Dragon Awakened (5 page)

C
yntag opened the door, leaned out, and yelled, “Allander!”

He held it open for several seconds, watching her for some reason—probably to make sure she didn't dash out—and then closed it.

“What does that mean?” Probably some Spanish word meaning
Bring the knives; we have dinner.

“This would be much easier if you trusted me,” he said, moving up beside her.

She leaned away, narrowing her eyes. “
What
would be easier?”

He released a resigned breath. “Exactly.” Then he pulled her against his hard body, one arm across her chest, the other on her forehead.

She jerked, but his hold was as tight as a locked seat belt. A seat belt with muscles. “Let me go! You want me to
trust
you, then you grab…” The rest of her words disintegrated as she stared at…she had no idea what it was, only that it hadn't been there a moment before: a creature only two and a half feet tall, skin burnished red with a pointy face and black hair as wild as a flame. It perched on the corner of the desk.

Cyntag continued to grip her, though it wasn't necessary. She'd stopped struggling.

“What…is it?”

“That's Allander. He's a salamander.”

“Doesn't look like any newt I've ever seen.”

“Not an amphibian-type salamander. He's a fire spirit. An Elemental. Didn't Moncrief include them in his stories?”

“He had fire, water, earth, and spirit faeries and elves.” Anything else she remembered fled her mind as she stared at Allander.

The creature lifted his lip in a snarl, revealing cat-like teeth.

“They don't like being stared at,” Cyntag murmured, guiding her to the mirror. Her gaze zeroed in on him first, his sharp features and then his dark eyes…except they weren't dark. An ember like the flame atop a candle flickered in their depths, just what she thought she'd glimpsed.

“Your eyes…” Hypnotizing, tugging at some deep part of herself…

“Look at yourself, Ruby.”

The sound of her name, blanketed in the richness of his voice, shuddered through her. She pulled her gaze to her reflection and gasped. “My…” A flame dancing in an unseen breeze, in
her
eyes.

Movement at Cyntag's shoulder caught her attention. The dragon—the friggin' dragon tattoo—ran its tongue across its upper lip.

Overwhelmed, she pushed away and turned to face him. No embers in his eyes, no moving tattoo, and no whatever-the-hell that thing was sitting on his desk. She searched her reflection. Just her hazel eyes, wide and unsettled. She didn't even think about it, just reached out and ran her fingers over his tattoo. His skin was warm but otherwise felt normal.

You're touching him.

Yes. Soft, smooth skin. Hard muscles.

She blinked and jerked her hand back. “What did you do to me?” She ran to the desk and patted the place where the creature sat. Nothing.

“I lifted the Veil so that, through me, you could see the Hidden. It's all here; you just can't see, as I explained.” He ran his hand down her arm, twining his fingers with hers, and stretched her hand toward the empty space. Except it wasn't empty, because she felt the skinny arm of the creature. Parchment skin, short, coarse hairs. “Now you can feel it.”

He released her, and she pulled her hand back. She stared at her tingling fingers as she rubbed them together, then at the desk. “It's still there, right this second?”

“Allander, light the candle…please. They don't speak, but they insist on respect. It's not always reciprocated, but Allander has been with me for many years. We have an understanding.” He nodded for her to look at the candle, because her attention was riveted on him. The flame came to life.

He leaned back against the edge of the desk. “Have you ever seen something in the corner of your eye, only to look and find nothing there? Or heard a sound somewhere in your home but couldn't find the source? How about the ubiquitous missing sock or keys that aren't where you left them?”

He tilted his head toward the invisible being. “Elementals, usually. They're in the non-physical plane all over the world, but we can see and touch them because of our own otherworldly essence. Some are mischievous, others a nuisance, and a few dangerous. A lot of what's considered poltergeist activity is either their doing, demons, or Deuces.”

Something in the corner of her eye? “Sometimes I see shadows move among the parts in my resto yard, but I can never find what causes them.” No, no, no, this couldn't be real. She focused on his last word, remembering it from Mon's stories. “Deuces who make orbs?”

“Most can make orbs of some kind, some more deadly than others. I need to find out if there's a select group of Deuces who can make the kind of orb you saw. That will help us narrow down who could have sent it, at least a little.”

“
Us
?”

“You and I have a lot of work to do before someone comes after you again.”

“Like hell I'm working, or doing anything else, with you. I need fresh air.” She grabbed at the candle, snuffing out the flame and sniffing the black wax. “You've got some kind of hallucinogenic substance in here. Or somewhere.”

“Those weren't hallucinations, Ruby.”

“Stop saying my name like…that.” She reached for the door, amazed when she turned the knob and stepped into the hallway without his hand clamping onto her. She didn't dare look back. Everything he'd told her, everything she'd seen, bounced around in her head like a hundred rubber balls.

Glesenda watched her stalk past with a puzzled expression. Outside, sunlight beckoned, and people walked past the studio, nice, normal people.

Don't turn around. Just keep going.

Cyn watched the girl walk so fast down the sidewalk that her ass swished provocatively back and forth. He had sensed Ruby, or at least sensed the presence of an unknown Crescent, in his studio. That she'd ducked out of sight when he looked up fired his instincts. He'd followed her scent to his office. Her accusation about Moncrief's murder shocked the hell out of him. He pulled on the shirt he'd grabbed in his office and slid into his shoes.

Glesenda followed his gaze. “Who
is
she? There was something odd about her. I thought I saw a flicker in her eyes, and then it wasn't there. I was about to mention the Dragon training room but stopped myself.” The flame in her eyes danced. “If she's a troublemaker, I can take care of her.”

He shot her a derisive look. “Pull back your fangs, woman.”

She
hmphed
and crossed her arms over her chest. “Fuddy-duddy. Don't worry, I won't eat your little friend. Wouldn't want to risk your wrath.” She studied him for a moment. “Your eyes are flickering something fierce. Been a long time since I've seen them do that. And over a girl who dresses like…I'm not even sure how to categorize her style. Grunge? Thrift store?”

He watched Ruby cross the street, or try to, between cars. “I'm not attracted to her.” Though she had an intriguing mouth, with her upper lip a bit wider than her lower lip, wide jaw line, and strong chin. The sass that came out of her mouth was more interesting than annoying, for the most part. She would learn to respect him. “You're going to see a lot of her. She's a new Crescent.”

“New, at her age?”

“Long story. I expect you to help her however you can. She's got a hell of an adjustment period coming.”

Glesenda's eyes widened. “You mean she doesn't know—”

“She has no idea.”

Ruby glanced back, blinking when she saw him at the door watching her. She gave him a look that probably equaled the finger and got into her dark blue truck. He pushed the door open before Glesenda could grill him further. The flow of traffic forced Ruby to wait before pulling out of her spot.

She also had no idea that a demon sat in the passenger seat of her truck. Whoever had sent the orb was wasting no time in trying to take her out. His Dragon clawed at him, its protective instinct pushing to Catalyze.

You know better. Not in public.

He ran to his '57 T-bird as Ruby peeled away from the curb. The demon turned to him, its red eyes flaring, its lip curling with victory. A humanoid demon, it took the shape of a person, but with brown skin and ears that pointed up like horns.

Hell. The damned thing was gloating. Cyn despised the humanoids only second to harbingers. He pulled into traffic as the truck moved out of sight. He tried to pull around the cars between him and Ruby, but traffic gave him no break.

He took the chance on a small gap, passing one car at the cost of a blaring horn. The demon watched him, its hand on the back of the bench seat like it was Ruby's date. It couldn't materialize, bound by the same rule as Crescents: never reveal your presence to Mundanes. It could, however, kill her right there, depending on how much evidence and chaos it was willing to cause. Demons weren't known to be subtle. Those rare cases of spontaneous combustion and one-car accidents? Usually demons.

“Damn it.” His Dragon strained now.

Cyn thought about pounding his horn to get her attention, but she'd likely drive away faster. He passed another car, narrowly missing a collision with an oncoming garbage truck. Now he was one car behind hers.

The demon leaned close to Ruby's neck, flicking its long pointed tongue toward her skin. She brushed at her neck, glancing over but obviously seeing nothing of the menace sitting right next to her. All the while it looked at him.

He thought she might go to her restoration yard. He knew where that was. Despite reluctantly agreeing to Moncrief's plan, he'd checked on the girl from time to time to see if the spell had broken yet.

The demon waved its long fingers as Ruby cleared a traffic light. The light skipped from green to red, making the driver in front of him slam on his brakes. Cyn's bumper tapped the rear of the car, but he was already looking for a way around. Ruby's truck turned right one block ahead. Short of running down people on the sidewalk, Cyn could do nothing but wait. He gripped the steering wheel so hard it began to crack.

He had to get to Ruby. The moment the demon had her alone, it would all be over.

S
ed, the demon, followed Ruby into a building that was identified as a library. She asked the person behind the desk where she could look up old newspaper articles, then followed his directions toward the back.

The place was not very busy. He searched for Crescents, who would be able to see him. A Deuce was checking out. Sed ducked behind the aisle as the man left. A handful of Mundanes. Easy to dispense with.

That was what had gotten him into trouble in the first place, relegated to a prison on the Dark Side. He had been sprung to carry out a task, the kind he most enjoyed.

The object of his task took a seat in the back of the building, the perfect location. If he could get rid of the rest of the inhabitants, he would be done and allowed to play as his reward.

Mundanes couldn't see him, but they could feel him. Sed moved up close to one male who was reading at a table.
Mmm, would love to eat him, torment him.
All he was allowed to do was send him a feeling of dread.

The man shivered and looked around. He closed his book and left. Several others were just as easily dispensed with. Some took the time to check out, while the more sensitive ones left their stacks of books behind.

Now, the workers. Sed made two of them violently ill by flooding them with negative energy. They staggered out, sure there must have been something toxic in the coffee they had shared. One became unaccountably angry and stormed out. Which left the man who appeared to be in charge, and who was accountably angry that his entire staff was gone. He did not respond to the demon's emotional blasts because he already held anger and hopelessness.

He reached for the phone and looked at a list of names and numbers. Before he could call replacements, the demon reached into the man's chest and squeezed his heart. He gasped, shock on his face.

The demon inhaled his pain.
Die, Mundane. Die by my hand, and no one will know any better.

The man dropped to his knees and collapsed, claimed by the heart attack. Sed ran to the door and locked it just as someone approached with a stack of books. The woman tried the door, peered in, and then dropped the books into the metal bin. The demon thought about sliding his hand out of the rotating bin and grabbing her. How amusing it would be to see her expression of horror.

Alas, he had to follow the rules if he hoped to gain freedom. He flicked off the light switches at the front and made his way to his target. The one he
could
torment.

Ruby's brain was literally buzzing.
Hah, I knew he put some funky drug in the air.

Except that didn't explain the killer orb. That was no hallucination, nor was Mon's death. And she didn't feel high or dizzy or otherwise altered. Her rash was flaring big-time though.

She'd barely taken time to enjoy the smell of the books, a scent she found oddly comforting, on her way to the bulky machines at the back of the building. Why had she never thought to look at the old newspaper stories dating back to the time of the boating accident?

She stopped at the headline:
FAMILY PERISHES AT SEA
.

This was it. To the side was a picture of all three of them, posing at what looked like a picnic. She plunged in. Her father was obviously doing well in whatever job he'd been working on—something to do with physics—as the boat was described as a yacht. The Yard certainly wouldn't fund such a thing.

The press played it up as another mysterious Devil's Triangle disappearance. Investigators speculated that it was either an accidental explosion, rogue wave, or pirates.

The
family's
disappearance. It hit her then, that she was included in the missing. There was no mention of her rescue. At the time, she was Ruby Winston. Mon adopted her and, as Cyntag had pointed out, immediately changed her name for some legal reason she had never questioned.

Because he was hiding you?

She'd been a distraught nine-year-old and had just gone along: name change, Mon's move into a new neighborhood, and his continuing touring, coming back to Miami every two weeks but leaving again soon after. The way he'd set up the Yard so it wasn't in her name until she turned eighteen. It also explained why she couldn't get her belongings or visit her friends. All those things she'd accepted and forgotten about. Until now.

It also explained why her grandfather kept his distance, something that had always hurt. But that would mean Cyntag was telling the truth. She flipped through the follow-up articles and was even more stunned: her father painted a villain, having sabotaged the physics work he had been doing at SUNLAB. One theory was that he'd stolen his research to sell to the highest bidder. Another was that he'd gone on a rampage before taking his family to sea to their deaths.

The man she remembered was kind and soft-spoken. Never once had she seen him lose his temper, and, God no, he wouldn't have killed his family.

So the alternative was…someone had killed her parents. All these horrible allegations were a setup to cover the murders.

She sat back in the chair, feeling so cold she was shivering. How
had
she survived? She remembered being on the boat, the jarring thud that knocked her out. The next thing she knew, she was at Brom's, about to get the worst news of her life.

As she absently rubbed her neck, she realized she was still feeling the weird warmth. She searched for nearby vents. Except it was summer and the heat wouldn't be on. Something odd prickled through her. This library branch was a small building, but it was eerily quiet. Though sunlight came through the windows near her, the interior looked dim. The electricity hadn't gone out, or the microfiche machine would have died.

Earlier she'd heard a couple of thumps and someone coughing violently, but now she heard nothing but a low-level hissing. She lurched to her feet. Danger bristled up the back of her neck. Her rash felt as though it was literally on fire.

A shadow moved in the corner of her eye. She twisted to the right. Nothing. Or maybe it
was
something, like that creature in Cyntag's office.

She reached for the gun she still had tucked into her waistband, keeping it down as she walked to the middle of the library. The fluorescent panels were dark, yet lights twinkled from a computer behind the checkout desk.

Not one person in sight. She raised the gun, ready to shoot. Something knocked it out of her hand, sending it skidding across the carpet. Something she couldn't see.

Hell.

Hot breath pulsed against her neck. She spun around, banging into the end of a book aisle. The gun lay only a few feet away, but what good was the damned thing going to be if she couldn't
see
what threatened her?

You cannot see
…

The shadow moved again. She strained her eyes, trying to discern an outline, anything. It, whatever it was, shoved her. She felt pressure against her upper chest a second before she tumbled backward to the floor.

It wasn't small like Allander.

A book toppled from an upper shelf, landing several feet in front of her. She scrambled to her feet, eyeing the door.
Not again.
As she dashed toward it, something hot pushed her from behind. She kept her balance, darting down the aisle to the checkout desk and coming to a bone-jarring halt. A man lay sprawled on the floor, his hand clutching his chest. His face was frozen in an expression of pain and shock. She knew, even without checking, that he was dead.

The sound of metal rattling against metal pulled her attention to the front door again. Cyntag! Trying to open the door that was obviously locked. Could she really be happy to see him?

Arms—at least that's what they felt like—wrapped around her. She dove forward, out of the thing's grasp. It pushed, sending her rolling across the hard, carpeted floor. Even with the room still spinning, she could see that Cyntag wasn't at the door any longer.

Maybe she'd imagined him. But she sure as hell wasn't imagining this thing. No, she wasn't that crazy. She held her hands aloft, ready for anything. Hunter/Prey. Was this what Mon had prepared her for?

A crashing sound drew her attention to the back door flinging open. Cyntag shoved the door closed, his hard gaze on something to the right of her. Of course,
he
could see it. And from the expression on his face, it wasn't good.

She ran toward him, definitely the lesser of two evils. He moved in that preternatural way, suddenly beside her with his arm protectively across her as he faced…well, nothing.

“Who sent you?” he asked it. “Who released you?”

“What is it?” she whispered, though she didn't know why. The thing could no doubt hear her.

“Humanoid demon.”

“What does it look like? How big is it?”

Cyntag didn't take his eyes from it, or where she guessed it was. “You don't want to know.”

“Yes, I do. Lift the Veil like you did at your office. I need to see what I'm fighting.”

His hand slapped over her forehead. Oh, God, he was right. Just the sight of it turned her stomach. Its eyes glowed red, like the embers of hell. Its skin was a bit like the Elemental's, only earth brown and mottled like water-stained leather. Its nails were like something out of a Freddy Krueger movie.

Books rained down on it. Though they fell right through its body, it flinched in pain and looked up. One of those Elementals sat atop the shelf, its heart-shaped face tight with anger as it pushed down more books.

The demon reached toward the creature, its arms stretching like rubber. The Elemental tried to duck away, but those arms looped around it and brought it down to the demon's level. The Elemental screamed and then fell silent as the demon tore its head off with teeth as sharp as its claws. The demon dropped its body and focused on them again.

The Elemental had been trying to help. Outrage filled her, and she tore out of Cyn's grasp, only to lose sight of the demon that, in a moment of insanity, she thought she could make pay. Something clamped onto her sides, two hands, she guessed by the claws that dug into her. A rush of heat washed against her side as she tried to pry those hands off her. Faintly she could see the shadow of the demon only inches in front of her. Suddenly the hands released her and something came between her and the demon.

Something big, black. With scales. Spines that fanned back over its head. And fangs like a saber-toothed tiger's.

The room spun as she staggered back and held on to the edge of a bookcase for support. Cyntag no longer stood there. What
was
there stole her breath away.

A dragon. A friggin' dragon.

“Get farther back, Ruby.”

Cyntag's voice came from the dragon. Had it eaten him? His pants lay in a heap, his shirt tattered on the floor.

Maybe it had.

Blue spikes studded the dragon's spine between two wings tucked against its back. It spun around, eyeing something behind her. She could only stare at the beast, larger than a horse. The dim light shimmered across its scales as it moved. It lunged forward, expelling sinuous black smoke. She saw the outline of the demon in the smoke, its long arms snaking toward the Dragon's muzzle.

The Dragon thrashed its head back and forth, knocking into the rows of shelves and sending them crashing down. She was leaning against one of them, so she snapped out of her terror and moved before she went down with it.

She felt the creepy heat again, the breath she'd been feeling since leaving Mon's house. That thing had been with her the whole time. Fear and revulsion rolled through her. The Dragon's head lunged toward her, freezing her as glistening fangs came close.

Though terror should have claimed her as the dark blue eyes of the beast held her gaze, she felt a longing ache.
The Dragon Prince.

It turned, its teeth snapping at the demon that was now obviously near its tail. That tail whipped around, knocking a cart several yards away and scattering the books it had contained. The Dragon snapped at the demon that must be climbing up its back by the way the spines were bending. If only she could see the damned thing. The Dragon threw itself at another shelving unit, obviously trying to dislodge it. Suddenly, the beast's head pulled back at a painful angle.

Do something!

Where was her gun? She couldn't see it among the piles of books. Frantically she started digging through them, gratefully wrapping her fingers over the cool metal. She aimed just above the dragon. The demon felt the books when the poor creature dropped them. How about a bullet? She jerked with the release, holding strong. The bullet hit the wall a short distance away.

Something sucked the air from her lungs, like a vacuum hose shoved down her throat. She dropped to her knees, gasping and clawing at her throat. What was the demon doing to her? Not strangling her, because she couldn't feel its hands.

The Dragon bumped her, throwing her to the side and ending the horrible asphyxiation. She struggled to her hands and knees, hearing the sounds of battle just out of sight. Then the roar of an explosion. A puff of black smoke rose to the ceiling. Her ears rang in the sudden silence. Who had won? Or, gawd, had they both combusted?

Cyntag stepped into view, wearing his white pants and holding the tattered shirt. “We have to get out of here.”

She got to her feet, scooping up her gun with shaking fingers. “You're a…were a…” She rubbed her forehead. “I've gone bonkers like my grandfather.”

Cyntag took her hand and led her through the wreckage, commenting on neither of her statements.

She glanced back to where the Elemental had died. “Is it there? The creature who died?”

He paused. “Yes. Its body will fade away.” He tugged her out the broken back door to where an old black Thunderbird was parked at an angle.

“Are you all right to drive?” he asked. “You need to follow me back to the dojo. We have a lot to cover and not a lot of time to do it.”