Kiss of Fire (33 page)

He breathed fire, almost idly enclosing Sara in a circle of flames. Sara jumped and tried to escape the closing circle, but Ambrose moved too fast and the flames were too high to jump. The circle was about ten feet in diameter and the flames burned against the hardpack of the dirt floor. Sara was sure they'd extinguish themselves for lack of fuel, but they continued to burn, the tips of the flames as high as her shoulders.

It was impossible, but it was happening all the same.

She turned in place, looking for an escape, as the heat made her perspire.

“No exit clause,” Ambrose said idly. “Sorry.”

“You're not sorry at all.”

“No. I'm not.” He sauntered closer, sending a stream of flame to make Sara's space smaller. The circle was only six feet in diameter when he was done and the flames just seemed to burn higher with every passing moment.

Sara was trying not to panic. The Wyvern had gone completely still.

“Dragonfire doesn't need fuel,” Ambrose informed her, then examined his talons with indifference. “Life is power enough.”

“There's no life in dirt.”

“There's life in anything. Too bad you're not sensitive enough to recognize it.” He granted her a cold smile. “Such an ignorant species.”

A tongue of fire licked at Sara's leg and she smacked at it with her hand.

“If fuel for the fire…” Ambrose mused. Sara understood then that the fire would exhaust her before it consumed her.

Ambrose cut the circle in half with an exhalation of flame. Sara danced to one side and the flames caught the hem of her shorts. She beat out the fire with her hands on one side, only to find the hem on the other side burning. When she had the flames out and was breathing quickly in fear, she glanced up to find Ambrose smiling.

“You've been a more worthy opponent than most,” he acknowledged, “but then, as Boris says, the ending is always the same. How dull.” He yawned magnificently and Sara saw the flame gathering in his throat. She couldn't jump up. She couldn't burrow down. She couldn't move from the spot he'd chosen for her.

And sadly, she couldn't take dragonfire the way Quinn could.

Ambrose's eyes glinted with satisfaction. Sara glared at him, refusing to surrender to the inevitable, at least in spirit. He took a deep breath and she braced herself for the inferno he'd unleash.

It was a crappy way to die, but at least it would be quick.

Instead of Ambrose's torrent of flame, there was the sound of destruction from above. A cool breeze caressed Sara's skin as the sky became visible overhead.

Ambrose swore as the roof was torn from the cabin and tossed aside. Three
Pyr
had taken the corners of the roof and wrenched it from the building. Sara wanted to cheer when she saw Quinn, looking grim and powerful, his steel blue scales glinting. She felt something slippery passing her and knew that the
Slayer
smoke was dispersing into the sky.

She also guessed that it was stinging the
Pyr
. Rafferty, Donovan, and Quinn recoiled immediately. Sara understood that they couldn't retrieve her from below. She saw Quinn's determination and knew he would try.

And that the smoke would kill him.

“No fair!” Ambrose roared and leapt skyward after the
Pyr
, abandoning Sara to the flames.

Sara saw her chance. She lunged skyward and seized the tip of his tail, holding tight as he carried her out of the smoke and flames. He twisted in midflight in rage; then his eyes gleamed when he saw her. Before Sara could gasp, Ambrose swung his tail up and opened his mouth beneath her.

Being burned to death was looking like the better option.

Ambrose's teeth were long and sharp and yellowed. His throat gaped large and dark, a dark abyss with nothing good at the other end. The scales on his tail were slippery, and Sara felt like she was trying to hold on to a large fish. Sara clutched at a pair of scales, but her palms were sweaty and Ambrose writhed so that she swung in the wind.

“Sara!”

She turned at the sound of Quinn's bellow and saw him closing fast. She also saw Boris move a lazy finger as if guiding something upward. She couldn't see the smoke in the cabin rise to follow his bidding, but she knew the moment that Quinn hit its wall.

He recoiled with a bellow of pain, steam rising from him from the
Slayer
smoke's vile touch. He writhed and beat at his chest with his claws, as if trying to turn something back. He breathed fire on himself even and Sara was afraid for him. Rafferty and Donovan closed ranks around Quinn, fighting to defend the Smith as Boris moved toward them. Sara knew that Quinn was badly hurt.

She could tell by the way Boris laughed.

She saw the blackened hole in Quinn's chest and remembered that was where his damaged scale was located. The smoke must have targeted the weak spot, the vulnerability created by his loving Elizabeth.

Who else could help?

Erik was down and motionless, Sara saw then. Niall and Sloane were nowhere in sight. The green
Slayer
ascended from Erik's fallen form to attack the three
Pyr
while Boris glanced skyward with pleasure. Sara saw him murmur, as if he were talking to the sky.

Or casting a spell. Was that possible? Dark clouds collided overhead with a crack of thunder and the wind swirled in unpredictable patterns. The sky had a greenish tinge and the wind was restless, a combination that Sara knew meant big trouble.

Where had the bad weather come from? The sky had been clear when she went into the cabin. And how had the clouds gathered from every direction? Boris must have been summoning a storm.

Because rain would ensure that fallen
Pyr
became dead
Pyr
.

“Seen enough?” Ambrose whispered beneath her and Sara realized he'd been watching her. “I love when everyone appreciates the stakes, although it did take you a while.” He wiggled his tail, forcing Sara to snatch at his scales in panic. The first heavy drops of rain fell, making her grip even more tenuous. “Don't miss the big finish, Quinn,” Ambrose shouted.

Quinn raged dragonfire, but it couldn't permeate the smoke. He was failing, Sara knew it, and there was nothing she could do.

Ambrose loved it. He was the focus of attention and worked the moment for all it was worth. He undulated with ease, chuckling as Sara's one hand slipped free.

“Oops!” he whispered, then wriggled again.

Sara gasped and snatched. She got a grip with one hand, her legs waving in the wind as she struggled. Ambrose ran his tongue across his teeth, gave his tail a flick, and Sara lost her grasp on him completely. She fell, right toward his open mouth.

This time, Sara did say her prayers.

To her astonishment, they were answered.

Quinn saw Sara dangling from the end of Ambrose's tail. He wanted to shred the
Slayer
who had taken so much from him and would have tried, if Donovan and Rafferty hadn't held him back.

He saw Ambrose wiggle his tail.

He saw Sara struggle for a grip. “I have to help her!”

“The smoke will kill you,” Donovan said.

“She'll be reborn,” Rafferty agreed sadly.

“That's not good enough!”

“Look at it this way,” Rafferty said. “You won't be the only one waiting for a firestorm.”

“We need you, Quinn,” Donovan said. “We need you
now.
”

“There's nothing you can do,” Rafferty concluded, but he was wrong.

“There's one thing I can do,” Quinn said. He whistled at Ambrose, then shouted, “Catch!” Quinn flipped his father's coin in Ambrose's direction.

The Roman coin glinted as it spun toward the
Slayer
. Ambrose's eyes lit at the sight of it. He abandoned Sara and lunged toward the coin, so anxious was he to catch it.

Quinn had been right: Ambrose's real argument was with him.

The coin began to tumble toward the earth, but Ambrose swooped in fast pursuit. He plunged through the
Slayer
smoke, and snatched it out of the air just before it hit the ground.

“You're on, Smith!” he roared in triumph, holding the coin aloft.

But Sara was still falling. Quinn fought against the two
Pyr
, wanting to help her no matter the price.

“Look!” whispered Rafferty.

A cloud of white emanated from Sara's pocket as she fell. It spread with astonishing speed, changing from a shapeless mass into a dragon unlike any
Pyr
Quinn had ever seen. The slender white dragon caught Sara in her claws and flew skyward, moving with effortless ease. She passed through the
Slayer
smoke like a wind slipping between the raindrops and seemed to feel no ill effects.

“It's the Wyvern,” Donovan whispered with awe.

He had to be right, because this dragon was unmistakably female. She was more sleek than any of the
Pyr
and so pale that she might have been made of spun glass. Her wings seemed embellished with feathers, more like those of an exotic bird than a bat, and were so translucent that they might have been made of sheer silk. They fluttered rather than flapped, as if she floated in agreement with the wind instead of flying with her own effort.

“Few see this sight,” Rafferty whispered with reverence.

“Something to tell the kids,” Donovan teased, earning a dark look from Rafferty.

“There's nothing wrong with wanting offspring,” he said, his gaze returning to the Wyvern.

She moved with a languid grace that made her look spectral and unreal. She carried Sara with tremendous care—something that worked for Quinn—then spread her wings over Erik's fallen form.

She lost altitude slowly as the rain began to fall with force, sheltering Erik from the water like a massive umbrella. She settled over him much as a swan shelters her cygnets beneath her wings.

“She's protecting him from the last element,” Rafferty said and the others could only nod agreement. Why Erik? Why did the Wyvern protect him? Quinn could only guess that it wasn't time for Erik Sorensson to die, that the Great Wyvern had another expectation of that
Pyr
.

Quinn had a glimpse of Sara disappearing beneath the Wyvern and didn't doubt that she was trying to help Erik herself.

Then he looked up and found Ambrose closing fast, his father's coin glinting in the
Slayer
's grip. “Protect the Wyvern,” he said to Rafferty and Donovan.

“But you're too injured to fight,” Donovan protested. “You need us.”

“The challenge is mine to fight,” Quinn replied. “I gave it and he accepted it.”

“But…,” Rafferty began to argue.

Quinn interrupted him. “Sara carries the new Smith.”

Donovan gave a low whistle. “Quick work, Quinn.”

Quinn agreed. The firestorm had come and gone too fast. He wanted years with Sara, not moments, but the choice wasn't his. If his dying deed was the killing of Ambrose, it would be the best possible gift to Sara and their barely conceived child. The
Pyr
would ensure that the boy was taught what he needed to know and Sara would help him understand what he had inherited.

He brushed off the concern of his companions and braced himself for Ambrose's assault. “You have to protect the future, not the past.”

Rafferty was the first to go, the wisdom in his gaze showing that he understood Quinn's choice. Donovan had a harder time with it. “I'll kill him for you.”

“You can't,” Quinn said. “The challenge was mine so the battle's mine.”

Even Donovan couldn't argue with that. Quinn still sensed that Donovan was torn, but the way Boris and Sigmund turned toward the Wyvern made up his mind. He flew to Rafferty's aid, leaving Quinn to face his oldest adversary.

The battle could have happened at a better time. Quinn's chest ached where the scale was damaged and the smoke had slid beneath it. He was determined, though, to resolve his old feud, whatever the price.

To Quinn's surprise, Donovan pivoted as he departed and spewed dragonfire on Quinn from behind. It was the gift of a friend and ally. Quinn smiled as the surge rolled through him, invigorating him and making him feel radiant once more.

He felt the power of fighting as a team, of covering each other's flanks, and knew that if he survived this fight, he could never go back to his solitary ways. Opening himself to trust others was something Sara had taught him. He wanted to learn all she had to share. He wanted to see their child. He wanted to make her eyes turn gold a thousand times.

Quinn wanted—and needed—to win.