Chapter Two #3
“Yeah, but the First Daddy himself admitted that he wasn’t very good at glamours,” Jim answered, pulling back its doggy lips to smile at the camera. “Right, May? He said that when you guys were in the Duat, right?”
“He did say that, yes,” May said slowly, her gaze flickering off to the distance. “But no one other than Bael recognized him, so I don’t know how valid his point was. Certainly Gabriel and I didn’t see through the glamour.”
“He mentioned something about seeking an artificer,” I said slowly, biting my lower lip (a bad habit of which I’ve tried hard to break myself, but it tends to come back in times of stress).
“That would work, except there aren’t any around. At least not any that you can find. They hide a lot, what with people torturing their families in order to get them to make the super-duper glamours,” Jim said, leaning on Aisling’s leg. Automatically, she patted it and gave its ears a fondle.
“You mean if the First Dragon had a stronger glamour, he could get inside the Asile? How would that help Yrian escape?” I asked.
Elle wrote quickly on her notepad and slid it toward me again. Glamour for your stepson, too!
That had me raising my eyebrows, but before I could comment, Aisling said, “Wait ... can we glamour Yrian? Could the First Dragon take a glamour in for him? Can you take something magical like that inside? I imagine the wards would prohibit that entering the building.”
“Hmm,” Ysolde said, scooting down the couch when her son, now dual wielding both swords, attacked the stuffed dragon. “That’s a really good question.”
“And also a good suggestion by Jim,” May said, nodding as she made a note. “So far, I have on my list locate an artificer, determine whether or not someone could smuggle a powerful glamour into the Asile, and ... what else?”
“Ways to get Yrian out if the glamours are a moot point,” I said after a few seconds’ thought.
“I think we’ll have to research glamours a bit more,” Aisling said, her brow furrowed as she looked at nothing in particular. “In order to understand their scope. Hmm. I’ll definitely pick Drake’s brain on the flight to Paris.”
“I’ll do the same with Baltic, although I assume if he had any good ideas, he would have talked to the First Dragon about them.
Oh! That reminds me—did everyone get an invitation from Allie to visit her and Christian at their castle?
Baltic is prone to refusing such an offer, but I pointed out to him that the reciprocal visit is coming up, and if we were there, the kids would be off dancing at the music festival. ”
“Reciprocal visit?” I asked, confused.
“Karma’s foster daughter, Pixie, is coming to stay with us for ten days while Karma and Adam go to Hungary for the trial of a spirit who attacked Karma,” Ysolde answered, shooing her son off the couch when he started jumping up and down on it while waving his swords.
“Lovey, why don’t you go out to the garden and beat up the imps. ”
Elle looked horrified as the child yelled with happiness and dashed off with a thundering noise more appropriate to a small herd of water buffalo. They let their kids kill imps? she wrote.
“Do you have imps?” I asked, equally startled by Ysolde’s suggestion.
“Not in the least, no,” she said complacently, smiling at us. “But Anduin doesn’t know that. Will you be attending the gathering at Christian’s, Charity?”
“I don’t think so,” I said, glancing at my phone, quickly finding the texted invitation.
“Much as it pains me as a siren to miss a musical event—it’s practically against the Siren’s Code to forgo such things—the First Dragon is very focused on the problem with Yrian, as well as something going on with one of his brother’s grandkids, so I doubt if we’ll have time.
But I will mention it to him and see what he thinks.
What about you two?” I asked May and Aisling.
“Oh, we’re going,” Aisling said firmly, her nostrils flaring slightly as she shot a pointed look at the door that I assumed was meant for her wyvern.
“Drake doesn’t think it’s important we mingle with vampires, but our kids and Allie’s are close enough in age that it will be good for them to play together. ”
“Drake’s a bit gaga when it comes to the spawn having contact with non-dragon kids,” Jim said before rolling over onto its back. “He wouldn’t even let Ash put them into a school with other immortal kids because he said they could be bad influences. Ha! Like the spawn could be worse than they are?”
“I am sitting right here,” Aisling said, glaring at the demon. “And if you don’t want to find yourself confined to the Akasha for the three days we are at Allie and Christian’s home, then I’d advise you to rethink your criticism of my children.”
Jim pursed its lips.
“Fine,” Aisling allowed, and gave in to its obvious demands for belly scratches. “They are hellions, but they’re our hellions, and we choose to admire their many good qualities and ignore the ones that sent their own grandmother running after just half an hour’s visit.”
May and Ysolde both laughed aloud. I had heard tales of the green wyvern’s mother, but decided that wasn’t my story to tell Elle.
“We’re going, as well. Gabriel thinks it’s important for us to help the vamps.”
“Why?” I asked May, unable to see a connection between the dragons and Dark Ones.
“I don’t know,” she said, giving a shrug. “To be honest, I don’t think he knows, either. He says it’s just a feeling he has, and he’s obligated to act on it. So we’ll be in Europe next week, too. I guess we can meet then and call you, Charity, with any results to our inquiries.”
That course of action met everyone’s approval, and we signed off.
“That was fascinating,” Elle said as we left the room. “I had no ideas that all this intermingling went on between the dragons and other beings. You’ll let me know what happens with the son, yes?”
“You’re welcome to stay for as long as you like,” I told her, catching sight of Avval as he headed in from the garden, his cell phone in hand.
“I know, and I will return, assuming you want me to visit you another time, but I’m as recovered as I ever will be from that rat bastard ex cheating on me with his nineteen-year-old student, and it’s time I get back to my plants.
I’ll take you up on your offer to run me to a portal, though,” she added as Avval entered the house, his gaze catching mine.
He gave her a long look, no doubt ascertaining why she felt the need to cut short what I had hoped would be an extended visit, and was obviously reassured that it was her own choice, because he just nodded. “My steward will see to your arrival at your home in ...”
“San Francisco. Thank you. Speaking of that, I’d better get my packing done so I can zip out of here after dinner, if that’s OK with you two.”
I wanted to protest, but bit it back and slapped a smile on my face before giving her a hug. “I’ll be up to help you pack in a minute, OK?”
She trotted up the stairs with mild protests that she wouldn’t bother me, but I ignored those.
Avval watched me closely for a moment before taking my chin in his fingers, tipping my head back to really study my face.
It wasn’t something I tolerated with anyone but him, and that was only because I could see the love for me shining in his soul.
“You will miss your friend. You are lonely?”
“No,” I said quickly, turning my head slightly so I could kiss his palm. “Not when you’re here. You know I’m an introvert by nature.”
“I know this,” he agreed, sliding his hand around me, and escorted me up the stairs. “But this loneliness I sense in you disturbs me. We will address it once I have retrieved Yrian from the deranged archimage. What did the mates suggest?”
I told him. He thought for a few seconds, then nodded.
“I have heard from the former Sovereign,” he said, speaking of the woman who was part of a team that had run the Court of Divine Blood.
“She said that the Interweb location where she purchased her glamours has disappeared. I do not understand how something that didn’t physically exist could cease doing so, but I do not wish to sit through another lecture from Stewart about virtual. ”
I was about to ask what virtual aspect he was confused over, but decided that was a discussion for another day.
Stewart was an excellent steward, having served with an Irish demigod for many centuries before the First Dragon hustled him over to work for us, but even he had limits, and sadly, although the First Dragon was superior in many ways, his grasp on all things Internet wasn’t particularly strong.
It was only since we met that he had taken to using a cell phone, since I’d asked him to keep in touch when he was away doing First Dragon things.
“Internet, my love, and that’s a shame about the glamour website.
I’m pinning my hopes on the mates’ collective to locate one. ”
He smiled at me and I wanted to simultaneously kiss the breath off his lips and have my womanly way upon him.
“Two days,” I told him when his eyes did the molten thing again, no doubt in response to my body’s obvious desire to seduce him. “And then, hoo baby, you’re mine.”
His slow answering smile was everything I wanted, and then some.