Marjorie Liu - Within the Flames

I just met the Cruor Venator, he thought, shakily.

And if it wasn’t them, and just some random witches. . then God, yes, he finally understood what Lannes was warning him about.

Their presence alone had filled him with crippling, nauseating fear. . though now, with some distance, he couldn’t understand why.

Is that what a spell feels like? Or was it just them? And why did they let me leave?

Because he had surprised them, he realized.

Those women were not used to being defied. If they could instill that much fear in anyone they chose, then he understood why.

No way in hell could they be allowed to get close to Lyssa.

Eddie glanced into the backseat and found her eyelids twitching. Even unconscious, she grimaced as though in pain. He wondered if that was what he looked like after losing control of his fire.

Lyssa had caused the explosion. It had to be her. He had felt none of his own triggers, and the heat that had rolled off her skin in the seconds prior to the blast had been immense. Just standing next to her would have been enough to put a normal person in the hospital for burns.

He recalled Lyssa’s hand on his throat, her glowing eyes, the scent of smoke. .

Someone got injured today. No way there weren’t injuries.

Maybe she won’t care.

He chanced another look, this time at her exposed arm. Her hand, covered in red scales, rested on her stomach. Claws glinted, razor-sharp.

Seeing her caught in a partial shift was disconcerting. As though it should have been a makeup job, something out of a Hollywood creature shop. It also limited his options of where to take her.

You only have one choice.

But it would be bringing more trouble on their doorstep.

He reached into his pocket for his cell phone. The screen was cracked, but he held his breath, and it powered on.

Lannes answered on the second ring.

“Trouble,” Eddie said.

Eddie parked the car on Fifty-eighth, in front of a steakhouse behind a white delivery truck. He wiped everything down with his sleeve. The hunt would have already begun for the cause of the explosion. Terrorists might be blamed. Homeland Security would get involved.

He called Lannes again and gave him the address.

“It’s on the news,” said the gargoyle. “Just now.”

Eddie stopped breathing. “Fatalities?”

“Nothing yet, but the media is going nuts. Were there security cameras in that area?”

“I don’t know. There was no way to stop it, Lannes.”

“I thought. .” He paused, his silence heavy and thoughtful. “I know you’ve been ill. It couldn’t be helped.”

Eddie stilled. Lannes thought he was the one who had caused the explosion?

Of course he does. I’m the one who’s been out of control.

It hurt his pride and embarrassed him. He almost corrected his friend, but thought of Lyssa. . and kept his mouth shut.

“We’ll see you soon,” Eddie said, and hung up before Lannes could say anything else.

Behind him, he heard a soft whimper.

Lyssa was still unconscious, but her face contorted with pain, her breathing shallow and fast. She clawed fitfully at her scaled throat. Nightmare, perhaps. Eddie hesitated, unsure whether to wake her.

Until a wave of heat blasted his face. Smoke rose from the charred edges of her sweater, followed by sparks. Another fire, brewing.

He twisted fully around, reaching for her hand. “Lyssa.”

She did not wake. But the pain in her face softened. Her breathing slowed. Eddie stroked the back of her hand and watched the sparks fade, along with the smoke and heat. He did not breathe any easier, though.

Her skin was so soft. Eddie rested his chin on the car seat, content to take a moment and just. . stare. Soot didn’t hide her beauty, which managed to be delicate and fierce — vulnerable — and totally, utterly, striking.

She can’t be all those things, his sister would have said. She’s a girl, not a laundry list.

Eddie smiled to himself. Fine. If he had to choose one word. .

“Fierce,” he whispered. Fierce, stubborn. . but not hard. Not yet.

Their conversation before the blast had told him more about her than perhaps she realized. Her words were sharp, cynical. . but her eyes had been soft with uncertainty and buried hunger.

Something he understood all too well.

If you get used to having the rug pulled out from under you — or not having any rug at all — you stop trusting anything that sounds like good news.

But that doesn’t mean you stop wanting to trust.

Once again, Eddie tried to imagine her life. She had dropped off the radar after the deaths of her parents. No other family. No apparent friends — except one dead shape-shifter — and maybe a little boy. Had she been alone all this time? Homeless?

If she had lived on the streets, she seemed to be doing better now. Her clothes had been worn, but clean — and even now he saw the edge of a blackened laptop poking through a charred hole in her backpack.

Everything about her was a mystery.

Eddie let go of her hand as she stirred. Not yet awake but settling deeper into the backseat. The ragged remains of her sweater slipped, revealing the curve of her pale breast. More breast than she would probably be comfortable with him seeing — though he gave himself a few moments to appreciate the sight.

His jacket was charred but mostly intact. He stripped it off, then squeezed between the seats to lay it over her, tucking in the sides as best he could. Eddie wanted, very badly, to wipe the soot from her cheek. He began to. Just one little touch.

Her eyes opened. Golden, hot, staring. And glowing.

His breath caught in his throat, his hand frozen near her cheek. Unable to look away as her eyes shifted from human to. . something else. Pupils narrowed into slits, and tiny hints of crimson appeared around the rims of her iris — as well as her lower eyelids.

Dragon eyes.

Lyssa did not move, but her golden gaze searched his face with a thoroughness that was alien and cold — and utterly unlike the woman he had faced before the explosion.

“You,” she whispered. “You, with fire in your blood.”

Her voice was dry and sibilant. Eddie stared. “Lyssa?”

“Lyssa,” she murmured, faintly mocking. “Lyssa sleeps. I am her dragon.”

He didn’t know how to respond to that. He wondered if she was playing games, but he looked closer into those eyes and felt power crawl over his skin. Whoever was staring back at him now was not the same woman. There was no fear in that gaze, no uncertainty.

Nothing remotely human.

He wet his lips. “I don’t understand. What does that even mean, you’re her dragon?”

She drew in a rasping breath that sounded like the rub of scales. “If she trusted herself, it would mean nothing. But she forgets that human and dragon can be passengers of the same heart. She does not believe that we are one, and that accepting me will not diminish her. So I wait, and protect her when I can.”

It sounded like a split personality disorder. He hadn’t realized that shape-shifters could be caught between the different spiritual and mental aspects of their existence — independent of one another. It was sort of creepy.

Eddie wanted to choose his next words very carefully. “Were you protecting her today? Were you aware of those women who came for her?”

“I was aware. But you protected her. Simply by saying no to them.”

“Who are they?”

The corner of her mouth curled. “Prey.”

Eddie wondered if she was cocky or just that dangerous. “Does Lyssa feel like that?”