“Am I de trop?” Savian asked, amusement evident in his voice.

“It’s the shard,” I ground out through clenched teeth, still fighting with my body and the dragon shard to regain control. “Don’t mention gold.”

“I didn’t. Oh, the lair?” He shook his head. “I didn’t find it, let alone any go—er . . . that shiny substance that acts like an aphrodisiac to dragons. I think I was close to the lair, but before I could pursue a very intriguing scent, that she-devil with the red hair found me. After that, the only thing I was concerned with doing was keeping my skin where it belonged.”

Savian’s calm, matter-of-fact voice dampened my ardor somewhat. Gabriel, with an effort, stopped stripping me with his eyes, and settled his gaze on Savian. His jaw was tense, however. I knew all I’d have to do was reach out with one silver-scaled, scarlet-tipped finger, and his control would snap.

“Mayling,” he warned, keeping his eyes on Savian.

“People who read other people’s minds can’t complain about what they find there,” I said, making a heroic effort to get control of my rampant emotions.

Savian laughed. “Even I knew what you were thinking, May. And if I didn’t think a limb or two might drop off if I got out of bed, I’d leave you two alone, although I would like to point out again that I am currently available.”

One of Gabriel’s fingers flicked. Savian’s hair caught on fire.

“What the . . . I take it back! I’m not available. Ow. Could you . . . ?”

I gave Gabriel a look of gratitude for the distraction before glancing back at Savian, who was slapping madly at his head. “You should know better than to bait a dragon.”

“May!”

I put out Gabriel’s fire. “I will, but only because I want to hear the end of your tale. So this woman beat you up in Latvia? How did you end up in London?”

He gave his head a couple more exploratory pats before glaring at me. “I just got my hair cut, too.”

“Latvia?” I prodded.

“I wasn’t beat up there. What sort of a thief taker do you think I am that I’d allow someone to get the jump on me in an unfamiliar place? If I was that green, I’d have been dead decades ago. By the time I was done unraveling all the bind runes, I was well aware that the only one who could have woven such an intricate protection was a goetist, and a pretty powerful one at that.”

I glanced at Gabriel. “Do dragons normally engage goetists to protect their lairs?”

“No. Most dragons use banes, which can be drawn by anyone, although sometimes demons are used to break them.”

“That’s right. I remember Aisling telling me she’d used some demons to break the bane on Fiat’s lair. But why bind runes for this lair?”

Gabriel looked as confused as I felt. Practitioners of magic, as any member of the Otherworld will tell you, are divided into only two camps: goetists and theurgists. Goety refers to the dark magic used by those with connections to Abaddon, and individuals who draw power from the dead, such as Guardians, and vespillos, whereas theurgists—mages and diviners—draw their power from sources in the mortal world. Others, like necromancers, utilize both sources.

“Dragons gain their power from theurgistic sources,” I mused, watching Gabriel. “So why would Baltic use a goetist to seal his lair?”

“It doesn’t make sense,” he answered, confusion giving way to a thoughtful look that he turned on Savian. “Dark power is less effective on dragons than it is on mortals.”

“Everyone knows that,” Savian said, picking bits of ash from his hair.

“It’s just one more confusing piece of a puzzle that I’m starting to think we’ll never solve,” I complained before gesturing to Savian. “What happened after you found the lair?”

He grimaced. “Unfortunately, one of the bind runes was a trap, and it no doubt alerted the redhead to my presence. By the time I realized what had happened, she was close by. I thought it was more prudent to leave the area and try another time, but by the time I made it back to Riga, I realized two things.”

We both waited.

One side of his mouth lifted in a wry smile. “The first was that she wasn’t going to be thrown off my trail by the simple methods I’d used. She was almost on me by the time I made it back to the hotel. It was only through the sheerest luck I happened to take a back entrance rather than the front, and saw her before she did me.”

“And the second thing?”

Savian gingerly touched the still-healing wound on his neck. “She wasn’t alone.”

“Baltic?” Gabriel asked.

“No. At least, I don’t think so. You said this wyvern was imbued with arcane power, and the dragon who helped the she-devil pursue me across the whole of Latvia, Germany, and parts of France didn’t have any scent of magic about him. I shook him off my trail in Paris. I thought I’d given both of them the slip, but the redhead jumped me just before I could reach you. I figured I was dead, but she stopped just short of killing me, dumping me in an alley nearby.”

“How very odd,” I said. Gabriel said nothing, but I knew his expression of puzzlement matched mine.

“No, no, it’s all in a day’s work. No need to thank me for almost dying while undertaking a commission for you. The most grievous and painful of injuries such as I have received are the merest nothing compared to your gratitude. A bonus hazard-pay reward isn’t at all necessary. Don’t even mention it.” Savian leaned back against the pillows, his eyes closed as he waved a wan hand vaguely toward me.

“I’m sure you’re being well paid for the chances you take,” I said, getting off the bed. “And as for your grievous injuries, they are mostly healed, and will be completely so in a few hours. You’ll be just fine to go back to Latvia.”

His eyes shot open at that. “Back to Latvia?”

“Of course.” I smiled at Gabriel, who took my hand and curled his fingers through mine.

“We must have the shard,” he told Savian. “And it’s obvious that we can’t wait for Kostya to get around to finding it. We will have to take action.”

“Get the shard ourselves, you mean?”

Gabriel nodded.

“I suspect Kostya isn’t going to be happy at the idea of us poking around his lair,” I pointed out.