“Shall I incinerate them?” Talon asked, inhaling deeply and scrubbing his front, hand-like claws together at the prospect.
“No.” Unsheathing his sword, Magnus shoved the bowl off his desk with its tip. “Get out. Never return, and count yerselves fortunate that I dinna send ye to the abyss. The only thing staying my hand from taking yer lives is yer loyalty to the blessed Highland Veil. But never return. I canna guarantee I will always be so generous.”
“But ye felt something, mighty chief.” Mairwen caught hold of her assistant and held her back from fetching the bowl. “Ye…changed. Went still and quiet.”
“She canna be the healer promised by the prophecy. Not if she canna sing.” He pointed the sword at the old woman. “My people are crossing over into the never-ending sleep eons beforetheir time. The curse of that damnable sickness fills our tombs with dragonkind and forces their humankind brethren to follow to escape the soul-wrenching pain of their grief.” He jerked his head from side to side. “If she canna heal my people, I want nothing to do with her. As I said, get out and never return.”
“If ye would but give her a chance,” the witch’s apprentice said, her voice quivering.
“That is what ye said about the others!” he roared.
Flinching, Mairwen dared to move closer. “Look upon her again, I beseech ye. One more time, great chief. For yer people.” She waved a hand over the puddle of spilled water on the floor. Its surface rippled, then opened up as if it were a window into the woman’s realm. The beauty tossed her head and smiled as she tapped her fingers across a strange plank of black and white ivory teeth set in a gleaming black box.
“Listen,” Mairwen whispered. She snapped her fingers over the puddle, then stepped back.
Strains of an ethereal, whimsical sound rose from the image, filling the room with a mystical blue-white light and making it brighter. When the beauty stopped touching the teeth, pausing to use a strange yellow stick to mark on a parchment propped on the ledge of the box, the soothing song and the light disappeared. Then she started tapping on the teeth again, and the song continued even better than before.
“What is that thing she touches to make the sound?” Talon asked, his booming voice barely above a whisper.
“A piano,” Mairwen’s apprentice said. “Lyla canna sing, but she is able to make music. That song you hear is one of her own creations. It never existed until she thought of it and made it so.”
“What is yer name, youngling?” Magnus eyed the annoying lass, finding her a bit more bearable than before.
“Keeva.”
“Can all the people of her time make a melody with that box?”
“No. Only those who have learned and mastered it.” Keeva cleared her throat. “She once sang the songs she created, but now she is only able to bring forth the notes on her piano.”
“Why?” Magnus couldn’t resist stepping closer, more to soak in the beauty of the beguiling lass than listen to the entrancing song. “Why is she unable to sing?”
“That is her story to tell,” Mairwen said. “She is a jewel with a lifetime of facets waiting to reflect the light of her fated mate’s love—yer love.”
“But if she is the wrong one…” Something within him couldn’t bear the thought of that. The incorrectness and removal of the two before her had disappointed him, but not overly much. But this one. He swallowed hard. If this one failed, he already sensed in the deepest core of his being that it would pain him greatly. “If she is the wrong one…”
“She is not the wrong one,”Talon whispered in his mind.“I dinna ken how she can be the one of the prophecy, but I believe she is yer soul mate.”“Bring the song box with her,” the dragon said to Mairwen. “The piano. Perhaps it will provide the healing we need.”
The crone made a face, as if she smelled something foul. She tipped a polite nod at the dragon lord before turning back to Magnus. “I am unsure whether that is possible, but we will try.”
“Fated mate or not,” Magnus said, “she must be able to create song and heal the ill, or the realm will not accept her.” As much as it pained him, he admitted the hard truth to himself. If the realm didn’t accept her, then neither could he—no matter the strength of his need to make her his.
Chapter
Two
Newport Aquarium
Newport, Kentucky
September 2026
Lyla stood justinside the long, transparent, acrylic tunnel, the amazing exhibit at the Newport Aquarium, watching the sharks and rays gracefully skim through the blue water on either side of her and overhead. She wondered if they wondered what she was, this strange, two-legged thing walking through the hole in their environment with the water not touching her. The aquatic creatures seemed almost as interested in her as she was in them—except for one of the larger rays. That guy couldn’t care less about anything other than his relaxing swim.
Meandering deeper into the tunnel and trying to embrace all the peacefulness the aquarium always gave her, Lyla waited for her on-again, off-again friend and agent to give her the bad news. When Jana Reedie remained silent, Lyla stopped pretending this was just an outing to get her to relax. She knew better. Jana didn’t love the aquarium nearly as much as she did and only accompanied her here whenever she needed to pass onsomething unsavory. “Out with it already,” Lyla said. “The only time you suggest a visit to the aquarium is when it’s terrible.”
“When what’s terrible?” Jana’s fake, carefree tone and her inability to make eye contact were a sure tell that the day was about to be ruined by whatever she hadn’t yet said.
Lyla didn’t grace the girl’s pathetic sidestep with an answer. Instead, she shoved her hands in her pockets and leaned back against the ledge built into the wall of the tunnel. Rather than lose herself in the mesmerizing grace of the sharks and rays, she fixed an unblinking stare on her agent. Apparently, today would not be a friend kind of day. It would be the kind of day ruled by a despised agent who had, more often than not, failed her lately.
