“I’m sure Drake has food at his Paris house, and probably a dozen bathrooms. And yes, we can talk about what I did another time—I simply brought it up to say that I’m aware I should be running away from you, but that I’m not.”

“I would be happy to chase you if you like,” he said politely.

“Chase me? Chase me where?” I couldn’t help but ask.

“If I told you where to run, then it would not be a true chase.”

I wondered if I was more tired than I knew, or if Avval had suddenly decided he lived in Wonderland, and was going to talk in riddles. “I don’t think I understand what you’re talking about. Why do you want to chase me?”

“A chase?” Baltic and Ysolde entered the outer room, Drake on their heels. “You’re having a chase? Ysolde!”

“Oooh, I haven’t had a chase in forever.”

“We’re doing a chase?” May asked, and stopped abruptly in the doorway. She turned to yell into the room, “Gabriel, they’re going to have a chase! Hurry up!”

“What in the name of all that is sleep-deprived is this hullabaloo about a chase?” I asked anyone who cared to answer.

May giggled. Ysolde smiled brightly. Drake swore under his breath.

“Dragons chase,” Avval said simply. “It is pleasurable.”

“How so?”

“Trust us, it’s pleasurable,” Ysolde said, with May nodding fervently in the background.

I looked through the glass windows out at the city. Paris had not yet woken up, the air still indigo, but with light fingers along the eastern sky. Absently, I slipped off my shoes and fingered the long strip of duct tape that Savian had used on my hands. Evidently, I’d shoved the tape into my pocket after he’d removed it.

What on earth was I doing? my inner siren asked. Why was I even there, allowing myself to be tempted by Avval’s nearness, and thinking thoughts in which I had no right to indulge? The man is a demigod, I reminded myself. A being so far above me I couldn’t even conceive of what his life was like.

I did know one thing—I liked him. A lot. And I wasn’t going to be responsible for making him miserable by damning him to a mortal life.

“Well,” I said, pushing open the door into the predawn Paris. “It’s been a long day. Maybe another time we can ... oh!”

I’d turned back while speaking, and now gasped and stared over the shoulders of all the dragons. They all turned to look back at what had so startled me. I shoved the door closed and, using the duct tape, wrapped it around the two vertical handles on the glass doors.

Avval was the first one to realize what I’d done. The expression on his face—surprise mingled with a hot flare of passion—remained with me as I bolted down the street, did a one-footed hopping seriocomic spin around the corner, and ran like mad into predawn Paris. Distantly, I could hear a roar, but didn’t stop to examine why I acted as I did. I had made the right choice in Hungary when I slipped out of the house while Avval was eating, and I’d made it again now.

My life was not one I could share with anyone, even if he was willing to give up everything he loved for me. Not with what amounted to the whole of the Otherworld wanting to either imprison me or use me.

As I ran around another corner, a black car that had been traveling toward me suddenly slammed on its brakes. I glanced over my shoulder to see two men emerging from the car, both racing toward me. A third man, tall and imposing, emerged, and shouted orders to not let me get away.

“Bloody, bloody hell,” I swore, and jetted down the street, dashing across the traffic without a mind to the honks and yells from the drivers who were out this early, and ran straight for a patch of green that I had glimpsed through the buildings.

Sounds of commotion followed while I flung myself around corners, ducked under awnings, and avoided both pedestrians and cars alike, my eyes fixed to the garden that was ahead. The black wrought iron fence around it meant I had to skid to a halt and look frantically up and down the street to find an entrance, wasting precious seconds. Behind me, voices shouted, car brakes squealed, more horns honked, and above it all, my heart pounded in my ears. I spotted an entrance about a block away, and raced for it, mindless of the pain of small pebbles grinding into my bare soles. I had just reached the entrance when I was suddenly thrown forward a good dozen feet, a white-blue flash of light dazzling me for a few seconds. For the second time in twenty-four hours, I found myself facedown on the ground, spitting out blades of grass.

Chapter Eight

Here’s a pro tip for people who might be the subject of an arcane magic explosion: don’t expect to be able to recover immediately from the effects of it. It took me a couple of minutes before my mind (and eyes—arcane magic is bright!) cleared, and I had my wits about me again. By that time, my hands were bound behind my back, and two large men in dark suits were hauling me to my feet. The third man, the one in authority, was striding toward us with an extremely annoyed expression. I shook my head and sagged against my captors, waiting for the third man to get closer. He started throwing around orders as soon as he could be heard.

“Gérard, gag the siren. Emile, have you bound her hands? She evidently had no difficulty escaping the thief taker, although that is not surprising since the man is an idiot who—”

I lifted my head the second his foot touched the grass, and sang.

The man froze. The two men holding on to my arms dropped them and went still. I sang a popular song about relationships turned bad, and behind it, I put a massive push to put the three men into a catatonic state. The third man resisted a bit, but went under after a few extra pushes sent in his direction.

Behind him, Avval suddenly appeared, his lovely hair a bit mussed, his eyes glowing bright gold.

“Charity! Why are you singing?”

I gestured toward the man in front of me, and turned so he could cut my bonds.

He snapped them off with his bare hands (making my inner siren squeal with delight), and spun me around, his hands hard on my arms. “Do you know what the chase does to a dragon?”

I stopped singing, keeping an eye on the three men. “May and Ysolde said it was fun. I gather you get some sort of jollies over being a predator hunting prey?”

“It stirs the primal being in us. It makes the sophisticated dragon of today hark back to the early days when we struggled to rise above our baser natures, when it was a matter of fighting merely to survive. The need to possess was vital to our being, for without our power we would have been consumed by those who strove to eliminate us.” His eyes were so bright, they almost hurt to look at, and for the first time, I felt—I truly felt—his dragon nature. This wasn’t just a respected elder: this was a man who created a race of beings from nothing, forming and shaping them against forces that must have been overwhelming.