Sinister Magic: An Urban Fantasy Dragon Series (Death Before Dragons #1) - Lindsay Buroker Page 0,2

Soon, we were close enough to the lair that my own ability to sense magic, one of the few powers I’d inherited from the father I’d never met, let me feel the aura of the wyvern.

The tunnel widened into a chamber twenty feet high and twice that deep. We had gone back far enough that I guessed we were under the spot where I’d parked my Jeep. A hundred feet under it.

Stalactites leered down from above, and stalagmites interfered with the view ahead. I couldn’t yet see our target, but I could smell her. More bones littered the floor in here. Some were deer and some were human, with blood and gristle still clinging to them.

My grip tightened on Fezzik, anger simmering as I wondered how many people this intruder in our world had killed in addition to those caught on the video.

She is resting behind those stalagmites, Sindari said. Your mongrel aura is weak, but you should cloak yourself.

It’s subtle, not weak. Just like me.

You are as subtle as those massive steel orbs on chains that pummel the sides of your buildings.

Wrecking balls, yeah, yeah. I touched the powerful cloaking charm, another hard-won prize, and faded from the sight and smell of others. My aura, my signature to those who could sense magic, also disappeared.

Sufficient, Sindari said.

Knowing I would prefer to attack from a distance and the higher ground, he led me toward a natural ramp creeping up the side of the chamber to a ledge. Just as the blue scales and folded wings of the dozing wyvern came into view, Sindari halted. His tail went rigid, and he whirled back toward the entrance.

Certain he’d sensed a second wyvern, I also turned, pointing Fezzik at the tunnel. I didn’t see or hear anything.

We need to get out of here. Sindari took a step but halted. No, we can’t go that way. He’s coming that way.

My ferocious battle tiger, the same tiger who’d been worried the wyvern would be too easy an opponent, looked around, nostrils flaring in fear as he sought some back exit from the cave.

I started to ask why, but then I sensed it. Something with an aura so great that even I could feel it from far away. And tell that it was getting closer.

He’s coming, Sindari groaned into my mind.

What is it? I’d never sensed anything like this.

A dragon.

2

A dragon?

I wanted to be skeptical and dismissive. Dragons didn’t come to Earth, not anymore. A thousand years ago, they might have, but they’d left long before the elves and dwarves had disappeared.

It was hard, however, to be skeptical when I could sense the incredibly powerful aura coming closer and closer. It—he?—was in the tunnel. And shape-shifted into something small? How else could a dragon fit in here?

We must hide. There’s no way out unless we run past him. Sindari backed farther up the ramp. Which I do not advise. Your weapons will do nothing against him, and my fangs will be like toothpicks if he shifts into his natural form. Even if he is in human form, he’ll be impossible to kill.

I followed Sindari, trusting his assessment. My only experience with dragons came through stories from other magical beings who had encountered them in their native worlds.

We scooted back to the deepest corner of the ledge. Below, just visible between two stalactites, the wyvern stirred for the first time.

Her head came up, snout opening to reveal long pointed teeth dripping with poisonous saliva. Her wings spread as she rose on her two legs to sniff the air. The wyvern was a distant relative of a dragon but much smaller, much less dangerous.

She shifted to peer around a tall stalagmite. I found a spot where I could watch her and also see the tunnel. Her talons flexed nervously on the rock floor, and she glanced around the chamber. Looking for an escape?

Her yellow-eyed gaze raked over us, and I held my breath, worried my charm wouldn’t be enough to keep me hidden. Sindari, his kind masters of stealth, had innate magic to camouflage himself. He wouldn’t be the problem.

But the wyvern’s gaze didn’t linger. It ratcheted back on the mouth of the tunnel as a human figure in a black robe with silver trim strode into view.

He had a tall, broad build and olive skin, a tidily trimmed beard and mustache, and short, curly black hair. My senses told me he was the dragon, even if he’d shape-shifted into this form to blend in. Not that he