The Dragon Conspiracy (21 page)

31

YOU
knew you were in deep doo-doo when dozens of harpies attacking a dragon like planes in an aerial dogfight had been relegated to insignificant background noise.

I suddenly remembered Viktor Kain because I heard another voice I recognized—or, to be more exact, another enraged dragon roar.

Vivienne Sagadraco.

We all knew the instant when the two behemoths locked literal horns.

The tuberculosis pavilion shook from its foundation on up to the roof over our heads. Chunks of plaster fell from the walls, and crashed down from the ceiling, and several more panes of glass lost their grip on their frames.

Suddenly I could do more than hear what was happening outside. I could hear what was going on inside Viktor Kain’s mind.

At the museum, he’d used images of torment from his sick and twisted memory in an attempt to intimidate and terrify me. Tiamat had used words on New Year’s Eve. Apparently Kain had used a light touch then so as not to destroy my mind because there was nothing light about what I felt now. I realized this wasn’t meant for me. This was Kain ranting against Vivienne Sagadraco. I didn’t know if it was the nexus or the activating Dragon Eggs, but I could see, hear, feel, and smell the memories triggered in Kain’s mind by his words. When the first wave of images crashed into my consciousness, I was completely unprepared, like being hit and pulled under by a giant wave.

I lost all feeling in my legs, and my body crumpled. The harpy didn’t bother to hold me up and let me drop to the floor. She probably thought I’d fainted. My body couldn’t handle the images being forced into my mind.

A black dragon leveled out over a city that’d been bombed and was burning, choking black smoke billowing into the night sky, pockets of glowing orange where anything flammable burned inside the shells of ruined buildings, illuminating the jagged silhouettes of the brick and stone walls that’d managed to remain standing. The humans had taken refuge in a place they called the Underground when the air-raid sirens had sounded.

The dragon leveled off, intently scanning the ground for her next target. She could hear the terrified heartbeats of thousands of humans huddling together beneath the city in tunnels. They were not her concern. They did not hunt her kind. The others did. They called themselves protectors of the humans, the small immortals, and the fae races.

SPI.

Only the strong deserved to live, to thrive, to mate, to hunt. If a creature was weak and couldn’t defend itself, it was food.

The traitor led those who protected the humans and immortals that populated this island called England, the island desired by those the dragon had allied herself with. Her allies were also human; but they recognized the value of master predators and offered her a portion of these lands as her own in which to hunt, mate, and raise her young.

She and others of her kind had agreed to use their fire breath by night to wear down the humans of this island until they would submit. It was a small and enjoyable task in return for land of her own with humans to feed her, her mate, and their future young.

She found the place where the protectors had gone to ground when she came at night among the flying machines of her allies.

The black dragon banked and turned, inhaling the thick, smoke-filled air, fanning the flames that lay waiting inside, gathering at the base of her long neck, to engulf, to consume, to destroy, cleansing the land for her future family.

The humans could only fly when seated inside their winged, metal shells. Rigid and clumsy, they could not maneuver as she could.

That night she sought out and destroyed the burrow of the humans called SPI. Her fire had gone deep and struck true.

The humans pursued her in their machines, firing at her what she had learned were called bullets. The dragon’s skin was thick and strong, and in the past, the bullets had been no more than a momentary annoyance.

These were different. They penetrated her scales, entered her body, and burned as no fire had ever dared to burn her before.

The humans in the metal machines did not react in fear when they saw her. They knew of her and her kind. She brushed their minds and gathered their thoughts.

Silver.

She had objects forged from it in her hoard. It was what the humans had used to forge their bullets. Their minds contained images of fire, descending into tunnels and chambers. Burning. Consuming.

Her fire. Their burrow. The protectors. SPI.

The traitor of her kind had sent them. They were all that remained of the protectors.

They hunted her as she had hunted them. They burned her with their silver as she had burned them.

Her burning became pain.

The pain became torment.

The torment made her leave her beloved sky and seek out the ground.

They pursued her.

She called out for her mate, but he did not come. Her human allies had long since abandoned her.

The dragon met her end on the island her human allies desired, the island she had been promised.

Groaning against the waves of nausea from the flickering images, I rolled over on my side, blinking my eyes to clear them.

The clock swam into view.

11:59:40

Thirty seconds?

All of that in only thirty seconds of Viktor Kain’s rage-fueled memories?

He’d been with his mate that night in mind, not body. The telepathic link of a mated pair. He’d known where she was, what she had done.

Vivienne Sagadraco’s SPI agents had taken his life mate.

He had felt her death in England in 1940 from hundreds of miles away, and had vowed vengeance if it took an eternity.

Tonight, an ocean away, that vengeance would be his.

Viktor Kain roared in my mind.
“I will destroy you and everything you ever loved! I will see you hunted and butchered as my Katerina was. There were no eggs with my Katerina, no young to continue her line. I gathered the Dragon Eggs as the legacy we should have had together—and as the instruments of my revenge.”

Then came an image. It didn’t come from Viktor Kain’s conscious thought; instead it emerged from his subconscious of private gloating, a triumph finally achieved.

Two people with a ball of white fire between them. Each reached out and put one of their hands into the fire. Both had pointed ears, one with pale skin, the other gray.

An elf and a goblin.

One goblin gem to heal, one elf gem to reveal.

Five cursed human stones to light the fire.

Once ignited, they can only be quenched by an elf and goblin united.

The staccato flashes of memory, rage, and gloating stopped.

It was like a whirly swoopy ride at the fair that stopped way too fast.

Then, in my mind, was blessed silence.

In the quiet, a familiar voice asked with unflappable British calm: “Did you get that, Makenna?”

With a groan, I rolled over; the broken ceramic tiles cool against the side of my face.

I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t think. Kain’s memories swirled in endless, high-speed laps in my head.

The London Blitz. SPI’s destruction. Katerina’s death. Kain’s obsession. An elf and a goblin.

An elf and a goblin?

What the hell?

I struggled to sit up.

Then I knew.

Viktor Kain hadn’t been able to resist, at the moment of his ultimate triumph, to let an image cross his mind of how it all could have been stopped.

It would have taken a miracle.

Viktor Kain didn’t believe in miracles.

A goblin and an elf, races separated by ages of hostility and distrust, joining together, risking their lives, reaching into the fire that was the activated Dragon Eggs to claim their people’s stones of power.

“Agent Fraser, it just so happens that I’ve brought an elf,”
Vivienne Sagadraco said in my mind.
“Do tell Rake to behave and make himself useful.”

32

MEANWHILE,
all hell had broken loose.

The chaos surrounding me would have been impressive any way you looked at it, but I discovered that being sprawled on the floor introduced the added danger of being trampled. I rolled so I was sitting on the floor, not sprawled on it, and quickly crab-walked myself into the closest thing a semi-round room had to a corner.

The door exploded off its hinges as Yasha burst in, followed by an even more unbelievable sight.

Helena Thanos.

I didn’t know if Sebastian du Beckett knew who and what Helena was, or if he had even seen her.

11:59:50

Ten seconds.

Sebastian du Beckett quickly maneuvered to put himself directly in Yasha’s line of sight.

Oh, hell, no.

My hands were chained but my feet were right where they needed to be. The gorgon didn’t even notice me on the floor.

But he sure noticed when I tripped him.

Du Beckett hit the floor hard, his glasses sliding across the broken tiles.

“You bitch!” Spit flecked the corners of his mouth as he scrabbled for me. I jerked my knees up to my chest, getting my legs between us a split second before he threw himself on top of me, one gloved hand at my throat, the other clawing at my tightly closed eyes.

“Look at me!” he screamed. With du Beckett’s hand clutching my throat, his weight, plus the pressure of my legs folded against my chest, I was in danger of passing out.

Then he was gone.

I flopped over on my side, legs still drawn up in a fetal position, coughing and gasping for air.

I risked opening my eyes and saw Ian with one arm around du Beckett’s neck, forcing him to look into Helena Thanos’s glorious violet eyes.

The two gorgons were locked in a death stare.

Sebastian du Beckett’s body went rigid, and I could actually see his neck and then his face harden into gray stone. Only when the process was complete did Ian release him. Without my partner to hold him up, the gorgon fell to the floor, his body shattering on impact.

Caera Filarion knelt in front of Ben, her hand hovering over his clenched fist. He was aware of her, tears streaming down his face as he fought to open his hand. He couldn’t. The force of the nexus pulling the power of the activated diamonds downward to merge with it was too strong.

“Rake!” I croaked, my throat bruised from the gorgon’s grip. I coughed and tried again. “Rake! Help her! A goblin and an elf. Both need to take . . .” My voice failed.

12:00:00

Midnight.

Oh no.

Rake dove for Ben.

Caera desperately tried to pry Ben’s fingers open. Rake’s hands covered both of theirs. The diamonds blazed, engulfing them all, pulsing faster and brighter. Rake bowed his head over their joined hands, his forehead touching them.

Seconds later, Rake raised his head, but didn’t loosen his grip. He was talking fast to Caera and Ben, but the rest of us couldn’t hear over the frenzied hum produced by the activated diamonds. Caera loosened her hands as Ben’s face became taut with concentration and determination. He forced his hand to open by sheer will, Caera’s hand maintaining contact on one side of Ben’s hand, Rake’s on the other, as the elf and the goblin reached into Ben’s opening fingers for the diamonds of their people.

The world went white.

33

I’D
heard that diamonds were virtually indestructible, but damn.

There were five smoking holes in the floor of the tower room where Rake had used the back of his hand to sweep the five diamonds from our dimension out of Ben’s palm.

Rake held the goblin Queen of Dreams in his other hand.

Caera had the elven Eye of Destiny.

Five holes the size of my fist had been burned through the fourth floor, through to the third, the second, and the first. They might have gone clear down to the interior of the island, but we couldn’t see that far. The cursed diamonds had left a blazing path of destruction in their wake.

And New York’s newest level ten gem mage, Ben Sadler, didn’t even have a blister.

Not bad for a newbie.

As an added bonus, his broken arm had been healed.

Contact with both a goblin mage and an elf had kept the power of the activated Dragon Eggs from reaching the nexus. As sensitive as I was to the island’s ley lines, I would have known if it had—and so would every supernatural in the tristate area. Though all that power had to go somewhere, and Ben and his broken arm couldn’t have been any closer. The Dragon Eggs wouldn’t heal humans, but I guessed being a level ten gem mage trumped being human.

Yasha was working off his pent-up rage at not getting to pop du Beckett’s head off his neck like a bottle cap by taking it out on Ben’s chains. We didn’t know where the keys were, so the werewolf was crushing steel links in his hands like walnuts. It seemed to be making him feel better. Caera sitting close to Ben, holding his hand, and talking to him was making both of them feel better. She didn’t know how she had helped to deactivate the diamonds since she didn’t have any magical ability. I had news for her; sometimes the best magic of all was simply being there.

Chunks of stone that were once Sebastian du Beckett were scattered all over the floor. In fact, it was difficult to tell the difference between him and some of the cement and brick mortar that had fallen through the new hole in the roof from the tower’s “battlements.” One look out of a glassless window confirmed that the boss and Viktor Kain had done more than a little property damage. From what I could see, it’d been enough to disqualify the tuberculosis pavilion from being called the best preserved building on North Brother Island.

The damage could be explained by a report that the same “terrorists” who blew up those three boats in the East River did all the damage to the island and its buildings, which was true. Between the two of them, Vivienne Sagadraco and Viktor Kain had also taken care of the harpy infestation. Again, Viktor Kain unknowingly helped.

Their knock-down, drag-out dragon fight had another casualty.

Me.

Walking in a straight line, or really simply walking, was more of a challenge than I was up to yet. Yasha took care of our chains. Dramamine took care of dizziness and nausea due to boats, planes, trains, and cars, but it wasn’t quite up to handling the effects of telepathic dragon communication on a human. I dimly wondered if I should send the manufacturer an e-mail suggesting an upgrade.

We were all out of the building now, waiting on the patrol boat that would be here in the next half hour. Before it got here, I should probably toss back another of my little orange, chewable friends.

A case of the woozies was a small price to pay; tiny, insignificant even. Though if I was going to be making this a habit, maybe I should see if the folks in the lab could work up something stronger and even more fast acting that I could carry around with me.

As a gem mage himself, Viktor Kain had sensed when the diamonds had been deactivated by exactly the means he’d gloated about. The boss believed that he sensed the Dragon Eggs’ separation from each other, and the five human diamonds making like nuclear cooling rods and having five mini meltdowns. He’d decided to cut his losses by leaving the island the way he’d come. LaGuardia was just a few miles away by water. His jet was waiting there.

“He’ll be back,” Vivienne Sagadraco said. She was sitting next to me on a stone bench across the kudzu-covered street from the pavilion. Most things on North Brother Island had crumbled with age; others like this carved bench had stood the test of time just fine. It was nice to sit down on something that didn’t move.

“Viktor’s mate, Katerina, believed me to be a traitor for choosing to protect humans and immortals over my own kind,” she said. “Katerina immolated one hundred and thirty-six of my agents in that London bunker that night. She was on her way north to Edinburgh to do the same to our Scottish headquarters there. I defended my people then, as I will always defend them. The pilots who pursued Katerina were RAF, but they were also SPI agents. My people gladly served and protected their country. Viktor was correct in one accusation; the orders that night were mine. As RAF or SPI, those pilots were charged with protecting Great Britain and its people from
all
threats. Whether from dragon or Luftwaffe, the deaths of British citizens—whether human or supernatural—would not be tolerated. For decades Viktor has plotted his revenge for the death of Katerina. He will go home and plan his next move.”

“Hopefully it won’t be as creative,” I said. “Or as disorienting.”

“My apologies, Agent Fraser. By remaining silent, I hoped that you would be able to hear Viktor clearly. Whether human or dragon, when one is consumed with a desire for revenge, when that moment finally arrives, emotion can override reason.”

“And you can say—and show—things you shouldn’t, even if you didn’t mean to.”

“His pain made him careless. During his long life, Viktor has caused untold pain and suffering, but it did not prevent him from feeling love for another. The loss of Katerina caused a wound so deep, that even if he had been successful and destroyed me as well as those I love and protect, his pain may have eased and his need for revenge may have been satisfied, but only for a short time. Wounds like that—the loss of the one who made you complete, who you looked forward to sharing your life with, to growing old with—such wounds do not heal; they merely become more bearable. I had hoped, and I still do, that Viktor would realize this.” She shrugged, a simple and common human gesture, made by a small woman who half an hour ago had been a big dragon. “He has never listened to me.”

I shook my head in wonder. “Viktor Kain comes here, your enemy, a known murderer, with the intent of murdering and destroying even more people, and you feel sorry for him.”

Vivienne Sagadraco looked across the street at the damage she and Viktor Kain had done. “I can feel sympathy for his loss and his pain without affecting who I am and my opposition to all that Viktor Kain is and stands for. When we lose our empathy for others and allow our enmity to spiral downward and twist into mindless hate, we are no better than the Viktor Kains of the world. Compassion is our strength, not our weakness.” She paused. “And it is a treasure that is meant to be shared. Do you understand?”

I nodded slowly and let myself smile, truly smile, for the first time in two days. “I understand perfectly . . . Miss Vivienne.”

Vivienne Sagadraco continued to look ahead, but now she smiled very slightly.

We watched as Helena Thanos and Alain Moreau emerged from the pavilion and walked slowly down the steps. Ian, wearing his protective glasses, met them at the bottom. He spoke briefly with Helena, reached down, took her hand, and kissed it, no doubt thanking her for coming to help, and especially for reversing Yasha’s paralysis. Just as an older gorgon’s stare could turn a younger one to stone, they could also reverse the paralysis inflicted by a younger gorgon. Helena leaned in and kissed Ian on the cheek.

However, du Beckett’s touch on Eddie Laughlin had taken the paralysis too far. The petrification had entered his bloodstream and begun spreading from there to his organs. Helena said it was turning him to stone from the outside in, his internal organs slowly solidifying, and would eventually end with his brain and heart. And, as it happened, Eddie would continue to be aware, but paralyzed the entire time and helpless to do anything to stop it.

Helena had mercifully looked into his eyes, and done what needed to be done.

Helena Thanos and Alain Moreau, arm in arm, continued to the island’s dock where a Coast Guard patrol boat, with a crew of clued-in humans and supernaturals, would be arriving shortly to take us back to the city. There wasn’t anything that Kenji couldn’t arrange.

Moreau had come over to check on me when Ian had first carried me out of the building since I hadn’t been able to walk two steps without falling down. I’d been used to seeing my vampire manager in a suit. Tonight he was wearing what looked like biker leathers in midnight blue. He absolutely rocked that look, and it seemed that Helena Thanos agreed.

Vivienne Sagadraco had made use of the invisibility amulet she had used on New Year’s Eve to defend Times Square against her sister Tiamat and her grendels. Tonight it had enabled her to fly herself, Moreau, Helena, and Caera to North Brother Island, sight unseen by the swarms of law enforcement boats patrolling the East River. Moreau had used a harness that the boss had had made long ago to enable her to carry her second in command. Helena and Caera had the stomach-dropping experience of being strapped into, essentially, a modified helicopter cockpit with a carrying bar. Ms. Sagadraco picked it up in her claws, and away they went.

“So older vampires are immune to older gorgons,” I noted with a smile. “Nice.”

“It was indeed a pleasant surprise. Both are equally rare, so it’s not surprising that there is no record of immunity.” She tilted her head back, gazing at the stars. “Many happy accidents have resulted from this evening’s events.”

I nodded in agreement. “The potential for vampire and gorgon romance. I’ll bet he’ll even be able to talk her out of the house.”

“That is highly likely.”

“Why did she agree to come? Especially traveling here the way she had to. If du Beckett had succeeded, she’d have been at ground zero.”

“She believed that had she remained at home, she would have died a coward. By coming here, even if she became dust, she would have tried to stop Bastian, and her death would have served a purpose. If you can choose your death, it is always better if you die so that others have a chance to live.”

“What about Caera?”

“When Agent Filarion asked to accompany us here, my first instinct was to refuse her. It wasn’t safe. However, she is fond of Mr. Sadler, and was quite insistent. On a night like tonight when so many things might have ended, other things should be given a chance to begin.”

The boss stood and walked over to where Ben and Caera were sitting against the base of a tree. Ben had seen her coming over and had attempted to stand. I smiled. My grandma Fraser always said that one of the true tests to tell if a man’s been raised right and is a gentleman is whether he stands when a lady enters the room—or tonight, in Ben’s case, when a woman walks under a tree. I wondered if our Mr. Sadler was a Southern boy. I hadn’t heard an accent, but you never knew.

Ms. Sagadraco gestured for Ben to stay put, not that he was having more luck keeping his feet than I was. She knelt down next to them, and started to talk. I had a feeling Ben might eventually be getting a job offer that was better suited to his skill set than being a diamond appraiser at Christie’s. Though I could see where the boss might find it valuable to have an agent on the inside in one of the world’s top art auction houses. Sometimes art was more than it appeared, and in the wrong hands could cause a world of hurt. Yep, an agent on the inside would be good.

I took my third and last Dramamine out of my pocket. If the second one hadn’t kept me from staggering like a drunken sailor, a third one—

Ian sat next to me on the bench. “Take that only if you want to pass out.”

I snorted. “You say that like it’s a bad thing. I haven’t slept in two days.” The fire hydrant standing perfectly preserved on the curb started tilting slowly to the right. “Oh boy.” I put my hands down on the bench on either side of me, bracing for the next wave of the dizzies. It was getting better. The first time I’d fallen right off the bench and into the kudzu.

“Is it happening again?” Ian asked.

“Oh yeah.”

His arm went around my shoulders, pulling me against him. “Don’t worry, I’ve got you.”

It didn’t stop the dizziness, but it did wonders for everything else.

“That was entirely too close,” I said quietly.

“Falling off the bench?”

“No. Tonight.”

Ian sighed and gave my shoulder a squeeze.

I settled tiredly against him and looked back over at the pavilion.

Five of the world’s most valuable diamonds were somewhere in or below that crumbling pile of bricks. If most New Yorkers knew that, the police, feds, Coast Guard, and the Hell Gate wouldn’t keep them from swarming the place in the ultimate Easter egg hunt.

Vivienne Sagadraco had said she was perfectly fine with leaving them right where they were.

The goblin crossing the street to our little bench would probably be paying the island another visit, just for the challenge and the fun of it, if nothing else. If anyone could coax diamonds out of rubble, it’d be Rake Danescu.