Dragonslayer (Twilight of the Gods Book 3) (14 page)

Thick bands of muscle flexed beneath glittering scales. Despite its injuries, the dragon launched itself skyward again. Once again, it was thwarted by the magical barrier. Airborne, it lifted its sinuous neck and hissed at the invisible wall to no effect other than to cause the men and women below it to shield their heads from the falling spray. Raquel didn’t so much as flinch, and the spell held.

Jacey readjusted her grip on the sword and glanced behind her to check on Christian. He’d only made it a few feet, but now Grace was there with her shoulder beneath his arm, guiding him back to the dubious safety of their rock pile. Jacey stepped back as the dragon dropped to its feet, wings folding against its body. It curled in on itself in an attempt to shield its belly from the advancing hounds, and retreated toward the cave.

It seemed smaller on the ground, more vulnerable, though it had already proven that wasn’t exactly the case. The Æsir warriors moved to reposition themselves around Raquel while the hounds circled the dragon. Aiden looked around him. His gaze settled on the injured hound for a moment before finding Christian. His expression tightened, and then he looked at her. Forget dragon spit. The raw fury in Aiden’s eyes could have lit her on fire.

A shiver racked her body, but she squared her shoulders as Aiden turned back to the fight. He could yell at her all he wanted later. Right now, they both had a job to do. Christian was safe behind her, but he was in no shape to take back his sword. Grace was there too, and if anything happened to Aiden’s wife because of Jacey’s actions, she was a dead woman anyway. So she stood her ground, watching as the hounds closed in on the cornered dragon. Despite how badly this had gone, she still felt sorry for the thing. It was a predatory flying lizard. She understood exactly why her ancestors would have feared such a thing. Why they’d have killed the darn things every chance they got. This was a baby. She could only imagine how much damage a full-grown beast could inflict. Still…

The dragon turned her way.

Golden eyes fixed on her, and the narrow, pointed snout lifted. Moist nostrils flared slightly, and its lips pulled back in a snarl, exposing a row of needle-sharp teeth. The world stopped. Her heart stilled in her chest and she couldn’t quite force her body to draw in the breath it so desperately needed. All of her limbs felt heavy and cold, her fingers so numb she would have dropped the sword if she hadn’t been holding it in a death grip.

Every instinct screamed at her to run, but she held her ground, even when the dragon unfurled its leathery wings and launched itself in her direction. The scream that welled up in her throat died as the dragon descended upon her, arms outstretched and talons open. The only thing she had time to do was lift the sword. She could point the thing. Maybe she’d get lucky and the dragon would helpfully impale itself on her blade.

No such luck. It flexed its right wing and dipped to the side, neatly avoiding the tip of her blade. Its back legs touched down briefly, haunches bunched, and then it kicked off again. Jacey turned the blade and sliced sideways. The dragon cocked its head ever so slightly, as if amused by her incompetence. She might have found that comical too under other circumstances, but not with those razor-sharp talons swiping toward her belly. She yelped and jumped back. One talon punctured the thick shell of her work coat. The dragon tried to jerk her forward, but her coat tore. The material was sturdy, made for outdoor workers who needed something solid that would last, but the dragon’s talon shredded through the material as if it were gauze. When a wickedly curved talon caught in the zipper, the creature shook her. Her limbs and torso tried to go in opposite directions and her teeth clacked together.

The zipper gave, and she went flying several feet before landing hard in the dirt. Drawing in a gasping breath, she rolled to her side and then pushed herself to her feet. She’d lost the sword. It lay well out of reach, almost directly beneath the dragon. Fortunately, the dragon dismissed her when the Æsir rushed forward to hack at its exposed back. It turned so sharply that Jacey nearly lost her footing trying to dodge the tail.

One of the warriors guarding Raquel bent to help a wounded hound, and Jacey saw the dragon turn its head in the direction of the defenseless witch. The dragon’s entire body flexed, pulling in on itself before launching across the clearing. Before the warrior could straighten, the dragon was there, barreling into the small group with enough force to knock the female guard onto her back and cause Raquel to stumble back several feet. The guard who’d stopped to help the hound managed to cut a furrow into the dragon’s neck. It was a solid hit. Even from where she was standing, Jacey could see the black blood bubble immediately to the surface to trickle down its chest. But that didn’t stop the dragon from taking another swipe at Raquel. This one connected.

The witch screamed and fell to her knees, clutching at her belly. The dragon threw itself into the air, and this time it burst right through the barrier. There was a strange popping sound as the air pressure equalized, and a shower of brilliant blue sparks rained down upon them. Jacey threw up an arm to shield her eyes, but the sparks were cool and soft where they fell against her skin. And then gone.

The dragon was gone too, winging to the west in the direction of the lake.

Aiden strode quickly to Raquel. Alan was already there, and Fen too. Fen must have changed from hound to human almost immediately. Jacey would have liked to have seen that transformation, but she’d missed it. He was nude now and helping his wife to sit up. Jacey released a shuddering breath when Raquel lifted her hand to touch Fen’s cheek. She was okay. They’d be more frantic otherwise. Even as she thought it, Alan moved on to another patient and Fen gathered his wife in his arms.

With a groan, she climbed fully to her feet and limped over to check on Christian. His face was a mess, but he was still breathing, propped up with his back to the rock. Grace was with him. Jacey bent to retrieve Christian’s sword. When she straightened, Grace looked up, and the strangest expression crossed her face. Before Jacey could interpret it, a hard hand clamped around her arm and spun her around. Aiden’s glower made her take an instinctive step back.

“Go back to the house and pack your bags.” He tossed her a set of keys. “We’ll take care of Christian.”

Chapter Seventeen

There was nothing to pack, so Jacey spent the next few hours wearing the finish off Christian’s wood floors. The kitchen opened into the family room, hallway, office and then kitchen again, so she was just literally walking around in circles. She began to have sympathy for Christian’s frustration at watching her drive out of town to work on the investigation. Waiting was hard work. Soul-shreddingly hard work.

He was okay. She knew that. They used magic for healing. Christian had told her that the Æsir were naturally more resilient than Midgardians, and that even if they did get injured that Alan could set just about anything right. His injuries had been bad, so maybe he’d scar, but he’d live. He had to.

When she heard the car pull up out front, she resisted the urge to run to the door. Instead, she stood in the hallway and waited for him to enter. Aiden had been so very angry with her, obviously blaming her for distracting Christian from killing the dragon when he had the chance. Christian might be angry with her too. He wasn’t hers to worry about. She was nothing more than a temporary partner he viewed as more of an obligation than an equal.

As soon as he walked through the door, all her intentions about keeping her distance crumbled, and she rushed forward to meet him. There was enough light from the other room for her to see that he’d healed perfectly. His skin was slightly flushed, but it was whole. He was silent as she examined him, stood unmoving as she lifted her hand to touch his cheek. His skin was cool, soft beneath his eyes, and scratchy with a new growth of whiskers at his jaw.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry you got hurt because of me.”

She wrapped her arms around his waist. His arms came gently around her back to gather her in closer. He was okay. Warm and whole and perfect. His heartbeat thudded reassuringly against her cheek, and the hot tangle of worry that had lodged in her chest began to ease.

He touched her hair, light as a butterfly. “I don’t blame you for what happened. It’s not your fault we couldn’t kill it. We did try.”

She looked up. “Aiden told me to pack my bags.”

The corner of Christian’s mouth lifted in a crooked smile. “He never really wanted you to stay. He almost sent Kamis here to wipe your memory and send you on your way.”

“But you stopped him again.”

Christian nodded. “I thought you’d want to see this through. If I’m wrong about that, you’re still free to leave with your memories intact. I trust you, and that will be enough for Aiden.”

“I thought about calling it in. The people out there deserve a warning.”

“Did you?”

“No. Tell me I did the right thing.”

His blue eyes warmed. “You did the right thing. We’re better equipped to take this thing down than anyone else in the area. There’s no point in calling in reinforcements. They’d only get in the way. Next time we’ll be better prepared.”

“I still think we should capture it. The dragon deserves a chance too.”

He sighed, his fingers flexing at her waist before he let her go. “That is an argument for later. I’m beat. We’re meeting back at Aiden’s in a few hours. Kamis and Raquel will have the rune stones ready by then, and we want to get out there before it goes to ground.”

“And me? Do I really need to pack my bags? I don’t want to leave. I’d rather stay right here and help. You should know that if you kick me out, I’m not going very far.”

His eyes glittered like dragon scales. “Are you ready to face Aiden again?” She nodded without hesitation, and his smile widened. “Then I won’t stop you. Grace said you took my sword.”

“It’s upstairs in your room.” The strange thing was that it had looked completely in place there lying on his bed. It was a modern room, dark wood. The walls and upholstery all in neutral tones of gray. And that sleek sword. It should have seemed out of place, but it didn’t. “On your bed. I didn’t know where else to put it. It didn’t look dirty.”

She thought she’d have to clean it, had even looked for a towel, but when she’d examined the blade, it was spotless and gleaming.

“Thank you.” Halfway up the stairs, he turned to look back at her. “You could have run.”

She winced. Apparently Grace had filled him in on her inept use of his sword and her pathetic attempt to slay the dragon she’d just stopped him from killing. “Not very far. We were all stuck inside the barrier together.”

“You could have remained hidden behind the rocks. You didn’t need to pick up my sword.” Piercing eyes searched her face. “Why take that kind of risk? Why insist on being there in the first place?”

She knew what he was really asking. Why was she risking her life to help them? Because it was everything she’d always wanted to do—protect rare creatures from extinction, save lives, make a difference. She’d spent most of her life just focused on survival, and now she was ready to live. She’d seen a dragon today. And magic. She’d brushed up against another world. All of that was the truth, and yet none of it was the real reason she’d reached for his sword.

She remembered Christian’s face, raw and blistered. The sight of him lying in the dirt completely vulnerable. She hadn’t really considered running away.

“It was worth the risk.”

Chapter Eighteen

From across the yard, Christian watched Jacey try to recruit Kamis to her save-the-dragon campaign. The expression on her delicate features was earnest and yet fiercely determined. Her fine hair kept trying to escape from beneath her hat. She talked with her hands, which were covered in hand-knit green mittens as crudely practical as the coat that swallowed her up from chin to mid-thigh. He wanted to buy her a leather jacket, one cut especially for her. Have it dyed the same gold brown as the flecks in her eyes. She’d look good in that. He could never quite figure out with Jacey if she dressed to hide her body to keep the men she worked with from hitting on her, or because she just didn’t realize how beautiful her body was. Maybe she actually thought the coat fit. Maybe he should stop thinking so much about the body of a woman who wasn’t his and never would be.

“I don’t know what you see in her,” Rane said, drawing his attention back to the group gathered around Aiden.

Christian bit back a sharp response, and Fen, ever the peacemaker, stepped into the gap. “I like her. I actually expected her to go right to the sheriff or the papers the minute she left town. She’s got guts and she keeps her promises. That’s more than I expected from anyone in Midgard.”

Rane rolled her eyes. “You always take his side.”

“What? She’s a nice person,” Fen said. “You’d see that too if you gave her half a chance. The only reason you don’t like her is because she’s not one of us.”

“
Like
doesn’t have anything to do with it,” Aiden said. “When it comes down to it, Jacey is still a threat. Just because she hasn’t talked yet doesn’t mean she’s not going to, especially now that she disagrees with our decision to kill the dragon. We need to end this today and get her out of here before she causes any trouble.”

“Grace is half Midgardian,” Christian pointed out calmly, appreciating Fen’s support but not liking the direction the conversation was taking. “There was always a chance that she would betray us too, but we gave her a chance. A lot of people didn’t want to take that risk.”

“Grace is half Æsir,” Aiden said. “She’s also a Norn. That alone was reason enough to welcome her.”

Maybe that was true, but they both knew that wasn’t really the reason Aiden had invited Grace to stay in Ragnarok. Christian thought it was disingenuous of his friend to even suggest that it was.

“Jacey is levelheaded and loyal. Her sympathy for our position is what’s keeping her mouth shut about what we are. So what if that same sympathy is making her uncomfortable about killing a living thing? She’s a little soft-hearted. I don’t see that as a bad thing.”

Rane snorted. “You’re sleeping with her. That’s bound to skew your opinion.”

Christian shook his head. “Why does everyone assume I’m sleeping with her?”

“Because we know you,” Rane said.

Christian turned his face away so she wouldn’t see how much it bugged him. Women had always come easily to him, the ones looking for a good time with no strings attached. He’d spent his whole life locked into an arranged betrothal to a woman he’d never met, and because of that, none of his relationships had been very long. Both sides always knew that going in—that it wouldn’t be forever. That didn’t make the relationships any less real. It had never stopped him from wanting more. Fen, he thought, was the only one who really understood that. It was what had made him run from Raquel at first.

Fen gave him a pitying look before turning to Rane. “What she’s asking isn’t unreasonable. The old texts don’t tell us much about dragons. It’s not an awful idea to try to catch and study one.”

“Catch and study it?” Rane crossed her arms, her nose wrinkling in disgust. “That’s the same thing the people of this world would do to you if they caught you. You’d really subject a living creature to that kind of captivity?”

That was the true sticking point. All of the Æsir would prefer an honorable death to life in a cage. Jacey’s idea of mercy just didn’t match up with theirs. It was a gap Christian didn’t know quite how to bridge. Didn’t know if he even wanted to try. He liked her soft-heartedness.

As if she sensed him watching, Jacey looked up, smiled and then went back to her conversation. He didn’t want to see her hurt, not even to disappointment.

He turned back to Aiden. “You trust me?”

Aiden didn’t hesitate. “Of course.”

“Then we trust her too.”

Jacey approached the leaders of the hunt with Kamis in tow. Christian saw them coming first. He looked up from his conversation with Aiden and stopped talking when his gaze met hers. Everyone else stopped talking too, and then turned to stare at her with varying degrees of hostility. Fen, Rane, Raquel, Aiden… The Odin’s expression wasn’t exactly welcoming, but he didn’t reach for his sword. At least there was that.

“You’re here to try talking me out of killing the dragon,” Aiden said as he moved aside to let her join the group.

She held up her hands. “I’m not trying to stir up trouble. I understand why you think killing the dragon is necessary, but I think we have a responsibility to keep it alive if we can. It has a right to exist.”

“So do the jötnar, but that doesn’t mean we’re going to stand back while they kill the clan.”

“Just…listen to what Kamis has to say. He has a few ideas that I think are worth considering.”

Aiden surprised her by smiling. “Every time a witch says they have an idea, I break out in hives.” He turned to Kamis. “What are our options?”

“It would be possible to anchor the dragon to the portal, effectively trapping it between worlds. If we commit to this course, that spell would be the fastest and easiest to accomplish.”

Aiden shook his head. “That’s no option at all. We’re not messing with portal magic again. It’s impossible to predict how it might affect the bridge, especially if you’re right about Yggdrasil. I’m surprised you would suggest it.”

“I agreed to present all of the options,” Kamis said with a faintly mocking smile. “None of them are easy to accomplish and they all carry risk.”

Aiden nodded, accepting that. “Go on, then.”

“A sacrifice could also be used to bind the dragon,” Kamis said. “An old magic. Crude but powerful.”

Aiden raised his brows. “Human?”

Jacey opened her mouth to tell Kamis to skip the impossible options, but before she could speak, Christian said, “Absolutely not.”

She looked up into fierce blue eyes. “I wasn’t going to volunteer. I was going to say that
clearly
we’re not going to sacrifice anyone.”

“Clearly,” Aiden agreed, turning back to Kamis. “Anything that doesn’t involve human sacrifice or destroying the universe as we know it?”

“Gleipnir. The fragments we have left possess enough power to bind the creature for a short period of time.”

Aiden’s eyes narrowed. “How long?”

“Longer than the stones we’re using to cage it today. We considered using Gleipnir to contain the dragon originally, but discarded the idea as too dangerous because the chain needs to be in direct physical contact with the creature before the spell is triggered. If we were able to disable the dragon first, we might be able to bind it using Gleipnir. That would give us time to suspend the dragon in a stable magic field so that it remained alive but deeply asleep. It wouldn’t entirely eliminate the problem, but it would no longer be an immediate danger to the town.”

Aiden crossed his arms. “But we would still have a living dragon in Ragnarok.”

Kamis shrugged. “It’s not a permanent solution, but it gives us more time to decide what to do with it.”

Aiden turned to face Jacey. “And if I give you my word that we’ll do our best to capture the dragon rather than kill it, you’ll promise to stay out of our way?’

“Absolutely.”

There was more. Aiden held her gaze like he was throwing down a gauntlet.

“When this is done, you get in your truck and drive out of town.” Aiden’s voice was soft, but his gray eyes were sharp and determined. “You don’t look back. You forget about us and you never whisper a word to anyone about what you’ve seen and heard here.”

Christian shifted closer, placing his hand on her back. She didn’t know if he meant it as a warning not to cross Aiden or as comfort, but in the end, it really didn’t matter. She’d never had any intention of doing otherwise.

“It’s a deal.”

Since everybody in town wanted to ride with the hunt to get a look at the dragon, there were no extra horses for her to borrow this time around. She rode with Christian, who wasn’t particularly happy that she was coming along but seemed resigned to the inevitable. Christian never left her out, she realized, even when he thought the better option was for her to stay behind. He’d state his objections, let her make her decision and then be there to back her up if she needed it. She’d never really had anyone in her corner like that.

It felt good to ride with him, her arms wrapped around his waist and his body moving against hers. She’d taken her gun along with her this time, secured in a scabbard Christian had attached to the saddle.

The saddle was made so there was a ledge for her to sit on, slightly raised so she could set her chin on Christian’s shoulder and see what was happening ahead of them. Her mouth was only a few inches from his ear, so she didn’t even have to shout. “I thought you guys only rode horses when you went demon hunting because the magic surges messed with tech equipment. Do we need to worry about them running when they see a dragon?”

He shook his head. “They hunt demons. And we don’t really know how the dragon will affect modern equipment. Best to stick to the basics. Besides, we’re used to hunting this way. No point in dragging out a bunch of ATVs.”

Fen darted by, a shadow of fur and stirred snow. He chased a smaller hound, who cut suddenly to the right, darting beneath the horse’s hooves. Jacey’s breath caught but the horse must have been used to such behavior, because he didn’t miss a step. Fen caught the hound, who she suspected was the young man introduced to her earlier as Ben. He landed on Ben’s back, his teeth gripping the other hound’s shoulder, and they rolled several times before separating. They both scrambled to their feet again and were off.

She ducked her head just a bit so that Christian’s bulk blocked some of the wind from her face. Her nose touched a patch of bare skin just above his armor, and she breathed him in. The deal she’d made with Aiden…she already regretted it. She regretted lots of things. She badly wanted to know what Christian’s answer would’ve been if she’d had the nerve to ask him to sleep with her, and there was no way for her to ask, especially not now when they were surrounded by the rest of the hunt and riding into danger.

“It’s strange that we’re out here chasing down a dragon and I won’t be able to talk to anyone about it later. Real magic, and no one will ever know. Do you think they’ll ever find out?”

Christian took a few seconds to answer. “If Kamis is right and Yggdrasil is truly beginning to heal, they’ll find out. Eventually, there’ll be no hiding any of this.”

Which scared the heck out of her, but it was just one more reason why she thought it was better to study the dragon than kill it. “You won’t be able to stay hidden forever, then. Even if we capture the dragon, even if you kill it, it won’t make much of a difference in the long run. Not if dragons start crawling out of the woodwork.”

He made a noncommittal sound. She felt the rumble in his chest more than heard the sound. She rested her cheek on his shoulder.

“Do you have a plan for what you’ll do when people find out about you?”

“You’re full of questions today.”

“You have no idea.” But she got that he didn’t want to talk about the inevitability of the discovery of his clan, so she changed the subject. “Do you think Kamis’s plan has a chance, or was Aiden just saying he’d give it a shot to pacify me?”

“Aiden wouldn’t have agreed to it if he thought it was a bad idea.” The odd twist to his voice suggested he was thinking about her promise to leave as soon as this was all over. Her arms tightened around his waist. “Jace…”

She spoke before he could continue. “I hope you don’t have to kill it. I’ll like thinking there’s a sleeping dragon out here.”

“You like the idea of a dragon in your backyard. It doesn’t scare you?”

He turned his head, and she could see the edge of his smile. It warmed her despite the cold. “Not with you to watch over it. Even if I can’t be a part of all this anymore, I’ll like thinking about you here. You and the rest of the hunt. I’m glad I got to see this place, to know that there’s real, true magic in the world.”

Christian’s hand covered hers, and even through her ratty old mittens she could feel his strength.

“I’m glad you came here, too.”

She fell silent as the hunt passed into the woods, riding single file down the trail to the lake where the portal was located. The woods were very still, even for winter. The animals were either spooked by the hunt or they knew a predator was nearby.

The lake was frozen over, covered by a light scattering of snow. Aiden dropped Raquel off beside a large flat-topped rock overlooking the rocky shore. Kamis and Lois joined her, and the three of them joined hands. As before, the hounds formed a dark, sinuous, sharp-toothed circle around the witches.