Dragon Soul Read online

  It warmed my heart that he was seeking advice. I knew that he’d struggled the last few days with all the new and intense emotions he’d been feeling, and I had hoped he’d take advantage of the older and wiser Gabriel. I paused just out of Rowan’s sight, although I had a feeling Gabriel knew I was there.

  “I’m sure you will find that you do. Just think of a time when you were feeling that all was right with the world and your future was limitless and without clouds. For me, that moment was when May swore fealty to me, and I knew she would be by my side forever.”

  “Hmm,” Rowan said, obviously thinking. “There was the bike my father bought me when I was seven. I loved that thing. Rode it for years, every summer, all day and most of the night, given the midnight sun in Sweden. Rode it to pieces, as a matter of fact.”

  “An idyllic childhood summer would be a good centering time,” Gabriel agreed.

  “But I think I’d have to go with the first time I saw Sophea,” he said, warming my heart even further.

  Gabriel’s eyes flickered briefly toward me. “Ah, it was love at first sight, was it?”

  “No, far from it,” he admitted. “I thought she was a red dragon and was trying to steal the ring from Mrs. P for her own purposes. I thought she was deceptive, and manipulative, and probably quite deadly.”

  “That doesn’t seem like a very grounding moment,” Gabriel objected gently.

  “Ah, but it was also the first time since the accident with the dragons that I felt fully alive, aware that life spread out before me with endless possibilities, and that Sophea was an opponent worthy of my fullest attention. I had no idea if she was going to beat me or not, but I knew I’d give her my best.” He must have felt me approaching because he half turned when I leaned down to kiss his cheek. “And I turned out to be right. She is a worthy of my fullest attention.”

  “Pretty words, wyvern,” I said, moving around to sit beside him, reveling in the feel of his leg against mine. “But let’s have a little more of that attention toward not setting everything in the cabin on fire every time we get a little romantic.”

  Rowan made a face. “I admit I’m not very much in control of fire yet.”

  “What did you mean when you said that May swore fealty to you?” I asked Gabriel. “That’s like an oath of honor, yes?”

  “In a way, yes. All dragons swear fealty to their wyvern, including their mates. It means simply that you as a mate will put Rowan first in your thoughts and will do your best for the sept. In turn, Rowan will swear to protect and honor you. You are not truly considered mated until the oath of fealty is sworn.” His eyes held an obvious question.

  I ignored it, trying to decide if the promises we had made each other a couple of nights before had been sufficient to be considered an oath of fealty. “Maybe you can tell me what this is. Rowan… I don’t know what the verb would be—burned? Marked?—anyway, he did this to me, and we are at a loss why he did it. Or even how.” I knelt down between the two men, and lifted the hair off the back of my neck to show the odd tattoo.

  “Ah, Rowan has placed a sept mark upon you. Interesting choice of images,” Gabriel said. “The silver dragons bear the image of a hand with a crescent moon. The sept mark is something all dragons give to their mates and children. If you have given the oath of fealty, then you should be able to reciprocate the mark on Rowan.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “Breathe fire on the same spot on his neck.”

  I looked at Rowan. He looked back at me. “I don’t know how to breathe fire,” I told him.

  “No, you don’t. You can set fire to your feet, though.”

  “And I did spit out a little ball of fire at that talking dog.”

  “True. Would that do the trick?” Rowan asked Gabriel.

  He shrugged. “It might. Or it might be a matter of Sophea practicing how to harness your fire. No doubt she didn’t have time to learn to use Jian’s before he was killed, so her abilities might be a bit stunted.” Gabriel rose. “If there are no more questions, I must go find May. She wishes to pick out a costume for me for tomorrow’s party, and although I can think of few things I’d like to do less than prance around in a costume, I live to make her happy.”

  “Actually, I do have another question. Ipy is missing. You two haven’t seen her, have you?”

  Rowan looked thoughtful. “I passed them this morning. They were all wearing swimsuits, so I gathered they were coming here.”

  “They did, but Ipy left shortly thereafter and hasn’t been seen since. And the captain”—I shot a disparaging look toward the bridge—“insists that she’s just sleeping off a hangover. But that’s not like Ipy. She takes her guard duties very seriously.”

  “We can have a look around,” Rowan said, getting to his feet.

  We made it down to the main saloon on the floor below before one of the crewmen staggered into the room, a blanket-covered form in his arms. I didn’t have to see under the blanket to recognize what it was—a body.

  “Oh, dear goddess, no,” I said, my stomach twisting around on itself. “No, not Ipy. Tell me that’s not Ipy!”

  Another crewman followed with a second blanketed bundle, this one much smaller. Both men looked faintly green. “Get the captain,” the first one said to the second, who promptly put down his small bundle, ran to a wastebasket, and threw up violently and noisily.

  “I don’t want to know what that is, do I?” I asked Rowan, tears making my throat hurt.

  He glanced at the small bundle to which I was pointing and shook his head. “Go back to the cabin.”

  I thought about arguing, but decided this was one time I wasn’t going to fight for equality in dealing with difficult situations.

  I ran out of the room, almost mowing down May and Gilly as they were coming upstairs.

  “Come with me, both of you,” I said quietly and, taking Gilly by the arm, steered her down to the cabin.

  “What is it? Did you find Ipy? Is she ill?” Gilly asked when we closed the door behind us. My throat was still aching with the need to cry… not cry, scream. Rail. Wail and sob and generally grieve as loudly as I could. But I knew if I gave in, the others would as well. Control, that’s what was needed here. Compassion for the feeling of the priestesses, yes, but I had to remain in control to ensure Mrs. P was kept safe.

  “Yes, we found her. Come along—I only want to do this once.”

  May looked concerned, but said nothing as we entered Mrs. P’s room. Several of the ladies were lying on makeshift pallets on the floor, one or two reading, one playing on a tablet computer, and a couple with eyeshades on, clearly having a nap. Mrs. P was sitting with Bunefer, having an intricate henna tattoo applied to the back of her hand.

  “Ladies—” My voice broke. I cleared it and tried again. “Ladies, I have some very bad news. Tragic news. Ipy has been… she’s passed away.”

  “What?” Gilly screeched and grabbed my arm. “How can she? She’s like the rest of us—immortal. She can’t just die.”

  I tried to forget that image of the smaller second bundle. “I think… I think someone did a grievous injury to her.”

  Silence filled the room for a few seconds, then I was peppered with questions. What had happened? Where was Ipy now? How had she been killed?

  Although I expected the questions, what I didn’t expect were the dry eyes and relative sense of calm.

  “I…” I stopped and shook my head. “I don’t want to sound callous, or like I’m judging how you’re grieving, because I know from my husband’s death that everyone grieves differently, but aren’t you guys… upset?”

  “Why should we be?” Mrs. P asked as Bunefer continued inking a fanciful pattern.

  “Because one of your dear sisters just died,” I said, my hands on my hips. “Great Caesar’s balls, woman—one of your fellow priestesses is no more!”

  “She’ll be back,” Mrs. P said, giving me pause.

  “She will?”

  May’s gaze was on nothing as she
clearly thought through the situation. At last, her eyebrows rose, and she gave a little nod. “I see. She died in the Underworld.”

  “Ahh,” I said, enlightenment dawning. “You mean she’s in the prefect place to be… reborn?”

  “Most likely in spirit form, I’d imagine,” May said, glancing at Mrs. P, who nodded.

  “She should be along shortly, full of fire for what happened,” Gilly said. “I can’t imagine who would be idiot enough to kill someone in the one place where death has no meaning. Not in that way.”

  “Well, at least we’ll find out who did it to her,” I said, my mind thinking of that smaller bundle. I shuddered despite the relatively happy ending to the tragedy.

  “Most likely so.”

  May and I left shortly thereafter. May’s demeanor was slightly ruffled, and she murmured something about finding Gabriel and talking to him about the possibility of it being a demon attack. I decided to find Rowan and demand some solace when Mrs. P poked her head out of the bedroom and gestured toward me.

  “Did you need something?” I asked, approaching her.

  She caught my wrist and pinned me back to the wall with her sapphire gaze. “You are my champion in all things, Sophea, and I appreciate that fact. I didn’t understand until now why he brought us together, but it has been made clear to me. Do not fail me. All will be lost if you do.”

  “Who brought us together?” I asked, but she simply closed the door in my face. I stared at the wood for a few seconds, then sighed, carefully locked the cabin door behind me, and went out to find Rowan.

  I badly wanted some answers and just hoped he’d be able to provide them.

  Sixteen

  “I like Gabriel’s attitude,” I told Rowan when I finally found him.

  He looked first surprised, then angry. “You’re my mate! You’re supposed to favor me over all others!”

  I laughed and licked the tip of his nose. “You’re adorable when you’re enraged about something so silly. Calm down, I didn’t say I liked Gabriel—I said I liked his attitude. And by that I was referring to the fact that he was so willing to do something that would please May. Do you live to make me happy?”

  “Of course,” he said, relaxing enough to give me a look that damn near steamed my cheerleader socks.

  “Well then, since Ipy’s death isn’t the tragedy that I thought it would be—and really, can we have a moment to process the fact that everyone is just fine with her being killed and turned into a ghost?—what say we go back to my room and I can harness your fire?” I gave him a come-hither look. “Mrs. P said Ipy won’t return in spirit form for a few hours, so we might as well put them to good use and let me try to put this mark on you, so we can match.”

  “Only if you promise to do a couple of cheers for me afterward,” he said, goosing me as I sashayed past him.

  I had to admit, the fire thing sounded a lot easier than it was. Rowan, lying facedown on my bed, said patiently, “How long is this going to take?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, looking down at his bare neck. “I’ve never done this.”

  “Just spit a bit of fire at me, so we can get down to business.”

  “What business?” I asked, thinking he wanted to discuss the magic ring issue again.

  “I’m going to sex you up until you can’t think straight.”

  “Oooh. I like the sound of that. All right, brace yourself, one sept mark coming up.”

  He tensed as I leaned over him, gathered my thoughts, and imagined the ring of fire that frequently appeared at my feet when I was kissing Rowan, translated into a ball. A bright glow the approximate size of a quarter danced before my eyes. I mentally threw it at the back of his neck.

  One of his shoulders twitched. “Was that it?”

  I peered down at him. “Well… not really. I mean, I see a bit of a mark there. I think it’s a sword, and a C shape behind it. Is your mark supposed to be different from mine?”

  “I don’t believe so. Maybe it’s not complete?”

  “Oh, good point.” I summoned up more fire. This time, it formed a ball the size of a small lemon. I reached out to hold it, feeling that a little more control was in order, and tossed it up in the air a couple of times before splashing it onto the back of Rowan’s neck.

  “I felt that,” he said, arching his neck for me to see.

  “Did it hurt?” I asked, worried that I’d messed up.

  “No.”

  “Good. I see more of a circle shape, but it’s still not like the one you say is on the back of my neck. It’s more a K with a C behind it.”

  “Try again.”

  In all, it took three more balls of fire (the largest of which reached the size of an orange) before I managed to get the whole image imprinted on his neck. Two more balls of fire set fire to a nearby book and the pillowcase, but at long last I traced the image of a pair of crossed swords over the outline of a circle. “Okay, this is pretty cool, I have to admit, although it did ding my pride a bit that it took you only one try to do it, and I had to have several goes at it.”

  Rowan rubbed his neck as he sat up. “That’s because I’m a wyvern.”

  I smiled at him. “You sound so comfortable saying that, like it’s a perfectly natural thing.”

  “It is natural, now,” he said, eyeing my sweater. “You look hot in that.”

  I tugged the miniskirt down. “You don’t think it’s a bit too short? I don’t have long svelte legs like Mrs. P has now, and having a bunch of underwear models running around is making me paranoid that my legs are pudgy and stocky.”

  “Your legs,” he said, rubbing a hand up the back of one of my legs, “are beyond delightful. They are in no way pudgy or stocky, but are instead delightfully satiny, well formed, and arousing beyond human belief.”

  “Dragon belief,” I corrected him breathlessly as he pulled me toward him. He was still sitting, so his face was at the level of my belly, a fact he put to use when he slid his hands upward toward my recently repaired underwear.

  “That, too.” He pushed my sweater up and kissed my belly. “I actually meant that you looked warm in the sweater, but you are also hot in the arousing sense. Very arousing. So much so that… oh no.”

  He sighed.

  “Oh no what?” I asked, suddenly worried that my stomach had offended him.

  He held up an arm. The hand was covered in red scales. As I watched, the scales rippled up his arm to his bicep. “It’s you. Every time I think about making love to you, this happens. And that.” He slapped out the fire that was burning merrily next to him on the bed.

  “Actually, I think that was my doing,” I said. “I really liked the way you slid your hands under my undies. Oh, goddess, yes, right there!”

  His fingers dipped into my hidden parts, a fact I enjoyed greatly until I looked down and saw his expression. “Rowan? Is everything okay down there?”

  “Hush,” he said, his face screwed up in concentration. “I’m finding my happy place.”

  I wiggled my hips. His fingers were still inside me. “You sure as shootin’ found my happy place.”

  He opened one eye to glare at me. “I am attempting to find my inner calm, woman. Stop distracting me with your breasts and belly and all the warm, soft, wet parts of you that are even now beckoning me to explore their depths. With my mouth. And dick. Oh, lord, this isn’t helping. All I can think about is burying myself in you.”

  “Focus,” I told him, wanting to help him gain control. “Keep breathing. Think about the summers riding your bike.”

  “No, I’ll think about you on the plane,” he said, his eyes closed. He wiggled his fingers inside me. I did a little Kegel to show support. After about a minute, he opened his eyes. “There. Now I have it.”

  “You do indeed,” I said, nodding to where his hand disappeared under my skirt.

  He smiled, a wicked, wicked smile, and withdrew his hand to slide my skirt off. In one move too fast for me to follow, he had my sweater and bra off, as well, and had
tossed me down onto the bed. “And now I have you exactly where I want you.”

  “Oooh, are we role playing?” I asked, pleased to note that he had, indeed, regained control, leaving his arm entirely human again.

  “Oh, you’re going to be ravished,” he said, and peeled off his shirt.

  I squealed softly and reached for his wonderful chest.

  And at that moment, a deep gong sounded from somewhere in the bowels of the ship.

  Rowan froze.

  I stopped trying to wrap my legs around him and frowned. “Was that—”

  “Yes.” He swore under his breath and rolled off the bed, jamming his feet in his shoes at the same time he grabbed my Xena sword. “Dammit, what a time for the second challenge.”

  He was gone out of the room before I could even ask what he was going to do.

  “Fire,” I said to myself as I snatched up the first garment I could find, which turned out to be his shirt. I slipped it over my head, grabbed the cutlass from my pirate outfit, and ran after Rowan, going down, not up, to where I knew the gangplank would be.

  As I suspected, the ship had docked at some point, and Rowan was already standing on shore. I ran down after him, his shirt falling to midway down my thighs. “What’s going on? Where’s the fire challenge?” I asked, panting a little when I reached him.

  The second I stepped off the ship, it disappeared, just blinked out of existence, leaving Rowan and me standing on a yard-wide bit of dirt surrounded by a lake of fire.

  “Ask and ye shall receive,” Rowan said, surveying the situation. I looked behind us, but evidently, we had been stranded in the middle of a fire lake, with no obvious way to shore.

  I squinted into the distance, trying to calculate how far it was. “Can we swim that, do you think?”

  “I’m not sure how deep it is. Perhaps we can just walk through it. I see now why Mrs. P insisted that a dragon be the one to deal with the challenges—anyone else would have issues with fire.”

  I smiled, confidence filling me with a positive outlook despite the situation. “And we are masters of handling it.”

  Rowan bent to use the sword as a measuring stick, but yelped and jerked his arm out of the fire almost instantly. We both stared in horror at the red welts and blisters that formed on the flesh of his hand and forearm.