Chapter Seven

Samael stood before the massive, gilded mirror, currently reflecting his and Meira’s forms in her bedroom in the gargoyle castle. “Are you certain of this?”

In the reflection, he slid his gaze to the woman standing beside him. The woman who had snored softly in his bed all night. Technically her bed. The woman whose scents of smoke and jasmine lingered on his skin still, leaving him aching and empty.

He’d woken to find her using his chest as a pillow, her bright curls spread across him in soft waves. He couldn’t let himself think about the sweet blush that had stained her cheeks when he’d shifted positions and woken her. Or the way the innocent trust in her eyes darkened to embarrassment, not the wariness he’d expected, as she’d backed away. The ache would only get worse and his dragon louder.

Seven hells, that conversation last night. That kiss. The unexpectedness of it all. Of the way he’d opened up, even a little. But so had she. Of comfort given and taken. But also the frustration with her determination to look at the world—at him—through that innocent prism. Her trust might just get them both killed.

Speaking of which, how Meira had talked him into this latest plan, he wasn’t entirely sure. She’d spent the entire morning on that tablet of hers, pulling up schematics and possible places the real Gorgon might have been taken, he discovered, using coded analytics to determine the most likely places and the highest probability of success to get him out of each.

Then she’d walked him through all of it systematically. The woman truly was an enigma, all logical calculations with her computers, a side of her he was only just now getting to see, but then she led with her heart in every other way. And he’d agreed to her suggested plan. As though he, like the rest of the world, just couldn’t say no to her, and she happily wandered through life with that power in her pocket.

She met his gaze, and something flickered in those ever-changing eyes that he didn’t catch. “With only one exception, no one has ever seen me in the mirrors when I didn’t want them to.”

He knew exactly the exception she was talking about. Him.

I’m the only one to have seen her?

Fuck. One more nail in his coffin, because the longer he spent with this woman, the more a certain knowledge settled deep within his core, bone-deep, soul true. Inside him, his dragon slashed his tail back and forth, impatient for Samael to act on what he knew.

But now was not the time. There might never be a time.

“That wasn’t a slip on your part?” he asked, desperate for any alternate explanation.

“I don’t think so.”

“And you’re sure about this?” he asked again, waving a hand at the mirror.

“I can’t make any guarantees,” she said slowly.

They had already spent a decent portion of the morning debating what their next steps should be. This was the best they could come up with.

They needed help.

“Right. Let’s get it over with.” Just in case, he dropped into a defensive stance, ready to unleash hell if needed. “Go ahead.”

Meira dropped her gaze to Vincent, who was standing between them. “Go find Carrick,” she told the goat.

Samael snorted. “Like he’d understand—”

Vincent trotted out the door.

Meira shot the black dragon shifter a shrug, then focused on what they were about to do. In an instant her fire flared over her body, the residual heat radiating out to him. The image staring back at them changed instantly to that of a different room. An empty room. In rapid succession moving quickly from space to space, Meira searched for her sisters throughout Ben Nevis. It didn’t take long until she found Skylar, but that particular sister was surrounded. She stood in the main training area located in the hangar of the mountain with all her and Ladon’s warriors, running through a series of physical exercises. Maul, lying in the back corner of the room, popped his head up.

“That’s a good sign,” Meira mumbled, more to herself than to him.

Yes, it was. “Skylar hasn’t been ostracized by the Blue Clan yet.”

Even through the wash of flame over her face, he still caught Meira’s sideways glance in the mirror, though she didn’t comment. They couldn’t talk to Skylar with a crowd of witnesses, so Meira continued to change the locations she searched.

“Kasia is not here,” Meira finally acknowledged, disappointment weighing the words. “She must’ve gone back to Store Skagastølstind with Brand. I’m searching for Angelika now.”

Again, the picture changed. Flashing, flashing, flashing. Like strobes. “There. Got her.”

Samael wasn’t sure what Meira had seen in the reflection at that speed. Perhaps she could sense her sister’s presence, because it took another few flashes before the image settled. It showed a smaller bedroom suite, the kind he recognized because he had grown up in a similar setup. Cramped, with fewer amenities and furnishings, meant for the common folk. He and his family had been happy in a suite like that. Right up to the end.

Only this place appeared as though bats have been living in it for decades—dirty and decrepit. He was fairly certain smells didn’t come through the mirrors, but Samael swore the musty scent of bat guano permeated regardless.

An unremembered, unused section of the mountain, perhaps? This was where they had put the wolves? How were those shifters, with their overdeveloped sense of smell, standing to stay there?

“Where’s your sister?”

Before she could answer, Maul suddenly appeared in the bedroom on the other side of the mirror. Samael was well aware of how the hellhound teleported. If he could see it, or knew what was on the other side, he could get there in short hops.

“Wait.” Samael frowned. “He was just in the training room.”

Maul’s head whipped in the direction of the mirror Meira was using. With happy dog sound, he disappeared only to appear just as suddenly in the room with them.

“Oh my gods, Maul,” Meira exclaimed, losing her hold on the mirror to whirl around and face the hellhound. “You can’t be here.”

The massive black dog that reeked of smoke and decay ignored her, instead bounding over, practically knocking Samael out of the way in his eagerness to get to Meira. With a chuckle, she wrapped her arms around the big dog.

“I thought this place was warded?” Samael asked.

Glowing red eyes turned his way, but he couldn’t tell if Maul was glaring at him or just looking in the direction of his voice.

“I guess not from hellhounds.” Her voice sounded from Maul’s opposite side.

Meira peeped at him from under the hound’s neck—the thing was as big as a Clydesdale. Bigger, probably. “Just for a moment,” she seemed to be pleading with him. “He worries about us.”

A hellhound protector. Gargoyles. Wolf shifters. Even rogue dragons. Serefina Amon, the girls’ mother, must have been something.

“Carrick is going to lose his shit,” Samael reminded her. He didn’t also point out that they didn’t have time for another of her strays.

“Right. Okay.” Meira’s hands dug deeper into the dog’s spiky fur for a moment before she stepped away.

“Now Maul,” she said, in a voice that he could tell she was trying to make firm, and adorably failing. “You can’t be here.”

The dog woofed, more of that smoke and rotting scent filling the air. Then Meira shook her head. Maul communicated in telepathic images. What was he showing her?

“I have Samael,” she said, with a nod in his direction. “He’ll keep me safe.”

Her faith set his protective instincts on high for all of two seconds before Maul looked directly at him. Then he showed him a series of images—first of Meira smiling and sweet, and then the tiniest scratch on skin drawing a single drop of blood, and then of Samael lying dead with a big dog bite in his chest.

Samael got the message. “I promise,” he said. “Not even a scratch.”

After a long, piercing stare, Maul turned his head to nudge Meira. She chuckled and then hugged him again. “I’ll be safe, but I’ll feel a lot better if I know you’re watching over my sisters while I’m gone.”

Another soft woof stirred her curls. Then Meira drew away and reignited. A second later, the mirror was showing the training room where Skylar was still working at Ladon’s side. Giving her one last nuzzle, the hellhound disappeared, only to show up back in Ben Nevis.

Meira took a deep breath and glanced his way, giving him an apologetic little shrug. “He must like you.”

After the image of his death by hellhound bite, Samael wasn’t so sure. “What makes you say that?”

“He wouldn’t have left me if he didn’t.”

Oh. The responsibility of her life, her safety, that already rested on his shoulders suddenly lightened in the strangest way. As though Maul’s faith in him only confirmed who he was supposed to be to this woman. Protecting her was not his duty. It was his right.

“Angelika?” Her soft voice broke into his thoughts. She seemed to be asking permission to resume what they’d been doing.

He nodded. What else was he supposed to do?

Immediately the mirror image changed, back to that shabby room. Two people were now inside. Immediately, Samael recognized the bright swath of Angelika’s white hair—no doubt inherited from their white dragon shifter father. Amazing how each of the sisters was so starkly different from the others. He also was familiar with the tall, military-looking fellow who dogged Angelika’s footsteps everywhere she went. Familiar in a way that one warrior sized up another, even if no immediate threat existed.

The man’s name was Jedd, if Samael remembered correctly. “Can he see us—”

Meira opened her mouth to speak but paused and closed it silently. No doubt she had also picked up on her sister’s distress. Angelika, her back to Jedd, pinched her eyes shut as if reaching for peace.

“I asked you a question,” Jedd said. He put a hand on her arm and turned her to face him. “Will you mate me?”

“Holy shit,” Meira exclaimed, then slapped both hands over her mouth.

Samael jerked his gaze from her to the two in the other room, but neither acted as though they’d heard. He wasn’t sure if he was more stunned about that or by the fact that Meira had used a swear word.

Angelika shook her head. “I can’t.” The two simple words were laden with emotion. Guilt or regret, Samael couldn’t tell which, since he didn’t know her beyond her name.

A muscle at the corner of the wolf shifter’s jaw twitched in a steady rhythm. “Because of some warped sense of belonging to those arrogant, asshole fire breathers?”

“To them?” Angelika shook her head, gaze earnest, her usual sunny smile missing. “No. To my sisters? Yes. To my family’s legacy? Yes. To my murdered mother and father? Even more, yes.”

“But you can’t—”

She put a hand out, stopping him, white-blue eyes suddenly sparkling with the kind of optimism he was starting to associate with Meira, though hers was different, more serious. “I can’t offer much, but I know I can make a difference. The gods blessed my mother with four daughters for a reason.”

Jedd grasped her by the shoulders, dark eyes intent and pathetically hopeful. “You can do that as effectively at my side. You feel something for me. I know you do.”

There was no mistaking the sadness in Angelika’s gaze as she lifted her hands to frame his face. “You have become one of the most important people in my life. My best friend.”

“Then why not—”

“Because that’s all I feel for you. Friendship.” Her words were quiet but firm.

Jedd’s hope visibly died a quick, agonizing death. The wolf shifter’s eyes darkened with pain even as his expression contorted with anger, turning ugly. “This isn’t about me. It’s about that dragon shifter. The white captive.”

A jolt of shock ricocheted through Samael. Only one man inside Ben Nevis fit that description. Airk Azdajah. The man who’d come back with Skylar from Everest after she’d escaped. Who’d been caged and held by Pytheios most of his life.

An aura hung about the man, a knife’s edge of danger. Granted, he’d been the son of Meira’s father’s beta, which meant royalty did run through his veins. In fact, other than the phoenix women themselves, he should be the one on the White Clan’s throne by right. That said, Samael didn’t think Airk could ever shift, not after so long without. His animal would go mad, was probably already there. No dragon shifter would follow a man who couldn’t lead them in the sky.

Angelika smiled, kindness and sadness both mingling there, seeming undaunted. “I don’t know what part he has to play yet.”

Jedd paced the room. “I’ve seen the way you watch him. Like you’re studying him. I guess it makes sense in a warped way. Another phoenix mated to another dragon shifter, and four out of six clans with one of the Amon sisters at the helm if you put him on the throne. No way will the other two clans stand against you after that.”

Angelika dropped her hands to her sides, though Samael could see in her expression that she was still hoping Jedd would come to understand. “It’s not about our family ruling all the clans, Jedd. It’s about taking out the man who destroyed things in the first place.”

Jed whirled on her, urgency in the taut line of his shoulders. “That’s not fate. It’s politics and strategy.”

She shook her head.

The wolf shifter studied Angelika’s face, and what he saw there must’ve convinced him. His head dropped forward, a sign of total defeat. If he’d been in his wolf form, he might’ve dropped to his belly, nosing at her ankles.

Then he pulled his lips back, baring his teeth in a wolfy way. “If you think I’m going to stand by and watch you make the biggest mistake of both our lives, then you aren’t the woman I thought you were.”

Jedd prowled from the room, though he closed the door behind him with a quiet click at odds with the anger vibrating around him.

At the sound, Angelika sighed, then slowly lowered herself to sit on the chest at the footboard of the bed. “That could have gone better,” she murmured to herself.

“Angelika,” Meira called softly.

Her sister stilled, obviously listening.

“In the mirror, baby sister.”

Angelika’s head snapped around, and she gasped as she looked directly at them. She jumped to her feet and rushed to the mirror, flattening her hands on the surface. From their side it appeared as though they were talking to her through a sheet of glass, her skin smashing up against it.

“Let me through,” Angelica practically begged, pushing at the reflective surface.

Meira shook her head. “I can’t.”

“Where are you?”

“You know where.”

Samael lifted his eyebrows. So, she had told her sisters where she’d been hiding. Just not Gorgon, her intended mate. What kind of trust did that show? Though, now he knew why. She was protecting the gargoyles. This phoenix apparently couldn’t resist the urge to protect any and everyone around her.

“What do you need?” Angelika asked. The sisters showed no questioning or hesitation with each other. Though, surviving for centuries with only them and their mother, he wasn’t all that surprised.

“Get Skylar and Ladon and bring them back here. I wish Kasia could be here, too, but that would draw too much attention. Meet in thirty minutes.”

Serafina Amon had trained her daughters well. Angelika didn’t quibble or question. She merely hurried out of the room even as Meira shut off her own fire then turned to face him. “That’s my backup. Now for yours.”

This next part was trickier. As part of her analytical walk-through of options, she had convinced him that rather than just his beta being informed, the only way to get his people on their side was to appeal to the entire Black Clan. Two people searching for the king could only get so far.

But if they were going to address everyone, they couldn’t do it from here. Not when they had made a promise to the gargoyles. Especially not after Maul had breached that edict.

“Let’s go.”

Meira’s fire crackled beside him, casting a pleasant glow around the cool castle room. Different from his black fire, which both illuminated a space even as it stole the light directly around it. Would her fire change once she was fully mated to a black dragon?

Again, the mirror in front of them changed, showing a new reflection this time. Samael studied the image, which was warped and curved, as though he was peering through a prism or maybe a crystal ball. The curving made it difficult to see exactly what lay beyond. Blobs of white and green and blue. A house, maybe?

“This might be a tight squeeze,” she warned. “I’d go through one of the bathroom mirrors, but I’m not sure what we’ll find there, so I’m trying something else. I’ll go first.”

“Wait.” Without thinking, Samael shot out a hand and grabbed her arm.

Just as fast he yanked his hand away as realization struck that he was touching her fire. Then he paused, lifting that same hand to hold it in front of his face, watching in silent fascination as the flames he’d taken away with him danced across his skin with no impact. No burning. Then, the tip of one licking red flame turned black, then another, and another, until the fire had become his own.

Samael lowered his hand slowly, his focus moving to the woman standing in front of him, watching in wide-eyed silence.

Her mouth parted, and he startled as it hit him that she knew, too. Or at least suspected.

Meira Amon was his fated mate.

In the worst possible moment, all he wanted to do was ask her if he was right.

“That wasn’t the smartest move,” she murmured.

“I’m well aware.” In more ways than one. More ways than she probably realized herself, which was either a blessing or a curse.

Through sheer will, he tipped his head at the image still displayed in the mirror. “Where are you taking us?”

When they’d discussed this earlier, she’d only said far away. Somewhere in the colonies not close to any dragon settlements. Somewhere safe.

She turned her head to stare at it, too, emotions playing across her features in swift array. He didn’t catch them all, but the one that was unmistakable was an anguish-laden dread.

“Home,” she said softly. And stepped into the mirror.

A dread of his own dropped boulders into Samael’s stomach, trying to drag him down as he watched helplessly from his side. Meira’s form twisted and warped until she appeared to drop out of the other side, but she was tiny from his perspective. From what he could tell, she got to her feet, dusted herself off, then her hand appeared through the center of the image on his side.

“Watch out for the last drop.” Her voice sounded as though she was speaking through water, muffled and slurred. “It’s a doozy.”

She’d doused the flames on that part of her body despite what just happened. He grasped her hand, soft but still warm from her fire against his, and had to fight his mind and the crazy idea looming larger by the second. His dragon side wanted to curl around her. This time, instead of the sensation of walking through water and a doorway, his field of vision shrank and narrowed, like walking through a circular tunnel. Good thing he didn’t suffer from claustrophobia.

“Jump,” her muffled voice commanded.

Into what? All he could see was a smaller bent image of her in a field, blue sky behind her, and blackness around the edges. Nothing.

“Trust me,” she called.

Samael jumped.

The world hurtled toward him, the same way the earth did when he tucked his wings in tight and dropped straight down, rushing up at him with each passing millisecond. His feet hit solid ground and his body hit Meira, tumbling them both to the ground. Samael didn’t have time to flip so that he took the brunt of the impact, but he did manage to get a hand under her head.

The world solidified to the right size half a second later, and he found himself nose to nose with her, gazing into eyes slowly turning whiter.

My mate.

Immediately, his body stirred to the feel of her under him, her soft hair against his hand, her scent filling his lungs.

But gods above, she smelled amazing. “You smell…”

He cut himself off before he could say the wrong thing. Like how she smelled of heaven and ambrosia.

Wariness gazed back at him. “I do?” She wrinkled her nose as he left the sentence hanging.

“Not bad, just…” He stared at her dumbly, even as a voice in the back of his head told him to get up. Get off her. “My mother used to grow vines of jasmine in our cave using a system of trellises and aiming the mirrored lighting at the plants, filling our home with the scent when they bloomed.”

Meira tipped her head, her silky hair winding more around the fingers still cradling the back of her skull. She searched his face and almost seemed to relax beneath him, wariness peeling away, leaving curiosity. “Why?”

Didn’t the woman have any self-preservation instincts? She shouldn’t be lying beneath a dragon. One quickly becoming aroused, his hard length pressing into her belly.

I should stand up. Move away.

He didn’t, and she watched him with that gaze that was a combination of curious and assessing and waited for an answer.

Samael shrugged. “She’d said it reminded her of the family and life she’d willingly left behind.”

“I can’t imagine being a human dragon mate,” she murmured. “To have to leave behind everything you know. Everything you thought you were.”

“For love the fates have bound together since the time of your birth.” He couldn’t help the way his gaze dropped to her lips.

He knew how she tasted now, and the taste was becoming a craving. A fire in his belly.

Again, she wrinkled her nose. “I’ve always wondered if those stories are made up to influence those same human women into believing they have no choice.”

“I believe the bursting-into-fire thing makes them believe that,” he said drily.

“So, you’d have no trouble taking a reluctant mate?”

Was she trying to relay some sort of subtle message? Or was she really lying here beneath him debating this? With Meira, he suspected the latter.

He toyed with the soft strands of her hair, letting the tresses slide through his fingers. “I don’t think it’s like that. I think a dragon shifter’s need to protect his fated mate, at all costs, would keep him from hurting her in any way. It would make him not only want to make her happy… It would be a…compulsion.”

That’s what he’d seen with his own parents. His grandparents, too. Every mated pair in his clan, come to think of it.

It’s what he felt for her.

Meira smiled slowly, though her eyes reflected a sadness that ran as deep and dark as an underground river. She lifted a hand and whispered her fingertips over his jaw, that damn curiosity in her eyes growing, but at the same time, clear to him that she wasn’t really aware of her actions, just following a compulsion. “I hope that’s true. I never got to see it with my own parents.”

The sudden impulse to chase that sadness from Meira’s eyes about blindsided him, and he did his best to take every emotion he was feeling and shove it into a box in his mind.

Now’s not the time, jackass.

Forcing himself to unwind her hair from his fist, he pushed to his feet and offered her a hand, helping her up.

“Where are we again?” She’d said home, but whose? He looked around them at the new location. “And what the hell did we come through?”

Turning, he discovered a silver orb set atop a pedestal. Some sort of seeing-eye object? Perhaps a magical ward?

“We came through lawn art.” Meira’s voice held a not-so-secret laugh.

“Lawn art,” Samael echoed slowly.

A choked sound had him jerking around to find her holding back laughter, a hand covering her mouth. At his raised brows, she lowered her hand to reveal a full grin, and the dimples that had him clenching against the urge to tumble her back under him.

“Lawn art is something humans do in parts of the world. Decorations in their yard. Only I think Mother put it there on purpose—”

The twinkle in her eyes doused like a candle snuffed out by a sudden gust of wind, her smile a falling star, fading away to nothing.

“Oh gods,” she whimpered. “Mama.”

Then she turned away and, almost like a wraith walking a graveyard, pushed through a gate in the metal fencing that appeared to be constructed of some kind of ineffective chain mail, and moved through the tall, spring-green grasses beyond.

Keeping his mouth shut as well as his distance, Samael followed until they reached a spot near a charred tree, the blackened bark reaching into the blue sky in spikes. The ground here was equally green, but beneath, he could see the evidence of fire. He could also detect the distinctive scent on the air, though faint now.

In the middle of that healing scorched earth, a bloom of flowers lay hidden among the taller grasses. Many different kinds. A burst of color, vibrant and glorious.

Meira dropped to her knees, still silent. She sat that way long enough that Samael debated reminding her that she’d given her sister only thirty minutes to meet. Then she reached out and used her hands to dig beneath the flowers, her actions growing more frantic.

“She’s not here,” she said in a voice so low he knew she wasn’t talking to him.

He didn’t have to ask who. Meira had said home, and now he knew what that meant. Her home…with her mother. Their last home. Underlying the smoky scent of fire was a sweeter scent. Kasia smelled of chocolate. Skylar of cinnamon. Meira of jasmine. But here, that layer of ambrosia smelled of honey.

A phoenix had died here.

“She’s not here,” Meira repeated, louder, distress tightening the words.

Samael dropped to a squat beside her. “What do you mean?”

“There should be…more of her. Ashes.” She raised her head, her expression one of such hopelessness, even as her eyes implored him to fix this. “He took her.”

Seven hells. What purpose could Pytheios possibly have with Serefina Amon’s ashes, other than a need to disturb her final rest or hurt her daughters?

Meira was holding herself so carefully still, he worried she might shatter if a strong breeze touched her. The hell with others waiting for them. Unable to stop himself, he pulled her against him, cradling her head. “We’ll find where he has put her. I swear it.”

After a beat, she leaned into him, muscles relaxing. Comfort given and received in a hushed silence. Only the earth made noise—a soft wind stirring the grass to rustle around them, the sweet chirping of birds in a nearby tree. The sunlight wasn’t as intense as it could be where he came from, but his dark hair warmed on his scalp as they sat together.

She stirred against him and pulled back, then laid a hand against his cheek, and Samael’s heart derailed like a train blown off the tracks. “You’re a good man, Samael Veles.”

“We need to work on your sense of self-preservation.”

She moved to place her fingers over his lips, stopping his knee-jerk denial. “You are a good man,” she insisted in a stronger voice. “But don’t make promises you can’t keep. We may never find her.”

With that, she pulled from his grasp and stood—fragile and yet incredibly strong at the same time. Like the flowers over where her mother had passed to the next life.

“Angelika and Skylar will worry if we’re late.” She walked away, back through the gate. Now that he wasn’t looking at it from through the curvature of the lawn ornament orb, he could see clearly a small wooden structure with dirty windows, missing tiles on the roof, and the back screen door off the hinges.

At the back door, she paused and flipped open a small piece of wood in the doorframe. Frowning, Samael watched as she pulled out her tablet and connected it to the socket exposed underneath. Quickly, fingers flying over the screen, she set to work.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

Meira didn’t lift her head or stop what she was doing. “Checking the security system.”

The security? His brows lowered farther. “That’s not like any system I’ve ever seen.”

Her lips tipped in a soft smile even as she continued to peck at the tablet in her hands, concentration focused, utterly in her element. Confident, unhesitating, and utterly in charge. As though he was getting a glimpse of the real Meira. “I installed this custom setup myself. We were pretending to be poor waitresses. We couldn’t have a state-of-the-art system visible—both for the humans and for any supernatural creature that came snooping.”

“How custom?”

She shrugged. “A fully integrated alarm system with video and infrared cameras, motion sensors, footstep detectors, and, instead of a command center, a hidden panel in each room to allow us to monitor and arm the house as needed. Outdoor sensors with a half-mile range. A protective blast film applied to the windows. Keyless biometric authentication both for entry and the system. That kind of thing.”

The way she rattled off the list had him staring.

She glanced up, eyebrows raised. “What?”

“What else do you do with these…skills?”

“Nothing too crazy. Doctored our paperwork to hide our aging. Moved our money around in different accounts.” Her lips twitched. “Mother told me to stay out of anything dragon related, in case they traced it back to me, but I had…monitors on your tech.”

He crossed his arms. “Uh-huh. What’s the shadiest thing you’ve ever done?”

She thought for a minute, brows knit. Then brightened. “I might have sent Pytheios to Antarctica on a wild goose chase for us.”

She paused, her attention pulled back to her device, watching closely as a series of videos danced across the screen. “Oh dear,” she sighed. Then hit another series of keystrokes. “I’m shutting it down now. We won’t need it again.”

So saying, the door sudden clicked, the bolt sliding back. Then her screen went blank. She folded it into its casing and tucked it away in the leg pocket she stored it in. Then let herself into the house.

“This was your home?” he asked as he followed her inside. Then jerked to a halt at the sight that greeted him.

The door led into a small galley kitchen with yellowing linoleum countertops and faded wallpaper sporting what must have once been bright-blue flowers. The place had obviously been ransacked. Broken dishes strewn throughout. Every cabinet and drawer gaping wide-open.

Meira sighed. “Yes. The last one, at least. We lived here a few decades. After pretending to go through school—again.” She made a face. “We all worked as waitresses at a diner not far from here.”

The irony in her voice when it came to schooling wasn’t missed. Repeating basic human schooling must’ve been torture. He didn’t see her handling boredom happily. Quietly, maybe, but definitely not happily.

“This way,” she said.

Indoors, the house was stuffy and warm, with a lack of moving air in an unlived-in, abandoned way. They passed through a small living space with couches that buckled in the center sitting on thick brown carpeting, all also ripped to shreds. Knives, he guessed. Not dragon claws, or the roof would’ve been ripped off.

A small squawk of sound reached his ears. Some kind of rodent in the walls, at a guess. Samael ignored it. They walked down a hallway past a series of smaller bedrooms. Each one he passed sported a single twin-size bed and basic dresser and desk. Nothing more. Once again, these rooms appeared as though a large predator had slammed through, ransacking the place. No doubt in search of any clue as to where the phoenix might have gone.

What would they have thought when they found multiple beds? That more than one phoenix existed at all was nothing short of miraculous, leaving an unending list of unanswered questions when it came to their legend and lore.

Samael paused at one bedroom with what appeared to be computer parts, though no computer. “Was this your room?” he called after Meira’s retreating form.

“Yes,” she answered over her shoulder, not stopping.

“Don’t you want to pack up some clothes or go through drawers for keepsakes?”

Meira paused in a doorway several down. “No. He already took anything of value.”

“He?”

“Pytheios. The video showed him going through the house.” She shrugged, but he got the impression that she was holding herself together by sheer will. “We weren’t allowed keepsakes, anyway.”

Nothing? Not a single thing to remember her life by? Remember her mother by? “And I thought I had a rough childhood,” Samael mumbled to himself.

Another tiny sound from one of the rooms down the hall, and Samael held in a sigh because now he recognized it. At the same time, a glint of glass catching sunlight streaming through the window snagged his attention, and he stepped inside to inspect it more closely. Caught in the thick carpeting, the same ugly brown as the rest of the house, was a silver ring with a small, polished gem of orange amber.

Not wanting to upset Meira more, Samael slipped it in one of the pockets of his borrowed pants. He’d give it to her another time.

Still following her lead, they made their way to a slightly larger room. Their mother’s room, no doubt. Meira had stopped before a tall free-standing mirror.

“Here. By me.” She pointed and he took up his position.

“Are you ready—” She paused and cocked her head, listening.

Samael had already caught the small sound again, much closer now, and grimaced.

“What was that?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“I know you heard that.”

“We don’t have time.”

That only got him a narrow-eyed scowl.

Samael sighed. “Under the bed.”

Meira dropped to her hands and knees, colorful hair spreading out on the brown carpet as she looked underneath.

“Oh, baby,” she cooed. Then slowly reached out, carefully and gently lifting something out from under the mattress.

A tiny, scruffy, skin-and-bones kitten. Difficult to tell its color under mud-matted fur. “You were just going to leave her here?”

Samael gritted his teeth against both her judgment and the guilt that she seemed to so easily elicit in him. “Cats are resilient.”

She held up the scrawny body and he—hardened dragon shifter warrior that he was—flinched inwardly. “Obviously not,” she said, still accusing.

Dragons might have protective instincts, but they had nothing on this woman. She collected strays wherever she went, it appeared. “What are we going to do with it while we track down Pytheios?”

That stubborn chin popped in the air. “Find it a home.”

Samael ran a hand over his face. Why was he not surprised? “At least put it on the floor out of sight while we do this thing.”

She pursed her lips but moved to stand beside him and settled the mite at their feet. For its part, the kitten stayed right where she set it. Out of fear or the recognition of a savior, Samael wasn’t sure.

At least I’m not the only one who does her bidding so easily.

Standing up, Meira looked at him. “Okay. Ready now?”

This was a horrible idea, but Samael honestly couldn’t see any other way. Meira was right. Secrets were Pytheios’s weapon. The only way to combat secrets and rumors was with the truth, even if it meant screaming into the storm.

“Are you sure you can do this?” he asked.

Appearing in every mirror in Ararat, a mountain she’d yet to set foot in, to deliver their message would stretch anyone with this rare ability, it seemed to Samael. Young dragons didn’t attempt to blow fire for the first year or two after they learned to shift. Meira had only been a phoenix for two years. Not even. And most of those were spent cooped up with gargoyles.

“We should stick to the plan. My calculations showed a high probability of success if we have more help.”

“That’s not what I meant.” He was talking about her powers, and she knew that.

Meira grimaced. “I’ve never tried something this big. We might have to do it in phases.”

That wouldn’t be as effective as Pytheios’s display. Still, it would prove she had power to those starting to doubt. What kind of power was a different story. Likely she’d be called a witch by the naysayers of the clan. Or, as Samael privately thought of them, the bitchers and complainers who apparently had nothing better to do in life than drag others down and see everything in a negative light. Humans weren’t the only breed with skeptics.

“No turning back now.” Meira closed her eyes, and the flames he was becoming intimately familiar with flowed from her skin in rivers of gold and red until she stood ablaze before the mirror.