I didn’t know when I’d started to be afraid for Zav instead of afraid of him, but it worried me that he had enemies among his kind.
It also bothered me that he’d tried to take the fall for me. He wouldn’t have killed Dob. He would have done the noble thing and, after defeating him in battle, dragged him back to his Justice Court for judgment. Even though he’d openly admitted to me that Dob’s family would have been able to get him out of punishment.
It is clear you have spent time with him, Shaygor continued. I believe you may have seen the battle in which my son was slain.
“I don’t know who you’ve been talking to—” how had Shaygor even found me? “—but I’m known as the Mythic Murderer to the magical beings in this world. I don’t spend time with them. I certainly wouldn’t go to some pit fight between dragons and munch popcorn while waiting to see the outcome.”
Do not lie to me! His yellow eyes glowed brighter. I am not stupid, mongrel. His aura is all over you. It is clear you have been holding his tail for some time.
“His aura is still on me? Damn, I’ve done everything I could to get rid of it. Hang on a moment. I need your opinion on something.” I held up a finger and grabbed my travel kit out of the Jeep, even as I scrambled for something to say to get out of this situation. The dragon didn’t realize I’d been the one to kill Dob, but if he could forcibly read my thoughts—which was what that telepathic scouring sounded like—he’d learn the truth. And there was nobody here to keep him from killing me.
“You’re a dragon, right? How do people usually get rid of the telltale signs or whatever you call it when you leave your aura on people?” I pulled out my bathroom kit, unzipped it, and tossed my soaps and the three loofahs I’d been experimenting with onto the pavement. “Would any of these implements be better than another?”
I would send him off on a wild goose chase, I decided while he stared at me and the junk on the ground. I’d tell him I hadn’t seen the battle but I knew who had. Maybe that would buy me time. And maybe Zav would come back to Earth in that time and I’d get a chance to ask him what the hell to do about his Dragon Justice Court.
You are attempting to stall me, Shaygor stated.
“No, I’m not.” Yes, I was. “I’m genuinely curious. Those two loofahs have nice firm fibers and are organic and non-GMO and farm-grown. That tool there is a silicone body brush that gives a better scrub to the skin, and then I also have an exfoliating pumice stone. Do you think—”
Pain erupted in my head as if my brains were being blown out.
I gasped, grabbing my skull, and collapsed onto the pavement, the hard gritty surface digging through my jeans and into my knees. I barely noticed it as I sucked in air, trying to push away the mental attack and the pure agony. I wrapped a shaking hand around Chopper’s hilt and tried to wall off my mind, but the attack only intensified. Blackness crept into my vision. What would he do if I blacked out? Kill me? Eat me?
The pain disappeared abruptly, but the blackness almost swallowed my vision before I managed to blink it away and focus on him.
There is a price for disobedience and for not showing proper respect for a superior being, Shaygor stated. You will not defy or lie to an inquisitor of the Dragon Justice Court. Tell me what you saw the night my son died.
“Look, I’m not trying to interfere with your inquisition. But I know less than you think I know. You should check with a couple of panther-shifter brothers named Pardus.” I pointed toward the west. “Back in Seattle. They were there that night. The fight happened right at their house.”
All that was true. Never mind that the brothers were dead now and the house was flattened. If it took Shaygor a couple of days to learn that, maybe I could figure out something else in the meantime. Like how to find a portal that would take me to a world dragons didn’t know about.
Shaygor shifted into human form—no, elven form. Like his son, he preferred pointed ears. As a silver-haired elf of indeterminate age, clad in black leather with lots of silver rivets that gave him a biker look, he strode toward me.
“Already you have wasted too much of my time,” he stated, lifting a hand as he approached. “I will find the answers in your mind.”
I scrambled to my feet, refusing to face him from my knees, but that was the last movement I managed. His power wrapped around me, locking me in place, and I couldn’t budge a muscle.
His cold hand came up to my face, fingers touching my temple. I couldn’t spit at him, yell at him, or kick him in the balls. I was screwed.
5
Even though he’d shape-shifted into elven form, the dragon’s aura made all the hair on my body stand up, and my skin ached all over from the charge of electricity battering it. But that was nothing compared to his presence in my mind. Shaygor’s touch on my temple was light, but mental talons raked through my head, eliciting pain as they stirred up my thoughts, digging trenches into my meager barriers.
I still gripped Chopper, but it didn’t matter. I couldn’t move that hand, couldn’t move any part of my rigid body. The mental protection the magical blade gave me was too little to be of help against a dragon. My thoughts were all I could attempt to use to thwart him.
I pictured ponies, childhood carnival rides, and grass growing up through cracks in a sidewalk. I thought of boring PBS specials I’d watched… Anything but the night I’d battled Dob.
But Shaygor kept pushing Dob’s image into my head, trying to stimulate the reaction, the memories, he wanted. He sifted through my mind, my resistance insignificant to him, and even though I kept pushing my thoughts in other directions, it would only be a matter of time before he got what he wanted.
Shaygor forced Zav’s image into my mind, and I reacted more strongly to that. I couldn’t keep from remembering our conversations at the water-treatment facility—and that lurid kiss.
Shaygor grunted in what might have been disgust. Would seeing me entwined with human-form Zav make him want to avoid touching my mind? In that case… I let myself dwell on that moment, on all the things a couple of humans—or a mongrel half-elf and a shape-shifted dragon—could do together, at least according to the naughty dreams that had been plaguing my sleep for the last three weeks.
Shaygor’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t pull away from me. He has claimed you as a mate? No wonder you fight to protect him. Foolish mongrel. You are not good enough for a dragon, but if you were, you would want one whose family is on the rise in power, not on the wane. Your precious Zav will not be anything much longer, especially if he insists on supporting his mother instead of coming over to the side of those who will take power next. Those who know it’s time to strip lesser beings from the worlds they’re destroying with their taint and to claim those worlds for ourselves.
Shaygor’s fingers shifted into talons that dug into my temple, and he pushed aside my sexual thoughts, using pain to keep me from letting my mind stray. Zaps of agony assaulted me until the correct thoughts flooded my mind. I wanted to continue to resist, but with no end in sight, it was hard. My mind weakened and let in memories of the battle, of Dob and Zav fighting over the rooftops of houses in that neighborhood, of the trees and homes burning all around.
Yes, Shaygor purred into my mind, leaning in so close that I could see his silver eyelashes. Show me what happened. Show me—
He dropped his taloned hand and spun away from me.
My knees gave way as control of my body returned. I would have collapsed, but I stumbled to the Jeep and used it for support.
Shaygor glared toward the sky, and then I sensed what he sensed. Zav’s aura. He was flying in our direction.
At first, I thought I was saved, but Shaygor turned his glare over his shoulder onto me.
Isn’t that telling? That your master has shown up in time to keep me from learning the truth?
“He’s not my master,” I said. It was supposed to come out as a defiant snarl, but my weakened body could only manage pained gasps.
If a dragon claims you for a mate, you will do whatever he wishes. And consider yourself the luckiest and most honored wench in the Cosmic Realms.
“Yeah, sure. And I’ll keep experimenting with loofahs until I find one that can scrub off dragon aura.”
You are truly stupid. Clearly, he mounts you because of your looks. Though it is hard to imagine why any dragon would lower himself to shape-shift into some beast form to have sex with animals.
“Says the dragon doing time as an elf right now.”
If Sindari had been here, he would have reminded me not to push a dragon’s buttons, but I’d unwisely not thought to summon him. I shouldn’t feel braver because Zav was coming—it was clear he was in as much trouble as I was, if not more, but a giddy ebullience filled me. Only because I’d survived, at least for the moment, not because I was delighted to see Zav again.
Elves are the most distinguished of the lesser species. They are not beasts.
I thought about asking Shaygor if being half-elf made me only half a beast and therefore more appealing, but Zav’s sleek black form appeared as he flew over the trees.
Zav landed on the road in dragon form, his eyes glowing violet as he stared at Shaygor. He didn’t acknowledge me at all.
The last time we’d spoken, he’d been pissed at me. He was protecting me, but it had been clear I’d put him in a bad position by needing to be protected. And by forcing him to lie. At the time, I hadn’t realized any of that or understood why he was so mad that I’d killed our mutual enemy, but now I got it. I didn’t regret killing Dob and still thought I had been right to do it, but I deeply regretted that Zav was in trouble with his people now because of it.
Shaygor folded his arms over his chest and stared indifferently at him.
Leave her alone, Zav’s telepathic words boomed in my mind. In both our minds. If you wish to question someone, I am here. To bring a lesser being into your inquisition is ludicrous and demeaning for your entire clan. Dragons handle their affairs with each other, without leaning on defenseless creatures.