Light Dragons 03 - Sparks Fly

can I say just how much of the world I feel is on my shoulders right now? Don’t fail or I what, wipe out the entire weyr?” I slumped against a shelf full of strap-on devices in varying sizes, colors, and species. “I really am getting tired of his dumping everything on me. I’m half tempted to just do as Baltic tells me, and ignore him, but unfortunately ... ” I stopped, realizing I was babbling everything to a man who didn’t particularly care if I fulfilled the task with which the First Dragon burdened me. “Well, enough about that. My time is up, and I have an appointment elsewhere. I will talk to you soon, Constantine. Enjoy your spectral whip and sexy sheep.”
    “Ysolde! I am not through discussing ... blast and damnation!”
    I glanced back to see him fading into nothing. I smiled and blew him a kiss before he disappeared completely. He followed me, unseen, to the register as I paid for my items, but after a few minutes, he ran completely out of power. With a few impotent snarls of rage, he disappeared entirely.
    “And I am so grateful that he stayed in a corporeal state for as long as he did,” I said to myself as I got into the car.
    “Who?” Ludovic asked.
    “Constantine.”
    “The silver wyvern? The former one, that is?” Ludovic looked startled.
    “Yes. He’s a shade now. I’m surprised you haven’t heard about it.”
    He blinked at me a couple of times, then nodded. “Very well. To the green wyvern’s house, I assume?”
    “Yes, please.” I sat back while Ludovic drove through the busy London traffic, my thoughts tangled and confused.
    Sadly, I was beginning to get used to their being in that state.
    “I’ll call if we’re done earlier than two o’clock,” I told Ludovic a short time later as he saw me to the door of Aisling and Drake’s London house.
    “I will be nearby,” he said, bowing in that formal way of all dragons. His manners may have been smooth as silk, but the way his eyes watched everyone on the street belied a background in protection that was comprehensive enough to pass even Baltic’s stringent requirements.
    I patted Ludovic on the arm before entering the house. “You don’t have to hide in the shadows and covertly watch everyone who walks down the street. In fact, I know you’d be welcome for lunch at Drake’s house.”
    He shook his head, his gaze flickering hither and yon, watching for any potential threat. “This is my job, Ysolde. I will fulfill my duties in a manner worthy of the blue dragons.”
    “He’s sooo serious,” I told Aisling and May some ten minutes later, after having spent a few minutes playing with Aisling’s twins before they went down for their naps. “I know that Baltic put the fear of god into him about keeping me safe, but he won’t even go sit in a pub when I’m shopping. He has to lurk in darkened doorways and skulk along alleys, waiting for Thala to pounce.”
    “If I had to answer to Baltic, I’d be skulking in the shadows, as well,” May said with a little laugh, leaning down to scratch the hairy belly of the demon in large black Newfoundland dog form that was Jim.
    “Aw, yeah, right there ... ” Jim’s voice trailed away in bliss as one of its back legs kicked wildly when May hit a particularly itchy spot. “You have the best fingernails of anyone, May.”
    “I should-they’re long enough,” May said with a smile, holding up her hand and waggling her crimson-tipped dragon claws.
    I considered them for a moment. “I’d just like to know why the shard, the very same one I carried, left you with the ability to shift into dragon form even though you’re a doppelganger, while I, who was born a dragon, can’t do so.”
    “I thought you were resurrected as a human,” Aisling said, entering the library, followed immediately by a couple of green dragons laden with trays of food. “Er ... the last time you were resurrected, that is. I wasn’t around for the first one. Lunch, anyone?”
    “Hooyeah!” Jim cheered, leaping to its feet and sniffing the trays. “Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about.”
    “You will eat only what you are given, and if I catch you mooching off May and Ysolde, it’ll be off to the Akasha with you,” Aisling warned as the table was laid out with tempting dishes.
    “Yeah, yeah, heard it before. You da big bad demon lord, and I’m just the lowly demon. Hey, where’s my burger?”
    “That is your burger,” Aisling said, nodding at the chopped-up contents of a plate in