Battle Bond: An Urban Fantasy Dragon Series (Death Before Dragons #2) - Lindsay Buroker Page 0,8
could have done that. I remembered how large Zav had been in his dragon form while standing on the rooftop of my apartment building. A dragon’s maw was definitely big enough for the job.
“Do dragons eat humans?” I shuddered at the idea.
Not typically. They prefer fat herbivores of substantial size. But they’re certainly capable of eating just about anything—and anyone. The dragon could have done this to make a point. Or as an efficient way to kill the man for snooping in his windmill.
“Is it really his windmill?” I looked toward the exit—the only way in or out, unless there was a big hole somewhere on a higher level. “How would a dragon fit in here?”
The only hole in the wall was the one I’d made.
They have long necks.
I thought he was joking, but Zav’s neck had been long. Elegant but long. Could his big head have fit through the doorway to kill this man with a bite?
They can also shape-shift into smaller creatures, as you’ve seen.
“True.”
I shook my head. I would let Willard know what had happened to this guy, but the children were why I’d been sent.
“Sindari?” I returned to the hole in the floor and pointed him toward it. “Can you tell if anyone is down there?”
He sniffed the air over the hole. That distant crying came again. No, not distant. Muffled. Maybe there was a door and another room down there.
“It may be another trap,” I admitted.
If he didn’t smell anyone, I would assume it was, that the dragon wanted to lure me down so it could later bite my head off.
I do detect other humans down there. Several of them. Stay here. I will look.
He disappeared into the darkness, dropping twenty feet and landing among the millstones without trouble. I dropped to my stomach and shined my light around below, hoping to spot a way to climb down—or climb back up, if I jumped down. Next time, I wouldn’t hop out of the Jeep without a rope.
The circular stone wall of the windmill extended all the way to the flagstone floor of the basement. The area down there wasn’t simply some pit that had been dug out after the initial construction. It actually looked like the original ground level of the mill and that the earth outside had been built up to cover it. Or maybe the windmill had been magically sunken into the ground. If so, to what end?
I pointed my flashlight beam toward the nearest basement wall. The mortar between the stones was crumbling or missing completely, leaving what I could turn into handholds for climbing. But the hole in the floor was more than ten feet from the nearest wall. There wouldn’t be a way to get over to it without suction cups.
“Or making a new hole,” I muttered.
A gouging noise floated up from below.
“I hope that’s you, Sindari.”
A loud thud followed.
“I definitely hope that’s you. Please let me know if ogres live down there.”
I am attempting to break down a solid oak door with an enchantment locking it. I may need you and your charm.
“I don’t suppose I can toss it down and you can use it without me?” I eyed the exit, worried about the dragon returning while I was down in the basement.
I do not believe I can use your charms. Also, when you used it on the doorway above, you did something beyond the intrinsic power of that charm. I sensed it.
“Any idea what it was?”
You did it. Do you not know?
“I know less than you’d think.” I located Sindari with the flashlight beam and saw the door. The muffled crying came again, and it came from that direction. That made up my mind. “I’m coming down.”
But not without creating a way out. I trotted to the wall, pocketed my phone, and, apologizing to Chopper for using it as a crowbar, slid the blade between the board and the stone. A mundane sword would have snapped off at the hilt. Fortunately, Chopper was no mundane sword. I’d won the blade in a battle years ago and didn’t know its history—Zav had hinted that it had powers I didn’t know about—but I did know it was far stronger than a slender piece of metal should have been.
It glowed a faint blue when it was out of its scabbard, but today, its glow was fainter than usual. Maybe it was indignant to be put to this use instead of going into battle.