Shana Abe - Queen of Dragons

• Название: Queen of Dragons
• Автор: Shana Abe
• Жанр: Любовно-фантастические романы
• Год: 2008
• ISBN: 978-0-553-90447-5

Hidden among the remote hills of eighteenth-century England lives a powerful clan of shape-shifters who've become the stuff of myths and legends. They are the drákon—supersensual creatures with the ability to Turn from human to smoke to dragon. Now a treacherous new enemy threatens to destroy their world of magic and glittering power.

For centuries, they thought themselves alone at Darkfrith, but the arrival of a stunning letter from the Princess Maricara sent from the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania suggests the existence of a lost tribe of drákon. It is a possibility that the Alpha lord, Kimber Langford, Earl of Chasen, cannot ignore. For whoever this unknown princess may be, she's dangerous enough to know about the drákon's existence—and where to find them. That, as Kimber can't help but concede, gives her a decidedly deadly advantage. And, indeed, it wouldn't be long before Maricara breached the defenses of Darkfrith and the walls around Kimber's heart. But the mystery of the princess's real identity and the warning she has come to deliver, of a brutal serial killer targeting the drákon themselves, seem all but impossible to believe. Until the shadowed threat that stalks her arrives at Darkfrith, and Kimber and Maricara must stand together against the greatest enemy the drákon have ever faced—an enemy who may or may not be one of their own. They have no choice but to yield to their passionate attraction for each other. But for two such very different drákon leaders, will an alliance of body and soul mean their salvation, their extinction… or both?

---

The thin, eldritch music punctuating his words ensured she did as told, stretched out on the bed, her hands curled into fists. The fresh air on her skin felt cool and wonderful; the diamond on his hand brushed her neck, and that felt like fire.

"It's time we talked," he said in a low rush of Romanian.

Mari licked her dry lips. "Speak English. I hate the sound of my language on your tongue."

Zane began to laugh. "Very well. I suppose I should have anticipated you'd learn English. You were a most precocious child."

"Lift the hood," she said, using her darkest voice. "Let me see your face."

"Alas, not that precocious, I must suppose. Persuasion, is it? One of my favorites. But your Gifts won't work on me, Maricara. You do realize that. And you realize why. Draumr's not quite what it used to be, but with enough of the pieces set together, it still does the trick of controlling unruly drakon, at least for a while. I'll tell you what, pet. I'll lift the hood. You will not Turn. Agreed?"

You will not Turn, echoed the remains of the diamond called Draumr, a spell sinking through her in rolling waves. You will not Turn...

"Yes," she managed, against that slow, dire ricochet of notes.

"Excellent."

The chamber was dim, with no visible outside light. It was done up in dusky, jeweled colors, the walls painted ocher, the furniture all gilded and flowered. Swags of cloth draped in billows from the ceiling down to the floor, tarnished gold and blood-red and purple wine; cheval-glass mirrors gleamed from every corner. An oddly sensible lamp burned atop a bureau, simple oil and brass, its flame so still it looked painted in place.

Above her, directly above, hung another mirror. The covers of the bed reflected deep velvet blue. There was a china doll chained to the bed, wrapped in a blanket. Her face and feet and hands poked out stark white.

"Do you like it?" Zane threw a glance to the mirror above them, amused. "A bit lurid for my tastes, frankly, but I purchased the entire lot from an old friend of mine and never got around to redecorating. Used to be what we'd call in the business une maison de joie—do you know the term, Princess? Yes, I see you do. Anyhow, no windows. Very handy."

He'd changed so little. His face was tanned and a bit more lined, perhaps. A little more drawn. But his hair was the same color, rich tawny brown, and still much too long; it made a braid that fell over his shoulder and across his chest like a bandoleer. His eyes still shone cunning amber.

"It smells," Mari said.

"I beg your pardon, it certainly does not. This is Threadneedle. It's a most respectable part of town, I assure you. Even the rats here are spanking clean."

"Oh. Then no doubt it's merely you."

"Now, that's just unkind. I'll have you know I bathe every day. Nearly every day. Imported soap, too, pressed by the hands of the fairest of South Seas virgins, every one of them infused with tinctures of ginger and hibiscus. Try finding that in Transylvania."

She looked up at her reflection, the breadth of Zane's shoulders, the top of his head. "You're using the stone, what's left of the stone, to control us. You're leading the sanf inimicus straight to us. Do you despise us so much?"

Zane's voice became a soft slur. "The men with me know nothing of the diamond. You will not tell them."

Draumr settled beneath and between his words, binding them in her brain. "Are we clear, Princess?" "Yes." She moistened her lips. "Where is Rhys?"

"Away from where you last saw him, and away from here. He's really not your concern, you know. If I were you, I'd be far more worried about my own skin."

"You didn't kill him?"

His brows lifted in mock affront. "Please. He reminds me far too much of his youngest sister." "What did you do with the girl? With Honor?"

Zane sat back a little, his smile fading. He looked down at his fingers, the dreadful gleam of little diamonds that stirred and murmured and slipped songs into her head. In the depths of the mirror, his braid rippled dark. "Honor," he said more quietly, "is safe. For now, she's safe. How much longer, I really couldn't say." His eyes lifted to hers. "She's with Lia."

Surprise kept her mouth closed. No doubt he read her expression anyway.

"You've seen her already, you know. You won't recall it, but you have. In Harrogate. That was a night, let me tell you. Between you and Chasen popping up like that, over a year's worth of plans were nearly demolished. But Lia found you first. She has her own pieces of Draumr she's been using to disguise herself from your kind. She told me she'd ensured you'd not remember your encounter."

"That was her?" She gave the chains a vicious tug. "Why would she hide from me—from her brother? Why not return to Darkfrith? Has she turned into a traitorous coward, like you?"

"My dear, such youthful venom! Tres charmante. One might say many things about Amalia Langford, but she's no coward. She can't go back to Darkfrith because she swore to me she wouldn't. Ever. I don't care what she or her parents say, I don't trust their council not to enact their alarmingly medieval notion of 'justice' on a female who runs away—especially one with the audacity to wed a human. It didn't go over very well with her, but she needed something from me, something important, and that was the only way I would agree."

"What did she need from you?"

"The protection of her family. Did you truly imagine I would be here for any other reason?" He offered her his crooked smile, a shadow of pain behind it. "Love sends us down peculiar paths be-times. Lia dreams the future, you know. She foresaw all this—the sanf, your travels to Darkfrith. Rhys, poor lovesick bastard. This girl, Honor, who apparently has a very interesting path of her own ahead of her—believe me, I'd rather be just about anywhere else in the world right now, Your Grace. But Amalia sent me here. So here I am."

She gaped at him. "You joined the sanf inimicus to help the drakon?"

"Ironic, wouldn't you say?"

"You're a spy!"

He looked pained. "What a loud voice you have."

"Why did you—"

"As much as I'd love to delve into all the details of my admittedly fascinating life, I'm afraid there's not that much time. The people with me speak only a rudimentary English, if that, but they learn quickly. I'd rather."

But he didn't finish the sentence; instead he sat back, his fine mouth tightening. From the shadows of the doorway stepped a new man, and then another, and another. Watching, alert. They were dressed better than she'd supposed they would be, not as peasants but as common Englishmen, with ordinary hats and coats and extraordinary, hungry faces. One was young and two were older, and all three stared at her spread-eagled on the bed as if she were that white-eyed ox tied to the tree. A creature moments from being devoured.

The bearded one said something in a language she'd never heard before; Zane responded from over his shoulder, brusque.

The Others inched closer.

Zane glanced back down at her. "They want to hurt you," he whispered, framed in velvet and gold. "You know that."

"Yes."

"I'll stop them as long as I can."

She felt her throat close and set her teeth against it. She made herself smile at him, made her voice flat, calm.

"Why don't you kill them instead?"

"Because, Princess," Zane said, "sometimes sacrifices have to be made. And as you've thoroughly mucked up my plans, this is the best I can manage at the moment. I'm sorry."

"That's quite all right. Kimber's here now, anyway." Mari looked him up and down through her lashes, holding her smile, then added softly, "You should run."

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

He smashed through the roof. There was no real reason not to. It was the most expedient way in.

It was a wooden hip roof, sloped and tidy. He descended upon it in full form, hind feet first, his wings straight up behind him for velocity. Against the roar of wind and blood filling his head, the Alpha slammed into a new wave of sound: that of a thousand Others glancing upward, witnessing a dragon of blue and red iridescence descending from the dark evening sky, talons extended, eyes alight. Their screams bounced off his scales. He plunged straight through that shimmer of sound, hardly noticing the humans pointing and scattering along the cobblestone streets. Horses galloped madly away, taking riders and coaches along with them. Vermin and cats and dogs, birds and cattle, all of them shrieking, fleeing, with Kimber as the center of their panic.

The last thing he saw before hitting the roof was a woman in a wig and shawl shedding posies behind her as she ran, her skirts hitched up with both hands, a straw basket still tucked into the crook of an elbow banging against her side.

He tore through the shingles. There was a pair of chimneys, too; red bricks and splinters spewed outward like confetti, tumbling through the air. It was swifter than the blink of an eye and he felt no pain; there was only her, still below him, her colors and scent. A cloudy, curious song surrounding her.

He took out floors. Chairs, beds, chandeliers, tables. All of them empty of Others, because they were still below—and then he was there too, on the ground level, his talons digging into the floor as he skidded to a stop in a large parlor full of pillowed sofas, ripping up rugs and chunks of hardwood. His wings slashed furrows along the walls; paintings crashed; sconces shattered, pungent oil splashing in great clear drops across everything.

He lifted his snout and opened his mouth and revealed his fangs to the Other rushing at him from the doorway.

The Other had a pistol. Still running, he raised his arm and fired, a spark of molten heat that ripped high through Kimber's chest, embedding against something that crunched. A bone.

It was hardly a remarkable feat; Kim took up nearly the entire chamber. So all he had to do was wait for the man to sprint near enough, then bend forward and snap off his head.

The body ceased its forward momentum. It dropped to its knees, and then to its side. The Alpha spat out the head, stepping over the dead man and into the corridor beyond without a second look.

The next human also had a pistol, but he appeared older, more hardened, and he didn't waste his shot. Instead, he stood his ground as the dragon stalked forward, Kimber's tail whipping back and forth, taking out the plaster and walnut walls of the hallway in huge, concave holes. Only when Kimber was near enough to see the spittle on his beard did the man pull the trigger. Kim Turned to smoke, so easy, and then at once back to dragon.

The bullet passed harmlessly through him, thunked into a wall behind him.

The Alpha's lips curled back, the closest thing he could manage to a smile in this state. The sanf man shouted something then whirled about, retreating to a hall to the left.

She wasn't there. Kimber smoked by it—in case there was another gun—and found her chamber, ill lit, crowded with shadows and furniture. The shadows began to flicker; he Turned back to dragon and let loose his fury.

He tore the tops off the lower two bedposts right away. She thought it might have been his wings that sheared them off, but more likely it was his tail, thick and strong, a set of eight razored gold barbs lined neatly along its end. With the iron posts gone she was able to lift both her feet high, still trailing chains but no longer bound to anything fixed.

The chains at her wrist were too short for her to sit up. So Maricara drew her knees to her chest and flipped her body backward; it tore the blanket apart right away, the pins snapping free, dull silver sprinkled across the blue covers. She rolled until her feet met the wall behind the headboard and the chains slapped against the plaster. She used her momentum to finish crawling downward, until she could rise to her knees with her arms twisted before her.

Kimber was a spiral of color and stealth, a glittery reflection from every mirror. He radiated heat; he blurred with every sinuous movement, nearly too fast even for her to follow. One of the sanf still dodged him, though, grunting with effort—it wasn't Zane, who had apparently heeded her advice. He was no longer anywhere in view.

From the mess and confusion of man and beast, something hot struck her in a spatter across the throat. Blood. Kimber's blood.

In the very same instant, she saw him wobble, drop to one knee. His body struck the bureau with the oil lamp at last. It teetered and fell and shattered with a pop into a rosebud of flame, a bud that opened and spread into a fume of soft rising noise.

Both the dragon and the man leapt back. She saw Kimber shake his head in the bright new light, more blood shining slick down his scales. The man saw it too.

Mari gathered herself. She bowed her head and drew her arms inward, her breath held, then released—a groan that burned chest deep, the last two posts bending with her will, the iron screeching—

The links snapped, and she pulled free. Instantly she vaulted from the foot of the bed, found the sanf in front of Kimber—he held a sword, and the tip was dripping red—

She jumped behind him. She wrapped the chain still attached to her right wrist around his neck, and pulled as hard as she could. His back arched; he dropped the sword and began to gurgle, clutching at the links.

"You will not hurt him," she snarled in Romanian. "You will not—"

Voices were calling from some other part of the building. Human voices, coming closer, high-pitched. Flames from the broken lamp found a swathe of purple silk and leapt all the way to the ceiling.

Kimber Turned to man. He picked up the sword of the sanf inimicus, fire a glorious bright halo behind him, and pierced the heart of his enemy with one short thrust.

Mari released the body. She caught the earl by his arms and kissed him, a kiss so rough and sudden it hurt, and tasted of blood, and he wrapped both arms around her and kissed her back harder still.

A new human staggered to the doorway, a man in a uniform with a metal badge on his chest, his hand cupped to his face.

"Oy! You there! You two!" He glared frantically about the room. "You've got to get out of here!"

She pulled away, panting, her chest and stomach wet with the blood that still flowed from a hole too near his heart. By then the man had darted into the room, followed by another, both goggling from the lump of the fellow on the floor to the two of them, naked amid the flames.

"I can't Turn," she said to Kimber, under the gathering roar of the fire. "I've tried. I'm trapped like this."

"Come on!" cried the second man. He stooped to grab the body of the sanf Kimber had stabbed, dragging it along from under the arms. "Follow me!"