Shana Abé: The Smoke Thief

“Every single day.” Except when you looked at me.

His hair was long and untamed, a spill of darkened gold down his shoulder blades. The muscles of his back were smooth and flat. Rue lifted a hand, combing her fingers through the strands. His skin beneath felt deliciously warm.

Kit tore off a rose petal, let it drift down to the rug. “It won't be simple,” he said. “Changing the ways of the tribe. It won't be an easy task.”

“No.”

Another petal. “Perhaps you might write to me. Offer suggestions.”

“Perhaps.”

“Rue.” He shifted around to face her; she let his hair slip from her hand. “You're not really going to make me be this noble, are you?”

“I think a little nobility might be good for your disposition, Lord Langford.”

“A little, ” he said with a strange, uneasy laugh, and closed his eyes. “God. You've opened windows in my soul I never knew existed. You've made me think I have a hope of becoming the man I always wanted to be.” He looked down at the rose; his fingers cupped together and tore off all the remaining petals at once. They fell in painted silence from his palm. “Rue-flower—Clarissa—for better or worse, you've woken my heart. I don't think I can be a noble man without you at my side, prodding me along every day. I'm a damned stubborn fellow. Don't you know that?”

She didn't reply. He tossed the stem to the floor, frowning now at her knees, as if the stretch of white chemise across them vexed him. He touched her arm, his palm skimming her uncovered skin, then lifted her hand to place his lips upon the inside of her wrist. His kisses were tantalizing, a path of sweet little butterflies winding up to her inner elbow. Rue found that she was holding her breath.

He pressed his cheek against her forearm. “You do realize that if you don't end up marrying me, I'll turn out a sour old man, just like the rest of them. I need you to rescue me.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “But what about my gown?”

Christoff looked up.

“It's going to take months of proper fittings. Swatches. Plates. A gown like that is not whipped together like some fishmonger's sackcloth.”

“Ah. I believe I understand.” He inched closer. “A lady's toilette is not to be rushed. If you think it's going to take so long . . . perhaps I might just stay with you. To ensure a proper fitting. I am, if I may say so, something of an expert on your figure.”

“Are you?” she breathed, lying back to the pillows, stretching out her arms.

He smiled down at her, a truer smile than before. His hand discovered the drawstring of the chemise; he wound a thin ribbon around one finger. “Aye. A most . . . loving . . . expert.” He tugged the bow loose.

“And what if I were to say to you—” Rue had to stop, because he had bent his lips to her chest, his tongue brushing her skin where the chemise fell open. “Say to you,” she went on, determined, “that I would want a few more gowns like it, every year?”

“I suppose someone must keep Far Perch in order.” His eyes were laughing, brilliant clear green, even though his tone remained bland. “It would be a crime to let it languish empty all the time.”

“I agree. And someone should also be around—periodically—to guard against the natural hazards of the city. Urchins. Purloined diamonds. Ruthless thieves.”

“Little mouse.” Christoff leaned up to cover her lips, abandoning his reserve, his body lithe over hers, pressing into her with his hard, eager heat. “Let them come. There's nothing there worth stealing. Everything of value in the world is here before me, in your eyes.”

Dawn came and left, waving green and gold and ginger, but Rue wasn't awake to see any of it. Kit watched her sleep, her lovely face unguarded, her cheeks tinted with the light. He felt an aching in his heart unfamiliar to him, and quietly perused it as he stroked the hair from her forehead. It took him a good while to realize that what he was feeling was happiness, absolute, complete.

It frightened him a little. He'd never known such a thing before. It seemed fragile, elusive, as temporal as the wash of colors that had blazed through the sky.

Her eyes opened. She regarded him with her drowsy, dark-eyed look, not speaking.

“Do you think you might love me again yet?” he asked.

She smiled at him, a woman's smile, mysteriously profound. “Ridiculous man. I've loved you my whole life. Didn't you know?”

He put his face into her hair to hide his relief. “A true gentleman is loath to appear immodest. . . .”

Her laughter shook them both. “Too late for that.”

He relaxed to his side and pulled her closer, her back to his chest, his arms going tight around her in a gradual, squeezing embrace. She hugged him back with her arms over his and her feet tucked up.

“Will you marry me, Rue? Truly marry me, before our people?”

Her answer came low. “I will.”

“Thank you.”

“You're welcome.”

Her body was softly rounded. Her buttocks made a warm, tempting pressure against his groin. Her breasts were a pleasing weight between his arms, her hair lay trapped across the pillows and under his cheek. Kit bent his head to hers with a new purpose.

“This is how we'll do it.”

“What?”

He nipped her shoulder with his teeth.

“Oh.”

“Tonight,” he murmured. “In the sky.”

Rue rolled over, wrapped in a sheath of lovely brown hair, white skin, pink lips, watching him through her lashes. She smiled with slow, sensual mischief. “Why wait till then?”

And drew him back to her.

The London Town Crier

July 20, 1751

Menagerie Set to Close

The M——s of L——d has made a Private Purchase of Graham's Menagerie, Chelsea, for a sum undisclosed, citing a Desire to restore the Peace to our City. Gentle Readers may recall the Peculiar Disappearance of an Entire Company of Capuchin Monkeys June last, which have since been discovered living Feral in Rollingbrook Forest and causing a Great Deale of Havoc in the crops nearby. The M——s has vowed no further Devilment will occur, as all the Creatures are to be moved to a Secluded Location, else sent back to the Lands from which they Came, sparing no expense at the cost.

The M——s wed in April. His Bride is said to be a most avid Lover of Wild Creatures.

The truth of the stones is this: they change the chemicals in dragon blood.

Like a drug to a mortal, a diamond or ruby or mere chip of jasper can incite visions of bliss, of torment or sorrow or unbearable desire. The structure of any stone can be echoed in the dragon heart, in their very substance; both dragon and diamond are true beings of the earth. They feed off each other. They are twin reflections of a greater whole, which is why the drákon collect the stones, and why a few—a very few—mortal men collect them as well.

For if the stone can change the dragon, the dragon, too, can change the stone.

In the year 1751, for the first time in centuries, two Alpha hearts united. The power of their union shivered the very web of the drákon . Souls trembled on invisible strings. Fates shifted. And ancient ties, long forgotten, thrilled to life.

In that year, Draumr, the dreamer's diamond, transformed her song. From her hidden place in the Carpathian mines, in the dark, in the cold, her beckoning rose to flare across the skies.

Neither fortune nor distance can rend a true family. Blood calls to blood.

It was only a matter of time before the English sent their own dragon princess to find us.