I turned and walked to the car, well aware that both the dog and the man were right behind me. I sighed when I reached the car. “You don’t have a car, do you? Fine, I’ll take you into town; then you can find your own way to wherever you’re going.”
“I will be tracked if I rent a vehicle. I will use yours instead,” Kostya said, then reached around and grabbed the keys from my hand, ignoring my protest to open the door and get into the driver’s seat.
“What the—Oh, you are not going to steal my car on top of everything!” I snarled, jerking open the back door and shoving Jim into the car before leaping in after him. And just in time—Kostya had started up the car before I could get the door closed.
“Where do you live?” Kostya asked.
“What? Are you insane? You actually think I’m going to tell you where my house is? You’re carjacking me!” I managed to get myself disentangled from the dog and sat up, considering how best to disable Kostya without causing him to crash.
“I’m not insane. I do not know where I am, but evidently you have a home here. We will go there, and then you will tell me everything I wish to know, following which I will return to my home and continue my quest to rid the world of all red dragons.”
Red dragons? Oh no, he was just like Terrin, believing in people who were secretly dragons. And if that didn’t scare the pants off of me, nothing would.
“You are so setting off my crazy alert warning bells,” I told the back of his head. I searched for something with which I could conk him on the noggin, but only halfheartedly—for one because it was dangerous to disable a driver in that manner, but mostly because the poor guy already had been walloped hard enough to leave a lump.
Poor guy? the sane part of my brain asked. Poor guy? He’s kidnapping you!
“Look,” I said in my most calming, reasonable voice, the one I found went really far in convincing Dr. Barlind that I had no more need of such heinous things as shock therapy and mind-altering drugs. “I know how it is when things around you get a little… intense. But kidnapping isn’t the answer. Why don’t you pull over, and we can talk about this. I’ll help you as much as I can, I promise.”
To my surprise, he pulled over to the grassy verge on the edge of the road. We were out of the tiny town, driving through the seemingly endless grassy pastureland where sheep and cows rubbed elbows with elk and reindeer. “I need a secure location from which I can evaluate the situation. I must determine if I’m being stalked or if they believe me dead. If they saw you rescue me…”
“They who?” I asked when he didn’t continue. For some reason, I felt a wave of empathy toward him, despite the fact that he wasn’t as sane as I first thought he was. “Are you implying that someone would have an issue with me pulling you out of the water?”
“They would likely kill you if they knew, yes,” he said matter-of-factly. “After they tortured you to find out what you know, of course.”
“Of course.” To my surprise, my empathy grew. I’d been in that poor man’s shoes, when no one believed me, and I knew well how much a sympathetic person could mean to one’s peace of mind.
“I won’t let them do either,” Kostya suddenly said, piercing me with a glittering look from those onyx eyes. “You have shown me kindness, and for that, I will not allow harm to come to you.”
“That’s very noble,” I answered, touched by his statement despite the unusual circumstance. I felt oddly protected, which wasn’t a wholly unwelcome feeling, although I could have wished my erstwhile protector had a few more wits about him.
“Will you take me to your home?” he asked.
I hesitated.
“I have sworn that no harm will come to you,” he said, correctly interpreting my unspoken concern. “That includes from me. I pose you no danger.”
“Well…” I bit my lip, weighing common sense with the understanding of what it was like to be cast adrift where no one would listen, really listen, to what it was you were saying. Kostya clearly had more than one screw loose in that attractive head of his, but that’s what others had said about me. I knew well what it was to have judgments made about me without having my voice heard, and I had sworn that I would never be in that position again.
Didn’t I owe it to deal with him as I wish I had been treated?
“All right,” I heard myself say. “It’s late, and I don’t suppose there’s a hotel or B&B we could park you at, so you’re welcome to spend what’s left of the night at my house. So long as you understand that should you attempt to assault me in any way, I will not hesitate to defend myself. And I know how to shoot my father’s guns.”
He made a face in the mirror. “I do not force myself on women, if that is what you fear.”
“It’s what every woman fears,” I told him, and got out of the backseat when he exited the front, holding the door open for me. I got behind the wheel, giving him a cautious look when he slid in beside me. I pulled back onto the road, saying, “There’s one thing I think you should know. I recently spent time in a facility for people who have a certain amount of mental confusion about life, and for that reason, I don’t put up with people who think it’s funny to poke fun at mental health, or the lack thereof. So you can just drop the references to dragons, dogs that can talk, and that sort of Alice in Wonderland crap because it’s not amusing.”
The look he sent my way was thoughtful. “Mental confusion? You were in an asylum? You have a sickness of the mind?”
“Yes, yes, and no, of course I don’t have a mental illness.” The tiny voice in my head cheered and waved a wee little banner at my show of support. It dropped the banner with the words that followed, however. “There was an event that I was at a couple of years ago, and I thought I saw something. Something… impossible. No one else saw it, so I was sent to an expensive clinic where they helped me realize that I was wrong.”
The sense of inner disappointment at my words was great. I felt a tiny little part of my mind curl up into a ball of despair.
“What event?”
“Hmm?” I dragged my thoughts from the absurdity of feeling guilty over hurting part of my own psyche to what Kostya was asking. “Oh, it was a traveling circus that had all sorts of creepy stuff.”
“Was it named GothFaire?” He frowned. “I recall coming across such a circus a few years ago. What impossible thing occurred?”
Something pinged at the edge of my awareness but wouldn’t come into focus. I drove for a few minutes in silence, trying to decide if I should tell him or not. In the end, my miserable inner self got its way. “I saw a man get killed. Right before my eyes. And the man who killed him turned into a black puff of smoke when another guy did something to him—I didn’t see what, although I think he stabbed him with a knife—but then the guy who I saw get killed came back and wasn’t hurt at all.”
My fingers started to hurt with the grip I had on the steering wheel. I made an effort to loosen the hold and didn’t look over to Kostya to see what he thought.
“Ah,” he said at last, and then I couldn’t stand it and slid a glance his way. He was leaning back in his seat, looking out of the passenger window.
“Ah? That’s all you have to say, just ‘Ah,’ like someone tells you every day that she sees a man murdered and miraculously resurrected? You don’t think that’s in the least bit odd?”
“Not really.” He turned his head to look at me, his black eyes unreadable in the dim light. But there was no sense of mockery in his voice, or even sympathy, which I personally found a thousand times worse. “You saw someone who was not mortal nearly slain by a demon. It’s not a common occurrence, but it’s certainly not unknown. Not every demon is as civilized as Jim.”
The hairs on my arms prickled. “You aren’t trying to say… no, you can’t. Because if you were that crazy, you’d be strapped down to a table right now while Dr. Barlind stood over you telling you that the shock therapy should help you break down those mental blocks that are keeping you from being well again. You can’t pos
sibly mean that the dog in the backseat of my car is a demon. I must have misheard you.”
“You did nothing of the kind.” He turned his head to look back out of the window. “Jim is a lesser demon—I do not rightly recall its class, although given experience with it, I assume it’s a low one; nonetheless, it possesses all the qualities inherent in a demon. I do not understand why it refuses to speak, though.”
“Dogs can’t talk,” I said in my super-calm voice. This despite the warning bells shrieking in my head.
“Demon ones can. Jim, tell the mortal you can speak.”
“I can?” The car jerked violently to the side at the sound of a male voice from the backseat. “Oh, wow, I can talk. How cool is this? Lookit me, I’m talking! Talk, talk, talk. I can talk. Whoa, babe, you may wanna watch the road and not look at me, because that tree is getting awfully—aieee!”
I slammed on the brakes, the rear of the car sliding with a horrible noise along the dirt and grass before we came to an abrupt halt less than a foot away from a stone fence.
My entire body shaking, I carefully unstrapped the seat belt and turned around as far as I could to look at the backseat.
Or rather, the dog that sat on it. He was panting, his eyes round, but there was nothing at all odd about him.
Other than the fact that I’d just heard him speak.
“You can’t talk,” I told him.
“I think I can,” he answered.
I blinked.
“Okay,” I said, raising a shaky hand to rub my forehead. “I’m having some sort of episode. Some… I don’t know, psychotic flashback or something.”
“Maybe the dude better drive, then,” the dog said sympathetically. I closed my eyes, wanting to scream and cry and run away as fast as I could. “’Cause you look like you’re going to ralph all over the place.”
“This is not happening,” I said, still rubbing my forehead. “I’m going to have to call Dr. Barlind, and she’s going to lock me up again, and I don’t want to be locked up! I’m sane, dammit! I’m perfectly sane!”
“I don’t know about that, but I agree with Jim that if you are going to vomit, I should drive,” Kostya told me.
I opened my eyes to glare at him. “This is all your fault!”
“I reject your accusations,” he answered with lofty disdain, then ruined the effect by asking, “How is it my fault?”
“You put the idea of a talking dog into my head! If you hadn’t, I’d be perfectly fine.” I smacked him on the arm. “Dammit, if I’m going to be locked up again, then so are you. I’m going to tell everyone what you said about that… dog… being a demon.”
“Hey, you don’t have to say the word dog like I’m made of poop or something,” came the protest from the backseat. I ignored it. It was just a delusion, nothing more. “And what do you mean, demon? I’m a demon? I thought I was a dog? That’s what the vet said. She told Aoife here that I was a handsome specimen.” In the mirror, I could see the dog looking down at himself. “Really handsome, I should say. Hey, I got a white spot on my chest. That’s cool.”
To my surprise, Kostya looked startled at the dog’s words. “What do you mean, are you a demon? Of course you are. What game are you playing?”
“I dunno. Spot the white on a black dog?” Jim the impossibly talking dog shrugged. I swear to all the gods, he shrugged! “What game do you want to play?”
“Why are you not with Aisling?”
“Twenty questions, is it?” Jim’s eyes narrowed on Kostya. “Okay, I give. What’s an Aisling?”
Kostya stared at him for the count of seven before turning a speculative gaze on me. “Order it to answer the question truthfully,” he said after another couple of moments’ thought.
“Huh?”
“Give it a direct command to answer the question truthfully.”
“What question?”
“Why it is not with Aisling.”
“I’m sorry, I can’t… this is all… I swear to you, I’m sane. I’m perfectly sane now, but I can’t indulge my hallucinations this way. Dr. Barlind says—”
“To hell with Dr. Barlind, whoever he is.”
“She.”
Kostya made an annoyed gesture. “You are not insane. The dog is a demon. It is speaking, and it belongs with Aisling. Order it to answer the question truthfully.”
“This is stupid—fine! I’ll ask him, but you get to go first for the shock therapy.” I turned around again to face the dog. “Dog—”
“Jim. Say its name.”
“You really are enough to drive someone nuts, you know that? Dog whose name is evidently Jim, at least according to the man next to me, please answer—”
“Command it.”
“Gah! Jim, I command you to truthfully answer the question of why you are not with someone named Aisling.”
The dog pursed his lips, scrunched up his nose, and said, “I don’t know anyone named Aisling.”
“Happy now?” I turned back to Kostya.
He sat back in his seat, a slight frown pulling his brows down. “No. Although this explains the rumors that Jim was no longer seen with the green dragons. It must have been given to another… but no, Aisling would not part with it. It was too dear to her.”
“Okay, this is going to sound like a ridiculously pedantic thing to say given that we’re both quite, quite mad, but why do you keep referring to the poor doggy as it? He’s a boy dog, if you were wondering.”
“Demons are always referred to with gender-neutral pronouns,” he answered absently.
“Hey! My gender is very much not neutered!” Jim said, bending over to snuffle himself. “Look, right there, two magnificent noogies, just as big as you like. Well, maybe not you, because you’d have to stuff them into your pants, but I think they’re perfect for parading around in front of the lady dogs.”
I looked at Kostya, feeling as if I were standing on the edge of a precipice. One step in the wrong way and I’d fall into a pit from which there was no return. Kostya sat in deep thought, staring out the front window, one hand rubbing his stubble-laden chin.
“Kostya, I command you to truthfully answer whether or not that dog in the backseat just said something about his balls.”
The disbelief in his eyes was almost comical. “It doesn’t work on me, mortal!”
“Sorry. I just figured that since you wanted me to do it for Jim—”
“Jim is a demon. You are evidently now its demon lord, although what Aisling will have to say about that, I do not care to think. Thus, you may give it commands and it must obey.”
I stared at him for a moment. “I’m what, now?”
“A demon lord.” He turned back to the window. “I wish that I was able to contact Drake. There might be a reason that Jim was separated from Aisling.”
I shook my head to myself, then decided that if I wanted to retain even the slightest shred of sanity, there was only one thing to do. I did it.
“Where are you going?” Kostya asked when I got out of the car and started walking down the road.
“Away from you.”
“Why? I have done nothing objectionable.” I didn’t even hear his footsteps when he caught up to me. I just kept walking. “I have made no untoward comment about the fact that you have mental instability, or that you pushed your breasts against me in a blatant invitation, or even that your driving skills are not as impressive as I had hoped.”
I stopped to glare at him. “My driving skills? I drive just fine, you arrogant son of a sea witch!”
“My mother is not a sea witch, although I admit that there are times when I would relish calling her that—”
I smacked him on the arm. “I drive wonderfully. I couldn’t help being startled by Bo-Bo the Talking Dog!”
“It’s Jim, evidently,” the dog in question said, strolling up behind us. “Are we going walkies? Because I think I need to drop a load, and you probably don’t want to be downwind when I do.”
I pointed to the field across the road. ??
?Go over there and do that.”
He grinned at me, a real grin, one with teeth, and curved lips, and an amused look in his eyes. “You’ve got it, oh master.”
“Stop that!” I snapped, then turned back to Kostya. “Go away. And take the demon dog with you. You can have my car. I’ll find a way back home somehow.”
Kostya took my arms in his hands, giving me a little shake. “You appear to be denying the existence of Jim, among other things. Is that it? You do not wish to admit that I am a dragon and Jim is a demon?”
“Oh, now you’re a dragon, are you?” I asked, stifling the urge to laugh hysterically.
“I have always been a dragon.” His tone implied that he was vaguely insulted, but before I could make a comment about his sanity—let alone mine for even having that conversation—the world as I knew it came to an end.
Or rather, the world that I had lived in for the last two years ended. Before my unbelieving eyes, Kostya’s form seemed to shimmer for a moment before morphing into that of a black dragon, complete with glossy black scales, ivory claws, and a trickle of smoke coming out of one nostril. I froze, staring, my brain trying to come to terms with the impossible being in front of me, but before I could do more than squawk, the dragon shimmered again and Kostya stood in its place.
That was the moment that my sad little inner voice stood up and shouted with joy, filled with vindication after two years of denial.
“Holy sex me now!” I said, the rest of my brain still having problems coping with the fact that a dragon—a dragon!—had stood before me, his claws on my arms.
Told you so, said the formerly sad inner voice. Guess Terrin was right all along, huh? Now we can get on with life. I wonder what a demon lord does?
And that’s when the penny dropped. “You’re the black dragon I saw at GothFaire that night the world went insane. You’re the guy Terrin pointed out to me.”
“I do not know anyone named Terrin. As for your request—”
“What request?” I asked, confused, while my mind was busy pushing bits of puzzle pieces into place. No wonder Kostya looked familiar to me. But that meant that everything Terrin told me was true. Which in turn meant I wasn’t the least bit gaga. Relief swamped me when I added, “I didn’t ask you for anything.”