Night Season (8 page)

She shoved his hand away. "I'm not in the mood for seduction."

"Cynna! I'm shocked by such blatant untruth. Your scent says otherwise."

"Well, quit sniffing me! It's annoying for you to—to—"

"Know things you'd rather I didn't?" He captured her hand and drew circles in her palm with his thumb.

"Draw stupid conclusions! There's a difference between sex and seduction, as any man of your age and experience ought to… That reminds me. How old are you, anyway?"

He shook his head, surprised. "Why is it so easy to underestimate you? You're right—seduction's as much mental play as it is physical. If you don't want your mind played with right now, why don't I just toy with your fabulous body?"

In the dimness he caught the shape of her smile in the curve of her cheek—and the reluctance of it in the tone of her voice. "How about you quit playing altogether and answer my question."

"I'll turn sixty next month."

"Jesus!"

Anxiety pinched, an irritation without focus. Why should he worry about Cynna's reaction? True, Lily had had a hard time accepting Rule's real age, but his situation was hardly the same. Unlike Rule, he wasn't dealing with a bonded mate… just with the mother-to-be of his child.

Anxiety had teeth, yes, it did. "You knew I'm older than I look."

"Yeah, but…" She snorted. "A sixty-year-old stripper! If your groupies only knew."

"I don't have groupies." He touched the corner of her mouth, tucked up at the moment in amusement. "You have to be famous to have groupies. I may dance in a mildly notorious club… or did. I think Max has fired me again. But most people have never heard of me."

"Quit it. You may not be famous, but…" Her voice dropped back to a whisper. "What was that?"

The thud had apparently been loud enough for human ears. "Mika, I believe. He's been redecorating."

Her brows twitched into a frown. "
Not
the park policeman you heard earlier, then. If you did hear him."

"Oh, I did. Perhaps I forgot to mention that he went the other way." Cullen dropped a hit-and-run-kiss on her scowl and jumped back, grinning, before her fist could connect.

She heaved a sigh. "You're pissing me off, Seabourne. How can a man on crutches move that fast?"

"Shall I drop the other one and let you have another swing?"

She tilted her head, considering it. She was definitely considering it. Lord, but the woman delighted him almost as often as she annoyed him.

"I guess not," she said at last. "I'd feel guilty if I hit you and even madder if I didn't. So you haven't learned anything yet about the shield spell?"

He knew what she was doing—distracting him with talk of spellcraft. It would probably work. He retrieved his crutch and swung around to resume their trek through the trees, going slowly so she could keep up. "Very little, aside from the physical components. I do know it's a drawn spell."

"Right up my alley."

He grinned at the casualness of her voice. "You'll get a look at it. I'm not so egotistical I can't ask for expert advice. Speaking of which, I've suggested that Ruben bring in Sherry and her bunch."
Suggested
might be a euphemism, but he thought
blackmailed
would overstate the case.
Required
! Yes. that's the word he wanted. He'd required Ruben to ask Sherry and her coven to perform a particular task. "They'll need your snazzy new coat."

"Are you talking about Sherry O'Shaunessy?" Disbelief coated Cynna's voice. Sherry O'Shaunessy was high priestess of a very old, very powerful Wiccan coven who occasionally consulted for the Unit. "I can't believe you called them in. You don't play well with others, and you don't like sharing your toys. And what would they need my coat for?"

"It isn't my spell to share or not, is it? I'm not paying for it. But Sherry and company aren't going to be learning the shield spell, at least not right away. They'll be casting personal protection spells. Yours goes on your coat."

"I've got a protection spell."

"Speaking of egotistical…"

"All right, all right. Sherry's coven can undoubtedly put lots more zip into spells than I can on my own. But why? Isn't the whole point of a shield spell protection?"

"You're assuming it's really a shield spell."

"I'm not assuming anything, but odds are that it is. And you'll be able to tell once you see it, right?"

"It's a drawn spell," Cullen reminded her. "Will a spell from another realm use glyphs we're familiar with?"

"Some of them, but… okay, okay, you're right. We can't expect to recognize all of the graphic components, so you'll be relying on the gnome's explanations of the glyphs. Which may not be complete, and could be nonsense." She brooded on that a moment. "Still, the gnome and the others will be in the circle with us, and I'm guessing they don't want to go
boom
."

"I doubt the spell causes physical harm. But think how handy it would be for a diplomat negotiating trade agreements to cast a good persuasion spell."

She did, apparently, think that over, keeping silent as they emerged from the softness of leaves and loam onto a paved path. There was plenty of room to walk side by side here; the trees lining the path had been knocked down and shoved into untidy piles.

"What in the world—?" Cynna stopped, looking at the woody debris.

"Mika likes this path."

"I guess he needs a little more room than we do."

"A little. Come on."

They started down the path. Cullen missed having her hand snugged in his jeans, but she must have been able to see well enough, now that they weren't under the trees.

For him, the world was drawn in crisp grays with pools of ebony shadows. What did it look like to her? His first Change was so many miles and years and heartaches ago… he couldn't call up a clear sensory memory of how the night looked back when he'd had merely human eyes.

"Okay," Cynna said at last, "here's how I see it. If the councilor tries something sneaky, you won't be affected because of your personal shields, but he doesn't know about them. But Lily wouldn't be affected either, and she'd probably be able to tell at a touch if any of us were. And the Edge people do know that. They know she's a touch sensitive."

"Which makes it unlikely they'll pull something, but not impossible."

"Oh, come on. I'm all for taking reasonable precautions, but—"

"Dammit, Cynna!" Suddenly angry, he spun. "Reasonable precautions? You're carrying my child. Have you forgotten that already?"

Her mouth opened—then closed again.

Temper sighed into exasperation. "You did. You really did forget."

"Look, as far as you're concerned, I've been pregnant for four and a half weeks. But for me, it's been…" She glanced at her wrist, then pushed a button on her watch. The dial lit up. "Nine hours and thirty-one minutes."

If she hadn't spent those past four and a half weeks denying reality… Cullen scrubbed his head with one hand and reached for the slippery reins on his temper. "I get it. You need time to adjust. While you're adjusting—"

You didn't ask if you could bring someone with you.

The voice was deep, disapproving, and oddly resonant, considering it happened inside his head. Inside Cynna's head, too, judging by her expression. "Hi, Mika," Cullen said. "The human with me is Cynna Weaver. I told you about her. We have a bargain we'd like to offer you."

"You can hear him?" Cynna asked. "You've dropped your shield?"

"Shields, plural, remember? One of them's specifically for mindspeech. I usually leave that one down." He still couldn't separate the other shields enough to use them individually. Shit, he wasn't even sure how many there were. But the mindspeech shield was the topmost, the easiest to peel away from the rest. Once he caught the knack, opening it was like opening the gate to the front yard while keeping the house locked.
Your timing is lousy, Mika
.

She is the womb-rich one?

Dragons could mindspeak one person, two, or everyone in their vicinity. This time the mental voice felt as if Mika stood at Cullen's shoulder, addressing him privately. The thoughts were, as always, clear and crisp as a knife blade.

Yes
, he answered silently.

You may approach, Cynna Weaver. I have not yet met a gravid human person.

Cynna rolled her eyes. "Great. I'm a curiosity."

"Better than being a snack."
I've something to say to Cynna privately
, Cullen told Mika, and mentally closed the gate to his front yard. He grabbed Cynna's hand. "Two things I want to say before we join Mika. Don't look him in the eye—"

"I
know
that." She tugged at her hand. He didn't let go. "And there's one more option I want you to consider for our child." She stilled, watching him warily. "You could marry me."

CHAPTER EIGHT

A breeze tickled the naked trees, making limbs and twigs rub together like sandpaper fingers. The same breeze plucked at Cynna's hair and chilled her cheeks. Overhead, the sky was a watercolor smear, black with charcoal streaks where the city bounced its lights off ribbons of cloud. A few stars poked through the haze.

It wasn't enough. She couldn't see Cullen's expression, only the place where darkness paled into the smudged oblong of his face. "You proposed," she said blankly. "You just proposed to me."

"Yes."

"Marriage."

"It's a reasonable solution."

"Lupi don't many Ever."

"Oh, that's right. Thanks for reminding me. I'd forgotten."

Cullen's sarcasm slid right past in the total strangeness of the moment. She didn't know how she felt… yes, she did. She was happy. She didn't know why, but his proposal—pointless and mysterious as it was—made her happy.

Which made her as foolish as him, but who cared? Cynna smiled at their mutual folly and patted his arm. "I'm not going to marry you."

He frowned at her hand as if he'd never seen it before. "Why not? It's a tidy solution. We're friends, we enjoy each other sexually, and we've made a child. Marriage gives us equal rights to that child, and if… well, Lady forbid it should happen, but if you were injured, I'd have rights there, too."

She hooted with laughter. "You mean, if I end up brain-dead you can tell them to keep me on life support until the baby's born? Now, there's an appealing notion!" She shook her head. "Wow. My first proposal. Likely my last, too, but I never thought I'd have even one. Thank you."

He tilted his head up and sighed loudly. "Why do I get the feeling you're not taking the idea seriously?"

"Because you're deranged, not stupid. Are you wanting to cleave only to me?" She chuckled. "C'mon. Let's go see a dragon."

He turned away without another word and swung himself along the path.

She followed. It was lighter out from under the trees, and the concrete path was pale, making it easy to see where her feet belonged. As she walked, she wondered if she'd pissed him off by laughing.

Probably not. Cullen's temper was not subtle. When he got mad, you didn't have to guess about it.

She'd confused him, maybe. She hadn't reacted the way he'd expected. But what had he expected? Some women dreamed of wedding dresses and tossed bouquets from the moment they held their first Barbie. Cynna's first Barbie had learned kung fu and either beat up or protected the other Barbies.

She could have sworn Cullen knew her well enough to understand that she was not marriage material. This whole baby business must have unseated his reason… a comforting notion. Nice to think she wasn't the only crazy one.

Not that she was so insane she'd consider marrying a lupus. Cynna might not know much about marriage—or any long-term relationship, really, since hers tended to fizzle out pretty fast. But surely fidelity was nonnegotiable, and Rule was the only faithful lupus on the planet.

She wasn't cruel enough to marry a lupus, either. She didn't know what the other lupi would do to one who violated one of their most deeply held beliefs, but it wouldn't be pretty.

Maybe Nokolai would kick Cullen out if he went nuts and got married. God! Pain pinched at her just thinking about that. She didn't know what it meant to a lupus to be clanless—not in her gut, anyway, not the way another lupus would. But she knew it was the worst fate they could imagine.

Cullen had lived clanless for most of his life. He'd been Nokolai only a few months… three, she thought, maybe four. He'd been adopted into the clan shortly before they met.

What was he thinking? How could he risk losing that?

Maybe he wasn't. What did she know? And dammit, she couldn't ask. He'd tell her what he wanted to—probably not lying outright, but he enjoyed stirring the truth into a shape that suited him.

Besides, she didn't want him to think she was considering his proposal. She could ask Rule what sins got a lupus booted from his clan. She'd need to keep it hypothetical. If she…

Some stupid piece of nature tripped her while she wasn't watching. Cynna barely kept herself from taking a header. "Dammit!"

Cullen stopped, turned. "Oh, for crying out loud! Here." He made a gesture as if he were tossing something in the air—and a ball of light bounced into being, then hung there between them, glowing like an enormous firefly.

She stared. "Mage light. You know how to make mage light."

"Mika showed me. It was embarrassing, really. Turns out it's pathetically easy. Doesn't take more than a smidge of power."

"And you let me stumble along in the dark all this time."

"You had your hand in my pants at first. I liked that."

"You—"

Tell your mate to open his mindspeech shield so I can speak to him.

Cynna jumped—and stared. A ribbon of darkness peeled itself off from the shadows up ahead and padded toward them along the path. A very large ribbon. With eyes. The eyes were silvery gray; the pupils, slitted. They were about ten feet off the ground.

The whiff of fear didn't surprise her. How could anyone see a dragon without tasting fear? "Ah—Cullen? Mika wants to talk to you."

Cullen put his hands on his hips and frowned at the approaching dragon. "What?"

Your female wishes to attack you, but believes an attack would be unfair. Explain this.

"Quit poking your nose in our brains," he snapped.

My nose is not… ah. You employed metaphor. I do not need to poke my nose anywhere. Her thoughts are loud. Muddy, but loud.

Cynna had seen a dragon up close and personal before. She'd even ridden one on their mad flight from hell. That didn't detract from her fear, or her fascination. As Mika drew closer, the two feelings melded into awe.

The ball of mage light wasn't as bright as a flashlight would have been. She caught hints and shadows of the long body with its sidewise sway; the great wings were folded into a dark hump riding his back. His neck was long and muscular and as flexible as a snake. He held his head roughly level with his shoulders.

That head was triangular, the snout almost delicate. Mobile frills like those depicted by Chinese artists decorated his eye ridges, ear holes, and jaw like black lace. In the soft glow of the mage light, the scales on his face shifted through a dozen shades of red.

When Mika stopped, his lipstick-colored head was about five feet away—and he was looking straight at her. It took effort to avoid looking directly in the large, moist eyes with their double lids.
Fairness puzzles me. Humans think of it often, but they change the meaning of the word with nearly every thought. Sometimes "unfair" means wrong. Sometimes it mean unwelcome. Fair can mean receiving what is agreed upon, but fairness is at issue even when there are no agreements. Such as now. You had not agreed to avoid attacking your mate, had you
?

"Uh—no. But he's lacking a foot. It isn't fair to attack someone who's impaired."

One-footed or Wo, he is your superior, physically. He would win any fight between you.

"No, he wouldn't, because he wouldn't hit back. That makes it unfair to hit him in the first place."

The great eyes blinked slowly.
Do humans consider it unfair to attack one who refuses to fight back? That is insane. In such a case, only those who refused to fight would win fights, which is clearly not true
.

"I guess…" Moral questions were not her strong point. What would Father Michaels say? "I guess fairness is like justice, but more personal. People have different ideas about what's fair and what isn't, because it's personal."

Fairness is a subjective construction of justice?

"No," Cullen said suddenly. "Fairness is moral equity or balance. Unfairness is moral debt. That's why it seems subjective—morality's a slippery bugger. A child might think it's unfair that he has to do his homework when his friends are outside playing. He doesn't yet understand the morality of discipline. And, of course, some adults have no more moral understanding than a child. They'll cry 'unfair' when they don't get what they want."

Ah.

Silence fell, both mental and physical. The dragon neither moved nor blinked. Cynna could smell him faintly—a scent like cinnamon, hot sand, and musk. She fancied she could even feel the warmth of his breath. She thought of Dis and demons and a terrible, wondrous flight on dragonback. Her heart beat quickly.

At last Mika looked at Cullen.
During one conversation, we agreed that morality is a being's mental construction of right behavior
.

"We did."

Human morality is a morass of contradictions with teeth ever pointed inward, gnawing at itself. Debt, however, is a reasonable concept, one shared by most sentients. I shall consider fairness in that light. Your mate believed she would incur a debt if she knocked you to the ground, so she chose not to follow her wishes.

"That's pretty much it," Cullen agreed, slanting Cynna an amused glance.

Given the human preoccupation with and confusion over morality, fairness must be a complex construction, subjectively variable. It is susceptible to bargaining?

"To some extent."

What bargain do you wish to offer me ?

"Three persons from Edge have arrived here, and—"

Edge ? Where is

—
ah, I see. You refer to Dsighliai
.

"Perhaps I do," Cullen said dryly. "I think Edge is the English translation."

Your mate is thinking she will go to Edge. How would she do this?

"They want Cynna to return with them, and apparently know how to open a gate to do that. Are you familiar with Edge?"

Do you bargain for knowledge ?

"Maybe I will, later. Right now…" He glanced at Cynna. "The Edge people want to erect a shield before we discuss terms. One of them, a gnome, says he knows a shield spell that he can't perform himself, so I'm supposed to help. I'm gathering components tonight. You've shed some scales since you arrived."

Silence. It wasn't promising.

Cullen persevered. "Cynna is a strong Finder. She could locate any scales you've shed and we could gather them for you. In exchange for that service, you could give us a percentage—say half—of the scales she—"

In a flash, the great body lifted impossibly—fifteen feet, twenty, more—with the wings extended, the forelegs off the ground and that snake neck arched. Mika's mouth gaped in a hissing display of teeth.
My scales are mine!

Cynna damned near peed herself.

Cullen looked up. "Yes, they are yours."

Mika didn't return to four legs, but he did stop hissing.
They can't be not-mine. What you propose has no meaning
.

"Humans—and lupi—barter what's ours in order to acquire something we want. I'm talking about an exchange."

What is mine is always mine.

The mental voice was utterly clear, utterly implacable. Mika wasn't interested in a philosophical discussion of the meaning of ownership. Cynna looked at Cullen. He frowned, gave a little shake of his head.

He didn't know how to get past dragon possessiveness, either. Was there a way to get the use of a scale without… "Copyright," she said suddenly.

"What?"

"Copyright law. That's the model that fits." She looked up and up at the dragon towering over them. "Humans don't feel the way you do about objects, Mika, but we do feel that way about some things. Things we create, especially. You, uh—do you know about books and plays?"

Of course

. Lots of disdain in that thought.

"Maybe you've heard of Shakespeare."

One of your story makers.

"Yes, well, we still talk about Shakespeare's plays. Even though the man's been dead for a few centuries, we speak of those plays as his because he made them—just like you made your scales. Yet people have the use of his plays. They can perform them, talk about them, quote from them. Books are like that, too. And paintings. Creators own what they create, and that can't be changed, but creators can grant rights to others in exchange for something they want."

Slowly Mika descended. When he had his feet back on the ground, he said,
What do you mean by lights
?

"We want you to allow us to use a scale in a spell. The scale is still yours, but we'd get the right to use it. In return, I'd Find all your missing scales and return them to you."

You can Find them? All of them?

"I can, if they're within a hundred miles of me. I guess we should make that one of the conditions. I can't Find objects farther away than that."

The long body settled further. Mika reclined, his forelegs tucked up, the enormous tail wrapping itself around him like a cat curling up for a nap.
We will discuss this
.

Two hours and forty minutes later, Cynna's eyes were teary from the wind. Her face felt frozen, her fingers were numb with cold, and her thighs ached from gripping tightly to the heated body between her legs.

The rest of her was toasty warm as Mika settled to the ground once more. Leather blocked wind, and both the dragon she'd ridden and the man who rode behind her were warm.

God, but she loved dragonflight.

Cullen slid down first, which turned out to be a good idea. When she followed, her legs buckled the second her feet touched the ground. He caught her easily and grinned, his eyes lit with exhilaration to match hers. "Not used to riding?"

"Not this kind." Cynna grinned back, punchy with exhaustion but still soaring. "You do know how to show a girl a good time."

She'd Found seven scales. They'd brought back only five because two of them, it seemed, were no longer Mika's. They were very small, the size of her pinky nail. Cullen said the magic had drained out of them.

The other five were larger, including one as big as her hand with the fingers spread. That's the one Cullen wanted—it still held plenty of magic. Of those five, two had come off there in the park—those had been easy to recover. The other three must have fallen off while Mika was in flight. They found one on a quiet street, another on the roof of an office building. The last one… well, that guy really should have given it to them when they told him the dragon wanted his scale back. It wasn't their fault he didn't know better than to look into a dragon's eyes, and one brief spot of ensorcellment wouldn't hurt him any.