Heart of a Dragon (29 page)

"You don't understand," he said.
 
"There is not time for me to explain, but you must trust me when I tell you that the answer is yes.
 
If he is allowed to, Salvatore will protect them all."

"And if you're wrong?" Donovan asked. "Or if he isn't given that chance?
 
What's your fallback plan?
 
Martinez, you came to me offering peace, but you walked in and out of my home without sharing the truth.
 
Why did you need that formula, and the crystals?
 
What are you planning to do with that paint?"

"I can't answer that," Martinez said.
 
"I don't fully know.
 
If I told you what I think, you might agree and help me, and you might try to stop me.
 
If you chose the latter, we'd both end up losers because Anya would certainly have her way with the Barrio, and possibly the city itself if the two of us were out of the picture.

"I have my plans, and you have yours.
 
I trust that you will do all that you can to stop Anya from completing her ritual.
 
I intend to make sure that, should you fail, we aren't without protection."

"If you lose control," Donovan said, "who will protect us from you?"

They stood and stared at one another.
 
For just a second, it seemed as if Martinez might look away, as if he might speak.
 
Then the front door of the clubhouse opened, and Jake stood in silhouetted in the light from the room beyond.

"Snake wants you out there," the big man said softly.

"Tell him I'll be right there," Martinez said.
 
He turned back to Donovan.

"You must do what you can," he said, " and I will do the same.
 
We seek the same thing, I believe, but we follow different roads to our goals."

"When this is over," Donovan said, "if we are both standing … we will talk.
 
If we cannot do that, there will be new problems."

Martinez held his gaze, and then nodded.
 
"It is long overdue," he said.
 
"Perhaps…you would like to meet my son…"

Without another word, or waiting to see that Donovan would answer, the old man turned and entered the Dragons' clubhouse.
 
Donovan watched him go, cursed softly under his breath, and then turned away.
 
He needed to find Amethyst, and they needed to get moving, or all of what they'd learned and done would be a waste of time.

~ * ~

Martinez walked slowly into the center of the yard, where Snake stood beside the fire pit.
 
All around them faces stared out from shadows. They watched him approach with a combination of fear and awe.
 
He knew they didn't understand him, or trust him.
 
He also knew that they were frightened.
  
Snake stood tall and silent, waiting.
  
Jake had returned to stand beside him.

"I'm ready," Snake said, not wasting any time or words on preliminaries.
 
"Bring your boy – your artist – to me.
 
Bring his paints, and his magic.
 
Bring him to me, and we will put an end to all of this once and for all."

Whispers sounded around the clearing.
 
Words were spoken too low to be heard.
 
Hushed questions were stilled by nervous coughs.
 
No one dared to voice opposition, or to question what Snake said.
 
The time for debate had apparently passed.

"I will return within the hour," Martinez said.

Snake nodded, held his gaze for a moment, and then turned his back, staring off across the fence sealing them from the world.
 
As solid as the wood seemed, the darkness encroached, and though the fire flickered and blazed, it seemed lost and empty in that greater void.

Martinez turned, and returned the way he'd come.

Snake turned to Jake and spoke softly.

"You'd better be right," he said.
 
"For all our sakes…you'd better be fucking right."

Donovan was halfway down the dark tunnel toward home when a shadow flickered across the floor.
 
He froze.
 
He'd never encountered another living thing in the tunnels.
 
There might be things trapped inside.
 
There might be others with the knowledge and power to walk those hidden roads.
 
He hadn't survived by ignoring danger, and he had no time for confrontation.
 
When a soft growl that rose to an almost inquisitive yowl floated from the shadows he could only stare in amazement. He hurried forward.

"Cleo?"

The cat stepped from the shadows, hunkered low, and then leaped.
 
Donovan caught her and held her up, staring in consternation. The two were connected in ways that sometimes amazed him, but he hadn't dreamed that she could walk the portals.

"What is it?" he asked.
 
"What are you doing out?"

Cleo emitted another low yowling sound.
 
Donovan closed his eyes, concentrated on releasing his thoughts, and sought the link.
 
If Cleo had something to tell him, they wouldn't be chatting about it.
 
If she'd found her way out of his home and into this dark place to find him, something was very, very wrong.

His mind blanked, just for a moment, and then filled with a series of images that were hard to follow.
 
He concentrated and made the shift from human to feline perception.
 
Everything was larger, and his line of sight was very low to the ground.
 
The world was a chiaroscuro wash of gray-scales and shadow. He gritted his teeth and focused.

After a moment, he recognized the Barrio, but not any of the areas they'd visited recently.
 
This was a park on the far side of Anya Cabrera's shop, several streets over and nearer to the city proper.
 
He saw shadows moving, and at first thought it was just traffic on the street.
 
It was difficult to interface with Cleo's thoughts.
 
The world shifted, and he nearly broke the connection as she leaped to a fence, changing the perspective with sickening swiftness.

Donovan felt Cleo's anger grow, felt a shiver as the hairs on her back rose, and the world shimmered back into focus.
 
He saw the entrance to a park.
 
The park was drenched in heavy mist.
 
Figures moved in and out along the edge of that mist.
 
Then everything faded, and another image rose.

Donovan saw Amethyst's face.
 
Her expression was a mixture of anger and fear.
 
Mist swirled around her, and the connection broke.
 
He staggered, and felt Cleo's claws drive into his arms, clinging tight.
 
He caught his balance and cursed.
  
Something had gone wrong.
 
He didn't know exactly what had happened, but the message was clear.
 
Someone had taken Amethyst, and she was in that park.

"Good girl, Cleo," he said.

He shifted her on his shoulder so that she rode more comfortably.

'There's no time to take you home," he said. "You're going to have to come with me.
 
If she is already caught up in that mist we'll have to act very quickly."

Cleo hunkered, wrapped herself around his shoulder and clung to his jacket as he broke into a run.
 
When he started to take a passage leading off to the right, she dug her claws in again, and he hesitated.

"What?" he asked.

Cleo leaped from his shoulder and dashed into another passage leading off to the left.
 
Donovan shrugged and followed.
 
If Cleo had found him in these tunnels, she very likely knew them better than he did himself.
 
That was a curiosity to be looked into at a later time.
 
He flashed on the image of Amethyst's face, and gritted his teeth.
 
He fought to keep up as Cleo flashed ahead into the shadows, cursing under his breath.

They exited through a doorway Donovan had never tried.
 
It brought them into a very short alley between two buildings he didn't recognize.
 
When they stepped onto the street, though, he saw that they were about two blocks from the park he'd seen through Cleo's memory.
 
He stepped out onto the street, kept close to the walls of the line of shops he passed, and moved carefully forward.

As he approached, he saw that there was a fire burning near the center.
 
This park was very close to the line that bordered the Barrio and the city "proper."
 
The police still patrolled it regularly, and Donovan frowned, trying to understand how there could be what amounted to a small bonfire in the center of a city park without drawing notice.

A mist had risen, turning to thick fog at its outer limits, and as he watched, it sifted across the ground and rose into the air.
 
Within moments the park was nothing more than a low-hanging cloud bank from the streets.
 
There were occasional flickers of light from within, where the flames licked higher for a moment, and then died down.
 
Anya Cabrera had effectively erased the small area from the face of the city.

After a few moments, Donovan saw a young man in dark jeans walking down the road from deeper in the Barrio.
 
He wore the colors of
Los Escorpiones
, and he glanced furtively from side to side.
 
He was obviously not convinced of the privacy of the gathering in the park, or perhaps he feared that Anya Cabrera was as
 
much a danger as an ally. He reached the park, glanced over his shoulder a final time, and then followed the young gang member into the mist.

"She's in there, isn't she, Cleo?" Donovan whispered.

The cat glanced up at him and let out a soft growl.
 
She rubbed against his leg once.
 
He leaned down and patted her head.

"It's time for you to get back," he said.
 
"This is no place for you.
 
I'll get her out of there, and I'll bring her home."

For a moment it seemed Cleo would ignore him.
 
She glared up with feral intensity, and he feared she might dart off on her own through that dark mist.
 
He didn't want to think about what might happen if Anya got control of Cleo.
 
It would be bad for both of them.

Then, without warning, she turned and darted back into the alley.
 
Donovan watched her go.
 
He thought about going in to be sure she got through the portal, then remembered where and how she'd found him, and shook his head.
 
He turned back to the park and concentrated on the problem at hand.

His jacket was lined with pockets and hidden pouches.
 
He never knew where he'd be caught, or in what kind of predicament.
 
No one knew what he carried with him, and he varied his portable 'arsenal' as often as he could, adding new secrets and trying things he discovered in his research.
 
It kept those who knew him off balance.

He still had the amulet Amethyst had given him, but that wasn't going to be enough.
 
It would obscure him from the sight of most, but not all, of those in that park.
 
It would keep any of the dark
Loa
from discovering him, but he thought it was likely that Anya herself possessed one of the amulets, and he knew for a fact that at least two of
Los Escorpiones
wore them.
 
That meant he was going to have to find a way to 'disappear' that would work on them all, and even then he was going to have to be very careful.
 
When he'd watched the previous ritual, those wearing the amulets had been vague – like pencil sketches mostly rubbed out, but lingering as gray shadows.
 
That meant they would notice him if he made a wrong move, and if he got in and close to Amethyst, only to be discovered, or captured, they'd end up worse off than they already were.

He rummaged through his pockets and pulled out a small scroll.
 
It was made of parchment, tied with a black ribbon, the knot sealed in wax.
 
He broke the seal, untied the binding and unfurled the small slip of paper.

The spell was powerful, but short-lived.
 
Once he used it, he would be racing against the clock.
 
A quick mental inventory of the other things he had with him told him it was his only chance, so he took a deep breath, and began to read.

The words were in Latin, but not the Latin taught in schools.
 
It was the Latin of a long ago world, pronounced just differently enough to bring the power behind the words to life.
 
He enunciated carefully, reciting each word clearly.
 
When he was done, the parchment burst into flames, but he didn't release it.
 
Though it burned his hands, he held on until the words had drifted to the ground at his feet as ashes. He murmured a final incantation, stepped across those ashes, and disappeared in a wisp of smoke.