Madfall

  At least they couldn’t shoot fire, like he could. If they ever figured out how to do that, he was packing it up and leaving the hills.

  As if to prove his point on the overall inconvenience of humans, one stepped out of the forest. He’d come from upwind, and the smoke of the fire had dulled Draknart’s nose.

  Draknart flexed his talons as he pushed to his feet and stepped between the visitor and Einin, calling over his shoulder, “You best stay out of this.”

  The young man in soldier’s armor strode boldly forward, sword at the ready.

  Flying so low over the village had been a mistake.

  “I’ve come to kill you, evil beast,” the youth shouted.

  They always said the same thing. Draknart swallowed his disappointment. “And who would you be?”

  “Jon of Fernwood,” the fool proclaimed proudly. “Dragon slayer.”

  Not groaning out loud took some restraint. “Might you not wait with the title until your dragon is slain?”

  The youth shot him a look of fury. Then his gaze cut to Einin, her fiery hair and round breasts. His expression changed to that of open desire. “Worry not, fair maiden. I shall save you from this vile beast and make you mine.”

  Einin made a sound behind Draknart that he could not interpret, and he could not look back at her face, for the youth charged with the usual battle cry.

  Make Einin his? This little vermin? With barely some peach fuzz on his weak chin? Darkness bubbled up inside Draknart. The bloodlust was instant, such as he hadn’t felt since he’d slain Fearan, who’d a century ago come to the hills and thought to take Draknart’s territory and treasure.

  Draknart was about to bite the fool little knight in half when it occurred to him that to kill a human while on a pilgrimage to ask the goddess’s forgiveness for killing humans might not be the smartest course of action.

  He snapped his jaw shut and contemplated the bastard. He’d never been in a fight before while trying to protect someone as he wanted to protect Einin behind him. He’d never been in a fight before where his immediate goal hadn’t been to incinerate his enemy or rip the man’s throat out with his talons.

  That moment of hesitation cost him a painful cut on the wing, clear through sinew and muscle. He held back the blast of fire in his throat.

  Instead of roasting the pup, he asked, “Can you swim?”

  The startled youth nodded.

  Draknart swept him up with his good wing, catapulting him toward the middle of the lake. The knight flew in a soft arch, screaming all the way, then a splash, then sweet silence again.

  The fool was probably struggling to peel off his armor. Draknart had half a mind to fly over and sit on his head, keep him under water. He would have, if he wasn’t convinced that the goddess would take drowning a human as badly as she would take eating him.

  Draknart failed to comprehend what Belisama liked so much about mankind. Yet she was fond of them, for she kept their kind alive. She was the goddess of fertility. She blessed them with offspring. And she blessed their fields so they could gather in the harvest and go on living and multiplying. And still, instead of worshipping her, many betrayed her for the new god the priests had brought to the villages from the south.

  When Draknart turned to Einin, he found her right behind him with her sword drawn.

  He narrowed an eye at her. He waited until she shoved her sword back into her belt before he returned to the fire and plopped down onto the sand, taking care to lick his wound clean.

  “Have you been preparing to help me or stab me in the back?” he inquired without heat.

  “Help you.” She cleared her throat. “Most certainly.”

  “You’d say that either way.”

  “I would,” she admitted, with a slight twitch of her lips. Then she eyed his injury and stepped closer. “Does it hurt?”

  He snorted. The cut was bad, mayhap bad enough to stop him from flying anymore today, but… “It will heal once we step into Feyland.”

  Her eyes rounded, her mouth gaped. “You mean to go into Feyland? We haven’t come to just see the circle?”

  She thumped down onto her shapely bottom, as if her knees had gone weak.

  “We will go in, if we can,” he told her. “I restored the stones, but they still might not work. If they do, the gate will open at twilight. I mean to have the curse lifted.”

  He wanted that more than he’d ever wanted anything. And yet, deep down, a part of him suddenly wished that the stone circle wouldn’t work.

  Chapter Seven

  Draknart lay on his belly, his nose filled with Einin’s soft scent as she washed and dressed his wound, using a strip torn from the bottom of her shirt.

  “’Tis not necessary, sweeting,” he said, all the while oddly liking the fuss she made.

  “I can’t just leave you to bleed.”

  “Why?”

  She shrugged, then looked away. “You took me flying and swimming. You fed me. You kept me warm in the night.”

  Her hands were small and delicate, her touch soft, yet he knew her arms were strong enough to wield a sword. Wispy locks of hair escaped her braid, creating a halo of sunshine around her head.

  “Why have you been cursed?” she asked, meeting his eyes at last.

  A cough rumbled around in his chest. She was not going to like this tale. Then again, ’twas not as if she liked much about him. None of her kind did. He was reviled.

  For a moment, he wished it could be different, that he were a different kind of beast, that mayhap he hadn’t done all he’d done in the past centuries. But the past was the past, and he was the beast he was, no help for it.

  “A hundred years ago or so,” he said, “I came upon Belisama’s priestesses at the river as they were tossing flower wreaths into the water for her as their gifts. They were comely lasses. We had a bit o’ fun.”

  Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “Meaning you swived them, then you ate them?”

  He flinched.

  She took that as a confirmation and shook her head with a sad look but did not stop caring for him.

  “I deserved the curse.” He hung his head. Then he looked up again. “But it’s been a hundred years. Could Belisama not forgive me?” An exasperated grunt escaped him. “I tried to swive you, then eat you. You’ve forgiven me, and you’re just a wee maiden.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I have?”

  “Haven’t you?”

  “Yes,” she said on a sigh. “Can I blame a beast for being a beast?”

  “You make me want to be less beastly.” The words came out unbidden. And since he was making no sense, he went all the way. “Should I then be more like the knights?”

  He glanced toward the lake where he could pick up the splashing sounds Jon of Fernwood made as he swam for the opposite shore.

  “You’re not entirely insufferable as a dragon.” She kept washing him, the wound deeper and longer than he’d first thought. “But you should not eat any villagers.”

  “Not even if they come to my cave?”

  “Not even. You are fearsome enough to scare them away.”

  Every time she touched him, the touch tingled across his skin, and an unfamiliar energy surged through him.

  Einin of Downwood made his heart live.

  If dragons could love, he might be able to love one such as her. Of course, she could probably never love a beast like him. A dark mood settled over Draknart at the thought.

  He watched her. Aye, she was fine. She was certainly fit for a god. Trouble was, Draknart was no longer sure he wanted to give her to Belinus.

  Yet belonging to Belinus in Feyland would be best for her. She would live in the god’s palace. Nobody would ever whip her again; she’d be far from the clutches of the people of her village. In Feyland, she would not grow old but remain forever beautiful Einin.

  As a cursed dragon, Draknart could offer her precious little: a dank cave, and human company for only a few hours each night. No, she would never choose that over Feyl
and. She didn’t think of him as an entirely vile beast, but a beast nevertheless.

  “Are you going to ask Belisama to dissolve the curse?” she asked. “When we go through the fairy circle?”

  “She swore that she would not,” he grumbled. “She’s that mad at me.”

  Einin shot him a questioning look.

  “I will ask the god Belinus,” he told her.

  Draknart stayed still as she gently wrapped his wound in moss, holding it in place with a plaster of wet leaves.

  When she was finished, she stepped back and inspected her handiwork with satisfaction.

  “Now you rest,” she said, then walked away from him, toward the water. Halfway there, she turned back. “Would Belinus go against his own wife the goddess?”

  “They argued some decades ago. He is no longer welcome in her glens and her palaces.” Then Draknart added, “He must be lonely.”

  Einin stilled, her gaze examining him with intent, very, very carefully. “Why would he help you?”

  Instead of responding, he looked toward the lake. The knight was now far enough so even Draknart’s superior hearing could not pick up the sounds the man made.

  Draknart rose. “Let us go to the fairy circle. Twilight nears.”

  Einin went with him, even stood in the middle of the circle with him, but as the sun dipped below the tree line, then dipped below the horizon and left the sky dark, nothing happened.

  Draknart’s spiked tail beat the ground, setting an impatient rhythm.

  “The sun stone must not be exactly lined up to the east,” he said then, and went to correct the stone’s placement. Then he adjusted another and another, the task easier now that he was dragon than it had been before. It still seemed to take forever. Mayhap because he kept on adjusting, turning the stones this way and that.

  When he was finished, thinking he might have gotten it just right, Einin asked, “What else can we do? Is there anything I can do to help?”

  “You could help me gather some branches,” he told her after a moment of consideration. He’d seen the humans crown the stones with green. Mayhap the gods liked that.

  She hurried to the edge of the clearing and broke off thin branches from the evergreen bushes, brought them to him by the armload, then went back for more while he twisted what he had into large wreaths.

  The night wore on as they decorated the stone circle. When it was all done to Draknart’s satisfaction, they drew back to inspect their handiwork. He thought it might just work. Of course, now they would have to wait another day.

  “How will you convince Belinus to lift the curse? What will you give him in exchange?” Einin asked.

  Draknart hated the answer. The plan he’d thought perfect just days before now seemed ill-conceived. Yet it was the only plan he had, his first real chance at restoration in a century.

  “He is fond of beautiful maidens.”

  “But—” Einin paled for a moment. Then all the blood rushed back into her face, and her cheeks turned an angry red. She flung her arms wide as she shouted, “You brought me for him!”

  He ducked his head. “Aye.”

  “You—” Her voice broke, not on fear, but on fury.

  Draknart felt her stark expression of disappointment as sharply as if he’d been stabbed in the chest. Was that a sheen of tears in her eyes? She was rapidly blinking. Then she squared her shoulders, and he knew she was about to shout at him again.

  “You will live in a palace,” he cut her off, then fell silent at the strange tone of his voice that sounded very much like begging, which could not be as dragons never begged. He cleared his throat. “You will lack for nothing. You will know neither hunger nor disease. Death will not touch you in Feyland.”

  She swore like a goatherd, sparks flashing in her eyes, her hands gripping her sword as she backed away from him.

  By the gods, Draknart loved her fire. Her fire was the truest and most beautiful thing he’d seen in centuries. If she stabbed him in the heart right now, it’d be almost worth it just to have met her.

  “Have you ever asked me if I want to live forever?” she shouted with rage. She threw her sword at him, missed, then picked up a stone from the ground to hurl it.

  Draknart didn’t duck. He let the missile hit him. He deserved that for not being honest from the beginning. He did. Now, as he watched Einin spin on her heel and march away from him with angry strides, his guts felt as if he’d eaten the fairy circle’s boulders for breakfast.

  At the edge of the clearing, she turned again to call back. “Fine. I choose to go to Belinus. I will serve the god, and I will live in Feyland forever.”

  No! The fire inside Draknart roared. To hear the words from her lips was like a broadsword slicing through his heart.

  His muscles coiled. He raked the ground with his talons as he rose to pace. He hated the look of disgust on her face. He wanted that face cradled in his human palms, just before his lips descended on hers. He wanted that lean, strong body. He wanted her fiery spirit and her sharp tongue. He wanted her courageous heart.

  He could keep Einin. He would. He’d bring a different maiden for Belinus. He could bring as many as a dozen, pick all the comeliest lasses from the village across the lake.

  Aye. The god would have to settle for a different maiden. Because the thought of Belinus touching Einin filled Draknart with a murderous rage. Belinus would not take her soft lips. The god would not hear her sigh in passion. Einin would not squirm in pleasure under anyone but Draknart. She would not spar with anyone else. And if she traveled the world, she’d be flying with him.

  She was stomping toward the deer path, probably to head back to the lake, avoiding his gaze, no doubt thinking about living in Feyland. Was she thinking of the god, thinking of seducing Belinus? Molten fury exploded through Draknart.

  He surged forward.

  “You will not give yourself to the god!” he roared. The birds in the trees took flight with a mad storm of flapping wings. “Einin of Downwood, I claim you by my dragon’s right.”

  She squared her shoulders as she roared back at him, “I am a woman free and wild. I’m not yours to claim!”

  Chapter Eight

  “I choose Feyland!” Einin shouted at the beast who’d broken her heart into a hundred useless pieces.

  She’d been so lonely for so long that she’d begun thinking that traveling the world with Draknart might not be so bad. They would fly in the clouds, hunt together and camp together, see wondrous sights like the fairy circle.

  For the briefest time, she’d dared to hope that the life she’d always dreamed of but never thought she’d have was possible. Yet all along, he had different plans. To him, she was nothing but a pawn, a bargaining chip, a gift he had the right to give away—an object without a will of her own.

  She would choose the path of her own life, she and no other. She found she was willing to fight to the death for that right. “You cannot take me one day, give me away the next, then take me back again.” She glared at him with all the fury and heartbreak she felt. “I will not be taken nor given!”

  The dragon stomped toward her, more angered than she’d ever seen him. His eyes were bloodshot, thick smoke curling from his nostrils. He looked ready to devour her.

  Might have been smarter to fight with him once he turned human. How far to midnight? It had to be near.

  Her gaze flew to her sword, behind him on the ground. More fool she! She shouldn’t have just thrown the sword. She should have run him clear through.

  A small voice whispered inside her: Run and live to fight another day.

  Einin stood her ground as the dragon reached closer, pulling back his lips to reveal fearsome fangs. She braced herself, expecting him to tear into her. But in the blink of an eye, Draknart was suddenly man, naked and…aroused.

  Her feet wouldn’t move.

  Another two long steps brought him within arm’s reach. His dark gaze burned her. They were toe to toe, their breaths mingling.

  “I’m
sorry.” He lost all anger and his tone was now a pained plea. “Forgive me, Einin.”

  So as not to fall into his eyes, she closed her own for a moment. It didn’t seem possible, but suddenly, she found Draknart the man even more overwhelming than Draknart the dragon.

  Heat radiated off him. His faintly smoky, masculine scent surrounded her.

  “Einin,” he said in a hoarse whisper.

  He might have said more, but a different voice interrupted, a deep, resonant voice that filled the clearing like rumbling thunder. “I thought she was to be my gift.”

  Einin’s eyes snapped open. Who said that?

  She didn’t get to see. She was nearly knocked off her feet as Draknart swept her behind him in an instant.

  He fell to one knee, the movement awkward as if not entirely voluntary but as if he’d been pressed to the ground by an invisible hand on his shoulder.

  “Greetings, Belinus,” he said through gritted teeth.

  Belinus!

  Einin’s breath caught. Cold fear coursed through her veins in a mad rush. The god truly was here. An ancient god!

  “You said the gate opens only at twilight,” she whispered to Draknart, dizzy with fear.

  “For us,” he whispered back. “The gods come and go as they please.”

  She was suddenly as scared to look as she was eager to see the god the priests claimed had been long vanquished. She filled her lungs at last and dared peek around Draknart, into the otherworldly, mystical light that emanated from the stone circle.

  Where was the god? Was he the very light?

  An impossibly tall, vaguely human shape took form, gliding between the two largest boulders—too beautiful and too terrifying at once, and entirely too bright to be beheld by human eyes.

  Einin’s gaze dropped. Her limbs were trembling, her throat so dry, she could not have uttered a single word.

  “Let us see her, then,” said the god, and oh, that voice again, as if the words were spoken by the very wind, everywhere at once, filling the entire clearing, and filling her chest too, making her gasp for air.