Descended from Dragons: an Urban Fantasy (Moonlight Dragon Book 1) (7 page)

~~~~~

"Orlaton is like the Mozart of occultists," Melanie said as she parked her car in the lot of a strip mall on Industrial Road. "He's a child genius who's probably going to be eaten by a demon. But you know what? I think he's got a crush on you. Can you believe it?"

"I think I'd rather date my fridge demon." I popped my seatbelt and twisted around to look back at the pet carrier. A pair of topaz eyes peered back at me through the door. "Alright back there? We're here."

I'm fine.

"Oh, yes, you are," Melanie murmured beneath her breath before breaking into giggles.

I rolled my eyes. "Behave." But when I thought Vale wasn't looking I winked at her.

Melanie cleared her throat and acted serious. "So tell me about this friend of yours. Why do we have to meet her in an alley behind a strip club? This feels so shady. I love it!"

"It's because she's a stripper. Well, I think they prefer to be called exotic dancers, actually."

"Seriously, she is? That's so awesome!" Melanie tapped her chin thoughtfully. "I've thought about stripping—I mean dancing. What an easy way to make a fortune, huh? People throwing money at you—who wouldn't want that?"

"Especially if you're a succubus like Liliana." I shouldn't admire her, but she really had a racket going and who couldn't appreciate an enterprising woman? "Not only does she absorb the sexual energy from men, she makes them pay her for the privilege. It's genius."

"Suddenly all my monkey can think about is how fun it would be to swing on that pole." Melanie was wide-eyed at the prospect. "I have the feeling if I got up on stage they might not be able to pull me off it!"

The mental image of Melanie in her monkey form, swinging on a stripper pole, was awesome. It reminded me of the time she'd revealed her shifter form to me. It had been about a week after we'd met, when she'd sold me a mango cake with lime buttercream frosting.

"The lime frosting is good, but you really need to make it spicy to make it awesome," she'd told me with authority after handing me the small cake from behind the service counter of Todos Tortas.

"What does that mean?" I'd asked, trying to be polite and listen to her and not just shove the entire cake in my mouth like I wanted to.

"You should sprinkle some Tabasco or Tapatio sauce on it."

I flinched. "On a cake?"

"What, you don't like different stuff? Out of the normal?"

I could sense she was talking about more than the cake. Magickal beings could cruise other magickal beings the way gay guys cruised each other in clubs. There were certain phrases and a look…you just knew something was up.

"I love all that stuff," I told her.

She studied my face for a long moment. "You want to see something funny?"

Here we go, I thought.

No sooner had I nodded than she'd vanished, seemingly into thin air. I'd been on the verge of jumping into the truck to see if she'd fainted when a monkey jumped up onto the counter and begun dancing some crazy monkey dance. I'd been so surprised I'd tossed my mango cake over my head. Her amused chatter had made me laugh at myself, too.

I'd still made her replace the cake, though.

"You'd better sign up for one of those pole dancing exercise classes and see if you're any good," I said in the car.

"Oh, Anne, we both should!"

Melanie's excitement was infectious, but we really were there for a reason, not just to fantasize about our future careers as strippers. After I dragged the pet carrier out of the backseat, she and I made our way across the lot, keeping beneath the street lamps as much as possible.

Industrial Road wasn't exactly shady, but when you had a bunch of strip joints and liquor stores lined up along a road, you tended to attract a certain kind of loiterer. I didn't call Lucky just yet, preferring to be optimistic, but I kept my eye on the scattered groups of men who were either urinating as a team or dealing and purchasing drugs.

"What can a succubus do that will help us?" Melanie asked as she continually scanned the area around us.

She looked like she was ready to jump out of her skin. I'd suggested we park farther away at the mall instead of in the strip club's lot, thinking it would be better to avoid the club's security cameras. But I was rethinking that decision because of the dubiousness of the area and because Vale's weight threatened to pull my arms out of their sockets.

"Liliana is multi-talented," I replied "She sucks up sexual energy, obviously, but she also can form impressions of people from touching things they've handled."

"So what, you want her to hold the gargoyle? Rub him like an oil lamp?" Melanie cackled.

"Not quite."

We were in the alley now, which was bordered by the freeway noise reduction wall on one side and the long side of the strip club on the other. The bouncer at the front of the club had eyed us until we'd moved out of sight, and I worried that he might send someone back here to see what we were up to.

At the back entrance, I set down the carrier and pulled out my phone. "I'll text her and let her know we're here. She works the day shift because she goes out at night and hits the clubs. She should be finishing up any time now."

"Vegas must be full of succubi," Melanie marveled as she leaned back against the club and kicked up a boot. "Probably most of the escorts and hookers are. Heck, the entire city must be made up of sex demons. It'd explain why we have so much trouble getting dates!"

"I'm not so sure sex demons are the problem," I said. "But yeah, Vegas is full of magickal beings. I bet we don't know what half of them are."

It was both a comforting thought and an alarming one. Many of my friends were shifters with the odd succubus and incubus thrown in. I was also acquaintances with witches and warlocks, a couple of sorcerers, and a handful of people who were
something
, though I couldn't quite figure out what.

Nonetheless, with perhaps the exception of one of the sorcerers, no one I knew could command the power that I could, which made me believe I was an anomaly. That was good, because it meant I didn't feel threatened. It was bad because it meant I stood out to the Oddsmakers.

One year, two days after New Year's Day, a homeless guy had walked into the Tropicana casino and gone on the win streak of a lifetime, turning one hundred dollars into nearly two and a half million dollars. It wasn't the first time someone had become a millionaire in the city overnight, but it was the first time someone had started their run with such a small bankroll. It had been the talk of the town for a week.

Later, we in the magickal community learned that the homeless guy had actually been an out of town warlock. A month prior, he had stumbled upon a Cambodian luck spell that he'd immediately thought to use on the blackjack tables. His punishment for drawing so much attention to himself? Well, none of us really knew. But for a few weeks afterward there had been a spot out in the desert on the way to the secret and notorious Air Force base, Area 51, that had glowed with magickal energy.

No one had dared gone out to investigate, but it was assumed that it wasn't an alien corpse that was buried out there. The Oddsmakers didn't tolerate the indiscreet use of magick no matter who you were or what your intentions. The key to survival with them was not to be noticed at all.

If I wanted to continue to live, I needed to fly beneath their radar. Too bad events of late were conspiring against that plan.

As I was putting my phone away, I heard the sound of rubber scuffing over asphalt. Melanie and I shared a nervous look. I'd hoped to keep this quiet, but luck was rarely on my side.

Except when I made it so.

I called forth my dragon, but subtly, so he was only a cool breeze looping through the alley as two men emerged from the shadows.

They were big, bruiser types. I assumed, perhaps uncharitably, that they possessed more attitude than brains.

"What're you ladies doing back here?" the bald one asked. He smiled but I didn't believe it for a second.

"Employees only," said the one with the goatee. Both of them wore leather jackets and motorcycle boots. Not the expected attire of security men and it increased my nervousness.

"We're waiting for a friend who works here," I said, trying to sound bored and like this was something Melanie and I did every night. Just chillin' behind strip clubs. No biggie. "She'll be right out."

"What's in there?" Baldy pointed at the carrier.

I smiled at him. "My dog. I'd be careful," I warned when the guy started to lean down and look into the carrier. "Fluffy's kind of a meanie."

"I'll take my chances," he said. He grabbed the handle of the carrier.

"Hey!" Melanie yelled, but I was already infusing Lucky with energy. He flared like an enormous golden fan above my head.

I expected the two guys to freak out at the sight of a golden dragon, but the one with the goatee simply reached inside his jacket and pulled out a gun.

Crap. It wasn't a gun.

It was a wand.

"Move!" I shouted as I shoved Melanie to the side.

Sparks traced the path of Goatee's magick as it shot down the alley toward me. I flipped backward, aided by a flick of Lucky's tail. Goatee's magick buzzed across my back like someone had zapped me with a low volt Taser. I landed shakily—no perfect score for me—but at least I was on my feet. In an instant I sent Lucky lashing out in retaliation.

My dragon hurtled forward, jaws open in a soundless roar. Goatee cursed and staggered backward, his wand out in front of him, spitting sparks. Blasts of magick hit Lucky in the snout but he barely flinched. He snapped his teeth over Goatee's shoulder and the guy let out a girly shriek before blasting Lucky off him with a complicated wave of his wand.

Something dashed through my peripheral vision. It was Melanie, shifted into her monkey form. She leaped nimbly off the wall and onto the back of Baldy, who still held the pet carrier containing Vale. She was small in her monkey form but she could be annoying as hell.

With her tail wrapped around Baldy's throat, she pulled at his ears and hair. The man yelled and tried to bat her off with his free hand. He staggered back and forth, hampered by the shifting weight of Vale in the pet carrier.

When he suddenly dropped the carrier and reached both hands up to try to dislodge Melanie, I sprinted forward and grabbed it, dragging the heavy thing toward the door of the strip club. Before I got there, however, sparks ricocheted off the side of the building and blasted me in the ribs. It felt like I'd been sucker punched. I dropped the carrier and staggered backward on wobbly legs. They buckled beneath me, dumping me to the pavement.

"Oof."

I looked down at myself. My clothes were scorched on my left side and I could see angry, red skin peeking through the burned holes. Who knew I'd need to wear a bullet proof vest to visit a strip club?

Grimacing, I turned to look back at the fight. Lucky was dodging Goatee's wand strikes, but my dragon wasn't strong enough to do more than drag the guy off balance.

I knew escalation would be a bad idea for a variety of reasons. It was something Uncle James had instilled in me: don't push the dragon within me. There was also the matter of defying my plan to lay low.

But Melanie and I couldn't afford to lose this fight. The men would take Vale and do who knew what to him, not to mention there was a demon involved who could take over and then all hell would break loose. I didn't think a demon had ever run free in Las Vegas. I definitely didn't want to be the one to make it finally happen.

It would be no defense if the Oddsmakers decided to drag me in front of them for using magick in public, but what choice did I have?

Easy. I had no choice. I had to maintain control of that demon at all costs.

I funneled more energy to Lucky. My dragon swelled in size.  He grew to over forty feet of pure muscle. His teeth caught the streetlamps and they were wicked.

I was on my feet, though I couldn't remember standing. Lucky continued radiating supernatural coldness. I was the opposite. I was burning up inside. A warning came to mind, something I had heard from Uncle James, maybe, or my parents before they died:

You know you've gone too far when your chest fills with hot coals.

It was a literal warning, not some hokey Chinese saying. I hadn't gone too far, not yet, but the tickle was there in my chest, the compulsion to breathe out in a long streamer of pain and power and mark my territory. Strange thoughts began to coalesce in my head. Thoughts of twisting and turning and winding and diving and
biting
and
breathing fire upon my enemies…

"Holy hell," I heard myself say, but my voice was far away from my body.

My body. Was
this
my true form? This pitiful bipedal form? This weak bag of pale flesh?

No! I was destruction and defiler! Dragon of doom!

I peered out at Lucky from behind a haze of red. Lucky was huge and golden, as bright as the sun, but I was beginning to glow, too, casting long shadows ahead of me and down the alley. Soon, my shadow would match Lucky's.