchanged a glance and he shifted shape in a shimmer of brilliant blue. She sat beside him and listened as his breathing slowed.

  When it seemed he wasn’t breathing at all, he shifted back to human form, just as Hadrian had done. He could have been a corpse on the heath. Rania closed her eyes, gripped his hand and wished them to Maeve.

  Yasmina had stayed low in Fae after Rania delivered her there. It had taken her some time to get into the treasury—even though she could assume her smoke form and slide beneath the door, the chamber had been heavily guarded. Leaving with the prize in her human form, and doing so unobserved, had been the challenge.

  She could have struck down a guard if she’d moved quickly and surprised him, but Yasmina was a healer through and through. She couldn’t bring herself to end even a Fae life. She knew the stakes and she told herself to get over it, but each time she raised the blade, she let it slide to her side again.

  She listened at a lot of keyholes, gathering what tidings she could, and soon realized that there was a plague of some kind in Fae. They whispered of it, fear in their hushed voices, and she saw the purple blemishes that stained their skin. She saw the marks spread and had never seen the like of them. As a healer, she was intrigued.

  Time had to be slipping away, though. It was hard to keep track in Fae, but Yasmina knew that Rania would be challenging the Dark Queen at the arranged time. She had to get the gem of the hoard to Hadrian in the armory before that.

  The sky grew steadily darker, as if deepest night was falling.

  When Yasmina saw the caged swans being hauled to the court, she knew she had to act.

  The guard before the treasury was one she’d learned was the least energetic. Maybe it was because of the purple stain spreading down his arms. It was on his neck, too, and he seemed to find it itchy. He rubbed his brow and sighed, then one of his fingertips fell off.

  Yasmina and the guard watched it shrivel, then turn to a brown leaf and blow away. He chased it, snatching it up from the ground and trying to fit it back on his hand. Instead, it crumbled to dust.

  He looked around and spotted her. His mouth opened to raise the alarm. Yasmina lifted her uncle’s bichuwa, but the guard suddenly shrank into himself. He transformed into a field mouse before her very eyes, one that had a faintly purple tinge to its fur. He looked to be as surprised as she was. Then his fur changed to plain brown and he scurried away, disappearing into the growth on the heath.

  The brass key to the treasury lay on the ground where he had dropped it. Yasmina seized it and entered the treasury to claim the prize.

  The old Fae mound wasn’t under a shopping mall after all.

  It was in the middle of a cemetery. Balthasar couldn’t believe it.

  The church beside the cemetery had to be two hundred years old and was both tiny and a bit rundown. Several of the windows had been broken and were boarded over. It looked abandoned. The door was locked and also padlocked. He parked in front of the gate and turned off the engine.

  Silence.

  Balthasar had taken Hadrian’s Land Rover and just followed his whim, and ended up in this place, wherever it was. He wasn’t sure he was even on the map anymore. He hadn’t passed another car on the winding road for at least half an hour before reaching the churchyard. The road ended at this place and he had the definite sense that he’d arrived.

  Balthasar got out of the truck and looked around. There were no houses in the vicinity. He hadn’t been anywhere so desolate in a long time and had a serious case of the jitters. The moon was full and high in the sky, so bright that it was like a searchlight. The iron gate to the cemetery hung askew and the trees were old and crooked. That had to be a hawthorne in the very center of the cluster of worn gravestones, so crooked and huge that it had to be older than the church.

  A golden light shone from beneath its roots. That sight made his heart stop, then race.

  As he moved closer, Balthasar saw that there was a gap between the roots, like the entry to a cave. And he heard the music, that infectious merry fiddle music that could set the most reluctant toes to tapping.

  He’d found a portal to Fae and he was going to enter it.

  The alarm on his watch buzzed. It was midnight. It was time.

  Balthasar took a deep breath and walked toward the golden light, knowing what he had to do. Just before he reached the hawthorne, he heard the calls of birds above him. He stopped and looked up, wondering what kind of bird would be in flight so late at night. Maybe he was stalling, but he looked anyway.

  Eight trumpeter swans descended out of the starry night in perfect unison. They landed in a circle around him in the deserted cemetery. One came toward him and inclined its head as if in greeting.

  “Edred?” Balthasar guessed.

  The swan gave a houp-houp sound.

  They were Rania’s brothers. Balthasar smiled, glad that he wouldn’t be completely alone.

  He gestured to the tunnel opening. “I think this is it.”

  Edred stretched out his neck as if sniffing the air that emanated from beneath the hawthorne. Then he straightened and nodded, looking Balthasar right in the eye.

  “After you?” Balthasar suggested and the swan quacked, like he was laughing.

  Balthasar grinned and led the way. Rania’s brothers clustered behind him when he stepped into Fae, moving between realms beneath the roots of the ancient tree.

  They gathered together on the heath, which stretched as far as the eye could see in every direction. There were no stars overhead, even though the sky was clear. It was really dark but Balthasar could see both a mound with light emanating from a doorway and a cage silhouetted in the distance. The light from the mound was what he had seen shining beneath the roots. It was a beacon, and he hoped it wouldn’t lead them to disaster.

  The brothers rustled their feathers in agitation as the cage was pulled toward the mound. There was something white inside, which fluttered.

  “Let’s bust them free first,” he whispered. “We’ve got surprise on our side.” Edred nodded and Balthasar shifted shape. He flew toward the cage, his citrine and gold scales glinting, and eight swans flying right behind him in a vee.

  The problem with battling the Fae was that they came in every shape and size.

  Thorolf fried an ogre, then slapped six small Fae dead against his scales. The last group were ri
ding beetles, their wings flying as fast as the beetles, and had descended upon the invaders like a swarm of locusts. The dead ones dripped from his hide like drops of pewter and gleamed on the heath before they disappeared. The ogre made a bigger puddle than that.

  There were bogies and brownies, pixies and phoukas, spriggans and sprites. Some were winged and some had tails; some wore hats and some had spiked boots. Some had thorns and some had sharp teeth. Their variety was almost infinite, but they were all bent on destruction. They stabbed and they bit, they lanced and they sliced, they stung and they gnawed.

  Thorolf felt as if he was being attacked on every side. He slapped and sliced and squished every being he could. He cracked heads like nuts and snapped weapons like twigs. He breathed fire when his allies were out of harm’s way, and he scooped up the wolf mates who stumbled. He’d never multi-tasked so effectively in his life, and once he got his rhythm, he had the time of his life.

  Kicking butt and taking names was part of the joy of being a dragon shifter after all.

  Bree was swinging her Valkyrie sword with gusto, slicing Fae to bits and sending that silver liquid flying in all directions. Kristofer had her back, breathing fire and slashing with his talons. When she was cornered, he snatched her up and flew her high above the throng. Lila jabbed with the trident of the selkies, switching off with Nyssa at intervals. Rhys defended both of them from behind, exhaling a masterful plume of dragonfire that fried a swatch across the heath that made Thorolf want to stand up and cheer.

  Mel was riding Theo’s back as he flew over the battle repeatedly, breathing dragonfire on the Fae attackers on the ground, then chasing more of them through the air. Murray was flattening all comers with the hammer he’d brought, and looked to be knee-deep in silver liquid. There were eight wolves snarling and snapping on the heath below Thorolf, rounding up Fae, biting them and tearing into their flesh. The white Arctic wolf was Wynter, he knew, because he’d seen her shift, but Caleb and the others in his pack were fearsome grey timber wolves with cold eyes and impressive fangs. Thorolf wouldn’t have wanted to face down any one of them.

  The crew from Bones fought in a loose ring around Murray: the medusa hostess was holding her own. Arach fought with them, alternating between his dragon form, and using the Fae sword in his human form. Bear-shifters tore at the Fae; djinns eluded them in smoke form, then reappeared to surprise them from behind; there was an entire company of demons with Rosanna from the circus, all glowing red as they spiked Fae with their pitchforks.

  The hobgoblins came out of the heath and charged the attackers, scattering the wolf mates—which was probably what they’d intended. Thorolf roared and dove into the fray to gather them all back together again. Others joined him and the hobgoblins were soon reduced to shimmering puddles of silver.

  A cheer rose from the invading company when the surviving Fae turned and fled.

  Arach shouted and pointed the glowing Fae sword at the distant court. “Let’s take this battle to Maeve!” he roared.

  The company shouted agreement. Thorolf swooped low and the wolf mates climbed on his tail and his back. Several even managed to reach the top of his wings. Thorolf picked up more in his claws, and the other Pyr did the same, carrying their forces to the new battlefield.

  This was as good as it got, in Thorolf’s view.

  Yasmina had the gem of the hoard and was hurrying toward the armory when she saw a Fae warrior heading in the same direction. There was purpose in his stride and she felt a premonition of dread. She tucked her prize amongst a cluster of rocks to hide it, then shifted to a wisp of smoke to follow him.

  It was the tall warrior she’d seen at Maeve’s side, although he had a purple mark on his forehead that she didn’t remember. Yasmina floated behind him, glad of the darkness to hide her smoke form. He crept close to the door of the armory, and paused there to listen, his eyes narrowed with suspicion.

  “Liam?” he asked, but she could tell he didn’t expect a reply. “Hurry up, Liam. The Dark Queen is waiting on us.”

  There was no sound from within the armory. The Fae warrior straightened, stared at the door for a long moment, then marched away. Yasmina knew she didn’t imagine that he was making sure his steps were audible. He pulled out a key and drew his sword, then darted back to the armory and unlocked the door.

  There was a roar and the brilliant glow of dragonfire. The Fae warrior lunged into the armory, pulling the door behind himself, and Yasmina heard sounds of battle. Weight crashed against the walls. Something shattered. Someone grunted and fell to the earth.

  And then there was silence.

  Quick as a wink, Yasmina slid through the lock of the armory and was horrified to see Hadrian in his human form on the ground, blood running from a wound on his chest. The Fae warrior stood over him, his expression fierce, then swore as the blade on his sword became tipped with hoarfrost. He stepped away from Hadrian, circling the armory with increasing speed as he examined the melting weapons.

  Then he turned to survey the fallen Pyr with mingled horror and awe. “You did this,” he whispered as Hadrian groaned. He kicked Hadrian who rolled to his back as if close to death. “I don’t know how it was possible, you will pay the price for this travesty. The Dark Queen will want to exact her own revenge.” He kicked Hadrian again, but the Pyr went completely still.

  Yasmina didn’t think Hadrian was even breathing anymore and she feared their quest had claimed its first victim. The Fae warrior swore again and kicked Hadrian again, with no response.

  “You were supposed to be dead already,” the Fae warrior complained. “Your corpse should have been burned to cinders in that fire.” He bent down and listened for Hadrian’s breath, then opened one of the Pyr’s eyes to peer into it. He stood up then, his disgust clear. “You will not escape the price of this,” he vowed. “If you can be roused, my queen will do it.” He nodded. “And then you will pay.”

  Hadrian didn’t move.

  The Fae warrior sheathed his weapon with a vicious gesture then hefted Hadrian over his shoulder, grunting beneath the weight of the other man. Then he left the armory, carrying the dead Pyr toward the court.

  Yasmina feared that Rania might lose heart when she saw that her mate had been killed. She wondered whether the plan should proceed, then hoped that she might somehow have a chance to heal Hadrian. She hurried to retrieve the hidden gem of the hoard, and when she picked it up, she glanced toward the departing warrior.

  And she saw the green glimmer of Hadrian’s eyes.

  He was alive!

  He had to be feigning the extent of his injuries in order to be taken to Maeve. Yasmina gripped the gem of the hoard and hurried in pursuit of the Fae warrior, slipping from shadow to shadow as she tried to keep up.

  This was a confrontation she didn’t want to miss.

  Rania manifested before Maeve with her prize and Alasdair fell hard against the ground. His scales looked shimmery and vital, even though he was supposedly dead, and she feared that their ruse would be discovered too soon. She was glad when he shifted one last time to his human form and remained motionless beside her. She bowed low before Maeve, trying to disguise her doubts and what would be seen as her treachery.

  She didn’t want her thoughts to be read.

  “That took you long enough,” Maeve said, rising from her throne. Kade, the dark-haired and dark-eyed dragon shifter who had betrayed his kind, hurried to her side. She stroked his cheek and kissed him, letting everyone see the affection between them.

  He approached one of his own kind, apparently dead, but he was indifferent. Did he know that Alasdair was banking the fires, or had Maeve put a splinter of ice in his heart, too?

  Rania felt herself tense as the Dark Queen drew near. The court gathered closer, chattering and speculating. She strove to keep her own expression bland.

  “An easy kill?” Maeve asked.

  “Never, my queen. The Pyr are most resilient.” Rania eyed Kade, who returned her survey steadily.

  Ma
eve stood beside Alasdair. “I can smell that he’s Pyr but why isn’t he a dragon?”

  “They rotate between forms when in distress, my queen, then remain in their human form once dead.”

  “Really? The last two who died in my court were dragon corpses.”

  “But they weren’t actually dead, my queen,” a Fae warrior said, striding into the court. He was carrying a man on his back and to Rania’s dismay, it was Hadrian he flung to the ground. Her dragon shifter wasn’t moving any more than Alasdair was.

  Was he dead or had he banked his fires? Rania wished she knew.

  “Bringing presents, Bryant?” Maeve asked. She bent and peered at Hadrian. “But that’s the dead one.”

  The Fae warrior, obviously Bryant, nudged Hadrian with his foot. “He wasn’t as dead as you thought he was, my queen. I found him in the armory, melting the weapons.”

  Maeve inhaled sharply and spun to face Rania. “Is this your doing? Did you revive him so that you could kill him yourself?”

  “Does it matter?” Rania asked, indicating Alasdair. “Here is my thirteenth kill and the Pyr you requested. I would ask you to free my brothers.”

  Maeve looked between the two Pyr, then eyed Bryant. “Melting the weapons?” she echoed and he nodded. “How much progress had he made?”

  “We are unarmed, my lady.”

  A whisper passed through the court at that, a fluttering of wings and a hissing of speculation. Maeve came toward Rania, her gaze dark with intent. Rania felt the Fae queen’s will bend upon her and winced as Maeve began to probe in her mind. She tried to close her thoughts against the intrusion, squeezing her eyes shut as she fought off Maeve’s advances.

  There was a shout and a brilliant shimmer of blue light. Hadrian had shifted shape to his dragon form. He roared and breathed a torrent of dragonfire over the Fae, compelling them to retreat. Bryant lunged at him, sword drawn, but Hadrian shifted back to human form. Rania’s dirk flashed in his hand. Bryant fell on him and the blade nicked Bryant’s shoulder. The Fae warrior moved quickly, thrusting the remnant of his Fae sword at Hadrian. Hadrian dodged the blow and Bryant slashed at his feet, moving so quickly that Hadrian fell to one knee. He shimmered blue, taking his dragon form, but Maeve cast a wave of red magick at him before he could defend himself.