Dragon Consultant (10 page)

"Only if you want to," Dane added quickly.

"Want to?" Mercury repeated awkwardly. Did Dane want them to stay? Dane's shoulders had slumped at Mercury's words as if he were hearing rejection. He was practically hiding behind his bowl as if he were embarrassed for assuming Mercury would want to stay.

"I didn't think you would want us around for much longer," Mercury said, repeating his own thoughts out loud. "After all the trouble we've caused you, I would think you would want us as far away from you as possible."

Dane's head lifted away from his stew to look at Mercury. "I like having company," he said hesitantly. "And your kits aren't the worst critters I've had running around."

"Would you like us to stay?" Mercury asked boldly, suddenly aware that Dane didn't feel like he could ask Mercury that question. It was as if Dane were imposing on Mercury instead of the other way around.

"Would you want to?" Dane asked, his voice still hesitant and unsure. "I'm not exactly good company."

Dane wasn't talking about his personality. He also didn't seem to know just how devastating his smile could be to Mercury or about Mercury's thoughts on whether Dane would be very good company in and out of bed. He was talking about his powers, Mercury realized suddenly.

"I don't care that you're a god," Mercury insisted. It was the truth. He didn't care about Dane's powers in the least. All he knew was that he wasn't worthy of being Dane's companion. He was only a bronze precious dragon. Dane should find another god to love.

"I'm only the son of a god," Dane said sheepishly, "but that usually scares people away."

"Doesn't scare me," Mercury replied around a mouthful of stew. It was good stew too, fragrant with spices and tender beef. Dane was blushing, Mercury noticed quickly as Dane turned back to his stew with a touch too much haste. "It doesn't," he reiterated. "I… You're too pretty to be scary." Mercury had almost said he liked Dane before he had caught himself. He wasn't ready to admit that just yet, especially when he had no business liking the son of a god.

Dane dropped his spoon back into his bowl and stared at Mercury in surprise. "I'm pretty? Have you looked in a mirror lately? You're the pretty one. I'm the one who has to hide behind a glamour so I don't scare everyone around me away!"

Mercury returned his own spoon to his bowl as he stared incredulously at Dane. "You don't look scary to me," he said softly, aware that he was apparently hitting a very sore spot by continuing their conversation. "I like you," he finally admitted. "If you weren't too good for me, I would prove it."

"Too good for me? It's the other way around! I'm the son of a god so everyone runs away from me screaming in fear. I'm the one who's not good enough for someone as perfect as you! Mercury, I know all the negative stereotypes about dragons, but you embody none of them. You are proof that dragons are far better than the stigma they've been stuck with."

Mercury shook his head in denial. Surely Dane's words couldn't mean what his heart hoped they did. Yet Dane was leaning forward and Mercury felt his own body responding without reference to his brain. Their kiss wasn't earth shattering. Mercury didn't see fireworks or feel faint. The press of soft lips against his was just that, and yet it was so much more. Dane was kissing him! Dane, who shouldn't be having amorous thoughts about a lowly dragon, had chosen to kiss Mercury.

It was an affirmation of reciprocal feelings and that made the kiss so much sweeter. There would be fireworks and shaking earth later, Mercury knew, but for now it was enough to know that Dane liked him back. He pressed harder into the kiss, wanting to indicate his interest and excitement without words. Dane whimpered and tilted his head so they could get a better angle.

The door slammed open and Nickel hurried into the room. Mercury and Dane jumped apart, Dane reaching for his stew almost reflexively, but his cheeks were still pink and his breathing slightly heavy. Mercury's own breath wasn't exactly even either, but he tried to hide it from his kit.

"What do you need, Nickel?" Mercury asked.

"Miss Daisy was feeding Alloy and he burped. I thought you should know that the kitchen is on fire and the oven is melting."

Mercury jumped to his feet, but he was a touch slower than Dane. "I'll handle it," Dane said. He placed his hand on Mercury's shoulder as he passed and squeezed a little more tightly than was strictly necessary before letting go and hurrying out of the room to save the rest of his house from dragon destruction. They would finish their conversation later, Dane's touch told Mercury. Nickel cast Mercury a suspicious glance—his kit didn't miss much, did he?—before following after Dane.

*~*~*

The warehouse at four in the morning didn't look any different from any other warehouse at any other time that Mercury had ever seen. Still, Dane and Nickel were certain that the air dragons were being kept inside. Mercury hadn't had the energy to go through Jacobson's notes, but he trusted Nickel and Dane. He believed them even more when he saw the first high-tech security camera a block away. These were dock warehouses, places rented to sailors going crabbing in the bay. There was no reason for more than a cursory security system.

Water splashed behind them from the Chesapeake Bay, hitting the concrete cement wall of the long pier. The air smelled fishy, damp, and generally unpleasant. There were places to dock boats along the wall, but all the spots were empty. It was still dark out and there wasn't any security lighting. The moon was long set and dawn was at least an hour away.

Mercury let Dane zap the cameras. He was staying on his feet well enough, but his knees were still shaky. Mercury wanted to conserve his strength for later. Nickel had his game face on and was clearly ready for anything; Mercury could do no less, even though he still wasn't feeling his best. Dane's spell on the cameras was supposed to show a constant loop of the last twenty minutes instead of their bodies as they walked up to the warehouse. On the long wall closest to the water were three oversized garage doors, no doubt ordinarily used to store boats. It was a safe bet that they were firmly locked, as was the lone door on the short end of the warehouse. Dane squinted at the door, and not only did the lock pop, but the door slid open.

No one yelled in surprise inside. Mercury also didn't hear running footsteps as someone watching came to investigate. Dane waited to make sure no one was coming before stepping into the building first. Mercury felt a subtle swell of magic as Dane dealt with whatever cameras and other security measures were inside. Nickel hurried forward next, able to move faster than Mercury. He vanished inside only steps ahead of Mercury who was quick to follow.

The warehouse was completely empty. The floor was solid concrete, the walls corrugated metal except where the garage doors broke up the monotony. Mercury could see a half-dozen cameras along the roof, but there was no other sign that the warehouse was in use. The air smelled stale as if no one had been inside for a long time.

"This is the right place," Nickel insisted as he walked further into the room. His voice echoed in the empty space. Dane's magic ruffled Mercury's hair almost playfully as it swept through the room. It bounced back just as easily as Nickel's voice. A little too easily, considering how strong Dane was. Mercury called on his own magic, but instead of letting it sweep the room, he let it creep along the walls and across the floor.

The walls were plain metal, but the floor wasn't uniform. His magic rolled over cement everywhere except for the far left corner where it felt like wood. Mercury hurried over and bent down to feel with his hands what his magic was telling him.

"There's a trap door," he explained to Dane and Nickel who had followed him across the warehouse. The door was colored the same gray as the concrete and Mercury didn't feel any hinges or a handle. Either there was an electronic hinge underneath that they didn't have the switch for, or someone with magic knew how to remove the door.

"Let me," Dane said as he kneeled next to Mercury on the floor. His hands brushed over Mercury's against the door for a brief moment, sending a shiver down Mercury's spine that was completely inappropriate for the time and place, before they flattened against the surface. He pulled upwards, but kept his hands pressed flat with a touch of magic. The door came free with a screech of metal grating against metal. Dane tossed it aside so they could all look down. A stepladder was set up below them, leading down into a dark hole of indeterminate length. It wasn't wet despite its depth and the proximity to the bay, but a little bit of searching told Mercury that the construction crew had had a witch on staff when the concrete was poured. The spell was an old one; it might predate the enemy taking control of the warehouse, but there was no way for Mercury to be certain. "I guess we have to go down," Dane sighed. He was staring into the dark hole with a look of disgust. "Nickel, we need you to stay here and guard our retreat."

Nickel grimaced, but he didn't argue. He wasn't being shuttled off on a chump job. Mercury knew that and Nickel was also smart enough to know how important guarding their exit was, especially when they didn't know who else might be coming to deal with any air dragons hidden below. A rear guard was necessary. Nickel didn't have to like being left behind—Mercury could tell he didn't like it at all—but he would do it and do it well. Nickel backed away from the trapdoor, putting his back against the wall so he could see the main door, the garage doors, and the trapdoor without being ambushed form behind.

Dane stepped onto the ladder and began to descend. His magic flared and light appeared below his feet.

"Stay safe," Mercury admonished as he waited for Dane to clear the ladder.

Nickel grimaced and flexed his fingers, water magic swirling around him. "Let them try me," he growled. Mercury grinned at him and then stepped onto the ladder to follow Dane down into the depths of the warehouse.

The ladder was seventeen feet high, about one story, and Mercury was on the ground beside Dane quickly. Dane held a small ball of light in one hand, which revealed that they were in the terminating end of a long white hallway. The space was unadorned and otherwise unremarkable. They followed the hallway slowly, watching for any potential traps. It led underneath an adjacent warehouse, which made Mercury wonder just how large the facility might be, and eventually opened up into a pleasant sitting area. The walls were still a uniform white, but the couches were a tasteful shade of blue. They were situated around a low coffee table. There weren't any magazines or coffee mugs lying around. In fact, if it weren't for the couches, Mercury would have thought the building to be long since abandoned. They had made more than enough noise opening the trapdoor, and stepping onto the hard metal of a marginally stable ladder wasn't exactly quiet. Someone should have come to investigate the noise.

"They've abandoned the facility," Dane murmured, echoing Mercury's own thoughts. "They've already got what they wanted."

"What about the dragons?" Mercury replied, fear tightening his voice. The enemy had wanted the dragons to create their magic serum. Now that their goal was complete, they didn't need the dragons they had been experimenting on.

Dane grimaced, no doubt his own thoughts echoing the morbid direction Mercury's had been taking. "There's only one way to find out."

The sitting room had two more doors along two separate walls across from where they were standing. Dane chose one at random and pulled it open. It led into a steel and glass lab that looked modern to Mercury's admittedly ignorant eyes, just like the labs in the last three facilities had looked. There were machines everywhere, although none of them were beeping or lit up like they'd been in the previous active labs. Dane tossed his ball of light towards the ceiling to light up the room. It was empty of people and dragons and there weren't any other doorways. Dane moved the light around to ensure they could see every corner. In the center of the room was an incubator with one white egg nestled into the lining. Mercury gasped and hurried forward, but skidded to a stop the second he came close enough to see what had been done to the poor egg.

Some idiot had drilled a hole through the shell. They were probably either planning to inject or remove something for one of their horrible experiments. What they didn't know was breaking the shell so heavily destroyed the magic that allowed the kits to grow properly. A small needle's pinhole wasn't large enough, but the one Mercury saw in this egg was the size of a silver dollar. The poor kit had died almost instantaneously, at least, and hadn't had to suffer any longer. Mercury turned away with a growl of disgust and stalked from the lab.

The other door in the sitting room was shut as well. Mercury flung it open angrily, but had to wait for Dane to catch up with the light before he could see what was behind the door. The light revealed another hallway, although this one was much shorter than the one where the ladder had been. There were five heavy metal doors on the right and blank wall on the left. Four of the doors had been left open, but the fifth at the very end was closed tightly.

They looked like cell doors, something Mercury confirmed when he glanced inside the nearest one and saw a small cot on one side of the five-by-five space and an even smaller toilet on the other side. He couldn't help glancing into each open door as he passed, just so he didn't miss anything, but they were all empty. Only the closed door at the end was different.

A heavy bar held the door closed. Dane helped Mercury lift it and toss it aside, but he let Mercury pull the door open on his own. Light shined into the small room, illuminating the same small cot and toilet. It also revealed a small figure wrapped in a threadbare blanket on the bed.

The figure slowly sat up and let the blanket pool around her waist. She had the white hair and gray eyes of an air dragon and the tight look caused by fear and torture that Mercury remembered from Nickel and Copper's faces when he'd first rescued them. The older the kit, the more scars they had accumulated in the facilities. The girl looked like she was also seven or eight years old, the same age as Mercury's older kits.