Authors: Zoe Chant
She hoped, for an instant, that the memory of that incident would make Laurence surrender to Farrell as he had to his brother. It would be a proper end to the challenge; he could yield now and end this.
But that flicker of hope vanished almost before she was aware of it. Laurence roared again, throwing himself back into the fight.
Farrell had relaxed his guard slightly, expecting Laurence to yield now that blood had been drawn. Laurence managed to knock into him again, wings beating furiously, and he snapped off his own burst of flame before they began to fight properly again.
Jane could still feel the raking wound down Laurence’s side. She could see that he was still flying without difficulty, but she also knew that Farrell would expect him to be weakened by an injury. He obviously wasn’t expecting an opponent with Laurence’s long-trained tolerance for pain.
The sun was up now enough to show the colors of the two dragons as they battled. Farrell was a topaz color that he always insisted was gold; the deep red of Laurence’s hide was marred with the even darker red, almost black, of dragon blood.
There was a monumental cry of pain, deep and massive as a roar but at a pitch that made all the hair on Jane’s body stand up. She knew almost before she heard it that it wasn’t Laurence—as if Laurence would scream. Farrell reared back, sculling through the air as red-black blood ran from a slash on his flank.
Laurence barely gave him any opening to yield—though it was obvious Farrell had no intention of yielding, despite his scream. Laurence was on him again a second later, and this midair grapple was different. Farrell was breathing fire, trying to sear the exposed flesh of Laurence’s wound. Laurence seemed to pick up that trick immediately, because soon they were wreathed in flames as they battled through the sky.
Jane pressed a hand to her side, but the pain was no worse; Farrell hadn’t managed to cause a real burn, though she felt other little injuries here and there. Farrell’s teeth and talons were breaking through Laurence’s scales in small ways again and again. Laurence fought on furiously, his rage stoked higher and higher by every scratch and bite, until they flew apart again.
This time Farrell didn’t make a sound. He was more falling than flying, and black blood ran freely down his chest and belly. The wounds weren’t mortal—he was able to spread his wings down against the ground, showing his submission, and still hold his head up warily, watching Laurence to see whether his surrender would be accepted. Jane wasn’t at all sure that he could get into the air again, though, and he wouldn’t be in any shape to fight there if he did.
Laurence landed lightly in front of Farrell and roared again, just as aggressively as Farrell had at the start of the challenge. Jane sensed her mother, William, and his father all tensing for what was about to happen, to see whether Laurence would harm Farrell after he’d yielded.
Jane didn’t have to wait, and didn’t want to see. She could feel Laurence’s rage still coursing wildly through him; she knew that he wasn’t thinking at all, let alone thinking about what to do. If Farrell fled, or begged—or took his human shape—it might have been enough to make Laurence realize what he was doing, but Farrell crouched there, watching. It was obvious that he was ready to start the fight all over again as soon as Laurence offered him a reason, and Laurence wouldn’t hesitate to give him one.
If the fight started again, with Farrell already wounded enough to force even that arrogant dragon to yield, it wouldn’t end until Laurence killed him.
Laurence! LAURENCE!
Jane tried to reach him in dragon speech, but it was like screaming into the wind—like screaming into a raging fire. He wasn’t blocking her out, but there was no way he could hear her.
Jane’s hand was still locked around her medallion. Laurence had fused the gold clasp to a smooth bead when he put it around her neck, but she was a dragon herself; it was easy to make it fall open again, pulling the medallion from her throat. She had to do something—she had to be ready to—to—
She squeezed the medallion so hard that the unforgiving edges of the dragonglass cut into her palm, sending the awful buzz of remembered fire through her body.
Laurence roared again, his attention swinging away from Farrell all at once to focus on her. His mind was still a firestorm, and Jane let the medallion fall from her hand as he threw himself into the air and flew like a bullet toward the platform where Jane was standing.
A boundary—far stronger than the polite reminder that marked out flying spaces over the lake—protected the Georgian Corps observers on the platform. It would repel Laurence like a sheet of dragonglass, and it didn’t give Jane room to shift while she stood on the platform. She would have had to turn her back on Laurence—to run
away
from him—to take the stairs down to the ground, and he was already only thirty yards away.
Jane jumped up onto the railing and threw herself off.
***
Laurence lunged forward, stretching his forearms to their fullest extent, and still he caught Jane much too close to the ground. He set her on her feet and felt himself shrinking at once into the shape that could touch her properly. He caught her hand between both of his to see the ugly gouge on her palm from the dragonglass.
He raised her hand to his lips, kissing it softly before he rubbed his own hand over hers, using the gold of the ring on his index finger to soothe the wound from the dragonglass.
I’m sorry, treasure. I’m so sorry.
“Laurence,” Jane said, and her voice sounded clogged with tears.
He dragged his gaze up from her injured hand—injured for him, he knew, to stop him from becoming the monster he could so easily have been—to find her beaming with tears on her face.
“Don’t apologize,” she said, her smile only widening. “You did it. It’s over. We’re free now.”
He blinked, staring at her, her words barely getting through to him. “I—I didn’t. You had to—”
“But you listened when I did,” Jane said. “My hurt was more important than your fight—even just a little hurt. Look, it’s already healing. Unlike you.”
Laurence looked down at her hand caught between his, and found that he was rubbing the ring on his finger over a mere pink line across her palm, and even that was fading. He noticed also that he was naked, and covered in bruises and scratches and blood, which was still dripping freely from his side.
“Oh,” he said, and then he couldn’t quite catch his breath as the raking wound on his side made itself known.
Oh, that really hurts.
Jane’s arms came around him, helping to hold him up. He felt the warm touch of familiar gold—the chain that held her medallion, the one he’d fastened around her throat just a couple of hours ago—over the wound, stretching and thinning to help hold it closed.
“We should...” Laurence leaned into Jane, breathing in the sweet familiar smell of her. He was suddenly drunk with exhaustion and relief.
It was over. He was alive, and not outlawed—three members of the Georgian Corps still stood above them and were making no outcry. Farrell had given way and was still behind him somewhere, nursing his wounds.
“We should take another bath,” Laurence murmured, thinking of how good water thick with gold dust would feel right now. It would soothe all his little injuries without Jane having to apply gold to each and every one.
Though there was also something to be said for Jane treating his injuries by hand, if they could be in a bed—or back on her hoard, in the little cave of the cellar. Anywhere would be good, as long as he was with Jane. His mate, and he could keep her now, he could stay with her forever.
It was over. They were safe.
There was a roar from behind him, much too close, and Laurence jerked upright and turned, fumbling as he tried to push Jane behind him while she was trying to push him behind her. Farrell had picked himself up off the field and was bearing down on them, maddened and blood-streaked and roaring, talons and teeth on full display.
How dare you! You should have yielded first! I won, I WON—
His silent raging and deafening roar both turned to another shriek of pain. He dropped, transforming abruptly into his human shape as he fell, another wound blooming on his shoulder.
Laurence stared, bewildered, but Jane cried out, “
Mom?!
”
He followed Jane’s gaze up to the platform behind them, where Jane’s mother was just holstering a gun like the one Jane had used to shoot him the night they met.
“Been wanting to do that for years,” Jane’s mother said with satisfaction. “Farrell’s been a pain in the whole county’s ass since you were a dragonet, Janie.”
William whooped and leaped down from the platform—landing lightly and unharmed in the grass, Laurence noted absently, needing no one to catch him. Jane probably wouldn’t have been hurt either, but...
Jane was curling into him, hiding her face against her shoulder at the same time she renewed the gentle motion of the gold against his side, encouraging the long wound to knit.
This is also not how I intended to introduce my mate to my mother, for the record.
Still better than her shooting
me
,
Laurence pointed out.
Although apparently I don’t mind so terribly when women shoot me.
“Nobody’s shooting you but me, my lord dragon,” Jane replied sternly, tipping her head back. “Not ever again.”
“Yes, my lady,” Laurence agreed, smiling. He lowered his head to kiss her.
William shouted in a carrying voice, “You’re in dragonglass for a
year
, Farrell—and don’t demand an appeal, I’ve got senior Corps officers standing right there to deny it!”
Laurence winced, jerking back to meet Jane’s eyes and finding her with a similar expression. He glanced up again and saw Jane’s mother was watching them with obvious amusement. He was aware all over again that the only thing hiding his nakedness from his mate’s mother was
his mate
.
Jane? Could we go home now?
Yes
, Jane agreed.
Immediately.
“Mom!
Close your eyes!
”
“Oh,
Janie
,” her mother said, but when Laurence glanced up again she had turned her back, so Laurence thought it was probably safe to turn and let Jane help him off the field.
***
Laurence was staggering a little by the time they got to the car, and didn’t argue about lying down in the backseat under the gold foil emergency blanket. She added a striped picnic blanket to hide the dazzle of gold. Laurence didn’t even seem to notice the added weight; he was asleep long before she got to the freeway.
She found herself grinning as she drove, glancing back again and again to see Laurence sleeping peacefully in the backseat. He wasn’t unhurt, but he would heal, and even more importantly he’d
won
. He hadn’t just been victorious over Farrell; he’d proven himself able to see a challenge through in good form. No matter what he said about her intervening, he’d been the one who listened to her and stopped.
Better than that, when Farrell attacked again after the fight was over, Laurence hadn’t instinctively shifted back to his dragon form to protect her. His habit of staying human and avoiding fights was part of
him
, not just the dragonglass he’d worn for so long.
She looked back at him again and giggled with pure glee. He was
hers
, her mate. No one would try to take him from her now. They could be together for real, for all their lives; there was nothing to stop them from making it official.
Well, Laurence would need to wake up first, but she supposed she could wait for that.
When she got to her house and parked in the garage, he was still sleeping soundly. She peeked under the blankets to see that he was healing well, and tucked him in to go on sleeping. She only needed a few things from the house.
A few things turned into two suitcases, but she could fit them both into her car, so that was all right. She picked up a pair of soft pajama pants and a t-shirt for Laurence while she was at it, and dropped them on the passenger seat when she got back in to drive them the last little stretch.
She pulled up in the loading zone in front of the tower building where she and Laurence had spent their first night together. An alert doorman started to approach, and she gestured him sternly away at the same time she used dragon speech to speak to Laurence.
Time to wake up, darling.
Laurence made a wordless grumble in dragon speech, but opened his eyes a little, then much wider, pushing up on one elbow; she could feel him realizing what had already happened today. “Where—oh.”
“I thought you might like to be on your own territory,” Jane said, very calmly and neutrally.
And it looked like you had a fair hoard here...?
“Not as much as you deserve,” he said hoarsely. “But enough to make a promise on, if you’ll trust me to let it stand for the rest.”
“I’ll trust you,” Jane promised.
It’s worked out well for me so far.