“Do you want some . . .” He was in front of her now. She felt him, but didn’t see him. Her eyes were closed against the pain. “That isn’t an ibuprofen headache.”
“I’m okay.” But her voice came out wrong and her hands felt clammy. “Some ibuprofen, though, sure. That’s a good . . .” Slowly her eyes opened. “Or maybe not. It’s easing off on its own.”
Rule took her arms. “You’re pale.”
“It hurts, but it’s going away.” No, not going away. Gone, between one heartbeat and the next. Though the departure of pain left her a bit shaky . . . she mustered a reassuring smile. “I really am okay.”
His fingers tightened. “You’ll cancel your session with Mika today.”
Of course that’s what he thought of. “I will not.”
“Lily—”
“I’ll tell Mika about the headache. If there is a connection—and honestly, I don’t think there is. But if I’m wrong, he’d know, wouldn’t he?”
“Sam probably would. I’m not sure about Mika. He’s the youngest of them.”
“Then he can ask Sam. Rule, it was just one of those weird pains everyone gets from time to time.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I guess not.” She smiled wryly and went up on tiptoe to drop a kiss on his unsmiling mouth. “Everyone human, I should’ve said.”
NINE
ROCK Creek Park was a welcome, woodsy sprawl sticking its unpaved finger up D.C.’s concrete butt. Portions of the park were tidied into bike trails, paths, bridges, a planetarium, a couple historic sites, and tennis courts. The wilder bits welcomed birds, raccoons, even the occasional deer or coyote.
And one dragon.
Not that Mika’s lair had originally been one of the wild bits. It had started out as an amphitheater—the closest thing, Lily supposed, to a cave Mika had spotted when he arrived last December to take up his duties as a magic sponge. That lair was supposed to have been temporary, but Mika had decided he liked it here.
No one knew why, exactly. The park was a pretty place, but Lily wasn’t sure dragons shared the aesthetic sensibilities of humans. Though she knew Mika liked trees. She walked along a cement path roofed by the interwoven branches of oaks beginning to don their fall colors . . . a path that was still intact because Mika hadn’t wanted to damage the trees that hugged it so closely. He’d removed most of the cement in his domain.
It was the parking lot, she’d heard, that had pushed park authorities over the edge.
They wanted it back. They wanted their amphitheater back. There wasn’t much they could do about it—the Accords allowed dragons to choose from any publicly owned land. But city authorities were unhappy, too. Lily could see why. People can be remarkably stupid at times. You could post all the “Danger: Dragon Lair” signs you want. A few idiots are going to climb the fence anyway.
As far as Lily knew, Mika hadn’t eaten any intruders. There had been a few incidents, however.
D.C. authorities had grown worried enough to approach Sam about it. Sam—otherwise known as Sun Mzao—was the largest, oldest, and most powerful of the dragons who’d returned to Earth after their long sojourn in the hell realm. It was he who’d sung the gate open wide enough, he who brought Lily and Rule with him . . . or they’d brought him, depending on how you looked at it.
Sam had been the one to descend from the night sky onto the White House lawn when he deemed it time to open negotiations. After the Turning, magic leaked into the world in quantities human tech couldn’t handle. Dragons absorbed free magic—and needed it, too. They also needed a new home, hell having grown too hot for them after a certain demon lord devoured the Great Bitch’s avatar and went wildly insane.
It wasn’t surprising D.C.’s mayor thought Sam was the dragons’ leader. Wrong, but not surprising. People really didn’t understand dragons.
Sam had been—for him—quite polite to the people who’d flown across the country to speak with him. He hadn’t allowed the mayoral party into his lair, but he had replied when they stood at the gate and talked to him.
Mika is young, Sam had said. He will tire of his odd choice eventually.
“But ‘eventually’ might mean years. Maybe decades, from what I understand. People use the park now. Children. It’s an invitation to disaster, having him there.”
Has Mika eaten anyone he shouldn’t? A pet? Your government was anxious about pets, I