“I’m all over silly,” she said with perfect seriousness. “Spill.”

I looked down at my hands, my fingers their normal strong, capable-looking selves. But I knew differently. I knew how easily they could change into digits tipped with curved, wickedly sharp crimson claws. “What if it’s the dragon shard making me feel like this?”

“You think it is?” she asked, giving the thought serious consideration.

“I don’t know. But if it is, then it follows that it’s the shard that Gabriel is reacting to. He told me once that he had never become involved physically with anything but female dragons. I was his first human. When we make love, he likes me in dragon form, Cy. It’s more than like. . . . I think he prefers me in dragon form.”

“Well . . . he is a dragon,” she pointed out.

“I know, but . . .” I hesitated, wishing I’d never spoken, but unable to keep from pouring out all my worries. “What if it’s the shard he loves? Oh, that sounds so silly—I knew I shouldn’t say it. I know he loves me. He loved me before the shard. I know that. But . . . oh, never mind. It’s too idiotic for words.” I covered my face with my hands to keep myself from shadowing. I just wanted to crawl into a hole and let the world go by without me for a while.

Cyrene surprised me yet again by not making light of my concern. “I think I know what you mean,” she said after a few moments of chewing it over. “You’re worried that he loves you more now because of the shard. But does he really love you more?”

“Yes,” I said without having to think about it. I uncovered my face, driven by some urge to make her understand. “When I first met Gabriel, we were . . . well, it was an instant attraction. Part of it was the biological fact that I was his mate, but there was also something that transcended that, a fitting together, if you will. And sexually . . .” I gave her a wry smile.

“I know. You don’t burn down a hotel if things aren’t good in the sex department,” she said with an answering grin, and then patted my foot again. “I will admit that I was worried about you at first, Mayling. You’d never been with a man, and I worried that you lacked the experience of sharing your life with someone.”

“I share it with you,” I pointed out.

“But we’re not lovers, and Gabriel was. Oh, don’t puff up and tell me you were on top of it—so to speak—because I could see well enough that you guys were getting on just fine.”

“We were.We did.We still do. But there’s a difference—we’ve settled into a life together. I really know what it’s like to have him be a part of me. I know what he’s like in the morning, when he’s just woken up, and is kind of grumpy until I kiss him. I know what makes him laugh, know what he values, know what makes him angry.”

“That sounds perfectly normal to me,” she said.

“It is. And yet . . . I didn’t have this insight into him before the phylactery exploded. Hence my concern about what will happen between us when the shard is decanted into a nonliving phylactery.”

She nodded her understanding.

I gave her a long look. “Not going to tell me I’m being foolish and imagining that Gabriel loves me more now because of the shard, and once the shard is gone, we’ll be just fine?”

“No, I’m not.” Her gaze met mine with unflinching honesty. “I’m not because I think it’s very possible that what you say is true.”

My heart crumbled.

“Gabriel is a dragon. You bear a piece of a dragon heart inside you. Of course he’s going to react to that. It would be impossible for him not to. It would be like me turning my back on a pool of calm water.”

“You could if you had to,” I grumbled, feeling hurt and dejected by the realization that she spoke the truth.

“No, I couldn’t.” She took my hand, squeezing my fingers until I looked up. “Mayling, this is hard for you to understand because you’re not a water elemental. But water isn’t just an interest—it’s my life. It rules me; it drives me; the focus of my being is completely on it. When I’m near a stream, I have to see it, have to touch it, have to glory in its beauty and purity. I am the stream, May. Do you understand that? It’s as much a part of me as my arms and legs and brain are—I’m an extension of it, that’s all. Just an extension. And I imagine that’s how Gabriel feels about the dragon shard—it’s part of the heart that beats in all dragons. It’s an integral part of him, just as water is to me. And now, to him, you’re part of that equation.”

“So long as I bear the shard,” I said dully.

She looked at me for a moment, then slid off the bed. “I know you’ve been worried that you’re losing yourself to the dragon shard, but has it ever occurred to you that the reverse might be true?”

“Huh?”

She padded over to the door, picking up the towel she’d set on the dresser. “I think the shard is changing you, May. But maybe you’re changing it, too. Maybe when it’s gone, you won’t be who you used to be. Maybe you’ll be who you were meant to be. And maybe you’ll change the dragon shard to be something more than just a piece of the heart.”

Chapter Eight

I puzzled over Cyrene’s bizarre suggestion for some time, until the sky started to flush with rosy light. Cyrene didn’t reassure me that Gabriel would love me as much when the shard was gone as he did now, but I realized I valued her honest reply more than any platitudes. I rubbed the small scar on my chest where the shard had entered my body, and stared out at the streaks of red and gold as they lit the horizon, wondering what Gabriel was doing, content, at least, to know he missed me as much as I missed him.

I went downstairs a few hours later, tired from lack of sleep and too much introspection. I thought I was seeing things when Jim ambled toward me from the dining room.

“Heya, Mayling. You look like you were pulled through Abaddon backwards on a porcupine.”

“Jim . . . didn’t you lose part of your fur?” I touched the side of its head that had been singed, then slid my fingers lower, to its chest, rubbing a large white spot. “And where did this come from? Is it paint? Dye?”

“Naw, I had Ash send me to Abaddon for a couple of minutes so I could get a new form, one with all the fur on it. You like?” The demon twisted around to examine itself. “The tail’s not quite as fluffy, but this form has the white spot, which everyone knows is a babe magnet. Oh, and look! Three white toes! Kinda racy, huh?”