CHAPTER 7
Davin watched Fearson’s car leave the parking lot entirely before he was willing to go back into the tea shop, so by the time we got inside, Amelia had finished her dishes, and Arthur had put together a plate for Cain, since like the rest of us, he was there for dinner.
It was nice to be able to see him without someone having to be murdered—or attempted-murdered?—first.
“So that guy was”—Cain paused and glanced at one of the tea shop employees, who had made an improvised sandwich of the roast, some horseradish sauce, and a dinner roll—“like Knight? Is that more common than I think?”
“It’s not,” Davin said, shaking his head. The most adorably overprotective guy ever, he’d moved to the other side of me at the table, so he could be close to both me and Twist. She’d gone back to eating, but was still periodically looking at the door and growling, even as Davin petted her to calm her down. He lowered his voice and whispered, just to her, “Not to worry, cat. I’ll see to it he crashes that car before I let him hit you with it again.”
When Cain continued looking at Davin, clearly expecting more of an answer, I shrugged at him. “My family were the only ones we knew of before. And now, I guess, him.”
“It’s not the same,” Bannockburn insisted from his basket. “You smell stronger. Even that doaty cousin of yours smells more like a dragon. That one smells like he’s wearing dragon perfume. Like maybe he only wishes he was.”
Huh.
I glanced back to find everyone, including the guy with the roast sandwich, looking to me to interpret the dog. I guessed I wasn’t very good at keeping secrets. In my hands, everyone in the world was going to know about dragons in a minute, and I’d end up the next Sage McKinley, all over the morning shows talking about myself. “He says the guy barely smells like it. I guess I stink more.”
Davin bumped me with his shoulder and rolled his eyes, all without taking his hand off Twist’s back. “He did smell weaker. I don’t have a good way to explain it, but he smelled mostly human, but with a little...a little smoke in the background somewhere. Almost more like he’d once hugged a dragon than he is one.”
So I wasn’t the only one who wasn’t good at keeping secrets.
Eh. People had dealt fine with learning arcane mages were real. And sandwich guy—I really needed to learn his name—didn’t even blink. “Maybe it’s because Flynn’s so much younger. Maybe it gets weaker when you age?” He stopped and cocked his head, looking at me for a long time. “How long does a dragon even live?”
Okay, I really needed to learn his name. But asking would be rude, since it’d make it clear I hadn’t paid attention when we were introduced.
I thought about it, and pulled the picture Wu Mei had given me out of my pocket, holding it up. “I don’t know when this was taken, but it’s my father.”
Everyone was interested to see that, leaning over the table until I gave up and passed it around, even with the amount of food present that might end up ruining the delicate paper.
Sandwich guy demurred when offered it, but did lean over Grady’s back to take a look. “That’s a cheongsam she’s wearing,” he said. “They started getting popular in the nineteen-twenties. Photograph looks like the right era. So your dad was your age a hundred years ago?”
I considered, but then shook my head. “I don’t think so. I think...I think he was already a lot older than me then. There was this whole conversation about the French colonizing his land of origin, which...we kinda think was Ireland? So he’d have to have been at least eight hundred there.”
This, finally, made sandwich guy pause. “So wait. How the hell old wasthatasshole?” He jerked his head toward the door, where Fearson had left.
And that? That was a really good point.
“Maybe...my father just knew about the invasion of England, and we’re presuming he was alive for it?”
Arthur shook his head. “No. It’s not that.” When everyone turned to look at him, like they were watching the world’s slowest tennis match, he held up the picture. “Fearson wasn’t born when this picture was taken. I’m sure of it. His company is moving their headquarters from London to here, and I interviewed for the job there. They have a picture of him on the wall in that office, from the nineties, and he was much younger then. He looked like he was in his prime in it.” He paused, cocking his head and considering for a moment, then admitting, “A little bit like your father, actually. But regardless, Fearson is not aging like your father. Maybe a little slower thanan average human, since he’s in his middle seventies and has no health troubles I know of, but this man looked in his twenties a hundred years ago, and managed to father you thirty years ago. That’s not the same.”
“Good point,” Grady said, nodding. “Even if we don’t include anything about the colonization, we’ve got proof your father was a minimum of ninety when you were born, and that’s pretty abnormal. Any pictures of him from the time?”
I shook my head. “No, but all my information says he basically looked the same as this then.”
“I want to know what moisturizer the man used,” Amelia muttered, staring at the tiny image of my father.
I shrugged. “I mean, you’ve all met Sexton, and he’s like fifty.”
The room went silent, and they all stared at me.
“Yeah, maybe that Fearson guy is like, half dragon,” sandwich guy said, shaking his head. “No way your cousin is that close to his age and looks that much better. And he does. He’s a weird little dude, but he’s a hottie. Love those sweater vests.”
Considering my mother was not a dragon at all, I didn’t think there was such a thing as a “half dragon,” but there was no reason to point that out. What mattered was that the guy, Fearson, was not right. If he smelled like a dragon, and I trusted Davin’s nose enough to say he did, then it was for some sinister reason that somehow made me trust him even less.
Not that one trusted an ableist bastard who hit kittens with his car in his free time to begin with. But I still trusted him even less knowing he smelled of dragon.
Davin was staring off into space, still petting Twist, his other hand on my thigh, when he startled. “You smell more like dragon than your cousin. And he smells more like dragon than Fearson.”
