Light My Fire (37 page)

But what about poor Istvan? Was he in on it, too, or
was he really dead? I had to know. If he was OK, then I
could relax and just go along with things.

“Jim?” I gestured for the demon walking slightly be
hind me. “Heel!”

“For crap’s sake, it’s all I can do to walk missing
three—that’s
three
—toes now!” Jim grumbled, but obeyed
and scooted over next to me.

“Would you like to go for four?”

“Bah!”

Gabriel laughed.

“Sorry, demon and demon lord talk,” I told him, not
wanting him to overhear what I was going to ask. “Would
you think me horribly rude if I had a few minutes with
Jim?”

“Not at all.” He walked a few steps ahead of me,
giving us a bit of privacy. Behind us, Drake, Fiat, and the
rest of the dragons marched along in silence.

“That time-and-space-ripping thing,” I asked Jim in a
quiet voice. “Can I do that for you, too?”

Jim shrugged. “You’re the boss. Pretty much whatever
you want to do, you can do.”

“Great. I want you to go to Drake’s house and look for
Istvan.”

“Ew. What if his body is all bloody and stuff?”

“There may not be a body. That’s what I want you to
see—if he’s there, fine, or hiding or something.”

“All right, but if anything exciting happens here and I
miss it, I’m going to hold that against you for the rest of
your existence.”

I stopped in front of the door I’d spotted and smiled a toothy smile at all of the people behind me. “Bio break!
Be right back.”

Drake frowned as I grabbed Jim’s collar and dragged the demon into the ladies’ room with me. “What do you
need— No. I don’t want to know.”

“Smart man,” I said, blowing him a kiss as the door
closed. I turned the lock and faced Jim. “Right, let’s do
this.”

I took a couple of deep breaths to clear my mind, fo
cused on the thought of Drake’s house, and reaching out,
selected the possibility that I wanted to use.

Nothing happened.

“Hmm. I don’t seem to be able to do it.” I tried again,
with the same result.

“That’s because you’re using dragon fire. This is a
demon lord skill, Ash. You gotta use demon lord power
to do it.”

“No.” I shook my head. “I’m not using that dark power
again. That stuff is bad, and if by some miracle my soul
isn’t already damned for having inadvertently used it to
banish Ariton, I’m not going to risk using it again. It’s
evil.”

“Power is power,” Jim said, putting its paws on the counter so it could check its teeth in the mirror. “It’s neither good nor bad. The person using it determines what
it’ll be.”

“Oh.” I thought about that for a few seconds. I wasn’t
quite buying what Jim said—I’d felt that power, and there
was evil in it—but perhaps I had the ability to neutralize
the bad. I weighed the revulsion I felt at using dark power
with the worry that Istvan could be lying injured or dead
somewhere, and decided I’d have to risk using it once
more.

“OK, once more. But just once more, and that’s it. I
don’t want to take any chances.” I cleared my mind again,
focused, and allowed myself to be filled with the thick,
warm power that seemed to ooze up out of the floor to wash over me. A horrible ripping noise filled the small
bathroom, echoing off the tile walls and floor as I rended time from space, tearing a hole big enough for Jim to pass
through. Overhead, two of the lights went out. The rip was right next to a sink, causing it to fall to the floor in
an explosion of porcelain on tile. Two pictures fell off the
wall, as well as a chunk of ceiling tile.

Water jetted out of wrenched pipe, arcing at an angle
that allowed it to hit the wall behind me, splashing every
thing—Jim and me included—within a ten-foot radius.

“Fires of Abaddon!” Jim exclaimed, looking with big
eyes at the damage.

“Later. Just go do what I asked.” I put both hands on
Jim’s furry derriere and shoved it through the opening.
The rip made an obscene sucking noise, closing up as the
last of Jim disappeared into its maw.

“Aisling?” The doorknob rattled. “Is everything all
right?”

I made an abortive attempt to shove some wadded-up
paper towels in the pipe, but it was hopeless. I’d simply
have to make restitution with the fencing people for the
damage my rip in space had caused. “Yeah, fine. I’m
coming.”

The front of my curtain toga was soaked with water,
but I figured that was the least of my worries. I unlocked
and hurriedly slipped out the door, quickly closing it be
hind me.

Drake, Fiat, and Gabriel all looked at my sodden front.

“I had
...
er
...
a little accident washing up.”

“If you are through with these games,” Fiat said, his
eyes as chilly as his flesh. He waved toward a double
door at the end of the hall. “We can proceed.”

“Right. Sorry.”

I started after Gabriel but paused when Drake asked,
“Where is Jim?”

“It’s . .. uh . . . cleaning up the water I spilled. It’ll be
back as soon as possible.” Or as soon as I had another
moment of privacy to yank it back through time and
space. I hurried after Gabriel, praying he was telling me
the truth about everything.

It didn’t explain why he didn’t try to rescue me in
Paris, but at least I’d feel a whole lot better about Fiat if
I knew that Gabriel wasn’t secretly siding with him.

₂₂

“By rights, I could call the challenge as a default.”
Dmitri’s voice rang out strong with self-confidence as we
took our seats in the raised dais of what Gabriel told me
was a training room.

That gave me a moment of thought. Why wasn’t Dmitri a bit more concerned about battling Drake? Was he really
so good at swords that he thought he didn’t have anything
to worry about? Or was something else going on?

Something nudged at the edge of my awareness, but I ignored it to focus my attention on Drake as he picked up
his sword, testing its blade before walking to the far end
of the room. “That would be foolish. You know the rules
governing a challenge as well as I do. The challenge resumes once an interruption has been dealt with.”

“You assume running off to see your woman is a valid
interruption. I feel differently, but do not fear!” Dmitri
held up his hand, an unpleasant smile on his lips. “I don’t want to give you any grounds for crying foul. I am satis
fied to have the challenge continue.”

Drake nodded and stood waiting, his stance relaxed,
but his eyes were at their most dragonish. I knew that
every muscle in his body was poised to attack.

“Sit here,
cara.”
Fiat’s voice made the back of my
neck twitch with irritation. He pressed me into one of the
few chairs on the dais. “You will be able to see well from
this spot.”

The
something
nudged at my consciousness again. I
frowned at Fiat, distracted enough by it to keep silent.

“En garde!” Dmitri lunged forward, his blade slashing
through the air at Drake. My breath caught in my throat
for a moment as Drake stood still, not moving to counter
the attack, but when the blade was a hairsbreadth away,
he swung around to the side, parrying the attack, sending
Dmitri forward onto his knees.

“This challenge is to be fought, not to the death, but until the vanquished agrees to yield,” Drake said, ad
dressing me as Dmitri snarled an oath, leaping to his feet.
“Normally a challenge is to the death unless it is agreed
otherwise.”

“I will kill you regardless,” Dmitri spat, doing a cou
ple of those big leaping fencing moves forward, his blade
dancing through the air.

Drake seemed to have no problem parrying him, however. His sword, identical to Dmitri’s, flashed silver in the blue-white lights. “My sept has lost too many members to
the sword, however, and I am loath to lose another, even
one who seeks to destroy me.”

“Bah. You are weak, Drake. I would never tolerate a
challenger to live after he had tried to take over as
wyvern.” Fiat’s cool finger trailed down my bare arm. I
snatched it away, giving him a glare. “Then again, you
have much to fight for.”

“I believe Drake’s thinking to be magnanimous and
humane,” Gabriel said, secret laughter lurking in his silver eyes. “Only a man secure in his power would allow
dissenters to remain within his protection.”

Oooh. Touche. Fiat’s face darkened, but he restrained
himself from saying anything. He turned to watch the two
men doing the peculiar fencing dance of back and forth,
but I wasn’t fooled. He had to make an effort to sit back
in the chair and appear only marginally interested.

I turned back to watch Drake, admiring both the power and the grace of his movements, his attacks controlled, his
defenses swift and sure. I had a feeling that he was play
ing with Dmitri, who had started to sweat. Drake’s moves were still easy and clean, but Dmitri was starting to labor.
His breathing was heavier, his movements slower, and
twice more Drake knocked him to his knees.

“Do you yield?” Drake asked a few minutes later, after Dmitri had thrown himself forward into a particularly un
coordinated attack.

“Never,” was the snarled reply.

Back and forth they went again, moving up and down
the floor, Drake continuing to be sure-footed and fast in
his strikes, Dmitri starting to make mistakes. Twin streaks
of blood snaked down his left arm, his right shoulder
stained red from another cut.

It was clear that Drake was drawing blood deliber
ately—not enough to endanger Dmitri, but enough to dis
orient and distract him.

“Enough,” Fiat shouted, getting to his feet after a
particularly clumsy block by Dmitri that ended with the younger dragon bleeding from the chest. “I grow weary
of this. End it now, Dmitri.”

A roar of frustration filled the room as Dmitri, sweating, bleeding, and clearly at the end of his strength, made
a last-ditch run toward Drake. Drake did no more than
parry the awkward attack, but it was enough to send Dmitri slipping on the floor, sliding a few feet on his
back. Drake held the sword tip to his throat again.

“Do you yield?”

Before I had time to even think, Fiat hauled me to my
feet, a sharp pain accompanying the prick of something
sharp against my neck.

“I believe that question is to be asked of you, Drake.”
 
I rolled my eyes over to look at Fiat, careful not to turn
my head.

“Fiat, do not be ridiculous.” Gabriel’s voice floated
over my head. I couldn’t see him, but I could hear the dis
may in his voice. “Release Aisling. We will talk this
over.”

“The time for talk is long past,” Fiat said loudly.

Drake still held a sword to Dmitri’s neck as he looked across at Fiat. His eyes were dark green, almost glowing
with an inner light. “What the hell do you think you are
doing?”

“I am ensuring the future of the weyr.” Fiat’s voice was
silky, rife with satisfaction. “I am doing something that
should have been done long ago—eliminating the obsta
cle to peace, true peace, as enforced by one who holds the
power to keep the septs in line, not that mindless democratic drivel you’ve been feeding us for the last century.”

“Fiat”—Gabriel took a step in his direction—”please,
do not do this. We will discuss your concerns for the fu
ture of the weyr—”

“Stay back! That’s all you and Drake know how to
do—talk. Now is the time for action, not endless discussions about how we should live in peace. You’re both
nothing more than politicians, your blood so diluted that
you’re more human than dragon. Well, I do not suffer
from such weakness! In this syringe I have fugu venom, the most poisonous of venoms in the world, drawn from
the ovaries of the fugu puffer fish. One step in Aisling’s
direction, and I will inject it directly into her blood
stream.”