Light Dragons 03 - Sparks Fly

Drake’s voice. “I’m sure you would, but I am not comfortable with explaining the whys and hows of the object to you just yet.”
    “Not comfortable?” he asked, his green-eyed gaze sharpening on me. “What about it makes you uncomfortable?”
    “That’s really none of your business,” I said, growing rather annoyed. While I was willing to admit he had a right to know what he was bartering his services for, he also had to know I wasn’t going to try to cheat him. “I will tell you tomorrow, once I have the item in my possession.”
    Drake was silent for a moment, then said in a drawling voice, “You forget my consequence, Ysolde. I must insist on knowing what object you use to barter with before I risk myself and my men. You will tell me what it is now, or I will not go forward with this agreement.”
    “Drake Fekete,” I said, deliberately using his original name in an attempt to remind him of his place, “I am well aware of your consequence, your history, and the terms of our agreement. It is you who have forgotten that you agreed to do the job based on my word alone. I have said I will describe the object tomorrow, and so I shall. Either you will honor our agreement, or you will renege on it.” I rose while making an imperious gesture. “But I will waste no more time on this. Decide now.”
    My heart was beating like crazy as I basically bluffed Drake, part of me worried sick what I’d do if he called that bluff, and left me without a thief, but the other part, the one who had absorbed much from Baltic’s dealings with other dragons, told me that there were times when arrogance had its place, and that time was now.
    “Oooh,” Jim said on a big breath, its expression watchful as it turned to see how Drake would respond.
    Drake’s eyes flashed molten green fire, his body tense, as if he was going to storm out of the room. Aisling opened her mouth to say something but evidently thought better of it, for she just put her hand on Drake’s and raised her eyebrows at him.
    After a moment’s silence that seemed to last a thousand years, Drake gave a sharp nod. “Very well. I will wait until tomorrow. But that is as long as I will wait.”
    “You won’t regret that decision,” I assured him. “You may think I’m trying to blow smoke up your ... er ... but I’m not. You’ll see that tomorrow-”

    A sudden crash from the hallway came at the perfect moment ... perfect for lessening the tension so rampant in the room, that is. On every other front, it caused me no end of worry. I fretted, as I leaped up and ran for the door, over whether a wall had caved in, or the stairway collapsed, or any of the million other forms of destruction that seemed to hang like a particularly brooding miasma over the house.
    “By the rood!” I yelled, charging out to the hall. “What is going on-really, Constantine? You have to do this now? It’s almost time for dinner!”
    Two dragons, identical expressions of chagrin on their faces, stood before me, one covered in shiny black scales, the other in glittering silver. The silver of Constantine’s chest was splattered crimson, blood from the three slashes dripping down onto the floor.
    Constantine’s nostrils flared. “We are conducting a challenge for the black sept, Ysolde. This is a sacred fight, one honored by all dragonkin since the First Dragon set forth the laws of the weyr, and it will not be stopped by something so mundane as a mere meal.”
    “You clearly haven’t tasted Pavel’s cooking,” I told him with a glare, pointing to the floor. “And you’re dripping all over the tile. I just hope you plan on cleaning that up, because it took the cleaning ladies three hours yesterday to scrub off all the muck and dirt, and I’m not having the tile stained again.”
    Constantine straightened his shoulders and looked down his long dragon snout. “I am wyvern! I do not clean floors! Now, stand aside so that I might beat my godson into submission and reclaim that which should have been mine in the first place.”
    “I grow weary of hearing you make such ridiculous claims about the black dragons,” Kostya said, whipping his tail around in an annoyed manner. It caught the edge of a small occasional table, knocking it against the wall, and sending a small, ugly ceramic vase to the floor.
    “Now you know how we feel,” Aisling said, sotto voce. Jim snickered. Drake shot her a long-suffering look.
    I transferred my glare from Constantine to the vase