She was hedging and he didn’t like it. Creatures who played games usually had something to hide. “Why?”
“Why should you let me go? So that I can breathe.”
Falcyn ground his teeth. “No, why should we trust you to help us?”
“Because I want out of here more than anything, but I lack the powers to break the seal or bargain for freedom. If you take me with you, I’ll show you where a portal is.”
Still suspicious, he released her. “And again, I ask what you are.”
“A kerling Deathseer.”
Falcyn conjured up a ball of fire and held it so that she knew her own death was imminent. “Deathseer or seeker?”
A seer saw death. A seeker caused it.
Holding her hands up, she stepped back from him. “Seer,” she said quickly, letting him know that she got the less-than-veiled threat in his actions. “Though ofttimes the Black Crom uses me to find his victims.”
“And why is that?”
“I was sold to him for such.”
Falcyn moved to kill her, but Blaise caught his arm.
“Don’t hurt her.”
Aghast, he stared at him. “Are you out of your mandrake mind?”
Blaise snorted. “All the time. But not about this.” He held his hand out to the petite brunette. “Come, Brogan. I won’t let him harm you.”
Allowing the fire in his hand die out, he scowled at Blaise. “Can you see her at all?”
Blaise shook his head. “I can only hear her voice. Why?”
Because she was exquisitely beautiful. Her long dark brown hair that had escaped her tight braids made perfect spirals around her elvish features and pointed ears. Enchanting features the fey often used to lure others to their doom. And that included her tight brown leather pants and corset that were covered by a flimsy green robe, and the fey stone necklace and diadem she wore.
But if Blaise couldn’t see it, then it wasn’t a trap for him. “Why are you attracted to her?”
“Didn’t say I was. I only hear the truth in her voice. She’s not lying to us. So I think we should help her.”
“And no good deed goes unpunished. You help her and you’re likely to pay for it. In the worst way imaginable and at the worst possible time.”
Blaise sighed heavily at Falcyn’s mistrust that had come from a lifetime of betrayal. “What I love most about you, Fal. Your never-ending optimism. It bowls me over.”
Perhaps, but sadly he expected only the worst from those around him, and very seldom had they risen above his low expectations.
Tucking down her gossamer wings so that they couldn’t be seen, Brogan retrieved her knapsack.
As she started past Falcyn, he stopped her. “You harm him … or cause him to be harmed in any way—even a hangnail—and I will make sure you die in screaming agony.”
Her eyes widened at his threat. “I see no death for him. You’ve no cause to threaten me on his behalf.”
As she moved to walk beside Blaise, Medea dropped back to Falcyn’s side. “What’s a kerling?”
“A conjuring witch.”
“That why you asked if she sought death?”
He nodded. “Kerlings can be a handful.”
“Known many?”
“No, but I’ve killed my fair share.”
Brogan gasped and glanced over her shoulder at Falcyn.
With a fake smile, he waved at her.
She let out a squeak and sidled closer to Blaise, who cast a fierce grimace in his direction. “What did you do?”
“I smiled.”
“Ah, that explains it, then. It’s such an unnatural act for you that you look like some questing beast whenever you try.”
Falcyn screwed his face up as Blaise allowed the kerling to lead them.
Medea frowned up at him. “So what’s the deal?”
“With?”
She jerked her chin toward Blaise. “You only heel for him. Why is that?”
“I don’t heel for him. I protect my brothers.”
“So you say, but that’s not what it looks like from where I’m standing.”
“Then you need to get a pair of glasses, a better vantage point, and look again.”
“Don’t get testy with me, dragonfly. I merely find it fascinating that you’d tuck your claws in for your brother. It just seems out of character for you. And weird.”
“Weird?”
“Yeah. I never tuck mine in for Urian. Rather I use him as a sharpening strop.”
“That’s the truth. She lets blood every time she gets near me.”
Falcyn bristled under her probing stare. “We’re dragons, not Daimons.”
Medea went cold at his words. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“We’re cold-blooded. The only warmth we have is our family, so we tend to shelter them more closely than others do. Why? What did you think I meant?”
“She thought you were taking a dig that we feed off each other’s blood.”
Falcyn snorted. “Oh … there is that. Honestly, hadn’t thought about it. Or I might have pointed it out.”
Brogan glanced at them before she leaned in closer to Blaise. “They always carry on like this?”
“Not really. They just met.”
“Yet they argue like a married couple … hmmm.”
Falcyn summoned another fireball for the witch.
Medea caught his arm before he could launch it. “Barbecue her, Simi, and we’re stuck here with no way back.”
“Not stuck. Just detained.”
“Yeah, well, I need to get home. Can’t afford to be detained any longer than necessary. So tuck the fire and temper, princess, and be nice.”
“I’m never nice,” he said sullenly.
He didn’t even like the sound of that four-lettered word. Hmmm, maybe there was some Simi in him, after all.
Suddenly, Brogan stopped.
Falcyn scowled at her as she cocked her head. “There a problem?”
Her eyes turned a peculiar color that defied all description. It was a strange fey hue that said she was tapping arcane powers to read their environment.
With the faintest whisper in her voice, she spoke. “Death is upon us.”
4
Before Falcyn had a chance to ask Brogan what she meant, the ground around them began to boil. Literally. Chunks of soil bubbled and churned as if it were a living, breathing creature about to rise up under their feet.
Medea cursed as she danced around it to avoid being tripped. Likewise, he jumped over a segment of the ground that burst beneath him. It shot chunks of earth, grass, and mud everywhere.
“What the hell is this? I’m too old for hopscotch.”
Brogan gasped as she jumped over another erupted rut. “Svartle Orms. Whenever the smiths break for the day, the orms are let loose from the forges and they stampede to freedom.”
The head of one ugly, foul beast came up from the ground. It opened its mouth, showing off rows of serrated fangs.
“They’re also starving,” Brogan added. “And will eat anything they catch the scent to.”
“Not on your menu, buddy.” Falcyn let loose his fireballs into the beast’s throat.
Howling, it lunged for him.
Medea fell in at his side, adding god-bolts to his fire to help fry the bastard. Urian and Blaise covered Brogan.
“What should we do?” Blaise asked her.
Brogan lifted her arms and began to whistle gently. The crooning went through Falcyn, making his sensitive ears ache. Blaise made a sound of sharp disapproval.
Still, she continued. Until it began to drive the orms back. “Run!” she said. “Head for the boulder caves! They won’t enter there.”
As they started for them, a cold wind came whipping through the trees.
“Ignore it and keep going! Don’t look up. Eyes ahead!”
Don’t look up? Was she kidding? Now it became an imperative need to do so. But conventional wisdom said it would be all kinds of stupid to defy Brogan’s order.
All kinds of—
Crap!
Falcyn glanced up before he could stop himself.
And the moment he did, fire rained down from the sky.