Better to have been thrown back in her cell naked than to have to face Piper’s accusing glare. And Esme’s empty eyes.
But that had been his intent, hadn’t it?
Piper didn’t seem to get that though; of course she didn’t, since she’d always been the pure-hearted one of their trio. She anchored her fists on her hips, angry Latina sparks glinting in her eyes.
Or maybe that was dragonfire. Although Ashcraft had said Esme would be the bait for a dragon, actually Piper had been the one to catch the beast.
For half a second, hope twisted up in Anjali. Did that miscalculation mean Ashcraft wasn’t as strong as she thought?
No. She’d seen what he could do.
The hope guttered out like an ember in the storm outside.
To her dismay, Torch left her standing there alone while he crossed the room to poke through the bags stacked against the far wall. Without the barrier of his big body, she felt exposed, and Piper’s stare drilled into her.
She couldn’t run from that outraged hurt any more than she could escape a dragon’s claws. Nothing could change what she’d done, and she couldn’t expect them to understand. “I’m sorry, Pipsqueak,” she whispered. “Ez, I’m so, so sorry. If only I’d…”
But what could she say? If only she’d known Ashcraft was as evil as a dragon? She
had
known; she’d just thought she could let them destroy each other while she and her friends got away. Instead, it seemed she’d sided with the devil and Piper had sided with the beast, and Esme was paying the price.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Piper’s stance didn’t soften, but she was chewing the side of her lip like she’d done whenever she was trying to puzzle her way through her chemistry textbooks. She’d kept struggling when Anjali had given up, knowing she’d never be able to hack it in school.
Anjali looked away. “You wouldn’t have believed me. And I wouldn’t have blamed you.”
“I’ll believe you now.” Piper glanced as Esme, and her brown eyes clouded with sorrow. “What do we have to do to help her?”
Wrapping her arms around the hollow ache in her belly, Anjali shook her head. “I don’t know. Ashcraft is just… You don’t know him, that side of him.”
Esme didn’t seem to be listening to them and never turned away from staring out the window, but a shudder wracked her thin frame.
Piper put a calming hand on her shoulder, and Anjali shivered as if she could feel that bone poking through her own palm like stigmata.
“I saw how he tried to control Ez,” Piper said. “But he lost her. So he’s
not
all-powerful. He has weaknesses.”
Anjali shook her head harder, the wet ends of her dreads slapping at her shoulders. “When you told me the dragon ichor is tainted, I hoped maybe that was the key. He’d be so greedy for the power of the ichor he wouldn’t notice it was spiked.”
Piper frowned. “We’re not killing one of the Nox Incendi to stop Ashcraft.”
Anjali shot a glance at Torch, still across the room, and sidled closer to Piper. “Why not?” she hissed. “They aren’t even human. They’re monsters walking in man flesh. They’ve killed people since before history began, and they’ll kill now to keep their secrets.”
Piper’s lips twisted. “And what secrets are you keeping?”
Anjali recoiled. “None. When Ashcraft told me to get the ichor or he’d let Esme die, I did it. And if it takes the sacrifice of a dragon, all the better.”
“Why do you hate them so much?” Piper leaned toward her. “How did you even know about them?”
After the night she’d had—no, after the last three days—no, since Ashcraft had chosen Esme as his bait, Anjali couldn’t hold back anymore. “A dragon killed my mother.”
Though she was looking at Piper, she was excruciatingly aware when Torch straightened. Who wouldn’t be aware of a dragon-man in a wet kilt? Her bag was in his hand, and all his many, many muscles were tensed, the metallic tattoos shimmering turbulently under his skin. Her bag wasn’t
that
heavy, since she’d packed for a sham bachelorette party knowing she might not survive it.
What happened in Vegas, stayed in Vegas. Like bones in a basement.
His dark eyes, still sparking from the storm, were narrowed. “Who was your mother? When did this happen?”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. My uncle confirmed it. Whatever lies you want to spin won’t change it.”
Piper, always too soft-hearted, closed the distance between them to touch her hand. “Anj, I’m sorry. You told us she died when you were little. In a car crash.”
“That’s what Uncle Gwain always told me.” She grimaced, clenching every muscle in her face to keep from crying out at the pain of the old wound ripped open. “But by ‘car’ he meant ‘dragon’. We left Louisiana to get away from the unnatural and unholy terrors.” She turned her glare on Torch. “Except they’re everywhere.”
He glared back. “You came to us,” he reminded her. “I don’t know what happened with your mother, but you want to be the killer now?”
“To save my friend,” she snapped.
Piper squeezed her wrist. “We’ll find a way.”
Anjali wrenched her hand away from Piper, tired of being grabbed. Where were all these touchy-feely people when her mother had died and her uncle had uprooted her from everything she’d known? “Ashcraft isn’t going to stop,” she warned. “When there’s something he wants, he doesn’t stop.”
Torch snorted. “And he thinks he can teach a dragon something about going after a treasure?” He strode toward her and took her arm.
He was much harder to shake off than Piper. Impossible, actually. The link of his fingers around her elbow was as tight as steel handcuffs. But almost scorching hot.
“I got your things,” he said. “C’mon.”
Piper twisted on her heel to watch them. “Where are you taking her?”
“You take care of your friend,” he told her. “I’ll take care of this one.”
After her instinctive stiffening, Anjali didn’t even bother fighting him. How could she? She didn’t have the strength physically, and after seeing Esme, she didn’t even have the will.
Just as he intended, she suspected.
She wavered when they walked out into the hallway and she found herself leaning into his hold, warming her chilled body against his simmering heat. Yes, he’d ruthlessly dropped her, but he hadn’t lied to her. “How long can she go on like that?” she asked softly.
“Not much longer. My cousin Rave knows something of alchemy. With Piper’s help he’s trying to undo whatever dark magic Ashcraft inflicted on her. But…” He shrugged. “You saw her.”
“I didn’t believe my eyes,” she murmured.
Torch glanced at her sidelong. “There’s not much left of her to see.”
“I mean when Ashcraft showed me how he controlled her. Like a puppet. He could call her on her cell phone and tell her what to do. He meant to send her here like a piece of white meat on a hook to catch a dragon.” She shivered.
“Why did he show you? Because you’re a witch?”
She stiffened. “I’m not!” As quickly as it flared, the surge of adrenaline ebbed. “I wasn’t. I told you, I didn’t believe. Not before.”
“And now you do.”
She summoned up just enough energy to glare at him, carefully keeping her gaze off the hard muscle of his bare chest. “I flew with a dragon.”
“And got dropped by one,” he said.
As if she needed the reminder. “I thought Uncle Gwain just ran a sketchy head shop. I had no idea…” She shook her head. “When I was a kid, he stole magic from a witch doctor in New Orleans. The witch doctor sent a dragon to retrieve it, but the dragon killed my mother instead, and that’s why we left for Salt Lake City. But bayou magic isn’t happy in the desert. The head shop wasn’t much more than t-shirts and a front for drug dealing. Until Ashcraft got his claws in Uncle Gwain. But Ashcraft was only biding his time until my uncle owed him, then he revealed that he wanted a dragon.”
She swallowed hard, tasting again the bile that had risen in her throat when her uncle had told her what he’d done. “They were going to use me as the bait.”
Torch rocked to a halt. “You?”
She twisted her lips into a mocking smile. “I know, right? They quickly figured out I wasn’t…ideal.” She wasn’t any of the things that tempted a dragon. Not winsome and not rich. Or blond.
Not a virgin.
Torch nodded slowly. “You’re too strong-willed and independent to be easily sacrificed.”
For a moment, she blinked at him in disbelief. He almost sounded as if he admired those traits… “Whatever reason, they chose Esme instead.” Her roommate. Her friend. And it was all her fault—she’d failed even as bait. “Ashcraft knew Ez, of course. They moved in the same circles in Salt Lake’s high society. He’d already been thinking of taking a wife since he’s getting to be that age where people start to talk.”
Torch tilted his head. “So Ashcraft actually targeted your uncle through you via Esme. She was the first point of contact.”
Now he made it sound as if it
wasn’t
Anjali’s fault Ashcraft had spellbound Ez, but she couldn’t accept any forgiveness. Instead she felt doubly guilty because it seemed obvious that Ashcraft had only found Uncle Gwain because she was friends with Ez. God, she failed everyone just by being around them.
Better if her uncle had left her in the swamp.
“It doesn’t matter who was first or last,” she said stiffly. “He’s not going to let any of us go.” Unlike certain other beasts she might mention…
Torch grunted as if he heard what she didn’t say. “I told you already, and Piper did the same, that you’re here now. Ashcraft isn’t controlling you anymore.”
“He still has Esme and my uncle. Maybe not their bodies, but he owns their souls.”
And the only reason he didn’t have hers was because he hadn’t wanted it.
No one did.
Chapter 4
Torch led Anjali down the labyrinth of hallways. He’d planned to take her back to her room, but he couldn’t now.
How could he throw her back in what was really her cell now that he knew more about what was going on? She was as much a victim as Esme. But at least maybe she could help them find answers, if she stopped being so hopeless.
He knew hopelessness. He saw it in the older Nox Incendi, slowly turning to stone from the petralys curse. He fought it as fiercely as he could: flying into the teeth of a storm, ravishing rich old ladies, making sure the Keep was quiet and safe for the wiser dragonkin like his cousin Rave who might have a chance of curing the stone blight. But he knew it was coming for him too someday, the poison congealing in his veins, turning his ichor to rock.
He couldn’t let Anjali drag him down with her.
Good thing he had a dragon’s wings.
He altered course for the one of the peaks of the Keep. Not as high as the turret where he’d launched them earlier, but high enough.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
He was surprised she realized they were off course; the Keep was confusing enough that even he still got lost sometimes. “To my aerie.”
She stiffened. “Why?”
“Because you aren’t a prisoner anymore.”
She halted. “You’re letting me go?”
He’d stopped the instant she had. Now he spread his fingers and showed her his empty hand. “Consider yourself let go.”
She spun on her bare heel and stalked back the way they’d come.
“Of course,” he raised his voice, “I still have your dry clothes, your phone, and your credit card.”
“The card is maxed, and Ashcraft has that phone number so I don’t want it,” she tossed insolently over her shoulder before flipping around so her dreadlocks flapped at him.
He lifted her bag and peered into the depths. He lifted a small circlet from the side pocket. “Pretty ring.”
She stopped.
He’d taken the ring from her before he tossed her into her empty room. Piper had said the ring matched ones that she and Esme had, rings Anjali had given them, that she’d made herself. And they’d been spelled somehow.
She might not know magic or like it, but she’d done something with it.
Slowly she pivoted to face him again and stared at the ring he held up between his finger and thumb. “That’s mine. Give it back.”
He arched one eyebrow. “I’m a dragon. I don’t give back treasure.” He lifted the ring to his eye and rotated it slowly. “Fire opal. Nice work.”
Her jaw worked. “I was taking a metal-working class in school and needed stones for the setting. I found three in my uncle’s shop I liked and made rings for Piper, Esme, and myself.”
“Did you know they had magic?”
She shook her head. “Now I know all stones have their own…ways. But then I thought they were just pretty.”
He watched her somberly. “Sometimes that’s enough.”
Her mouth twisted. “Yeah, ask Esme how pretty works against Ashcraft.”
“If you are so sure no one can stop Ashcraft, why not let me try? Since you hate dragons anyway,” he reminded her. “Stop running away. Help me fight him.”
He held out the ring as enticement.
When she took a step toward him, reaching for the prize, he took a step back.
She stopped again with a muttered oath and dropped her hand. “What do you want from me?” she demanded. “I can’t help you. I couldn’t even help myself.”
“You’re not alone against Ashcraft anymore,” he said.
“Exactly. I dragged Ez and Piper in with me.”
Her lower lip quivered, and it struck Torch that she was nowhere near as tough as she wanted to be.
Maybe dropping her had been kind of a dick move.
He closed the distance between them in one step and lifted her hand. He put the ring in her palm and folded her fingers over the glimmering opal. “Piper fought to get away,” he said. “Esme is fighting to stay alive. Are you going to walk out on your friends?”
She looked down at her clenched fist. “They’d be happy to see my backside.”
“Well, they could see it all through that skirt.”
Her gaze snapped up. “Thanks to you.”
He inclined his head as if accepting a compliment then waggled the bag in his hand. “This is yours, right? Change into something that’s not see-through and if you still want to go, I’ll walk you to the door myself.”
Without looking to see if she followed, he turned down a smaller hallway and let himself through the double doors wide enough to let a dragon past.