Boreal and John Grey Season 2 (18 page)

He whispered in her ear, “The nest.”

The dragon nest.

Right.

“You got what you needed?” Before the Shades attacked the weaponry? Before Jefferson showed a side of himself Ella had never suspected and Dave saw with his own eyes you can’t keep the Veil from tearing anymore?

He pulled back and nodded, patting the duffel bag slung over his shoulder. She burned to know what he’d thought necessary.

Tamping down on her curiosity, she led the way outside. The weather had changed from weak sunlight to overcast skies and a cold drizzle. Finn’s limp was so bad it made her wince, but he didn’t even seem to notice it, his face set in determined lines, his expression pensive.

They set off in her car toward the seaside, and cleaned up as best they could with a bottle of water she kept under her seat and a box of tissues.

Then she drove toward the old abandoned harbor. After an earthquake and geological uplift some twenty years back, that caused the harbor to become too shallow, it was decided that a big, modern port was in order. So the new port was built and the old harbor was left to the mercy of the elements, eventually becoming the territory of those left adrift in life — homeless, drug-addicts, prostitutes, illegal immigrants and anyone else falling through the cracks. 

Ella knew the place. There had been a Shade attack a year ago. Back then she’d also been volunteering with the Salvation Army to help the homeless, at least through the winter months. It was Simon’s idea and she’d tagged along, although she wasn’t in the least bit religious. Come to think of it, neither was Simon.

Double-faced son of a bitch.
If only she’d known all he’d been hiding...

Finn was staring out the window as they drove down the exposed wharf with its dilapidated buildings — shops with broken fronts, restaurants with their doors and windows gaping open, flea-ridden dogs and cats scratching themselves on the threshold, rusty skips full of trash. The low wall keeping the sea at bay had crumbled to bits and waves crashed over the pier occasionally, dousing the car.

Ella slowed, trying to remember the images the dragon’s mind had flashed at her. A young woman came out of a dark doorway and beckoned, one hip jutting to the side. Ella could see the crimson of her lipstick as they drove away — red like blood.

There was a ship, Ella recalled. A large, red ship, tilted slightly to one side. Abandoned, too, then. And a large warehouse. Where could it be?

“Ella!” Finn hissed and she swerved, coming too close to the crumbling wall and the sea.

Shit.

“Maybe you should drive,” she said, stopping. “Just for a while, until I find the place.”

Finn’s eyes narrowed on her, as if he were suspecting a trick. When she got out of the car and went around to open his door, he grinned.

“Go slow, okay?” she warned while waiting for him to get out, wincing in sympathy when he grimaced and leaned on the car door. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

The delight on his face was worth it, and anyway there were no red lights here to run. Who knew Finn liked driving so much?

Or was it the speed?

She was having second thoughts as she sat shotgun and Finn took the wheel, but too late.
Breathe in and out, Ella.

She tried to focus on their surroundings as Finn put the car into first gear — yeah, her car was an automatic only in its dreams — and set off. He drove okay, not that she remembered any lurching and sputtering of the engine last time he’d driven, but she’d obviously been pretty much out of it at the time with the Ettin’s paralyzing poison running in her veins.

He also drove slowly, as she’d requested, and a smile lingered on his lips, faint but genuine. Beautiful. Damn distracting.

Focus, Ella.

She forced her gaze back outside, to the crumbling storefronts. Warehouses came into view, old concrete block buildings with shattered windows, shut with wooden planks and covered in graffiti. The doors were barred. Could there be a dragon nest inside?

She tried closing her eyes to better recall the flashing images from the dragon’s mind — and new images flashed.

The red ship, listing to one side. A warehouse nearby. The sea heaving, water splashing the pier. The ship again, rocking slightly, metal groaning. A hole in the deck.

She blinked. The nest wasn’t in the warehouse.

“Are you okay?” Finn asked.

“Look for the red ship,” she said, and winced, because more images flashed behind her lids — different ones, blurred impressions of broken crates and barrels and white scaly skin, metal walls and a pinpoint of light.

The tires scritched and skidded on the wet concrete. Ella snapped her eyes open and found a wall coming at them. “Watch out!”

Finn cursed, blinking dazed eyes, and braked.

The car spun ninety degrees and scraped lightly on the wall, surely leaving off paint from the door on Finn’s side.

Ella closed her gaping mouth. Did the bond work with the baby dragons, too? And why the hell was there a wall blocking the street? Meanwhile, the drizzle was turning into rain, obscuring what lay ahead.

Finn glared at the wall, gripping the wheel. He looked unhurt, which was the main thing, but still looked stunned. He’d seen the images, too. No wonder they’d almost crashed.

Dammit.

“Looks like we continue on foot.” She stepped outside, inhaling the sea air, fishy and heavy with humidity. A run-down metal gate loomed on one side, and Ella hoped there was a way through.

Finn finally let go of the wheel, grabbed the duffel from the back seat and dragged himself over the passenger seat to get out. The bruise on his jaw was fading to sickly yellow and brown, and the bandana had slipped down over his eyes, letting his ears poke out.

She reached up to adjust it as he straightened. It looked odd with his shorter hair; the hippy vibe was gone.

Still cute, though.

She kissed him on the cheek, which earned her a small smile, and locked the car, hoping it would still be in one piece when they returned.

Finn set the pace, hurrying to the gate and finding a hole in the chainlink fence to crawl through. In the driving rain, it was all Ella could do to rush after him, trying not to lose him from her sight. Her jacket snagged on the chainlink and it tore as she passed to the other side.

It was one of those days.

Finn was limping toward the bulk of a tall warehouse and Ella could just make out the mass of a ship in the water. This was the place.

“Hey, you,” someone called from the shadows of what looked like a ticket booth. “Better not go near that ship.”

“Why not?” She slowed, trying to see the person, but could only make out a skeletal silhouette and the glowing embers of a cigarette.

“There’s something inside that ship. And sometimes a white nightmare comes flying. You must believe me.” He coughed. “I’m not on drugs anymore, I cut that crap.”

Ella nodded and hurried on, catching up with Finn as he neared the ghostly form of the cargo ship. There was a low whispering in her mind; no words, just feelings — fear, hunger, confusion.

Finn headed to a metal ladder nailed to the side of the ship and started to climb. The ship rocked slightly on the high tide as she followed him up, praying her hands and feet wouldn’t slip on the wet metal. The rain still pelted down, shrouding everything in a blurry curtain of water.

Finn jumped onto the lopsided deck, his leg nearly giving out under him. He slid and fetched up against one of the crumpling dinghies. The rain plastered his hair on his face and water ran down his cheeks.

Ella jumped on board, landing in a crouch. She glanced around. The deck was empty, the rain drumming around her.

Then came a hissing noise, though she couldn’t tell from where. Was that the baby dragons?

Finn straightened and limped to the broken hatch of the cargo hold. A hole, big enough for a horse to go through gaped in its middle — large enough for a dragon? Or had she simply let the eggs drop inside?

A rich organic smell drifted from the ship’s innards, like guano — crap and ammonia — and a faint odor of burnt plastic. 

Finn let the duffel down, then crouched and peered into the murky depths. A scratching noise came from below.

“And now?” Ella whispered, hunkering down. A subtle stench of rot rose from the hold and she held her breath, her stomach twisting.

Finn didn’t move. Brightness rose from his hair like a cloud, painting a halo around his face. What was he waiting for?

A sudden flame burst through the darkness, spearing up toward them. Finn grabbed Ella’s shoulder and shoved her back, still in a deep crouch.

Looked like they’d just found the dragonets. So they breathed fire like their mama.
How cute.

Finn shook her lightly. Oh right — not the time to zone out, no matter how weird the situation. He opened the duffel bag and drew out a weird machine gun with a small tank — no, wait. A propane flamethrower.

He shoved it into her hands and she curled her fingers around it; a reflex action.

“What’s this for?”

“Don’t aim at them,” Finn said. “It’s to make them believe you’re one of them.”

One of them...

What, a dragon?
She opened her mouth to say just how ass-crazy this sounded, but before she could utter a single word, Finn stood and took a deep breath.

Then he dropped though the hatch into the hold, right in the middle of the nest.

Damn!

Chapter Five

Sunlight

“Finn!” Ella’s voice echoed. Still hanging on top of the hatch, she clutched the flamethrower to her side and struggled to see something in the dark. How deep was the hold? Wouldn’t she break a leg if she fell badly? Wouldn’t she land on top of an explosive little dragon? What if it threw a tantrum? “Finn, are you okay?”

When only silence answered her, she gritted her teeth and brought the propane torch forward. Well, Finn had said to use it — and she needed light.

With a flick of her thumb, she triggered the fuel release, pumping the gas, and then pulled the ignition trigger, lighting the spark.

Fire whooshed into the hold, tearing the blackness — showing her a collection of sparkling white shapes and a person that had to be Finn curled in their midst.

Ella turned off the fire. It was a long way down, easily twenty feet, but Finn sat smack in the center of the nest.
Shit.
She’d jump, no question about it, and chew Finn out over it later. If she survived.

But she’d also seen a length of rope dangling on one side, probably from a broken winch. It didn’t seem to reach the bottom, but it was something. A lucky break, could that be?

Slipping her arms into the straps of the flamethrower, wearing it like a backpack, she slid her legs into the opening and tried to picture where she’d seen the small dragons and Finn. Then she gripped the rope and dropped into the hold in the hopes of landing next to them — not too close, not too far.

She’d trained for all sorts of situations. The Shades weren’t predictable at best; usually they were downright crazy bastards. She’d jumped into the darkness before, but flames criss-crossing space while sliding down a rope would certainly cast the experience in a new light.

The air was dry inside the hold and it was freaking cold like a giant freezer. Halfway down, the rope ended. She let go and she was free-falling, trying to keep her body straight. She thumped down and rolled as she’d been taught, to minimize the impact on her joints, though a sharp pain shot up her ankle. Ah well, a minor sprain was the least of her worries right now.

Coming up on one knee, she unslung the flame torch and swung it around, letting out a short burst of flame.

She blinked as the fire died out, not sure she’d seen right. Finn held the horned crest of a small dragon in each hand, and a third dragonet, white as snow, curled at his feet, its small wings spread. Like white lizards in appearance, they were roughly the size of bull terriers with long tails. A warped nativity scene, she thought, with a haloed angel and an entourage of cherubs — only the angel’s eyes held a hard glint and the cherubs were fanged little demons.

With only a slight shudder — because she was a badass agent, duh — she approached the strange scene, letting out one more blast of fire.

“Stay back,” Finn said. He was patting the creatures’ muzzles — no, feeding them. “Wait.”

Where had he gotten the meat strips he was giving them? He’d really prepared for this — probably sneaked into the canteen kitchen and stolen bacon from the breakfast trays.

She lowered the thrower. Finn glowed enough to illuminate the dragonets and the assortment of broken crates and barrels below and around them — things she’d seen in the images she’d received from them.

Interesting.
The little creatures weren’t smaller versions of their mother. They were snake-like with stubby legs and large heads, their horns small and rounded. Their teeth looked razor-sharp where they snatched the meat from Finn’s hands.

Finn’s glow unnerved her. It meant he was stressed or afraid — but he seemed to have the situation under control, go figure, not even needing the flamethrower to calm down the baby dragons, so what had gotten his briefs in a twist?

That was when she realized his gaze was glued to a spot behind her. She turned and let out a burst of flame to see better.

A body. It sprawled on top of a piece of broken machinery — the winch? A slender body, clad in what looked like silver filigree, long pale hair hanging like a curtain to the side, the head half-covered by a metal helmet.

The dragon’s rider.

The hissing and growling from behind her rose in volume and she turned the flame torch, revealing the three little dragons advancing on her.

Finn shading his eyes. “More fire,” he said, and she reached for the fuel release trigger, letting out more gas.

A tongue of flame gushed forward, and the dragonets hissed and stopped, stomping their clawed paws, shaking their lizard heads. Finn limped between them to reach her side as the flame died.

They turned toward the corpse, Finn so bright he cast pale light around them.

“Why are you shining?” she whispered, unable to tear her gaze from the silver-encased body in front of them.

“Headache,” he rasped.

Magic in the Veil. Did that mean another spell was about to break? Best thing would be to take what they’d come to find and get the hell out of there.

Finn staggered a few steps, his gait uneven and unsteady.
Damn.
Dropping twenty feet surely hadn’t done his leg any favors. But he didn’t seem to be in pain, or at least to notice it. His gaze was locked on the body of the other Boreal.

“
Kona
,” he muttered, and the word rang a bell.

“A woman?” Ella didn’t know why she should be surprised. They hadn’t talked about gender politics of Aelfheim — hell, they’d hardly talked about anything at all — but their queen was a woman, so why wouldn’t the dragon riders be women, too?

The woman’s head was in an awkward position — the neck was broken. The body was more slender than Finn’s, though not shorter, the shoulders slightly less bulky.

It occurred to her she was looking at her first elven woman — in the flesh, that was, cold and dead as it was. Seeing Finn’s mother and the queen in the mirror of the Gate didn’t count, she decided. That hadn’t seemed real, whereas this...

Finn leaned over, supporting himself on the piece of machinery, his glow flickering.

From up close, the woman’s face was both beautiful and scary — the eyes were closed, thank god for small mercies, but her skin was papery and translucent like old parchment, her cheekbones jutting out like blades. Her brows and lashes were white like ice and her eyes looked larger. Her jaw was slender, less angled than Finn’s.

Had she fallen off her dragon as it had gone through the Gate? It must have been disorienting, and Ella was glad Finn had been on foot when he’d crossed over.

Finn grimaced and closed his eyes. Was it because of the headache or the shock of seeing one of his own race in this world?

A data device, he’d said. That was why they were there.

This woman had to have one somewhere on her person, so Ella gritted her teeth and set to work, her hands hovering over the metal armor — or was it clothes? The metal seemed molded to the woman’s slight frame, following a faint curve over her chest and down her hips. Something glinted there — a tube, like the one Finn had held in his dream-memory, but much smaller. A weapon?

Finn reached for it before she did, pressing his fingers on small hollows in the Boreal’s belt and unhooking it.

“That what we need?” Ella whispered and glanced over her shoulder, making sure the dragonets weren’t right behind them, about to burn them both to crisp. They’d stayed at the nest, staring at them with glowing yellow eyes.

Finn shook his head and reached under the corpse, jostling it. He pulled out another tube, flatter and duller in hue, lines of symbols spiraling around it.

More spirals. Figured.

“We can go now,” Finn said, his voice colorless. So yeah, maybe he was in a bit of a shock — who wouldn’t be?

Ella nodded and looked up, at the open hatch. Way, way up. Right. The only problem now was — how would they get out?

***

“This won’t work,” Ella said.

Finn stood, arms crossed over his chest, head bowed. He’d tied up the tubes with a piece of rope he’d found in the hold and had slung them at his hip.

“You can’t climb that wall,” Ella whispered. It was sheer at least half-way up, and even if he reached that high, with his leg hurting so much...

Finn lifted a brow.

Okay, fine.
She sighed, gave him the rope she’d found coiled close to the corpse. There was no question of her climbing that wall. “Just don’t leave me down here, okay?” She eyed the dragonets, who eyed her back with equal measures of distrust. “The situation might get explosive.”

Finn turned, walked to the hold wall and examined its smooth expanse. Then, finding invisible holds, he started to climb.

Ella stood, gaping. It occurred to her this was another first. She’d never had the opportunity to watch him crawl up a wall like a spider, although she knew he’d done it plenty of times, one of them being when he’d been shot and bleeding out.

Still, it was so cool, the way his every movement spoke of strength and balance, every tiny motion slow and thought out.

It took one tiny slip for the awe to give way to fear. Shouting and screaming wouldn’t help him concentrate, right? So she slapped a hand over her mouth and fought to breathe as he hung with one hand for a long moment, then swung himself sideways and found another grip.

Goddammit.

Now she remembered; she’d seen him do this before — in a memory as he’d climbed a cliff face where star flowers bloomed to reach a dragon’s nest. It was part and parcel of his job. He was a hunter. A tracker. A rock climber.

Ella wondered if any other of his kind, any other Boreal, had such skills. They had magic and probably had no need for anything more.

Finn crawled up the wall like a spider, long limbs spread, finding purchase where there appeared to be none. The tubes in his belt glinted as he approached the top and the broken hatch.

She watched, her breath snagging in her throat, as he found handholds and hang from the hatch, swinging himself until he reached the hole and lifted his legs. He swung them up, disappearing through the hole.

Ella gaped. Jeez, that had been worthy of an Olympic champion. It really was time to get serious about exercising again, if only to keep up with Finn.

The rope dropped from the opening, lower and lower, until she could reach it. With one last look at the hissing dragonets and the silent corpse, she grabbed it and let Finn haul her out of the hold.

Back to the freezing wind, the sound of the sea, the empty pier and the illusion of normality.

***

Finn’s body glowed softly under the shower, the water plastering his hair to his face. He pushed the soaked strands back. His eyes glimmered under his wet lashes as she washed off the blood, ichor and grime from his skin. His fingertips played on her shoulders, slipped down her arms, and she stilled, hyperaware of his strong body pressed against hers.

His mouth brushed her cheek, warm and soft, and he tugged the sponge out of her hand. “My turn,” he whispered and ran it up and down her back, sending shivers of pleasure down her spine.

She could’ve stayed there forever, but Finn stopped and cocked his head to the side, as if listening.

“What is it?” she whispered.

“A sound.” He frowned. “I can’t hear it anymore.”

She listened. “Can’t hear anything. Is it the Veil?”

He shook his head, sending droplets flying. “It was a scratching noise. It’s gone.”

“Maybe it was coming from Mike’s apartment. Hey, I’ll go make some tea and coffee.”

With some reluctance, she left Finn to finish washing and hurried out, wrapping her head in a towel.

And halted. There was a faint, high-pitched sound that put her teeth on edge. What the hell was it?

She stalked down the corridor, crept into the living room and then the kitchen, listening for the strange whine.

The apartment seemed empty, though, and the noise stopped.

Just your imagination
, she told herself as she boiled water and set the coffee maker going. Finn liked dark roast and she heaped enough spoonfuls into the filter to wake a slumbering elephant. She shuddered, thinking how bitter it would turn out.

There really was no accounting for people’s tastes.

She grabbed a teabag and reached for her favorite mug, remembering after a long moment that Finn had broken it, and chose instead a random cup to drop it into. She poured the hot water, watched the bag float in it.

The pallid, gaunt face of the dead Boreal kept flashing in front of her eyes. 

The silver, carved tube Finn had retrieved from the corpse sat on the counter, drawing her gaze. Mug in hand, she stepped closer and stared.

The artifact sat there, cool and alien, somehow sinister. She ran her fingertips over its relief designs, the ever-present spirals, the circles and hash lines, the rectangles inside rectangles and the abstract lines.