B00CGOH3US EBOK (34 page)

His eyes grew hooded as he regarded her. "'Tis simple, my lady. 'Tis what I do."

Jill's breath caught, forming a tight knot in her throat. "Right. You're the mighty dragonslayer."

"And he is a dragon."

"He was once a knight, just like you."

"What he once was matters not. He is an abomination now."

"You don't know the whole story. He didn't choose to be this way. He was cursed, and since then he's been forced to live for centuries being the thing he hates most. I'd like to see you do that and not go completely insane."

Tears pricked like needles in Jill's eyes. Not of sadness or fear, but of anger. Roderick was being such a pig-headed ass. He refused to listen to her, refused to see the truth right in front of him.

"What happened to your knightly code? Isn't loyalty supposed to be a part of that? Until a few hours ago, he was your new best friend. Nothing has changed since then."

"
Everything
has changed since then." His voice was so low and calm, it brought chills to her skin.

"You're wrong. He's the same man he was yesterday. And he's as good a man as you, if not more so, because of what he's had to live through all these years. If you can't see that, you're just as blind as all those other people back there, living in fear and ignorance." Jill wagged her finger in his face and he leaned back as if she were brandishing a sword. "Let me tell you something. I've spent the last three weeks with him and he's shown me nothing but kindness and respect, many times when I didn't deserve it. In the week you've known him, he's been just as civil and courteous to you. And I'll tell you what—that's a hell of a lot more than you've shown him."

Roderick stared at her for a long moment and she saw something pass behind his eyes. A thought. A memory. A doubt.

Just as quickly, it was gone, replaced by a cold determination that frightened her more than any fire-breathing dragon could. This was the look of a cold-blooded killer, a man who could take another's life without fear or regret.

"What are you planning to do?" Jill asked, although she was afraid she already knew.

"Being the possessive creature that he is, the dragon will not let you go so easily. He will come." Roderick glanced up into the violet clouds of the coming dawn, as if expecting Baelin to come swooping down on them at any moment. "And when he does, I shall be waiting."

"And then what?"

"Then I shall slay him."

She glanced at the heavy sword strapped to his waist. "How?"

"'Tis not easy. The dragon is a creature of the devil walking this earth, with their breath of fire and their blood the very elixir of hell. The beast's scales are as a thousand shields, hard and impenetrable. It is nigh unbeatable. There is but one way to kill a dragon and I know it well." Roderick pointed to the center of his chest, over his heart. "There is a spot here, where the scales separate. When my blade finds the mark, the dragon will die."

With sudden clarity, she recalled the sunburst scar on Baelin's chest, the place where he said the witch had exchanged his human heart for a dragon one. If he was stabbed there while in human form, would the dragon die…or the man? The very thought chilled her to the bone.

"You talk about killing him as if you'll be fighting him in dragon form. But what if he comes as he is now, as a man?"

"Man or beast, it matters not to me. Either way, the dragon shall die."

Baelin stood in the shadows of the forest, careful to keep hidden from those who continued to hunt.

After hours of chasing him through the night, most of his pursuers had returned to tend to the injured and bury the dead. But others were still out there, searching the forest and the sky above with relentless determination. Only now did he risk returning to the place where Kendale and Lady Jill had disappeared into the trees.

Smoke from the smoldering timbers of the inn drifted among the trees like wandering ghosts dancing about the dark trunks, but there was no trace of the corporeal beings he sought.

They were gone.

Anger and betrayal swirled within him, wrapped in a bone-deep sense of loss. How could Kendale have taken her?

He could not allow this to happen. He would not lose her. Not now.

Before he could scent their trail, the air around him shifted, bringing with it a prickling awareness. He pushed his anger aside, tensing as something darker moved among shadows, slipping in and out of the drifting smoke. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end as he searched the hidden recesses of the forest. He drew his sword, sensing this time it was not the people from the inn, but something much more dangerous hunting him now.

One dark shadow separated from the rest. He tensed as more followed to join the first, until two dozen surrounded him.

Like their leader, each man wore a black surcoat with a red dragon erect. Baelin knew it all too well. It had been a score of lifetimes since he'd faced one of the Dark Witch's knights. He'd hoped he'd seen the last of them.

"Greetings, Sir Baelin. Queen Isylte sends her regards."

Baelin gripped his sword hilt tighter. He had no desire to exchange pleasantries with the witch's mindless underlings. "Why are you here?"

The man grinned, but the glitter in his eyes held the sharp edge of malice. "She knows, Sir Baelin. She knows about the maid."

His gut clenched.
Nay, she cannot know of Lady Jill.

But how could he have thought she would not learn of her? After all, the Dark Witch was the one to set this curse upon him, so it stood to reason she would know when the first test was passed. She would now stop at nothing to prevent them from succeeding against the remaining challenges. Baelin sucked in a breath as a horrible possibility entered his mind.

"What has she done?"

The warrior shrugged, his stance calm, unconcerned with the armed dragon-knight standing before him. "She ordered us to remove the tapestry or the maid from your possession, for without one or the other, the curse cannot be broken." The man nodded at the tapestry tucked securely in Baelin's sword belt. "I see you still possess the tapestry, but it appears our little diversion worked, for the maid is no longer with you."

Dear God. Had he unwittingly brought death to those hapless travelers at the inn merely by sheltering with them last eve?

The leader cocked his head to the side, lowering his voice as if to exchange a confidence to a friend. "Tell us, Sir Baelin, for Queen Isylte will surely want to know. Did you watch the girl burn?"

A black vengeance rushed in, filling Baelin with fury and anguish for the innocent lives lost at the Dark Witch's whim. He bellowed with righteous outrage and charged at the knight, his sword raised high.

"Take him alive!" the leader shouted as he drew his sword. The knights rushed in, tightening the circle surrounding him.

Before the first could reach him, Baelin let loose the dragon within and blasted them with its fire, sending several warriors careening across the forest floor, igniting the dry leaves in their path. In the wake of their screams, he hacked and chopped at the others who kept coming, stabbing and slicing in a blur of motion and blood and limbs, until he stood in a circle of the dead, their blood seeping into the mossy ground underfoot.

As quickly as they'd come, those still alive vanished back into the shadows, transformed from men into formless dark clouds a dragon's fire could no longer harm and leaving no trail he could follow. He would never be able to catch them, much less kill them in their present form.

But he knew all too well where they would go. They would return to the Dark Witch and tell of what happened. They would tell her they had not succeeded in killing the maid, for without seeing Lady Jill's death with their own eyes, they couldn't be certain. And to fail the Dark Witch meant a fate worse than death. He knew, for he'd faced her displeasure himself.

Nay, they would be back. And the next time they would make certain the deed was done.

He had to find Lady Jill, for as long as the Dark Witch knew she lived, she would not be safe.

He sheathed his bloody sword and charged through the forest.

Kendale and Lady Jill were on horseback. They would make good time. If he flew, Baelin would be faster, but it would do him no good. The forest offered concealment from the air, so he was forced to follow them on foot, looking for the horse's tracks in the soft ground of the forest floor and broken twigs on the brush as they passed by. It wasn't fast, but it turned out to be deceptively easy. Kendale had left a trail even a child could follow, as if the knight knew Baelin would come after them and he welcomed it.

But even without the obvious signs of their flight through the forest, he would be able to find them. He could still detect the sweet, familiar scent of Lady Jill, faint on the damp forest air where they'd passed. She was so familiar to him now, he would know her scent anywhere, and on that alone he could follow her to the ends of the earth.

As he sped through the forest, questions began to plague him. The Dark Witch had sent her warriors this time. He'd killed several, but more would come. But in what form? More warrior knights? Another dragon? Or something else entirely? And on the edge of those thoughts, other doubts chased Baelin as he slipped through the trees.

Was Kendale truly who he seemed to be? Was he a dragonslayer in truth, or was he one of the Dark Witch's minions, too? Had she first sent a man with a handsome face to turn Lady Jill's head and steal her away? The possibility terrified him.

But nay. He'd been a sennight in Kendale's company. Irritating though the man could be, Baelin would have sensed if the knight was something other than what he appeared to be. Wouldn't he? He prayed for Lady Jill's sake he'd not been wrong.

Then as he leapt over a fallen tree, another thought chilled him even more.

What if she'd gone with Kendale willingly? He recalled with painful clarity how she'd left him the first time after witnessing the dark side of the dragon. Had she left him again? Had she seen in the other knight a means of escape from the beast she felt held her captive?

Baelin didn't want to think it, but he couldn't help but wonder if Lady Jill had chosen to go with the dragonslayer.

And that was the worst possibility of all.

Baelin found them just before the sun reached its zenith.

Though plenty of light remained in the day, a large fire blazed out in the open field a stone's throw from the edge of the forest. The smoke billowed up in a thick, black column, entwining with the clouds above, high enough for all the countryside to see.

Or one very angry dragon.

Not that Baelin intended to descend on them from the skies in his dragon form. But from the look of things, Kendale was expecting him to.

He had to credit the dragonslayer's tactics—he'd chosen the site well. Kendale took his stand on high, open ground, able to see for several furlongs, yet he was close enough to the forest edge should the protection of the trees be needed. The knight sat fully armed upon
Flaume Stelan
, the flickering light from the nearby fire glinting off the shiny plates of his armor, waiting.

Just as Baelin knew he would be.

What he didn't know was if he was rescuing Lady Jill or about to take her from the man she'd chosen as her salvation from the beast.

He had no choice. Without her, the curse could not be broken. His life, and very likely any hope Lady Jill had of returning to her time, depended on getting her back.

Baelin left the cover of the trees, walking on human legs as would any other man. He did not draw his sword, but kept his hands at his sides. Though he'd once called Kendale friend, if only briefly, at the moment he wanted nothing more than to run the knight through where he stood. But he had no desire to spill the man's blood in front of Lady Jill if he did not have to. He'd made that mistake once before.

Kendale was not so inclined. Noticing Baelin's approach, he drew his sword, the sudden motion bringing Lady Jill to her feet. She turned wide, frightened eyes his way.

What she was thinking, he could not tell. She made no move either in his direction or toward Kendale, but stood still between them, her face pale beneath smeared soot and ash. Then, as his blood threatened to deafen him with its pounding in his head, she took one small, tentative step toward him.