Mercy Burns (Myth and Magic 2)

He glanced at me. “Because there are at least two men guarding her at the one time, and only one of me. I need the additional muscle.” He glanced at Damon, and a hint of mischief touched his lips. “You’ll do just fine in that department, lad.”

Angus shifted a little, moving from one foot to the other, and in that moment, the window exploded inward. He jerked sideways and blood splattered the mirror behind him.

Then he fell to the floor in a heap.

Chapter Eight

Damon moved so quickly he was little more than a blur. He hit me low and fast, dragging me facedown onto the wraparound couch while he knelt beside me on the floor.

“They shot him!” I said, voice half muffled by the leather and more than a little shaky. “Why the hell would they shoot him?”

“Maybe they’ve figured he’s outlasted his usefulness.” His attention was on the window above us rather than me, and his body hummed with an energy that seemed dangerously ready to explode. “Keep your head down until we know if they’re still out there.”

The warning made my heart race even harder, and I hadn’t thought that was possible. “But why would they risk shooting him with so many people around?”

“With rifles these days, you don’t have to be anywhere near your target to be certain of a kill.”

“It just seems wrong for dragons to be using weapons,” I muttered, and looked up at the middle of the three windows that lined the side of the boat. The thick glass was shattered, the pebblelike shards littering the top of the couch, glittering like diamonds in the cabin’s bright light.

“A gun is anonymous,” Damon said, his face so close to mine that his breath washed across my cheek. “Dragon fire isn’t.”

“It’s still wrong,” I said, wishing he weren’t so close, that he didn’t smell so good. Wishing I could just snuggle up a little closer to all his heat and strength and confidence.

“It’s not the weapon,” he refuted. “Weapons have their place in the world. It’s the reasoning of the man behind it that’s wrong.”

I shifted to stare at him. “Says the man who kills for a living.”

“What I do, and what these people do, are two different things.”

“Both of you have reasons and both of you think they’re good ones. But that doesn’t make either of you right.”

On the floor, Angus made a whispery noise.

“Shit, he’s alive,” I said, and scrambled toward him, away from Damon’s grasp. I grabbed the sea dragon’s hand and stared into the blue of his eyes. His flesh was like ice against mine. I tried not to see the blood soaking into the carpet behind his head, and tried to ignore the sensation of death gathering close. “Angus? We’re here. We’ll get help. Just hang on.”

His mouth opened, and although no words came out, he struggled on, trying to speak. I glanced up at Damon. “We need to get a doctor here.”

“It won’t do any good, Mercy.”

“But we just can’t sit here and watch him die!” Although I didn’t raise my voice, the desperate need to do something—anything—to help this man filled it with a hard edge.

“There’s no dragon medic close by, and we can’t risk human intervention. That could lead to complications with the council neither of us would enjoy.” His voice was as stony as his face. “But even if we did bring in human help, they wouldn’t be able to save him. Look at him. Half his head is gone.”

“But—”

“I’m not arguing about this. We’ll wait to see if the shooter comes to investigate his kill, and then we leave.”

“But someone has to stay here until dawn.” Disbelief and anger ran through me. “Someone needs to be here to guide his soul on. You can’t just leave—”

“We can, and we must.”

It was said so coldly that I could only shake my head. “God, you’re an unfeeling bastard.”

“Death often is.” He said it almost gently, like he was speaking to a child.

“But you’re not death,” I snapped back. “It’s just your job. It’s not what you are.”

“Then you see things that no one else does.” Humor touched his tone, but it held an edge that was lightly mocking. “Including me.”