The Dragon Heir (23 page)

Warren stood in the
second-floor window of the warehouse and scanned the empty street. He checked
his watch for the fourth time. You'd think she'd learn.

Well, she'd pay, one way or
another, for being late.

Leaning against the window
frame, he lit another cigarette, careful where he flicked his ashes. The place
was a firetrap, for sure. Many of the old buildings in Cleveland's Warehouse
District had been rehabbed into studios, restaurants, and bars. Not this one. It
was decrepit, still littered with trash, abandoned industrial equipment, and
barrels of God knows what. He could hear rats scurrying around when he lay down
at night, and he made sure he put out wards to keep them away.

There was no sanctuary for
Warren Barber. He felt twitchy, uneasy. The stench of betrayal was all around
him, stinging his nostrils and crawling over his skin. Assassins had come after
him, twice now. Both times, he'd escaped, but his luck couldn't hold out forever.
They were sent either by Claude D'Orsay or by the servant guilds in Trinity.
Either way, Leesha had talked.

So Warren had left his
apartment and moved into this place three nights ago. After he met with Leesha,
he'd move again, though if Leesha came through as promised, maybe he wouldn't
need to.

The day before, Leesha had
called to say she'd finally found where they'd hidden the Dragonheart, along
with the rest of the things stolen from the ghyll. She'd wanted him to meet her
in the sanctuary, but he wasn't fool enough to fall for that. She'd tried to
make a deal over the phone, but Warren demanded that she meet him here to talk
terms. And from this vantage point, he could see if she brought anyone with
her.

Traders. He snorted. They
always thought they were in a position to negotiate.

If she was telling the truth,
things might work out after all. It had been stupid bad luck that Jason got
away before Warren had a chance to interrogate him. Warren had sweated it,
worrying he'd never get the information he needed. But now things were back on
track. Once he had the Dragonheart, he'd have no need of D'Orsay. With the
covenant and the Dragonheart, wizards would flow to his banner. He'd make the
rules. There'd be no more skulking in back alleys, watching for death over his
shoulder.

If Leesha showed, she'd bring
the goods. Otherwise, she wouldn't dare leave the sanctuary. She'd want the
collar removed. As if that would ever happen. Hunted as he was, he needed
someone to do his bidding. Slave Leesha. He wasn't ready to give her up.

Something was moving on the
street below. Warren focused, feeling the proximity of the collar. He leaned
into the opening, careful of the broken glass on either side.

It was Leesha. She passed
under a mercury vapor light on the side of a building, her shadow stretching
out in front of her, a backpack slung over her shoulder. He looked up and down
the street. She seemed to be alone.

It was funny when you thought
about it, a teenage girl walking alone in this neighborhood at 2 a.m. Any
mugger who thought he saw an easy target was in for a surprise.

She reached the warehouse and
turned aside, passing under him to the entrance. Warren slid through the window
and descended the fire escape into an alley. Once again, he looked up and down
the street, alert for betrayal. There was nobody.

As he entered through the side
door, Leesha was spinning around, flame spattering out in all directions. He
flung himself backward, throwing his shields up, then realized he was not the
target. Blueblood Leesha was frying rats.

“Hey! Be careful with
that. You'll burn the place down.”

She swung toward him. “As
if that would be a loss. I can't believe you asked me to meet you in this
dump,” she said.

He relaxed a little. It was
Leesha, all right.

“Funny,” he said.
“People keep trying to kill me. This place seemed safer than my
apartment.”

“Really? Darn. Well, I
don't want to be here any longer than I have to in case somebody tries
again.” She unslung the backpack, setting it on top of a barrel like it
was made of glass. “OK. I brought it all. The Dragonheart. And some other
stuff. Only—be careful. It's really
powerful and hard to handle. They've been having trouble controlling it, I
guess.”

“Where'd you find
it?”

“They had it hidden under
McCauley's porch.”

“How'd you find out it
was there?”

“I bribed someone.”

“Good work, Leesha. I'm
proud of you.”

She shifted from one foot to
the other. “I was wondering. What happened with J…with Haley? Did you…did
you find him?”

Good, Warren thought, crossing
one problem off his list. Haley is history. Never called. Never wrote. Never
came back and snuffed Leesha Middleton for ratting him out. He must be dead
after all.

“Yeah, I did find him, as
a matter of fact,” Warren said, smiling. “Why do you ask?”

Leesha bit her lip. “Just…wondered,
is all,” she whispered.

Don't tell me Leesha Middleton
is growing a conscience, he thought. That would be inconvenient.

But she pulled herself
together and checked her watch. “Look,” she said coldly. “You
asked for the Dragonheart and I delivered. Now take this thing off and I'm out
of here.” She slid her forefinger into her neckline and lifted her chin,
exposing the glittering torc.

Warren laid his hand on the
bag. “You expect me to take your word for it?”

“See for yourself. The
Dragonheart's in the velvet bag on top. I'd rather you not mess with it until
after I leave. In case you set it off.”

“Nuh-uh.” He shoved
the backpack toward her. “Show me.”

Hissing with irritation,
Leesha unzipped the backpack and pulled out a velvet bag with a drawstring. She
worked free the knotted ties.

Then she flung the pouch at
him.

He leaped to the side and hit
the floor rolling. When the pouch landed, it exploded into a shower of
carbon-black powder. Like coal dust.

Gemynd bana. Mind-Slayer. Meant to knock him out in an instant.

Leesha was more agile than
he'd given her credit for. She backflipped out of range of the powder
explosion, and scrambled madly for the door. He could have used the collar; he
could've used an immobilization charm, but some things are best done directly.
He charged after her, three long strides, and then tackled her, bringing her
down on the floor under him. Her head bounced, hard, on the battered wooden
floor.

He threw up a shield in time
to turn an immobilization charm and a gout of flame. Pinned her hands to keep
her from scratching his eyes out, then sent a little disciplinary flame through
the collar. She screamed and thrashed around, trying to rip her hands free.

“You scheming little
double-crossing trader,” Warren muttered. “What did you hope to
accomplish?” And then, understanding flooded in. “Who are you working
for now? D'Orsay? Longbranch? McCauley?” He could've gone down a whole
long list, but just then the front door shattered, spraying them both with wood
splinters and hardware.

Two tall figures stood in the
empty doorframe. One had a wicked sword in his hand. The other didn't need one.
A warrior and a wizard side by side.

It was Jack Swift, looking
like a muscle-bound action hero. Except for the Trinity Soccer T-shirt and blue
jeans.

And Seph McCauley. Leesha was
right when she said he was scary. He was scarcely recognizable as the naive
blueblood who'd arrived at the Havens. He was taller than Warren remembered,
thin and angular and intense, as if he'd outgrown his weight. He wore a black
hoodie and jeans, and his pale face and green eyes were framed in a tangle of
curls. You could see Hastings's blood in him—distilled
down and concentrated. Leicester had been an idiot not to spot it at the
Havens.

Warren rolled to his feet. He
reached down and grabbed Leesha by the arm and hauled her up in front of him,
pressing his fingers into her carotid, where a whisper of power could stop the
flow of blood.

“They made me!”
Leesha said, flinching at the sting of his fingers.

“Sure they did,” he
muttered. He followed that with the classic, “Back off or the girl dies!
”Wondering if they'd care.

Swift scanned the room for
other enemies, then focused back on Warren. “I guessed that we'd run into
each other again, sooner or later. I should've killed you the last time I saw
you.”

Right. He should've. But Jack
Swift had been too noble to cut the throat of a helpless enemy. Which was why
Barber was totally going to win.

McCauley extended a hand and
muttered a charm, and Leesha went limp in Warren's arms. Immobilized.

Clever. Warren could still
choose to kill her, but he'd have to drag her body around with him if he wanted
to keep using her as a shield and hostage.

He tried the countercharm but
it went nowhere. McCauley's magic was wicked strong. Warren was getting sick of
it. How many times was he going to have to face off with him?

“Put her down, Barber,
and let's talk,” McCauley said. “We want the Covenant, and we want to
know what happened to Jason.”

The Covenant. Jason Haley. You
couldn't trust a trader with any kind of secret if someone else made a better
offer. "I don't know what you're talking about. Leesha asked me to meet
her here. Said she had a proposition. Then she attacked me.

“Right.” Swift
feinted with the sword, and Warren turned, keeping Leesha between himself and
the warrior's blade. But it was an exhausting business, and Warren wasn't
exactly fast on his feet.

“Don't be stupid,”
Warren said. “She's a trader, remember? She'll say anything if she thinks
she can turn a profit.”

“Lucky you're here to set
us straight.” McCauley fired an immobilization charm, and Warren lunged
sideways to avoid it. Swift rolled fireballs off the tip of his sword, spinning
them past Warren's ears. Leesha just wasn't big enough to provide good cover.
Warren countered with a wizard graffe that barely missed nailing McCauley, but
then the boy wonder whipped off three charms in answer, and Warren knew this
was a battle he couldn't win.

His only advantage was that
they probably wanted him healthy enough to interrogate.

Lifting Leesha's limp body,
Warren pitched her into Swift and McCauley. He spun a razorwire net, gathering
it up and sending it  spiraling over them. Limp  Leesha, Swift, and McCauley ended
up tangled together on the floor in a kind of giant bleeding cocoon, the wire
cutting into their flesh. Swift struggled to maneuver his massive sword into
position so he could cut through the net without decapitating anyone. Warren
sent cascades of wizard flame boiling into their midst until McCauley put up a
makeshift shield.

Warren didn't wait to see the
outcome. Swiveling, he sprayed the perimeter of the room with flame. It went up
with a whoosh.

What do you know? he thought.
This warehouse is a firetrap.

Wizard fire was notoriously
hard to extinguish. The place was history, and three of his major problems
would go up with it.

Though in Leesha's case, there
was no need to trust to luck. Regretfully, he dismissed thoughts of Slave
Leesha and muttered a charm that activated the torc. Would she burn to death,
or strangle first?

He sprinted toward the rear
door, pausing in the back hallway long enough to weave a web over the doorway.
Even if they freed themselves from the net, the web would slow them down long
enough to allow the flame and smoke to do their work.

As he turned to make his exit,
he heard a sound behind him and instinctively dodged aside. Something crashed
down on his head. If it hadn't caught him off center, he would've been done for
sure.

He stumbled, almost went down.
Blood streamed into his eyes. He staggered backward, spewing flames in all
directions. There followed a massive blow to his shoulder, and he screamed in
pain, his left arm rendered almost useless.

He turned, mopping blood from
his eyes to clear his vision.

A girl, with a mother of a big
sword. Familiar, somehow. The girl, not the sword. Then he remembered. Ellen
Stephenson, the warrior he'd encountered the first time he'd gone to Trinity in
search of Seph McCauley.

If she'd wanted to kill him,
she could have taken his head off with that blade. She'd hit him with the flat
of it, so she was trying to take him alive. That was good to know.

He flung out a charm, but
before he could finish he had to pitch himself backward as the blade slashed
past his mid-section, slicing through his shirt and the top layer of skin. Damn,
she was good. He didn't even know he'd been cut until the blood came.

Smoke boiled into the
corridor, stinging his eyes. He drew a breath, coughing, spinning out flame
like an out-of-control firework to keep Stephenson at a distance. She easily
parried his scattered attack with her sword, then advanced toward him.

“Your friends are burning
to death in there!” Warren gasped, nodding toward the main storeroom.
“Make a choice!” He turned and zigzagged down the hallway. Bursting
through the exit door, he stopped long enough to barricade it with another web.

Warren ran down the alley,
then cut between several rows of warehouses and descended into the Flats along
the river. He tried to support his injured arm, gritting his teeth when he
jostled it. He threaded his way around the great concrete feet of a lift
bridge, then slowed to a brisk walk, following the river, trying to blend in
with the late nighters headed to the bars. Those that were still sober cut a
wide circle around him, furtively checking out his blood-matted hair and
clothing. It was all he could do to resist the urge to pitch them over the side
into the water. He was several blocks from the warehouse before he heard
sirens.