Wildfire (30 page)

Through it all, she saw Jack grab at his right arm, blood
seeping between his fingers.

Woman and dragon entwined in agitation. Lynn grabbed the
flashlight, found herself next to Jack, her hands on him. Before she could
think it through, she threw the flashlight at Henry, but he ducked. “You shot
him!”

“I should have shot him in the damn nuts.” Henry glared as
he picked up the flashlight. “Either of you try anything like that again, and
I’ll aim there next.”

Fuck it. She should have attacked Henry instead of flying to
Jack. Talk about stupid moves. She cut her eyes at the man lying next to her.
Mr. Callaghan was so not good for her. Lynn rummaged through her backpack, and
pulled out a purple and silver pashmina scarf, saved as a memento of Obaa-chan.
She grasped the soft material with regret. Jack needed it. Sighing, she tied it
tightly around his wound.

“Enough with the nursing.” Henry rested on a boulder. “Get
to clearing.”

When she reached for the axe, Henry tut-tutted. “No need to
dirty your hands, sweet heart.”

“Thanks for the offer.” Grim faced, Jack lifted the axe with
his good hand and hacked at the vegetation with a deliberate murderous rage.
Sweat darkened his shirt as he stood panting finally, at the mouth of a dark
opening in the rock wall. “There you go.”

A rope tied around a boulder near the lip continued down the
hole. Probably left there by a prior visitor. She glanced at Jack, but he stood
staring away from her, sadness kissing his face. What was down there?

Henry pushed off the rock and aimed the gun at Jack. “Toss
the axe down the hill.”

Clenching his jaw, Jack complied.

All the air almost left her lungs as the axe disappeared
from view, swallowed by darkness. With Jack injured, her chances against Henry
didn’t seem too good. A shiver rappelled up her spine as she remembered his
alien takeover of her mind.

“Off we go down the rabbit hole.” Henry extended his gun arm
like a gracious host and smiled at Jack. “After you.”

Nerves twitching, Lynn hovered by the opening. The darkness
beyond lay shrouded in sinister warning. “I don’t want to go in there.”

“Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.” Henry sniggered at
his own wit, then shoved her forward.

Like worms they crept and crawled through the dirt, deeper
and deeper into the earth. Jack’s movements slowed, turned clumsy. Lynn was
glad she plugged the space between the two men. With Henry on the edge, she
didn’t want him to hurt Jack any more. The blood soaked shawl had turned a dark
plum.

Finally, they emerged into a cave and stood up. Lynn stifled
a scream as the flashlights lit up the pale stalactites and stalagmites, rising
from the floor, bearing down from the ceiling. For a moment, she stood as if in
a mouth full of jagged, sharp teeth.

“Cool.” Henry turned in slow circles, his face bright with
wonder.

Lynn stole a quick glance at Jack.

He stood swaying on his feet, then crumpled into a heap.

She ran to him, but an iron-strong hand wrapped around her
hair and jerked her away. Henry held her next to him. “Another one of his
tricks?”

“I-I don’t know.”

His hold eased on her. “Go kick him.”

“No.”

Kick him
. Icy eels slithered through her thoughts,
nudging and prodding, coiling around.

“N-no.”

“Go kick him or I’ll shoot him.”
Go
. The silent word
shoved her forward.

Lynn dragged her feet to Jack, then barely tapped his body
with one foot.

“Harder. Like you hate him.”

The click of the gun chambering and an overwhelming shove
inside her pushed her into action. She swung her foot back and kicked him on
the topside of his back. Jack took it like a rag doll. His awful stillness tore
something inside her, filled her ears with a silent scream.

“Come on let’s go. We still have to find the treasure.”

She stood a moment, staring down at Jack, struggling to
think. Her mind seemed to be floundering in muddy waters. “We can’t just leave
him here.”

Henry swung around and eyed Jack’s form. “I could shoot him
and put him out of his misery, but I don’t want to waste the bullet.”

Come.
The word, insistent, demanding, echoed in the
chambers of her mind.

Finally, an idea broke the surface, formed itself into
words. Jack would be safer without her. Lynn shot away from Jack and returned
to Henry’s side. “What do you want from me?”

“Everything.” Henry scanned the various caves facing them.
“But first the treasure.”

Hot, caustic words bubbled to her lips only to be staunched
by the icy presence in her mind. She settled for a flinty glare.

He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the sound of water.

As Lynn moved further and further away from Jack, fear
infested her bones like termites feasting on wood. She moved along the cool
earth walls, keeping to the shadows, alone with Henry once again.

They found the emerald pool, shimmering and glassy like
polished stone. Large enough for a dragon, or two, to swim in. Relax. Play.

“Make love.” Henry nuzzled her ear. “Once you help me
release my inner dragon, we will make love in these waters, under the pretty
lights.”

She tried to move away, but he snatched her against him.
“I’ll share the dragon’s treasure with you, I’ll make you my mate.” He nodded
at her. “You really should consider it, the relationship would be mutually
beneficial. Special.”

The sudden swings from borderline hysteria to seething anger
to calm reason spread a chill in the pit of her stomach. Swallowing, she tried
to focus, to imagine a single flame burning in the darkness.

Resistance is futile.

The trickling of water soothed her jittery nerves, stirred
an old memory. She stared at the water rippling down the rock wall, merging
with the deeper waters of the pool.

What will you get from resistance? Nothing
.

Obaa-chan’s voice whispered in her mind.
Be like the
water, soft and flowing. Move with the currents, along the channels of life.
Don’t resist. And nothing will be able to resist you.

Henry’s voice resurfaced like oil rising on the top of
water.
Don’t resist
.

She dragged in a long, cold breath. Lynn turned the corner
and bumped her nose against Henry’s back who’d stopped moving. Peering around
him, she gasped.

A fully intact dragon skeleton shone under the twin beams of
the flashlights. Shimmering white scales lay piled around the bones like
untouched snowdrifts. Sadness bruised her heart and she wept inside for the
dragon, for
Obaa-chan
, and for Jack.

Laughing with childlike glee, Henry rushed forward. He
darted around the skeleton, touching the bones, gathering up handfuls of scales
and pouring them out. Listening to the dry rustle and clatter of the scales,
his grin grew wider.

Perhaps she should have seized her chance and fled back to
Jack, but Lynn found herself oddly mesmerized by this side of Henry. While she
winced as he tramped around this sacred resting place, she also couldn’t help
being touched by the sheer force of his joy. She could almost like him again.

He looked up just then. His eyes sparkled as if sunlight
danced on the ice in them. “Can you believe this? Isn’t this amazing?”

She nodded, stunned silent by the enormous remains.

Henry ran back to her, traced a line along her cheek. “It’s
a dragon just like you.”

“I’m not that big.”

He’d already turned back to stare at the shiny bones. “I
know, but you’re just as magnificent.”

You are beautiful.

Beautiful? Not a beast?

You are beautiful. Stop resisting
.

She stumbled toward him, as if ensnared by an invisible
lasso.

I will make you happy.

Her feet hurried.

Together we will rule the world.

She tripped over her own feet.
Power.

Yes, imagine the power.

He caught her, swept her into his arms and danced a slow
waltz.

Dizzy, she rested her head on his shoulders and closed her
eyes.
Power without understanding
.

You will help me understand, come into my full potential
.
He swayed with his head laid on top of hers. “You have to help me release my
dragon.”

The fire inside her head flared, stirred by the memories of
Obaa-chan
.
She had to know. “Why? Didn’t you turn down my grandmother’s offer?”

He stilled.

Breath got stuck right beneath her breastbone and fluttered
there like a trapped moth. She focused on her breathing and waited.

Henry stepped away from her. “She told you?”

The dragon roared inside her head. Cracks spread at the
speed of a lighted fuse through every wall she’d ever built between the beast
and herself. “She tried to help you.”

He sneered. “She tried to control me. Meddling old woman.”

Flames slipped through the chinks with greedy, grasping
fingers, pushing and prodding her. Stirring her anger. “You killed her.”

He smiled at her then, a smile so cold that it coated the
fire inside her with ice. “No love, you did.”

The ground beneath her feet shook and she stumbled to her
knees. Her eyes watered, and her throat closed in on itself, as the sharp smell
of smoke whipped around the cave. Great big chunks of herself broke and tumbled
into oblivion, then she remembered. Behind her clenched eyes, fire tasted the
air with a hundred hot, hungry tongues. In the midst of this hell, lay her
grandmother’s tiny, unmoving human form like a discarded and broken doll.

In an instant, Henry’s arms went around her and his head
drew close. Soft, invisible fingers played among her thoughts, caressing and
soothing. Touch, after seductive touch. Exploring.
I told you we were alike
.

Lynn’s eyes flew open. “No.” The word emerged from her as a
moan.

He pressed kisses to her neck.
My fire would have
devoured her eventually, but you couldn’t wait.
He shivered against her.
I
will never forget watching you breathe flames. So beautiful.

The image of an angry jet spurting from her lips, igniting
the slick, shiny floor. Flames splitting into an army, rushing like hell’s
hounds at her grandmother looped inside her head. Eyes open or shut, the ugly
truth couldn’t be avoided any longer.

Tears poured from her like a long-awaited rain storm.

The smell of smoke and something nauseous and oily. Slick
and shiny floor. What was on the floor?

Gasoline.
Henry’s whisper sucker punched her, left
her reeling.

More memories thundered through her. She’d burst into the
burning warehouse. Too damn late. Spied her grandmother through all the smoke
and flames and rushed forward. Until a
word
formed in her head.
Stop
. Surrounded by all that heat, she’d frozen.

Fear frosted her breath as she remembered something alien
and ugly scurrying like a spider inside her mind. Lightning flashed
illuminating the darkest nooks and recesses. As the flames had drawn closer to
Obaa-chan
,
she remembered her feet had stumbled and pulled her in the direction of the
voice.
Come closer little girl
.

The heat of panic had boiled away the fear, and burnt away
the alien existence for a moment. That’s when her breath had whooshed out in
flames. Ignited the damn gasoline she hadn’t realized covered the floor.

Why hadn’t Obaa-chan turned dragon?

I trapped her mind before she knew what was happening. No
point making things harder than necessary.

You.

The hand clutching the heavy flashlight flew up and knocked
Henry’s head back, drew blood. He ducked the second blow. She clipped his jaw
with a jump front kick. He staggered back.

At the same time, the change flooded her, washing away the
last of the wall, drowning out all reason, all humanity. Churning, boiling heat
filled her veins. Claws slid out like well-oiled razorblades. Her human face
elongated, filled with teeth ready to tear. Bones, muscle, and flesh distended
and twisted, spread and stretched as if elastic, then started settling into
dragon form.

A chill fog permeated her skin into her veins, until the
energy flow slowed and thickened like honey left forgotten on the bottom of the
jar. Her transformation sputtered, then stopped. She stood frozen, a mishmash
of monster and human.

Henry had scurried back and now lay staring up at her.
What
the fuck are you doing?

What I should have done the night you killed my
grandmother.
With great effort, Lynn moved the muscles of her mouth,
massaged her gums with her tongue, the resulting saliva melted some of the cold
gumming her up. In her half-state, calling fire would hurt like hell as the
heat burnt away any remaining human cells. No choice. She took a deep breath
and blasted out a flame.

Henry rolled out of the way with lightning fast reflex, but
the pungent odor of singed hair hung in the air.

Stop this! Show me how to be a dragon.

Her throat burned, her breath steamed in the air.
Never.

We can be so much together.

Another fist of fire grew inside her.
Never.

Unseen fingers sunk into the soft tissues of her mind.
You
are mine.

Ice cold air shot through her nerves.
Coated her
throat.
Never.

The vise-like grip tightened.
Then you will die.

Her teeth chattered.
Fine.

Gunfire whined in the air. Bullets hit hard against her
frozen body
,
glanced off the scales.

“Fucking Useless Piece of Shit!” Henry shoved the gun into
his waistband. “Don’t worry, I don’t need the gun for you. Just like I didn’t
need it for your grandmother.”