“You are quite safe in my presence,” Rowan said to us, his voice level, but the way he was looking at Mr. Kim was an open invitation to dispute the statement. “You may stay if you wish.”

I looked helplessly at Rowan—the way he had stood up to Mr. Kim told me that he saw the latter as a threat just as I did, but how he could suggest we stay was beyond my understanding. I didn’t feel in the least bit secure, not so far as the vulnerable Mrs. P was concerned. “Thanks, I think we’ll just leave now.”

“If you wish to do this the difficult way, so be it,” Mr. Kim said, gesturing toward his friend, who rose and moved to his side. “My master does not care about witnesses. They are easily disposed of.”

I stepped back, feeling like someone had punched me in the gut. Mr. Kim alone was bad enough, but with his buddy standing next to him… I shivered and said quietly, “Put your shoes on.”

Mrs. P pursed her lips, but still refused to comply with my urging.

“Do you know what a bane is, mate?” Mr. Kim called to me, lifting his voice to be heard over the sound of the séance. “In the case of the one that Elton is about to cast upon you and the thief, it will make you our slaves, your wills totally subjugated to ours. Banes aren’t easy to cast, of course, and require the blood of an innocent to cast, but luckily…” He smiled over my shoulder. “Luckily, that is easy enough to come by.”

Air swirled behind me as the door was opened, but before I could turn to see who had entered, Rowan was suddenly at my side, his gray-green eyes no longer sleepy. In fact, I figured they were about as close to spitting out laser beams as they could be. Before I could say anything, his left arm shot out, followed by a squeal of pain.

Still on my knees before Mrs. P in an attempt to either cajole her into putting on her shoes or force them on myself, I looked into the tearoom to see if no one else was curious about the craziness going on at the front. No one was even looking our way. I wondered if this was part of the floor show, but decided I didn’t want to stay to find out.

Gabriel and May hurriedly moved around the table toward us just as Mr. Kim instructed his companion to begin. His friend closed his eyes, started drawing symbols in the air while chanting unintelligible words.

“Right,” I said, standing up and grabbing Mrs. P’s arm. I spun her around, lifting her over the man who rolled on the floor in the doorway, evidently disabled by Rowan. “We are so out of here.”

“My shoes,” Mrs. P wailed when I hustled her barefoot across the street, holding up an apologetic hand at the drivers who had to slam on their brakes to avoid mowing us down.

“I’ll go back and get them in a bit,” I promised, and mouthed apologies to the drivers while pushing Mrs. P forward until I got her back into the lobby of the Hotel Ocelot. There I released her and peered through the window to see if anyone from the tearoom was following us.

No one emerged from the door, but while I was watching, a man’s body was slammed up against the window, causing some plants in pots sitting on the interior windowsill to fall. All I could see was the back of the man, so I couldn’t tell who it was, but after a few seconds, the man slid slowly down the glass, leaving a smear of blood behind.

“And with that, we go upstairs and lock the door, and don’t open it for anyone,” I told Mrs. P, who was telling Hansel about how I had forcibly parted her from her shoes across the street. “I just hope it was the nasty Mr. Kim and not Rowan. Come on, Mrs. P. Let’s go barricade ourselves in. I have a feeling this is going to be a much longer night than I originally imagined it would be.”

Four

“You are the silver wyvern, I assume?” Rowan flexed his shoulder, winced, and wondered if he might not have cracked his collarbone in the fight that ensued as soon as Sophea had removed Mrs. P from the tea shop.

The man next to him nodded, and examined his knuckles. They were covered with blood, and cut in several spots. “I am Gabriel Tauhou, yes. This is May Northcott, my mate. And you are the Dragon Breaker.”

Rowan was expecting that, so didn’t feel the little zip of pain that usually accompanied such statements. He glanced at Gabriel’s hand, but could muster little sympathy when it was he, and not Gabriel, who had dealt with the demon who had come in the door behind Sophea, as well as Mauritius Kim. The silver wyvern and his mate only took down the demonic dragon casting the bane.

“I’ve heard of you from Gabriel,” the woman, May, said, eyeing Rowan thoughtfully. “You killed some dragons a while ago.”

He was silent for a moment, his shoulder hurting, his brain still a bit muzzy from less than an hour’s sleep, and his soul crying for solace. “If I told you that I didn’t kill them, that their deaths were due to their own actions, would you believe me?”

“Possibly,” she said without hesitation. “But that’s not what the dragonkin say about you.”

“No, it is not,” Gabriel said, a chilly look in his eyes. “All dragons know of the Dragon Breaker and how the First Dragon punished you. We know he charged you to aid us whenever we needed, but you seemed to disappear immediately after that pronouncement. How is it you avoided detection?”

Rowan gave a jaded smile. “Perseverance and dedication to being lost to the world.”

“And yet you are here now.”

It was a statement not a question, but Rowan was an intelligent man. “My sister asked for help. As soon as I knew it was to aid dragons, I felt obligated to do what I could.”

“A noble intention, given your past with us,” May said with a little nod. “And now I suggest that since we have to work together, we let the events of the past go.”

Gabriel stayed silent for a moment, his eyes seeming to sear through to Rowan’s soul.

“Let it go,” May said, nudging her mate. “He says the story that we know isn’t the truth, and it may well be that’s so. Regardless of what happened twenty years ago, we need his help now. He’s the only mortal-born alchemist around.”

Gabriel sighed and nodded, his gaze warming up slightly. “You are right, as usual, little bird. Very well, Dragon Breaker—”

“My name is Rowan.”

Gabriel made a little face, then his lips twitched in a smile. “I will trust my mate’s judgment on this, Rowan. We will work together in amity.”