“That’s because I’ve known him for such a long time, and worked for him, and helped Violet with Maura, although admittedly that didn’t turn out very well.”
“I liked the part where her men shot Baltic.”
“Hush, Constantine.” I gave Baltic a meaningful look. “There is another option, and that’s to use someone against whom a necromancer’s powers are ineffectual.”
By the time I finished the sentence, Baltic understood where I was heading. He rolled his eyes in a dramatic gesture. “You can’t think to use Constantine to subdue Thala! He’s a shade!”
“A very good shade! You wish you could be such a shade!”
“Time-out is incoming if you don’t be quiet,” I told the part of the room where Constantine was lurking. “And I mean it!”
An injured sniff was the answer.
“He would not be a shade if you hadn’t had him raised as such,” Baltic accused me.
“Which I wouldn’t have done if your father had just bothered to tell me outright what he wanted me to do, as I told him the other day in the sex shop, but he just looked at me the way he does and ignored that whole issue. He’s so frustrating at times.”
Baltic froze. “You summoned the First Dragon to a sex shop?”
I damned myself for that verbal slip. I hadn’t intended on telling him about the little chat I had had with his father. “I didn’t summon him at all. He just kind of appeared. It must have slipped my mind to mention his little chat with me, what with Brom’s being kidnapped.”
“Hmm.” Baltic didn’t look convinced, but he let that point go to pounce on what I least wanted his attention focused on. “For what purpose did he seek you out?”
“I was there, too. Ysolde admired my spectral whip. I believe she desires one.”
“Constantine—” I said warningly.
“You have lost that little zest that I so admired in you in the past,” he said in an aggrieved tone, but fell silent again.
“I don’t want a whip,” I told Baltic, just in case he believed Constantine. “Not the spectral kind, anyway. I saw a very interesting soft leather device in the fetish area…. Never mind.”
The expression in Baltic’s onyx eyes was only too readable. I cleared my throat and continued on a different tack. “The First Dragon wanted what he always wants with me—to tell me I’ve failed yet again, and to get on with redeeming your honor, or else. It was all too annoying, and I told him that, so you can stop looking martyred about the whole thing.”
“If I look martyred, it is because I will hear about your conduct at a later time,” he said with a sigh. “I’ve told you before not to heed what the First Dragon says. You have yet to take this advice, but I assure you it will make both our lives easier.”
I took his hands in mine and rubbed his knuckles on my cheek. “He says he loved your mother, you know.”
Baltic’s fingers tightened in mine. “We are not here to discuss the past, mate. My objection to Constantine stands.”
I allowed him to change the subject, since I knew he would feel uncomfortable talking about his parents in front of an audience. “Shades are powerful against necromancers, my love. Constantine is willing to help us with Thala, as well as the shard. Would you prefer that I prostrate myself before Dr. Kostich, or be forced to make some sort of an agreement that will make me vulnerable to him, and place us in obligation to him?”
His teeth ground for a few seconds while he thought that over. “I prefer to handle this myself.”
“I know you do, but Thala is just too powerful when she has all her minions around her, so you need to just let go of some of your animosity toward Constantine, and accept his help.”
“I do not like your having dealings with the dead one.”
“I’m dead because I sacrificed myself for Ysolde!” Constantine chimed in.
“You’re dead because giving your life for hers was the only way you could pay for killing Alexei!” Baltic snarled in return.
A silence so thick you could cut it with lemon pudding filled the room.
“You…Did I hear that right? You killed Alexei?” I stared at the now slightly visible Constantine with stunned disbelief. “Your own wyvern?”
“I did not,” Constantine said, but he couldn’t look me in the eye. “Your mate, as always, attempts to divert the truth by casting guilt on others. Ask him what happened to Alexei, if you like, but do not expect to hear what really took place. I have better things to do with my time than to stay here and be abused by him. I bid you farewell, my lovely one, for the moment. I will return as soon as I can.”
He faded away to nothing, and the sense of his being near disappeared, as well.
I turned slowly to face Baltic.
“No,” he said, marching past me. “Not now. I am too busy. Another time.”
“The questions are stacking up; you know that, don’t you?” I called after his retreating form. “I can stifle only so many of them before my head explodes! And if that happens, you’re going to have to clean up the mess. Baltic? Baltic! Drat that dragon! One of these days, he’s going to drive me really insane, and then he’ll be sorry.”
“The sleeping arrangements leave a whole world to be desired,” Maura said approximately seven hours later when one-handedly she helped me shove a small bed close to a window seat.
“I’m not thrilled about them, either, Your Royal Pain-in-the-assness,” Savian replied, irritation overriding the dulled glint of pain obvious in his eyes. “And I’d better not catch you ogling my manly form during the night. I’m a very light sleeper, and I’ll know if you try to have your womanly way with me.”
Maura turned to face him. “Have my womanly way with you? Seriously? Because right now, the only thing I want to do to your manly form is bang it on the head with a very heavy blunt object. And then maybe find a hacksaw.”
“I told you the handcuffs can’t be sawed apart,” he retorted.
I fluffed up the pillow on the window seat and made sure the blankets, which Pavel had brought from one of three trips into Riga, were adequate to keep the sleeper from getting a chill.
“I wasn’t intending on sawing off the handcuffs,” she answered with an arch look.
His eyes widened, but the fact that he didn’t retort told much about his physical state. Although a Slavic healer had made the rounds of all the occupants of our house, spending the most time with Holland and Savian, she wasn’t a dragon, and her healing abilities were not as profound as I would have liked. Holland was recovering quite nicely, but Savian was mortal, and thus couldn’t regenerate like the rest of us.
Despite her veiled threat, Maura helped me get Savian into bed, although he did balk a bit when I tried to undress him.
“I’d accuse you of wanting to change my nuts to toads again, but I suppose after today, I can trust you with them,” he said, slapping away my hand when I tried to unzip his pants. “However, I can’t say the same for her ladyship.”
Maura blinked for a second. “You tried to change his testicles to toads?” she finally asked me.
“No, I just threatened to change them to—never mind; it doesn’t matter. That was months ago, and I’ve long since changed my mind about Savian.”
“Thank you,” he said wryly.
“You can’t sleep in those pants,” I told him, gesturing at his legs. “They’re caked in dried blood. Pavel bought some jeans and underwear while he was in town getting the bedding, so at the very least, let me get a clean pair of shorts on you.”
“I have dressed myself since I was very young, and I do not need any assistance now,” he replied with great dignity.
“You don’t have anything I haven’t seen before, and you know full well that I’m madly in love with Baltic and have no lustful thoughts whatsoever regarding you, in case you were worried, which I suspect you are, because I know what men who look like you think, and that’s that every woman on the planet wants you. Well, we don’t.”
“I’m well aware you are
harboring no desires for me, but that confidence doesn’t extend to her.” He pointed to Maura. “I’m not getting naked in front of her. It was traumatic enough having her hanging out the door of the loo while I used it, but I’m not letting her get another eyeful.”
“Oh, for the love of the Virgin and all the little saints—Maura, turn around, please.”
“And close your eyes!” Savian demanded when, with a muttered oath, she spun around, her arm stuck out awkwardly behind her. It didn’t take me long to get Savian out of his filthy pants, and into fresh clothing. The wounds across his torso and legs were somewhat better, but I knew they must hurt like the dickens.
“No shirt until your key comes, unfortunately,” I told him as I tucked the blankets around him. “Unless we tie one on you.”
Murmuring something that didn’t make much sense, he immediately fell asleep. I looked up to where Maura stood, leaning slightly to one side in order to accommodate him.
“Let me know if he gets worse during the night,” I told her. “I’ll leave your door cracked open a little bit so someone will hear you if you yell.”
She looked down on him, her expression unreadable.
“Aggravating man,” she said at last, and with my help, got out of her shirt (leaving her tank top since we didn’t want to cut that off), and slipping into a pair of lounging pajamas.
“He can be, but he’s also very brave, and quite nice once you get to know him.” I paused, my matchmaking instincts suddenly coming to the fore. “May—that’s the silver wyvern’s mate—she and Gabriel think the world of him. He helped them quite a bit, you know. Some of it was locating Baltic, but really, that served to help me, too, so I don’t hold that against him. Just let me know if he starts getting feverish, all right?”
“I will.” She got into the bed, turning on a small lamp I’d placed next to her for reading. “Oh, and Ysolde, I feel obligated to say once more how sorry I am about what happened in Ziema a few months ago….I really had no idea that Thala had plans to try to destroy you. I just thought she wanted to hold you for ransom.”
“That, I think, is a subject we’ll leave for another day.” I bade her good night and headed for the room Brom had claimed for his own. He was happily ensconced in bed, making notes in a blank journal Pavel had bought for him in town. I double-checked that his window was locked, glanced in on Holland, and bumped into Pavel on his way downstairs.
“You’re taking the first watch?” I asked him.
“Yes. Nico wished to take one, as well, but Baltic told him to recover from his wounds, first.”
“That’s a long shift for each of you. I could help by taking one of the watches.”
He laughed. “Do you really think your mate would allow that?”
“No, I suppose not.” I smiled wryly. “He’d just sit up with me to make sure nothing happened.”
“Exactly.” Pavel made a little gesture of annoyance. “The watch itself is probably not necessary, since the oracle or Thala could not find us this quickly, but Baltic does not wish to take chances that Brom may be taken again.”
I shivered at that thought and promised to send Baltic down in a few hours to relieve him. “I hope you won’t be bored sitting here all by yourself.”
He sat with his back to the wall at the end of the hallway, his feet propped up on the banister as he toasted me with a glass of dragon’s blood. “I will entertain myself with thoughts of those toys you said you bought me.”
I laughed and wished him a good night before returning to my own room.
Right into a scene of madness.
At first I thought it was a bonfire that lit up the area, sparks of amber and gold wafting upward like fireflies into the velvety indigo of the night sky. But as I stepped forward into the pool of light cast by the fire, I realized what it really was.
A funeral pyre.
“Oh, my love,” I said, tears pricking behind my eyes as I found Baltic in the crowd of silent dragons paying homage to the dead. “This is for your mother, isn’t it?”
He didn’t answer me, of course—the Baltic who stood with such a stoic expression was the past Baltic, but I knew by the way his jaw was tensed that he was beset by grief. I moved next to him, watching the firelight play over the hard planes of his face, gilding the soft linen of his tunic scarlet and gold. I wanted to touch him, to hold him against the pain that I knew he was experiencing, but I was as insubstantial to him as the sparks that flew upward into the heavens.
“It is done,” a deep, somber voice said from behind me.
Baltic didn’t respond, his gaze locked on the fire.
The dragons around us filed past the pyre, each stopping next to a page who held a small wooden casket. As each person passed the fire, he or she reached first into the box, then cast something into the fire before joining a solemn procession that snaked up the hill to the keep.
“What is it you’re throwing on the fire?” I asked no one, moving closer to the page so I could see. Inside the box appeared to be sand…until the page shifted, and the firelight caught the contents, making it glitter with a warmth I felt down to the tips of my toes.
“Gold dust,” I said, wanting to run my fingers through it. “You put gold dust on the fire? Why?”
One by one the dragons paid their respects to Baltic’s mother, until only three men were left.
Baltic continued to stare at the fire, his eyes filled with pain, but his expression an unemotional mask. Constantine stood next to him.
“It is as Alexei says, Baltic—it is done. You did everything you could for her. Now you must let her go.”
“I did not save her,” Baltic said in a monotone. “I let them kill her.”
“You couldn’t have known that Chuan Ren would strike her down in order to hurt you.” He gestured toward the third man. “Alexei didn’t know they would go that far. I didn’t dream they would do such a heinous thing. No one could know.”
“Baltic knew,” a man’s voice said as a fourth person emerged from the shadows.
“I might have known you’d show up,” I said, narrowing my eyes at the human form of the First Dragon. He turned to look at me, giving me a massive case of the heebie-jeebies until I realized he was staring beyond me, at the fire.
Alexei made a low bow to the First Dragon. “You honor my Maerwyn’s memory with your presence, dragonsire.”
Constantine looked more than a little awestruck, bowing and stammering some inanity or other before glancing nervously at Baltic, but the latter continued to stare at the fire, too bound in his grief to acknowledge even the appearance of his father.
The First Dragon stood before the fire, staring deep into its depths. I wondered if I had mistaken what he had said in the sex shop. What did he feel at seeing the body of the woman he had taken as a mate? Was he sad at her loss? Did he miss her? They had a child together—surely he must feel something at her passing.
And yet his face was as unreadable as Baltic’s.
“Your Maerwyn should be alive,” the First Dragon finally said, switching his gaze to Baltic. Even in human form, as he was now, the First Dragon had an “other” sort of aura to him, some intangible quality about him that warned he wasn’t what he appeared. His expression, though, was usually neutral, sometimes benign. But now? I shivered, rubbing the goose bumps on my arms. His face was as austere and frigid as the cold winter air. “And she would be, had it not been for you.”
Baltic at last turned his head, bowing it to acknowledge his father, but silent as a tomb.
“Will you honor my request?” the First Dragon asked of him.
“No.”
The word was curt, but filled with conviction.
“You are aware of the price of such defiance?”
Baltic nodded.
Constantine moved closer to him, saying under his breath, “God’s thumbs, Baltic, do not be so foolish. Take Chuan Ren as mate, and be done with this.”
“Whoa now,” I said, blinking in surprise a few times. “C
huan Ren is who everyone wanted you to hook up with? Nasty, backstabbing Chuan Ren?”
“I will take no dragon as a mate,” Baltic answered, surprising me yet again. He gestured at Alexei. “You heard the soothsayer yourself.”
“Soothsayer?” The First Dragon shifted to look at Alexei. “Explain.”
Alexei’s shoulders slumped. He looked weary beyond words, his grief, at least, etched into every line on his face. “Before she was killed, Maerwyn brought a soothsayer to the keep. She said it was to stop a terrible tragedy.” His eyes closed for a moment as a spasm of pain flashed over his face. “It is ironic, is it not, that her prediction has caused a tragedy beyond words?”
The First Dragon said nothing, clearly waiting to be told what prediction had been made. Alexei passed a hand over his face, turning away, his shoulders jerking as he gave in to his emotions. Tears spilled down my cheeks in sympathy for a man who so obviously loved his daughter.
“The soothsayer told Baltic he would die if he took a dragon for his mate.” Constantine licked his lips, his gaze skittering between Baltic and the First Dragon as he spoke. “She told him that he would find love only in the arms of a human, and that all others would bring death and destruction to him and the black dragons.”
I clutched the chain that hung around my neck, holding the love token for comfort, my heart sick at Constantine’s words. Baltic never should have come back for me—I was a dragon when he found me, even if I had thought I was human. It was my fault the silver dragons destroyed his sept. It was my fault all those dragons died in the Endless War. If only Baltic had found this woman he had been meant to be with, none of the tragedies of the past centuries would have happened.
I wanted to simultaneously vomit and scream my denial of such a thing. We were meant for each other. There could be no other woman who loved him as much as I did.
“And this is your final choice?” The First Dragon simply looked at Baltic, who met his gaze without wavering.
“Yes.”
“So be it. Alexei?”
Alexei turned around. “I do not wish to strip my grandson of everything he has, dragonsire. There must be something else—”