Lord's Fall

  “Everything is beautiful,” she told him.

  He bowed again with that touch of Old World charm, excused himself and left. Linwe left with him, and the Wyr were alone for the first time that day.

  Eva set the others to inspecting the apartment then she joined Pia by the window. She said, “The man had a point. I’ve seen better welcomes.”

  Pia grimaced. “Beluviel told me telepathically that the emissary arrived this afternoon. Apparently they’re several days earlier than expected.”

  Eva pursed her lips. “Well, that complicates things.”

  “Yes, it does,” Pia said grimly.

  Calondir and Beluviel might have invited her first, but the gods only knew how long it had been since they had seen Elves from Numenlaur. In contrast, they had only seen seven months of border tensions with the Wyr demesne. To people of their immense age, seven months must seem like nothing more than a passing moment.

  But the trade embargo had to have hurt the Elven demesne as much as it did the Wyr. They had held out and made their statement successfully. Wouldn’t they be just as relieved to let it go as the Wyr would?

  She felt like her mind was spinning from one thing to the next. It seemed like she did nothing but move from one pitfall to another. She couldn’t wait to see Dragos tonight and to put things right between them. Then maybe she could turn things around tomorrow and make something good come out of this damn trip.

  The others made short work of thoroughly inspecting the apartment. Pia claimed the first bedroom they cleared, shut the door, stripped off her dirty clothes and staggered into the bathroom to take a long, warm bath.

  Her Wyr healing abilities, along with the soothing soaps and water, soon eased the aches and pains of the day away but left her exhausted. As she climbed out of the bath, Eva knocked and brought in a tray laden with strange, delicious foods. Pia stuffed herself, shoved the tray outside the bedroom door afterward, climbed into the soft comfortable bed and was out before her head hit the pillow.

  Despite her quick plummet into sleep she tossed and turned. Several times she came partly awake, frustrated and searching. She couldn’t find the right connection. Every time she reached for Dragos, all she could see was a male with green eyes. He held out his hand and beckoned to her, but it was much too dark where he stood. Every time she saw him, she shuddered and turned away.

  Then she came awake in a rush.

  Disoriented, she thrust out of bed and went to the window. The sky was growing lighter. It was early in the morning, and she hadn’t dreamed of Dragos.

  They hadn’t dreamed.

  Panic throbbed like a migraine at her temples. She strode to the door and snatched it open. James and Andrea were talking quietly, keeping watch in the common room. Both came to their feet at her appearance.

  James put a hand on his sword. He asked, “Everything all right?”

  “No,” she said. “Get Eva.”

  “I’m here,” Eva said from one of the other doorways. She was barefoot but otherwise dressed in black cargo pants and an army green T-shirt that fit snugly against her lean torso. She strode across the room quickly, black eyes sharp. “What up, princess?”

  She said to Eva in a low voice, “Dragos has been casting spells so that he and I can dream together, and I didn’t dream last night. Something’s wrong.”

  And she couldn’t make a simple, goddamn phone call to see if he was all right.

  Eva’s gaze had widened as she talked. “Okay,” the captain said. “Let’s talk it through. Has he ever had problems dream casting before?”

  “We’ve only done it together a couple of times,” Pia said. She rubbed her mouth and tried to get in control of her panic, to force herself to think logically. “The Power in the Wood interferes with phone calls. Maybe it can disrupt Dragos’s spell.”

  “He’s Powerful as shit and older than dirt,” Eva said, her voice steady and not unkind. “Rather than something happening to him, it’s much more likely that the Wood interfered with his spell, don’t you think?”

  Suddenly Pia grew calm. “That makes sense, but he doesn’t know that, and last night was important. We had things to discuss.”

  What would Dragos do now?

  He would be doing the same thing that she was doing, working his way through the possible reasons for their missed connection. She had the advantage. She knew he went to bed safe in his home territory, whereas to him, she was deep in the heart of enemy territory.

  Would he watch and wait for word? If he didn’t—if the Elves discovered that he had crossed the Elven border again without permission, she didn’t think there was anything she could say then that would repair the treaties, and they might not be able to avoid war. The Elves had been quite clear: they would treat any further trespass from him as an act of invasion.

  She said, “We need to send someone out and hope they get out of the Wood in time to make a phone call before Dragos decides to come in after us.”

  Eva’s eyebrows rose. “Sounds like we better get someone out fast.”

  • • •

  Throwing their bed against the wall hadn’t done anything to improve Dragos’s mood. He knew Pia felt stressed about the trip, and he had no intention of arguing via text messages, but he was utterly furious with her.

  How dared she rebuke him, leave their dream and turn off her cell phone? How dared she bring up that old issue of servants and employees, and throw Rune in his face?

  Did he not allow her to do as she wished in most things?

  How dare she disobey him?

  Yeah, he heard that.

  He tossed the king-sized bed back into place, showered, dressed in black fatigues and a thin, black silk sweater, and left the Tower.

  Another heavy day of fighting was scheduled for that day, so the bouts started at five A.M. Despite the early beginning, all the seats were filled. Tension had ratcheted up. One hundred and twelve contestants would start the day. By tonight there would be fifty-six.

  When Dragos arrived at the mobile office, he told Kris and his other assistants, “Find somewhere else to work today.”

  None of them asked questions. They took one look at his expression and scattered, leaving him to prowl the supersuite and fume in isolation.

  All the sentinels were scheduled for early combat. By some trick of chance, none of them had yet drawn Quentin Caeravorn as an opponent. Aryal, Grym and Bayne had cycled through their fights already, and now Constantine was on the floor.

  Con was brawny and blond, as were all the gryphons. He was also what his fellow gryphon Bayne liked to call a “man slut.” It was a testament to Constantine’s actual skill set that he was so effective at his job while remaining so aggressively promiscuous, because from what Dragos heard, Con never got a full night’s sleep.

  His current opponent in the arena was one of the gargoyles, and both contestants had shifted into their Wyr form for the fight. The gargoyle had morphed from a mild-looking man into a seven-foot winged monster, with a demonic face, huge batlike wings and a tough, stony gray body.

  Their fight caught even the raging dragon’s attention. Dragos paused at the window to watch.

  A human would have had a difficult time following the fight without the benefit of instant replay and slowing the action down, but Dragos had no trouble at all making out every detail.

  Con was not Graydon. He had broken one of the gargoyle’s legs and a wing, and now, catlike, he played with the guy, letting him get close and then batting at him with a giant paw. Constantine was just plain nasty in a fight, whether he was in gryphon or human form. The gargoyle was done for, but apparently he was too stupid or stubborn to quit.

  Dragos shook his head and turned away.

  He had been an autocrat for so very long, and he was utterly used to absolute rule. Then Pia came along. She c
oaxed his arrogance into laughing and charmed him into easing up, giving in. He had convinced himself he was growing more tolerant in indulging her wishes, but the brutal truth was tolerance and indulgence were simply other forms of the autocrat.

  Pia had said, The real point I’m trying to make is that I have no idea how to be your partner.

  More brutal truth: he had no idea how to be her partner either, or anybody’s partner, for that matter.

  She was always going to be a softer personality than he, immensely younger and less experienced. More peaceful. And yet here she was his best teacher again, for she had already shown him how she could bend to his will when he needed it. That, he realized, involved a profound kind of trust in him.

  Now he had to learn how to bend to her will when she needed it.

  Not tolerate, allow or indulge. Really bend, despite his mood, the circumstances or his temper. As old, strong willed and entrenched in the habit of power as he was, this was a lesson he might have to relearn over and over again.

  But Pia also had to learn, there would only be so far he could bend. He was simply too dominant. They were in uncharted territory, and he did not know how far he could go. Plus he had been on edge for months, ever since the economy had taken such a serious downturn, Tiago and Rune had followed their mates and left him and the other sentinels running at full throttle, and the Oracle had made her uninvited, impromptu prophecy last summer that hung in front of Dragos like a mushroom cloud.

  He would never forget the strange, dry voice that had come through the Oracle’s Power, or the quiet way it had spoken and what it had said.

  It had spoken of stars dying in agony, and the nature of evil, of Light and Dark as creatures, and Lord Death himself having forgotten he was a fraction of the whole.

  “I am not form but Form,” the voice had claimed, “a prime indivisible. All these things were set in motion at the beginning, along with the laws of the universe and of Time itself. The gods formed at the moment of creation, as did the Great Beast, as did Hunger, as did Birth along with Finality, and I am the Bringer of the End of Days. . . .”

  Which, when it came right down to it, was insane gibberish. It made no fucking sense, and his atavistic reaction to it was just as nonsensical. But every time he thought of that voice he remembered the Power in it, and the hair at the back of his neck raised and the dragon clawed its way to the surface and looked for war.

  But it had not targeted Dragos specifically. It had only mentioned him. In a way the real significance was not what had been said but that the prophecy had come to him, and when he and Pia had consulted with the Oracle a second time, the Oracle had said the events might not surface for months or even years.

  They could not live their lives in fear. He would not. When Pia brought up the possibility of visiting with the Elves, he listened, eventually. Just as the Elves had intended, the trade embargo had caused damage, and it was time to explore ways to end it.

  Not only that, but Pia and Dragos were natural lightning rods. There was always going to be some kind of shit happening, because some kind of spotlight was always going to be trained on them, and they lived eventful lives. If any shit happened while they were separated, they would deal with it.

  And so he tolerated, allowed and indulged.

  Gods damn it. The hardest thing to break was a habit, and the attitude crept in when he wasn’t looking. When all was said and done his behavior had been boorish and typical. He . . . owed her an apology.

  And how strange it was, to recognize how he had grown to need someone after being autonomous for so very long.

  He counted the time until he could go to bed and cast the dream spell. Then he counted the time as he waited, and she didn’t come, and she didn’t come.

  Dawn bled a pale, colorless light over the eastern sky, cold and bleak as death. When he rose he did so silently, full of cunning, for the world he inhabited was filled with prophecy and predators. The dragon was not a safe creature at the best of times, and that was true especially now that he was without his mate.

  He had questions and he needed answers, and while those answers could be found within the forbidden Elven Wood, there was a quicker and more efficient way he could get them, another place he could go that was much closer to home.

  He called Bayne and made some arrangements.

  Then he went on the hunt.

  He found his prey easily within the hour. She wore a classic black two-piece suit, four-inch heels and another sleek chignon, but Dragos remembered another image of her from an age long past, wearing armor, covered in blood and screaming at the sky as he soared overhead, her face twisted with rage and hate.

  The early morning was still dark gray and bitingly cold, and huge mounds of dirty snow were piled everywhere, but like Dragos, the Elven tribunal Councillor did not bother with an overcoat. She stepped out of the front doors of the Plaza Hotel on Fifth Avenue followed by two attendants.

  If the Elf had seen him coming, she would have tried to find some way to avoid him, so he had not given her the opportunity.

  Dragos could cloak himself so completely while he was in dragon form that a mouse could run over his talons and never know it. Usually he did not bother with casting such a strong spell, but he did this time. He cloaked himself while standing on the street curb and added a small, subtle aversion spell so that pedestrians somehow avoided the spot where he stood, until the Elven Councillor reached a spot just a few feet away.

  Dragos said, “Sidhiel.”

  She screamed and spun, her sophisticated poise shattered, and there was his old adversary again. Despite their designer clothing and their urban setting, and the laws and traditions they had surrounded themselves with, civilization remained the thinnest of veneers after all.

  EIGHT

  The Elven Councillor’s attendants had whipped around also, drawing weapons. Dragos regarded them contemptuously. Pulling guns on him was a stupid move. Firing on him would be even more stupid.

  It had been a very, very long time since he had killed an Elf. He raised an eyebrow and almost smiled.

  “Put away your weapons, fools!” Sidhiel snapped. Looking shaken and wild-eyed, the two attendants holstered their guns. The Elven woman regarded Dragos with abhorrence. “This is outrageous, Wyrm. You have no business approaching me for anything.”

  “Quite the contrary,” said Dragos. “Talking to you has become the most important priority of my day.”

  “I have nothing to say to you,” she gritted. “But I will have a great deal to say to the Elder tribunal if you do not leave me alone immediately.”

  “The tribunal is not here,” Dragos said in an exceedingly gentle tone of voice. “Would you like a cup of coffee, Councillor? Perhaps a ride to the Garden.”

  She hissed and yanked a BlackBerry out of her suit pocket. Moving faster than sight, Dragos grabbed her wrist. He held her effortlessly as she struggled to free herself.

  Sidhiel’s attendants stood frozen. Dragos told them, “You are out of your league. There is no shame in acknowledging that. Do nothing.” They watched him unblinkingly and didn’t move.

  Sidhiel’s eyes widened as her BlackBerry grew hot. “Stop. Stop it!”

  He said nothing. With a gasp the Elf’s fingers sprang open, and her BlackBerry tumbled to the ground. As both he and Sidhiel watched, the phone glowed red and melted into a dangerous, acrid smelling puddle that steamed on the frozen sidewalk.

  Sidhiel’s gaze raised, her features sliced with impotent fury. “You are a blight upon this Earth.”

  “I’m always amused at how the Elves insist upon vilifying me,” he remarked. “Your pot is much blacker than my kettle. Yes, I hunted some of you long ago before I grew and evolved. But you killed so very many more of yourselves than I ever did, and you tore up the Earth while you did so.”

  “My gods, I loathe
you.”

  “About that cup of coffee,” said Dragos. As she turned woodenly toward the hotel entrance, he told her, “Not in a public restaurant. Your suite or my limo. Or even my suite at the Garden, if you prefer.”

  After a brief struggle with the choices he offered, she turned to her attendants. “Go. Wait for me at the main entrance to Madison Square Garden. If I am not there shortly, call the head of the tribunal and tell him what has happened.”

  “Councillor,” said the taller of her attendants.

  “You can do nothing here,” she said through white lips. “But you can bear witness to my absence.” She threw a scathing glance at Dragos. “You will be held accountable for anything you do.”

  “You should be careful when you talk of accountability, Sidhiel,” he growled. “I am not a patient man at the best of times. Now my mate is visiting your demesne, and I cannot get in contact with her.”

  She stood rigid, her startled gaze searching his face. Then she gestured to her attendants, gave him a curt nod and strode with him to the sleek black Mercedes limousine that idled at the curb.

  In the back of the limo, Dragos settled back in his seat with his arms crossed. He watched indifferently as the Elf positioned herself so that she avoided any accidental contact with his long legs. Without any further preamble, he said, “You may not have heard, but Beluviel invited Pia into Lirithriel Wood so that she could talk with Calondir. They traveled in yesterday morning.”

  Sidhiel’s gaze flickered. “No, I had not heard.” She added slowly, “Someone should have warned you that cell phones do not work in the Wood.”

  “I already know that,” he said impatiently. “What I want to know is if the Wood can block spells.”

  “What kind of spells?” Sidhiel asked suspiciously.

  He studied the Elf, his mouth tight. He was secretive by nature, and he hated to give up any kind of information to her, but there was no other way for him to find out what he needed to know. He said, “I have been dream casting, but last night either it didn’t reach Pia or she didn’t sleep. I chose to talk with you before I went down to South Carolina to discover for myself if she is all right.”