Solus and Tarn were arguing about something from just a few feet away, and it sounded as if there were some more people down below. A hand reached out to my face, smoothing away my hair, and I blinked my eyes into focus. Tom.
“Hey,” he said, gently. “How are you feeling?”
Tears swam into my eyes. “How many people?”
He looked confused. “What do you mean?”
“How many people did I just kill, Tom?”
He smiled at me. “None.”
“How many people are hurt?”
“None.” His thumb carefully stroked over the bruise on my cheek. “Well,” he amended, “I think the barman might be eyebrow-less for a few weeks, but other than that, everyone’s fine.” He gazed at me in all seriousness. “You brought it back, Red. You shifted and apparently breathed fire down at the bar, but you brought it back. You were in control.”
Control? That’s what he called control? I transformed myself into a dragon in a humiliatingly public manner. I couldn’t have chosen a worst spot to lose all of my senses than if I’d stood in the middle of Piccadilly Circus. Despite my overwhelming relief that I had managed to avoid hurting anyone, all I could think about was how in the fuck it had happened in the first place.
I staggered to my feet, doing everything that I could to avoid the sickening lurch of lightheadedness. The two faeries immediately quieted, and Solus came running over.
“Why?” I croaked. “Why did I shift?”
Solus looked stricken. “I don’t know, dragonlette. Maybe the loss of blood?”
“My eyes were doing the fucking spooky glowing thing before that. Why now? Why today?”
I turned to Tom for help. “You’re a shifter. Help me out here.”
My old friend looked worried. “I don’t know, Red. It happens when it’s a full moon, you know that. We can’t control the urges and so we just spontaneously…” he shrugged, “shift.”
“It’s not a full moon. And that’s never happened to me before anyway.” I smiled sourly, hugging the soft throw tighter to me. “I don’t think us Draco Wyr work like that.”
“It can happen in times of huge stress. You know like when you were at the mages’ academy and that wraith showed up.”
“I’m not stressed.” I ran my tongue over my lips. “Not like I was then anyway.”
“Sometime younger girls can’t control their shifts when they get their periods. Betsy was like that for a while. I don’t know what else to tell you.”
I vaguely remembered waking up in the middle of the night years ago in my old dormitory to the sound of snarls and Julia’s soothing tones. I wasn’t a young girl in the first bout of puberty though, and I didn’t have my fucking period. A flash of heat flared up uncomfortably in my lower stomach, then settled there, like a hot boulder. Bloody hell, I felt awful.
“So, pretty much, you don’t know. Nobody knows. I don’t know. Apparently now, not only is the whole world going to be in absolutely no doubt as to what I really am, but there’s the chance I might just spontaneously combust when I’m strolling down the road. Outfuckingstanding.”
I slammed my palm against the balcony railing, and stared down. There were a couple of ogres hovering around, and a few people mopping up the remnants of splashed drinks and broken glass. A vast scorch mark now travelled from one length of the bar to the other.
Tom touched my shoulder. “The Lord Alpha’s on his way.”
Brilliant. Just brilliant.
I turned to where Tarn was standing, another bout of dizziness attacking my senses. “You got what you wanted,” I snarled at him. “Now give me what I asked.”
“You destroyed my club,” he commented.
“Your fucking club is fine. Tell me where Endor is, Tarn or, so help me God, I’ll fry you on the spot.”
He leaned down, scooping up a delicate champagne glass and taking a small sip. “I don’t know where he is.”
That’s it. I was going to kill him. I took a step forward, then wavered slightly. Solus moved over, putting his arm round my body to steady me.
“Well,” Tarn continued, eyeing me with the nervy enmity of an old street cat, “I don’t know where he is right now. At this particular moment in time. But I do know where he’ll be.”
I watched him, unforgiving, waiting for something else. And because, right at this moment, I wasn’t entirely sure I’d be able to take even a step without collapsing.
“In five days’ time, it’s Lughnasadh. The pagan first harvest of summer. He’s going to use