Dragon-Ridden (20 page)

She suspected the blond was much
more astute than his face suggested. He wore a mask of good cheer that hid his
true thoughts. Rather than being a mere spectator of the proceedings, he was
the conductor, forcing the music to bow to his agenda.

Reluctantly she said, “What’s
surprising is how often I’m called odd or strange or unique. Why, I’m told that
so often, I’m almost beginning to believe it. To me, you are the strange ones.
Kidnapping random people off the street, only to tell them they’re odd, is much
stranger.”

“And yet, you do not ask the one
question that every other person we’ve kidnapped asks,” Lucius said. “’Why am I
here?’ Or some variation.”

Tate shrugged. “What can I say? I’m
unique.”

“And contrary,” the blond remarked.

“What is your name, sir?” Tate
asked.

“What use is it to you?”

“I simply grow tired of calling you
the blond one in my head.”

There was a pause as they digested
that comment. Then the blond threw back his head and laughed. Even Lucius
smiled slightly. Tate had grown accustomed to being laughed at, and as such,
her attention had wandered back to the problem of stealing the controller from
Sam.

She didn’t allow her eyes to rest
on him, not wanting him suspicious. Instead she prowled the edges of the room
as if restless. There was only one entrance to the chamber and the guard Tate
had assaulted stood in front of it. The look he gave her as she passed him was
unfriendly. She sniffed. If he hadn’t wanted to be manhandled he shouldn’t have
pushed her. Twice.

“I’m Lucius,” the friendly man said
leaning forward and smiling as if they were sharing a joke.

“But-“ Confused, Tate looked at the
man she had assumed was Lucius. “I thought. Then who are you?” she asked him.

“Lucius,” he said.

Two Lucius’s. Huh? For a moment the
puzzle was enough to distract her from her objective. “It must be difficult,
when people are addressing you, to tell which they are talking to.”

Lucius Two, as Tate now referred to
the former blond, laughed again, the sound cheerfully filling the chamber. He
propped a chin on one hand. “Yes, and it confuses would be assassins as well.”

“Because they can’t tell which of
you is the real Lucius,” Tate finished for him. “Clever.”

Lucius Two leaned over and patted
Lucius One’s arm. “You’ve brought such an exotic bird home.”

Hurry,
Night thought at
Tate.

Hush,
Tate snapped back. She
had her own problems to solve. She’d help him if she could but not at the
expense of her safety. Tate was a lot of things, but selfless was not one of
them. A thought occurred to her based on what Sam had said earlier.
If I do
this, can you get me back to the surface?

Surface?

You know. Sky? Not underground?
Tate could sense his puzzlement so she sent him a hazy image of the city
streets. His recognition filtered through her mind.

Yes, but first you help rescue
the cubs from the Red Lady.

That wasn’t exactly what she’d had
in mind. She’d hoped getting the remote would be enough to gain his help. It
would also mean staying underground longer when being here was already drawing
her nerves tight with tension.

What if I give you the remote,
and you take me to the surface?

He rejected her idea immediately.
No.
You will help rescue the cubs then I will take you to the surface.

It was a risk. He could be lying
about knowing the way. There was no way to know for sure without helping him.

“Which one do you think is real?”
Lucius Two asked.

Huh? Tate had forgotten what they’d
been talking about while trying to strike a deal with Night. Probably not the
best idea in a dangerous situation like this one.

The confusion must have shown on
her face because he elaborated. “Who is the real Night Lord?”

Tate pondered the question as she
circled the room again. What answer was the least likely to get her noticed?
She wondered if it was a question they posed to all of their “guests.”

“Does it really matter which of you
is the real one?” she finally asked.

“You are dodging the question,”
Lucius One said.

“Am I?”

“Yes,” Lucius Two said tilting his
head. He examined her with a curious expression as if she was a pet who’d done
something unexpected.

“I don’t think so,” Tate
contradicted. She stopped two steps from Sam and changed directions to the
cage, almost bumping into Blade in the process. “I imagine that you both are
the real Lucius. Or close enough that it doesn’t matter.”

She examined the hinges and even
chanced touching one. A spark snapped at her fingers, and she barely controlled
her yelp. She rubbed tingling fingers against her pants as she turned back to
the two Lucius’ and sauntered to stand next to the sly man again.

‘That’s a cop out,” Lucius Two
said, sounding slightly disappointed.

Tate snorted but didn’t reply. No
matter what her answer was she was going to be wrong, no doubt. Not that it
mattered. She wasn’t here to play guessing games.

She waited patiently for them to
figure out she was done playing this game. The silence built as she casually
glanced around the chamber. All of her moving around had lulled all the guards,
except Blade, into a false sense of security. Though they remained focused on
her they no longer were as on guard as when she’d first entered the room.

“Jost mentioned that about you,”
Lucius Two said. “That you could be stubborn and that when you were done you’d
just refuse to play anymore.”

“Did he?” Tate said trying and
failing to show disinterest.

“He’s the one who pointed you out
to us actually,” Lucius Two said. He cocked his head. “I hope you don’t think
he was betraying you. He probably wanted you to work for us as a friend.”

“I doubt that. Friends don’t kidnap
each other.”

“Isn’t that how you came to be on
the same ship?” Lucius One asked. He laced his fingers together as he trained
dark eyes on Tate. “By being forced onto it?”

Tate’s breath caught. There was no
way he could have known that little tidbit unless someone had told him. Tate
considered her secrets hers. Sharing them would have been a deep violation of
trust, one that would be difficult to forgive for any reason. On the other
hand, Jost wouldn’t have known she’d be leaving the crew here.

Seeing he had made his point,
Lucius Two continued. “We brought you here because you interfered with an
operation of ours.”

He paused to see if Tate had any
comments. She gestured for him to continue. “You took a hair ornament from one
of our operatives.”

“You mean pick pocket.”

“It is extremely important that it
be returned to us.” He smiled politely at her. “So we’d like it back.”

Tate didn’t respond. She was quite
simply, stunned. This entire debacle was over a hair ornament that she’d
liberated on impulse? She’d been kidnapped, not once but twice, to get back
something that goes in a person’s hair. A female’s hair, which none of these
men were. Tate didn’t have the words to express her feelings and just shook her
head dumbly.

“Are you kidding me?” she finally
shouted. The guards reacted reflexively at her outburst, putting a hand on
their weapons. “All of this.” She gestured wildly, hitting Sam by accident. She
steadied him before continuing. “All of it has been over a hair ornament? One
that I don’t even have because I gave it back to its owner. Who, by the way,
was sitting with you at a table right before you knocked me out.”

It was unbelievable.

“It was a fake,” Lucius One said
calmly, not phased in the slightest by her outburst. Lucius Two chuckled
slightly to himself. The guards looked a little rattled.

“What was a fake?” Tate snarled.

“The hair ornament you returned.
Our boy stole the real one, which you took from him. The one the lady has now
is a fake. That leaves you with the real one,” he reasoned. “We need it back.”

“Or she got wise and decided not to
wear her jewels around the city anymore and instead is using a fake one.”

“She’s not,” Lucius One said
implacably. “You will give us the real one.”

“I don’t have the real one,” Tate
snarled back.

“Look little bird,” Lucius Two
interrupted, holding up a hand to forestall her next words. “Give us what we
want, and we’ll let you go. We won’t even hold this against you in future dealings.
Don’t give this bauble to us, and your life will get very uncomfortable.”

“Future?” Tate asked. “Once I get
out of here, I hope never to see any of you again.”

“That’s going to be hard since, as
a thief, you fall under our domain,” Lucius Two explained.

“Yeah, but I’m not a thief. I lived
with thieves for a while and might have helped them a time or two, but that
does not mean I have any intention of continuing in that tradition.”

Lucius Two cast a knowing smile
Tate’s way. He played the charmer in the Lucius duo. Tate would bet that when
Lucius One’s intimidation tactics didn’t work, Lucius Two got it done with a
bit of honey. “In the course of a day you have stolen from one of our master
pick pockets and not even moments earlier you stole Sam’s necklace. Nice job by
the way. If that doesn’t make you a thief, I don’t know what does.”

“What? My necklace?” Sly man’s
voice was high and panicky as he ran his hands over his shirt searching for his
necklace.

This wasn’t exactly what Tate had
planned by taking the controller. She’d hoped to be subtle and not have anybody
notice until she was gone.

Not finding the controller in his
clothes, Sam turned to Tate in a rage. “Where is it?” he hissed, advancing on
her, his face flushing redder and redder. His beefy hands curled into fists and
he swung at her. Tate dodged back and almost ran into the cage. She sidestepped
to stand next to it. Night growled threateningly at the man. If a six foot
predator with teeth like Night’s had growled at Tate like that she would have
made sure there was a considerable distance between her and it. Maybe Sam was
just braver than her.

“I have an alternate deal to
propose,” Tate said, keeping an eye on Sam.

“Oh?” Lucius One folded his
eyebrows and leaned back in his chair.

“How about I expose a plot to kill
you, both of you, and save your lives at the same time?” she said hopefully.
She waited a beat for confusion to wash across their faces and a horrified
understanding to register on Sam’s. “Now Night,” she shouted.

The feline burst out of his cage in
a rain of sparks as the door literally flew off its hinges, landing on Blade.
Before the shock of his escape could die down, Tate was out the door running
down a corridor. Night hard on her heals. Not knowing where she was going she
took random turns in an effort to lose their pursuers. A left then a right and
a left again.

Night bounded in front of her,
running on all fours, his stride eating up the distance. Tate followed close
behind, her lungs burning. Sounds from Lucius’ men pursued them but died down a
little more with every twist of the tunnel they ran down.

They were free but lost. Tate
really hoped Night had been telling the truth when he said he knew the way out.

Tate stumbled to a halt, not caring
if Night left her behind. It had been twenty minutes since they last heard any
sign of their pursuers, and she didn’t think she could run another step. She
was exhausted, her feet hurt, and she really wanted out of this gods-be-damned
maze.

If she wasn’t very much mistaken,
they’d been traveling down for the last few minutes, the last direction she
wanted to be heading. Tate pressed a hand into her side as she panted. Instead
of slowing down, her breathing sped up until she gasped for air, as she tried
not to think about being lost down here for days. Panic fed into more panic
until it seemed she wasn’t getting any air.

Whiskers touched her face. Tate
opened her eyes and looked into Night’s concerned face. How embarrassing to
have someone witness her weakness.

He curled up beside her and lowered
his head into her lap.
Just breathe. It’ll be all right.

His chest vibrated against her as
his purrs filled the corridor. It was soothing against Tate’s frayed nerves.
She closed her eyes and concentrated on the sound, forgetting the rest.
Gradually, her breathing slowed, timing itself to the hand petting his fur, and
the tension washed away from her muscles.

They rested. Tate was unwilling to
move and spoil the first instance of total peace she’d had since descending
that first set of stairs.

She hadn’t thought it would be this
difficult to make a go of it on her own. Being on a ship had been easy, like
being on an extended holiday with no rules and no one to tell you no. Danny and
Riply always had her back. Before the crew had become so hostile, ship life had
been free of this constant fear.

Here, she kept finding her way from
dangerous situation to even more dangerous situations. There was no end, and
unless she wanted to start killing indiscriminately, the people she angered
simply grew.

To cap things off, she was lost
underground pursued by men who thought she had something of theirs. It was her
worst fear realized.

This place scares you.
Night’s
voice was stilted and awkward, echoing Tate’s unspoken thoughts.

“Yes,” Tate said, her throat
clogged with unshed tears.

Many hairless ones have trouble
when they become lost down here,
he said seriously.

Tate laughed. “It’s not my first
time being lost in a maze like this. Though, that maze is thousands of miles
from here.” She looked around and shivered. “I never thought I’d be in this
situation again.”