city of dragons 04 - fire marked by crowe val st

Author:crowe, val st [crowe, val st]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Punk Rawk Books
Published: 2016-07-21T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“What are you doing here?” Iona glared at us through the screen door on her camper. “If it weren’t bad enough that you treated me like trash—both of you—then there’s also the fact you killed my great-grandpa, so I can’t think of any reason why I’d want to talk to you.”

“It’s about Dune,” said Lachlan. “It’s not about the past.”

“Go away,” said Iona, narrowing her eyes.

“Just want to ask you a few questions is all,” said Lachlan.

“No. You killed my grandpa.”

“He made me do that,” said Lachlan. “He issued a challenge. What was I supposed to do? Run away like a coward?”

“Yes,” she said, her nostrils flaring.

Lachlan rolled his eyes. “Where’d you meet Dune?”

Iona turned to look at me. “Maybe I’ll talk to you, but not if she’s around.”

“I don’t think so,” I said, hands on my hips.

“She stays,” said Lachlan. “We work together. We’re a team. That’s how this works.”

“Work?” she said. “This is work? What kind of job you doing? I thought you were a dragon slayer.”

Lachlan’s jaw twitched.

“Just a figure of speech,” I threw in. “This isn’t pleasant for us either. But if you help us out, then we’ll get out of your hair.”

“No, you won’t,” she said. “Dune already told me that you were harassing him. You think he’s working with the drakes. You’re just fishing for something to nail him with. It’s like you don’t want me to be happy, Hawk. Why you gotta take everything from me, huh? Dune’s all I got.”

“Well, if he’s using you,” said Lachlan, “then you don’t have him anyway.”

“He’s not using me. He’s through-and-through loyal and good. He loves me.”

Lachlan started to say something else.

I jumped in. “Listen, if Dune’s really innocent, then just tell us what you know, and I’m sure we’ll come to the same conclusion that you have. But the more that you refuse to answer any of our questions, the more it seems like you’re hiding something. Are you hiding something?”

“No,” she said. “I’m not hiding anything!” She opened the screen door and came out, letting it slam behind her. “Okay, fine. What do you want to know?”

“Where did you meet Dune?” said Lachlan.

“At a bar.”

“What bar?”

“I don’t remember. We were up north someplace. Maine, I think.”

“You go that far north?”

“We used to be pretty settled in the Texas area, but then you showed up and everything went sideways.”

“You can’t blame me for that,” said Lachlan. Of course, it was his fault. He’d turned them over to the authorities and everything.

“That’s what everyone else says, but I don’t know…” She cocked her head, sizing him up. “Something about you just ain’t right.”

“Sorry you feel that way,” said Lachlan. “So, um, you met him at a bar. Is he from Maine?”

“Well… no,” she said. “I think he’s actually from around here. He was only traveling in Maine, like I was.”

“Traveling for what reason?”

“He was running something,” she said. “Some kind of drugs or magic or something. We didn’t much talk about it.”

“So, he worked for another gang before he joined this one?”

“No, he was freelance.

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