The Unbearable Lightness of Dragons

Chapter Fifteen

“You know, Ysolde, Dr. Kostich and I . . . well, we’re not the best of friends.”

Jim rolled its eyes as Aisling rose from her seat in the lobby of the hotel my former employer favored when he stayed in London. “Maybe that’s ’cause you more or less told him you could take him down if he got in your face?”

“I never said that!” Aisling whapped Jim on the arm. “I just said that I bet I could give him a run for his money. And he got all bent out of shape because I zapped Caribbean Battiste that one time, which is silly because Caribbean wasn’t upset with me. Well, not after I apologized and swore that I’d never again turn him into a simulacrum. And paid for a new suit, since his was ruined. And then Drake had to pony up some money for the Elderly Guardians’ Home, but that’s a worthy charity, so he didn’t really mind. Much. Anyway, the point is that Kostich and I have a bit of a rocky history, so I’m really not sure how well he’s going to take to my being there with you.”

“Good morning,” I told her, smiling at her protestations. “I’m well aware that Kostich has no love for you, but since he has even less for me, I figured it couldn’t hurt to have a powerful wyvern’s mate and Guardian there to remind him that we’re no pushovers.”

“No, we’re not, but he’s also a whole lot more powerful than most people realize,” Aisling told me as we entered an elevator. “Er . . . do you know what room he’s in? Shouldn’t we let him know we’re coming for a visit? What if he’s not here?”

“He always stays in suite 1818, so I know where he is, and honestly, I’ve found it’s better if I don’t announce my visits. He usually forbids me to enter if I do.”

“Oh, that sounds good,” Jim said with ominous portent. “At least I have my cell phone and can get video footage of him when he comes unglued.”

“Hush, you,” Aisling said as the two other people in the elevator gave us odd looks. A few minutes later as we stood outside the suite, she said, “You sure you want me for this, Ysolde?”

“I’m sure. I’m out of ideas of what to do for Jim, and Dr. Kostich, as you pointed out, is the most powerful mage around.”

“You never met Bael when he was masquerading as a mage,” Aisling said with a grimace. “He was no lightweight either.”

I decided I’d ask her about that later, mentally girded my loins, and hit the bell next to the door.

A familiar redheaded man opened the door.

“Jack!” I said in happy surprise.

“Tully! No, wait, it’s something else . . . Isabel?”

“Ysolde, but you can call me Tully if you like. I answer to both names. I had no idea you were in London. I thought you went to Cairo.”

The freckled, sunny-faced young man grinned. “Finished my training there in record time, so the master had me return. But what are you doing here? I thought you were off being the mate to that dragon mage who attacked us.”

“I am, but there’s a little situation that’s come up, and I need Dr. Kostich’s help. This is Aisling Grey and her demon, Jim.”

“Hiya,” Jim said. “I remember you from the day the spawn were born.”

“Er . . . hi.” The smile faded as Jack cast a quick glance over his shoulder. “You don’t have an appointment, do you?”

“No.” I touched his arm, dropping my voice. “I need to see him, Jack.”

His face was filled with sympathy. “You know he doesn’t see people if they don’t have an appointment.”

“I know, but there’s really no other way. I’m doing a job for him, but if I made an appointment, he’d be sure to ask if it was related to that, and you know how impossible it is to lie to him. The man has a built-in lie detector.”

The corners of his mouth went up. “I guess you get that being the most powerful archimage of this age.”

“Exactly. So if you could just look the other way and let us in, I’d be eternally grateful.”

An interesting parade of emotions passed over Jack’s face, everything from regret to obstinacy, finally ending with a mischievous twinkle that I prayed boded well. “It may cost me my position, but I’ll do it.” He stepped back, holding the door open for us.

“If it would help, I can tell him that Jim overpowered you,” Aisling offered as we entered the suite.

“Rawr,” Jim said, flexing his muscles.

“Er . . . no, I think I’ll just take my chances with the fact that Ysolde’s now an important personage,” Jack said, waving a feeble hand toward the room I knew Kostich used as his office. “You won’t mind if I don’t announce you?”

“Not at all. Thanks, Jack. I really owe you.”

He nodded, and disappeared into a side room, obviously not wanting to attract any of the wrath that I suspected would be flowing free as the wind in a few moments.

“I really hate it when I’m right,” I told Aisling three minutes later as Dr. Kostich stormed around the room, ranting to no one in particular about the arrogance of people who should know better than to disturb their superiors.

“It’s a curse, isn’t it?” she said with sympathy, giving my arm a little pat as I took a deep breath and stepped forward to stop the tirade.

“I’ve already apologized twice for interrupting your work time, and I will do so again if it makes you feel better, but this is a serious matter, and although it doesn’t have anything to do with the task I’ve undertaken on your behalf, it does have an impact on me, and as such, I am forced to seek assistance from the only one who is powerful enough to help me.”

“Nice oiling of the squeaky hinge,” Aisling said in an undertone.

Dr. Kostich wasn’t immune to being buttered up, but neither was he overly impressed by flattery. He stopped stomping around the room and marched over to face me, his scowl almost as fierce as Baltic’s. “You ask for much, dragon. First you demand the interdiction be lifted, and now you seek my aid with a bungled spell? Give me one reason why I should not have you and that troublemaker thrown out,” he demanded, pointing at Aisling.

“Hey,” she said, rising from the couch where she’d been sitting, and lifting her chin. “I’m a professional Guardian, thank you, recognized and duly authorized by the Guardians’ Guild. I am not a troublemaker.”

Kostich shot her a potent look that had her sitting back down.

“You’re the only one who has the ability to figure out what’s going on with my magic,” I said, counting on the challenge of my situation to offset his reluctance to get involved.

He glared at me for the count of seventeen, then with an annoyed noise, sat at his desk and gestured toward Jim. “Have the demon shift.”

“Effrijim, I command thee to take thy preferred form,” Aisling said, sitting on the edge of her seat as Jim stood and looked to her for instruction.

The human form shimmered and compacted itself down into that of a shaggy black dog. Dr. Kostich watched with steepled fingers, narrowed eyes, and a sense of intensity that I knew meant he was focusing his full attention on the problem.

“I get to stay like this for anywhere from a few seconds to a minute or two,” Jim said, and sure enough, as soon as it spoke, the form shimmered again and returned to the human version.

Kostich’s eyes narrowed even further as he rubbed his chin. “Again,” he commanded.

Aisling and Jim obliged.

“Do you want to know what spell I used?” I asked when Jim was once again shifted back.

“The spell is immaterial,” he answered dismissively, gesturing toward a penholder on his desk. “Change that pen to a vase of flowers.”

“All right.” I focused my energy, recited the most basic of transmutation spells, and watched with resignation as the pen, rather than re-forming its matter to that of the requested vase of flowers, turned into a bowl of spaghetti.

“Lunch!” Jim said with a brightening of its face.

“It’s like my magic is all backward. It’s been that way ever since you put the interdiction on me, only now it seems to be—”

We all stared in surprise as the bowl morphed into a pigeon that blinked back at us.

“—worsening,” I finished as the pigeon flicked its tail and pooped on Dr. Kostich’s papers.

He closed his eyes for a moment, his gaunt face reflecting patience that had worn thin. “You are sundren.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Sundren. It is an archaic term, but it aptly describes the relationship between mages and their powers when they have ill used them.”

“Me? I haven’t ill used anything.” The pigeon squawked and changed into a small marble statue of Hermes. “Well, not much. How did I hurt my magic?”

“You are a dragon.” He held up a hand to stop my protest. “You appear human, yes, but you are not. You have yourself admitted that your current form harbors that of your previous being, and it is that which has caused the sunder between your magic and your being. This manifests itself in the misfirings that you see.”

“Great. I’m a misfiring?” Jim looked pathetically at me. “Can you refire me, please?”

“But that doesn’t make sense,” Aisling said, looking puzzled. “We all saw the vision where the First Dragon resurrected Ysolde. She’s been human ever since then, which means if she was sundren before, it would have shown up then, wouldn’t it?”

“She was sundren, yes, but the division wasn’t as pronounced as it is now that her dragon being has begun to awaken. Before the attack by her immense mate on the house of the green wyvern, her magic was simply ineffectual. Now the sundering has increased, causing the effects you see.”

We all looked at the statue as it disappeared into nothing.

Dr. Kostich sighed. “And now I have lost a favored pen.”

“OK, I changed my mind,” Jim said, backing away from me. “I don’t want you to try to give me back my magnificent form.”

“Is there nothing I can do?” I asked Kostich, my heart heavy with sorrow at the thought of losing such an integral part of my being, not to mention leaving Jim in a form it detested. “Can’t you help me?”

“With the sundering? No.” His gaze shifted to Jim, his expression sour. “I can, however, act as a focal point for your magic to change the demon back to its canine form, not that I understand why it wishes to do so. But there is a cost.”

“I have a credit card,” Aisling said, reaching for her purse.

“No, this one’s on me,” I said, doing the same.

“Not that sort of a cost,” Kostich interrupted, giving us both a disgusted look. “There is a cost to your attunement with arcane magic to have another act as your focal point. That is why it is forbidden in the Magister’s Guild. In effect, you are allowing another mage to use your power, and arcane magic does not like being used in such a manner. So long as you are aware of the risks associated with such an act, we can proceed.”

“What risks, exactly?” I asked, my stomach tight with nerves.

“Oh, man, I’m going to lose more toes. I just know it,” Jim moaned. Aisling smacked it on the arm again.

Dr. Kostich shrugged. “You will not know until you try.”

“You make it sound like arcane magic is . . . well . . . sentient,” Aisling said.

“You were proscribed. You have felt the opposite of arcane magic. Would you say the dark power was sentient?”

“Oh, yes,” she said with a shudder. “Although I didn’t realize that at first. I thought someone was using it to get to me.”

“Someone was,” he said dismissively, getting to his feet. “Are you willing to try, Tully Sullivan?”

I flinched at the sting that accompanied my name. “Yes. I owe it to Jim. So long as you’re sure that with you focusing the magic, Jim will be changed back.”

“My powers have not yet begun to diminish,” was all he said as he gestured me toward him, placing his cold fingers at the base of my neck. “Proceed.”

I closed my eyes and turned east, beginning the call to quarters. “Air surrounds thee.”

Dr. Kostich, his fingers still on the back of my neck, turned with me as I faced south. “Fire fills thee.”

“Oh, great, this is the one that left me naked before,” Jim complained. “Ash, you better have a blanket handy just in case.”

“Quiet, demonic one,” she snapped.

Kostich and I turned north, then west. “Earth nourishes thee. Water gives life to thee.”

I faced Jim again, opening my eyes and pulling as hard as I could on Baltic’s fire. “Demon in birth, demon in being, by the grace within me, I release thee from thy form.”

For a second, nothing happened. Jim stood with a frightened expression on its face; then the same rushing sensation of power flowed over and through and inside me, wiping out everything I had been and would ever be, before ebbing away to an abyss of emptiness.

The man looked at me with an expression of mingled annoyance and patience. “You are making a habit of this, daughter of light.”

I sat up, eyeing him. He looked familiar somehow, his eyes infinitely wise, his face that of a man, and yet there was a sense of something other about him.

“Are you here to see my father?” I asked, confused about who he was. I glanced quickly around the room, startled to find other people present, a man and woman in strange clothing and a large black dog, all three of whom were staring at me with expressions of stark disbelief. “I’ll fetch him for you. I think it’s him you wish to see, my lord . . . er . . . I’m sorry, but I seem to have lost my wits this morning, and don’t believe I was told a mage was coming to see my father. What is your name, sir?”

“I am not a visiting mage,” the odd man said, holding out his hand to me. I took it and rose to my feet, the world spinning for a few seconds before it settled down. “You are important to me, daughter, but I cannot keep rescuing you. You must find your own path, and not rely upon me to help you again.”

I put my hand to my head, my brain swimming at both his words and the strange surroundings in which I found myself.

“Fires of Abaddon,” someone said. “Has she, like, reverted to her old self?”

“Hush, Jim. Um . . . Mr. First Dragon?” The woman, dressed in an odd shortened tunic and leggings, gave a little wave to the man who still held my hand. “I know Ysolde has a bunch of questions about what you want her to do, and since she seems to be a little out of it, I thought perhaps you wouldn’t mind if I asked them.”

The man cast a glance at her, repeating, “She must make her own path.”

“Yes, but—”

“A life was given for yours once, daughter. Do not repay that debt with failure.”

My mouth dropped open as the man shimmered with a bright silver light, as if he was suddenly made up of a thousand raindrops shining in the sun, the drops glittering brightly before dissolving into nothingness.

“By the rood!” I gasped, waving my hand through the air that had just held the man. “I must tell Papa about that! Even he can’t turn himself into light drops!”

“I would find this tedious except for my interest in elemental beings such as the dragon ancestor,” the tall, thin man with washed-out blue eyes said. I didn’t like him. He eyed me as if I were a bucket of slops. “Now that he is gone, however, the charm of the situation fails to engage me. Aisling Grey, please remove my former apprentice.”

“You can’t just throw her out like that!” the woman said, rounding on the man. Her, I liked. “She was just killed a few minutes ago! Killed because of your magic, I’d like to point out!”

“Someone was killed?” I asked, looking around, feeling more than a little dizzy, but if there was a body lying around, I wanted to see it. I’ve always had a ghoulish fascination with them, much to my mother’s dismay. “Who?”

“You,” a man’s voice said, and my jaw dropped again when I realized it came from the big black dog.

“Me?” I squeezed my arm. It felt solid enough.

“Yup. You dropped like a sack of anvils. Then the First Dragon made his grand entrance, waved his hands around, and blammo! You were alive again.”

“The First Dragon . . .” There was something about that name, some memory that tugged on the edge of my awareness.

The woman and man had been arguing while the dog talked to me. I wondered for a moment if I had gone moon-mad, but decided that if I had, it didn’t matter if I talked to dogs, so I asked it, “Who are you?”

“Boy, you really are out of it, aren’t you. You don’t remember anything? Baltic’s going to go bonkers if you’ve lost your memory again.”

I frowned, searching my mind. There were many fleeting shadows of memories that moved so quickly I was unable to pin them down. “No, I . . . there’s something . . . a man, I think. He’s . . .”

“Fine!” the woman yelled, taking me by the arms and steering me toward a door. “But if Baltic wants to know why Ysolde is all wonky from being resurrected a second time, I’m going to be sure to tell him it’s your fault.”

The man snarled a curse as I was hustled out of the room, down a short hallway, and out another door into a corridor filled with doors.

Something about the surroundings struck a familiar note as well. “I think I’ve seen this before,” I said, pointing at the wall as the woman and the dog herded me into a small metal room. I touched the wall of it, lurching when the floor moved beneath me. “This is a . . . a . . .”

“Oh, man, I hope you get your memory back soon, or Baltic really will have a hissy fit,” the woman said.

I looked at her as she pulled me backward out of the small room and into a big, bright hall.

“Not hall,” I corrected myself as I looked around. “Lobby. Hotel lobby.” The world seemed to resolve itself before my eyes, as if it was slowly being brought into focus.

“Thank god,” Aisling said as she and Jim pushed me into a large off-white chair.

“Aisling!” I said with delight. “I know who you are! And Jim!”

She gave me a crooked smile, then gestured to a waiter and demanded coffee. “Whew. You gave us quite a fright there. I was trying to figure out how to tell Baltic that we killed you changing Jim back, and then the First Dragon was suddenly there, and . . . well, I’m just glad your brain is back, too.”

I frowned as she began her sentence, but by the time she was done, I had pulled together enough of my wits to respond. “The spell killed me?”

“I don’t think so. Kostich said it was the backlash of arcane magic that was suddenly released when Jim was changed back into Newfie form. You lit up like a Christmas tree for a minute, then collapsed. We’d just figured out you were dead when pop! The First Dragon was there, calling your name, and bringing you back.” Aisling gazed at me with a kind of amazement. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone being resurrected twice, especially not by the First Dragon. Drake says he hasn’t made an appearance for centuries, not until May saw him when she re-formed the dragon heart. It’s obvious you have some sort of a tie with him.”

I took a deep breath, grateful to feel air filling my lungs. “Well, I’m not going to complain, since I’m alive. I can only imagine what Baltic—” Horror made the skin on my neck crawl as realization struck me. “Oh, dear god! Baltic! He must have felt me die!”

Frantically, I searched my pockets for my cell phone, but found nothing.

“Oh, geez. I didn’t think of that. Your phone got blasted with the explosion of light. Here, take mine,” Aisling said, shoving her phone at me.

My fingers shook as I punched in the phone number, remembering well the promise in Baltic’s voice when he swore he would not live without me.

“Were you dead long enough to kill him?” Aisling asked, adding a hellish nightmare tinge to an already overwhelming sense of panic.

“Please answer, please answer,” I chanted as the phone rang. Tears filled my eyes as I blocked the need to examine the worst-case scenario. “Please, Baltic, please—”

A wordless snarl of anguish answered the phone.

“Baltic!” I yelled into it.

“Ysolde?” Heavy breathing was all that met my ears for a few seconds. “Christos! What are you doing to me? Where are you? Why did it feel as if my heart was ripped out anew? What have you done?”

“Oh, thank god.” I covered the mouthpiece for a moment. “He’s all right, Aisling.”

“Thank god,” she said as well, then grabbed Jim and pulled it after her to another grouping of chairs in order to give me a little privacy.

“Where are you?” Baltic demanded again. A horrible noise followed, a combination of breaking glass and screaming metal, followed by a muffled explosion. “Bloody hell!”

“What’s going on? What was that?” Fear gripped my heart despite the sound of his voice.

“Pavel?” Another crash of glass sounded sharp in my ear, followed by Baltic grunting as more metal screamed. “The door is off. Are you hurt?”

Distantly, I could hear Pavel answer, “Just my arm. Air bags saved us.”

“Oh, my god, you were in a car? You crashed? Are you all right?” I stood up, spinning one way and then another, needing to go to him but having no idea where he was.

“Yes. This car is defective. We will get another. Now you will tell me why I felt as I did the time Constantine killed you.”

I took a couple more deep breaths, pointing out to myself that if he could talk, he was fine. “Something happened when Dr. Kostich helped me lift my borked spell off of Jim.”

“Your what spell?”

“Borked. You know, wonky.”

He sighed, and in the distance I heard a whoomp noise. “Mate, I know you believe you are human, but you are six hundred years old. You do not need to adopt the language of mortals to prove otherwise.”

“Actually, I’m more like six minutes old, but that’s neither here nor there. What was that whooshing noise I just heard?”

“The defective car has burst into flames. What happened with Kostich? Why did it feel as if you died?”

“I did die.”

Stentorian breathing was all I could hear for half a minute. “Why,” he finally asked in a voice that sounded strangled, “did you die?”

“I just told you. Kostich and I were lifting the spell off of Jim, and it went bad. The backlash of the release of arcane power killed me. The First Dragon resurrected me. Again.”

Baltic swore profoundly. “I’ll never hear the end of that,” he muttered before raising his voice as sirens sounded near him. “Stay where you are. I will acquire a new vehicle and fetch you.”

“Oh, no you don’t. You stay where you are and I’ll get a car and pick you and Pavel up. Is his arm hurt badly? Are you hurt in any way?”

“Mate, do not give me orders when you have just come close to destroying me. Stay there. We will find you.”

We compromised after five minutes of argument to meet at Aisling and Drake’s house.

“Are you sure Drake won’t mind my showing up?” I asked Aisling as our taxi pulled to a stop at a graceful house in a exclusive neighborhood.

“Not at all,” she answered, then added with a little grimace, “And if he does, tough noogies. I want you to see the babies. They’re beyond adorable, even though I’m hardly impartial. Jim, stop that. Your package is exactly the way it used to be. Ysolde, I hope you don’t mind being frisked. Drake’s security since the twins were born has almost gone past what’s tolerable, but he means well.”

It took a good three minutes for me to be scanned, searched, and have an oral swab taken to determine whether I had any communicable diseases, but at last I made it into the foyer of the house, and Aisling bustled me upstairs to the nursery to see her babies.

The twins were sleeping in identical intricately carved wooden cradles, swathed with lace and filled with a number of stuffed toy dragons. I duly admired them, chatted with their nanny, a young green dragon named Grace, and reassured Aisling that I would return at a later date when the twins were awake so I could admire them as they obviously deserved.

“Drake wanted to name them both with Hungarian names, but I was adamant that I get a Celtic name in there—my family has always had Celtic names—so I picked Iarlaith, even though the pronunciation trips everyone up. Drake chose Ilona’s name. It means ‘beautiful. ’ Now, while we’re on the subject of children, tell me how Brom is doing. May said he had a grand time while visiting her and Gabriel, but I hope he hasn’t been affected by this stupid war.”

“Not—”

The door to the sitting room where we were having tea was thrown open, and Baltic stood in the doorway, bristling with indignation.

“—in the least.”

“Oh, dear,” Aisling said, eyeing him. “I hope Pál wasn’t overly zealous with his security precautions.”

“Full cavity search?” Jim asked Baltic. “Metal detector up the ol’ wazoo? X-rays and soft-tissue scans?”

Smoke swirled out of one of Baltic’s nostrils. His hair was mussed and loose around his shoulders, and he looked like he’d been grinding his teeth. He also looked like he was capable of tearing down the house with his bare hands.

“Thank you for the tea,” I told Aisling, forestalling the inevitable explosion. “I think I’ve probably pushed Baltic past his tenuous grip on patience, so we’ll be on our way.”

“Oh, so soon?” She looked disappointed. “Maybe Baltic would like to see the babies first?”

He rolled one eye over to her. She flinched. “No, I see your point. Another time, then.”

I took Baltic’s hand and leaned in to kiss him gently. He didn’t move, but his gaze, furious and, as I suspected, without a shred of patience, scorched me. “Come, my darling. I will assuage your anger on the way home.”

He said nothing, but a spark of interest flared in his fathomless eyes for a moment. “It’s going to take a hell of a lot more than assuaging, mate. You asked me about my fantasies the other day. I have one now, and it involves meting out the punishment you deserve for putting me through the last hour.”

“Ooh, punishment fantasies,” Jim said, cocking a furry eyebrow. “Drake has a lot of those.”

“Jim!” Aisling said, pointing a finger. “Out! Don’t you give me that look. I’m the demon lord here, and you just better remember that—”

We left Aisling in the middle of scolding Jim. I took one look at the dark promise in Baltic’s eyes and allowed him to escort me out to the taxi he’d engaged, wondering just what form his idea of punishment would take, and whether I should make up a new batch of caramel sauce for it.