They were Beth’s teasing words, in answer to his own question. Remembering it made him grin. A faint spark in Aurel’s eyes betrayed he had read the memory too. Despite Michael’s apparently useless mental barrier.

  “You must make a hell of a policeman,” Michael observed. “Do you want a job?”

  “If I ever want to change, I’ll look you up.”

  Michael grinned, liking the Dragul Law Keeper almost in spite of himself. But Aurel had already stepped back to talk to Aaron, asking him about medicine in the City, and Michael was left once more in the company of the dragon girl.

  Looking straight in front of her, she walked with incomparable grace at his side, seeming to glide over the ground, her curvaceous body naturally sinuous, elegant and unconsciously arousing -- at least Michael imagined it was unconscious. But the undulation of her hips inside that loose tunic was still playing havoc with his libido.

  She took him by surprise speaking into his head. “It isn’t that she doesn’t talk of you. It’s that she tells us of your life with her, not what you do apart from her. She misses you and Aaron. And Eve.”

  Eve. He really didn’t want to go there. It was an old pain, so familiar he would miss it if it ever left him. But the Dragul chose that moment to turn her head and meet his gaze directly. And abruptly Michael wanted to close her too perceptive eyes, and her mouth, with passion, feel her writhing under him, pliant and pleading. He would soon drown that intolerable understanding in fire…

  He smiled, deliberately releasing the predator. “I hope she does. What’s your name?”

  She blinked. He heard her breath catch, saw a flurry of emotions sweep across her face again before she schooled it. “Danna.”

  “Danna,” he repeated softly. “And what do you do?”

  “Do?” she repeated, baffled.

  “You have an ordered society; everyone has their job to do. Aurel is Keeper of the Laws. What are you?”

  “I am the Dancer.” With the words, her uncertainty seemed to vanish. A smile lit her eyes once more, warm, scarily deep and sexy as hell. “I am the Dragon Dancer.”

  Chapter Two

  The man’s blue eyes darkened till they looked almost black. They seemed impossibly intense as they held her gaze, but Danna wouldn’t look away. A smile curved his full, sensual lips, knotting her stomach.

  “Would you dance with me?” he asked softly, and Danna had the feeling he was offering rather more. In spite of her returning self-confidence, it threw her.

  She tore her gaze free. “I dance for everyone.”

  “I said with not for.”

  She said stiffly, “I would be honoured to dance with visitors.”

  “I’ll hold you to that. But what puzzles me -- one of the many things puzzling me right now -- is what a dancer was doing keeping watch on us.”

  In spite of herself, her gaze flew back up to his. He was tall for a human, and even she had to look up at him. His straight dark hair flopped forward over his eyes. Beneath it his regard was teasing, yet curiously sharp, determined to get his answers. And it still held that frightening intensity.

  Why was that so frightening to her? Intensity and emotion were her blood and air. She drew them in like a sponge, absorbing them and returning them in her dance. But he, this man, was alien, strange, alarming and not at all what she had expected.

  He said, “Do you work for Aurel too?”

  She stared at him, not quite understanding at first. “Of course not,” she said at last with a contempt that was meant to wither.

  He didn’t look withered. “Then you watched us for pleasure?”

  “For curiosity,” she snapped back. “And I barely watched you at all!”

  “I sensed you since morning. Close by. And distracted enough to walk into the Dome dwellers’ trap.”

  “Which took you by surprise also,” she said smoothly, finding a weapon at last. “Were you also so distracted by my distant presence that you could not sense the nearness of your enemies?”

  He only smiled. He had a devastating smile which creased the corners of his eyes and entrancingly curved mouth and further intensified his gaze. “I must have been. You have quite a presence.”

  She chose to ignore that. “I was drawn by your mind. Even blocked as you are, it radiates something. An aura of some kind. I think it masked the presence of the others for me.”

  “Blocked as I am? I don’t appear to be blocked at all, either to you or to Aurel.” He spoke evenly, and yet she sensed his unease. The unamiable part of her, which wanted to pay him back for his effect on her, thought seriously about feeding that unease. Perhaps she even would have, had she not caught the faintest hint of vulnerability, a genuine fear of being read against his will.

  She said, “We have ethics. And now that we know your mind, it is easier to respect your block.”

  His eyebrows lifted. His lips curved sardonically. “Meaning I broadcast like a radio?”

  She found herself smiling back. “Not quite.”

  “I was sure you wouldn’t know what a radio was. You have the most beautiful smile.”

  Her stomach twisted. After a moment, deciding to ignore his second statement, she said only, “Beth showed me one.”

  “You and Beth are friends?”

  She inclined her head. With something approaching relief, she saw they had reached Home. He saw it at the same time, so she watched his stunned reaction as he gazed down over the array of hills and steep valleys among which they had built their city.

  After the first instant, he took it in methodically, quartering it, observing the structure and the movement. His face gave little away, and she would not probe his thoughts, but she couldn’t help wondering what he thought of it. She was sure its size surprised him, but the rest…?

  What was his City like? The famous “City of the Damned” where mutant humans actually lived side by side with their so-called normal brethren. The City almost completely wiped out by war, which had somehow pulled itself out of the mire to thrive afresh. A huge, close-packed place according to Aurel…

  At last he said bafflingly, “Home and garden…”

  “You have no idea,” said Aurel.

  * * *

  Beth had gone native. Bolting barefoot out of a palatial building on a grassy street, wearing only a deep green Dragul tunic, she hurled herself over the distance between them and into Aaron’s arms while her own reached for Michael so that she could hug them both at once.

  In that first glimpse of her face, Michael found no trace of surprise -- clearly telepathy worked well between Beth and her “husband.” Nor could he find any trace of unhappiness: the City girl glowed with health and excitement. She even looked suntanned. Which was surely impossible. Like Michael, she was half-vampire, and although they could go out in the daylight without difficulty, they had to use vast quantities of sun-block. Vampires just didn’t get suntans.

  Aurel said resignedly, “I thought you’d be pleased. Look after your friends, Beth -- I’m going to the king.”

  “King?” Aaron repeated quizzically, as Aurel strode away down the street toward the big square they had already passed. Danna had already left them, with no more than a nod and civil farewell. She hadn’t looked back. “There’s a king as well?”

  Beth laughed. “Very much so. His name is Vasil and he’s gorgeous and brooding and knows everything.”

  “A bit like your Aurel in fact?” Aaron suggested.

  “No,” Beth said simply. “You’ll find out in time. Come on, let’s go inside -- Dragul houses are amazing. What are you doing here? Did Will send you, or are you here of your own account?”

  “Can we go in first?” Michael asked mildly.

  “Sure, but you won’t get any more privacy there!”

  At first it seemed she wasn’t joking. She appeared to live in a huge office like an exotic town-hall. It transpired Aurel worked from his home, which doubled as library and drop-in law centre.

  But once through the main hall, full of curious Dragul who bowed politely and stared blatantly, they went through a curtained archway to a stone staircase, which led up to an obvious living area -- massive, high-ceilinged rooms, bright landscape murals and soft sofas and cushions. And a huge window looking out over the city and the hills beyond.

  “Wow,” Aaron said, impressed. “I guess your Aurel is an important man.”

  “He is,” said Beth, and there was both pride and warning in her voice. “Every aspect of the law is very important to the Dragul. I suppose you could say Aurel is number one under the king. So did Will send you?”

  “Can we talk here?” Michael asked, looking around as he threw himself down on a very comfortable sofa.

  Beth nodded, though she looked suddenly wary.

  “Yes, Will asked us to come. That idiot from the Dome -- Niall? -- that you came up here with last month, reported a load of nonsense back to his government, some of it libellous -- against you -- and some of it fairy story. However, the bit about the dragon people was believed, and the Dome is making moves to annex both the land around the tether and the Dragul land. We know they sent someone up here to contact the Dragul. Fortunately they’ve just behaved so badly that they’ve ruled themselves out of any chance of alliance. Either with us or the Dragul.”

  “And the City?” asked Beth quickly. “What does it want?”

  “Alliance with the Dragul,” Michael admitted. “Or at least an agreement not to quarrel… Will wants me to check out security here, make sure there is no threat either from the Dragul themselves -- which he doesn’t believe is likely -- or from the Dome through the Dragul.”

  “You’ll have to talk to Aurel, and to the king,” Beth said uneasily. “But I have to tell you they are strict isolationists. They have every reason to stay away from humanity, but they are determined not to leave here. You won’t budge them on that. And they have a completely different idea of time -- they count in centuries, Michael, not years.”

  “Well, that’s another reason I’m along,” Aaron put in. “I’d really like to study their medicine.”

  “And their genes,” Michael put in sardonically. “My mother is wetting herself with curiosity about their genetic make-up.”

  As she was meant to, Beth smiled at this unlikely image of the ice-cool Katia, but Aaron added seriously, “It could be really useful for us in the City, with our differences in life-span. We all age at different speeds now and we need to know why and how to level it out.”

  “You’re right,” said Beth, pouring large glassfuls of sparkling water from a fountain that stood in the middle of the room. “We have much to learn from the Dragul. But what do you imagine you have to offer them? Offhand I can’t think of anything that would come close to making them reconsider their isolation.”

  Michael said, “You.”

  She paused to stare at him. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean they have normal affections. They are not so determined in isolation that they kept you out. Will thinks that is our chief hope.”

  * * *

  Beth said, “I’m not the only human here, you know. There’s Iona, whom they found abandoned here when they first came. She was a baby. I’ll take you to visit her when you’ve eaten.”

  They were sprawled on the floor, eating fruit. “Sorry there’s nothing heavier,” Beth apologised. “They don’t eat meat. In fact they don’t eat at all.”

  Aaron stared at her. “Of course they eat something!”

  “They live on energy. Wind, fast-flowing streams, warm, pumping blood…”

  She met Michael’s gaze. Aaron glanced from one to the other. “Wow,” he said again.

  Beth changed the subject. “So you met Danna? As a dragon?”

  “Well, not ‘met’ exactly. We were ill-advised enough to mount a rescue when some Dome goons had trapped her in their net.”

  “Show-off.” Beth grinned.

  “She said she’s a friend of yours,” Michael observed casually, leaning back against the cushions.

  “I like her.”

  “She told us she’s a dancer. But somehow I can’t imagine her winding herself around a pole in some sleazy nightspot.” Actually, he could, and it made it necessary to shift position to hide the effect of it. He added quickly, “In fact, I can’t imagine there being a sleazy nightspot in this place!”

  “You spend too much time in the club,” Beth said dryly. “There’s more dancing than sleazy dancing.” She frowned. “Although to be honest, she’s bloody sexy.”

  “We got that part,” Aaron assured her.

  Beth laughed. “I’m sure you did! But it’s not just about watching… it’s feeling. Her dance is part of their storytelling traditions, and somehow the story reaches you telepathically through her dance. It’s an incredible experience -- emotionally, physically overwhelming… but you’ll see it for yourself soon enough, I’m sure.”

  “Does she have a partner?” Aaron asked innocently.

  Beth kicked him lightly in the ankle. “None that she mentions to me. The Dragul are -- liberal, until they find their One.”

  Liberal? Being liberal with Danna was a prospect Michael found incredibly arousing, but the idea of her liberality with anyone else? He wasn’t sure whether that excited or appalled…

  “How old is she?” Aaron asked curiously. “Within a hundred years!”

  “I’m not sure. She’s young for a Dragul, I think, but that still makes her older than you can imagine!”

  Though Beth answered Aaron’s questions, her gaze was on Michael. He returned it blandly, eyebrow raised.

  She smiled, and suddenly stood up. “Come on, let’s go and see Iona. As well as being human by birth, she’s the healer’s assistant, so Aaron can pick her brains!”

  * * *

  “So you met the humans? What are they like?” Iona demanded. The healer’s assistant was understandably curious -- she was human herself, at least by birth. Danna had prepared herself for the interrogation, and yet she wasn’t really ready to talk about the strangers.

  At least not the dark one with the blazing blue eyes and the dangerous, predatory smile. The mutant-human who flew without wings, who talked lucidly with his mind and yet leaked a wild confusion of intense emotions, a baffling yet fascinating mixture of efficiency, arrogance and vulnerability…

  Deliberately, Danna cut off her wayward thoughts.

  “Male,” she said calmly, sitting on the stool provided and submitting her cleansed wrist to Iona for the ointment. “A policeman and a healer. They’re Beth’s friends. Come to check up on her. And on us, I suppose.”

  And, no doubt, to pester the king for alliance or submission or whatever the City’s government thought was necessary. She was sure they were not nobodies in their City… The dark one was a law keeper, and yet he fought like a warrior, all force and speed, the movement of his lithe body oddly beautiful for all its brutality.

  Stop it, Danna!

  “So where are they now?” Iona demanded, carefully rubbing the last of the ointment around the wrist abrasion and turning to the one on Danna’s shoulder. “With the king?”

  “Aurel took them to Beth.” Danna regarded her thoughtfully.

  Though she was a human without any of the genetic mutations which had occurred in the City of the Damned since the war, Iona’s latent telepathy had been carefully nurtured by her foster parents until she could communicate as easily in the Dragul way as in the human. With Danna, who had been her friend since childhood, she tended to talk in a mixture of the two methods which others found hard to follow.

  Danna said, “You must wonder about their world. Especially since Beth came.”

  Iona smiled. “We all wonder, I suppose. I’ve lived among Dragul all my life, so humans are as alien to me as they are to you. Is that better?”

  “Much. Thanks, Iona. I think you’re about to have more patients. Call Dmir back from his nap.”

  Iona laughed, and Danna shook down her sleeve, just as someone burst through the curtain.

  Beth, followed by Aaron, and Michael.

  Michael. The dark one. Her stomach gave that odd twist, driving her pulses. Something about that one bothered her. It wasn’t just his looks, although the goddess knew they were attractive enough, or his all-too-fascinating contradictions. It was him, the way he looked at her, the way he spoke to her, the way he just was.

  Although Aaron now wore a plain brown Dragul tunic, Michael still wore his own clothes, constricting trousers that hid his flesh and yet emphasized his narrow, flexible hips, a tight, sleeveless shirt that revealed the powerful muscles in his arms. The sweater she remembered was held casually over one broad shoulder.

  His scanning gaze found her quickly and paused. Annoyingly, she could read nothing in his eyes, or his expression. He nodded casually, and his gaze moved on to Iona.

  Nothing, she thought numbly. Though she might have been trying to avoid it, deep down she knew that the disturbance he caused in her was attraction. Desire, confused by his strangeness. And yet, despite his earlier behaviour, which she could have sworn was flirting? -- one of Beth’s words -- now there was nothing.

  Piqued, because the Dragon Dancer was not used to being passed over, she would have slid quietly out the door, except that Beth caught her arm, asking about the day’s adventure and how she came to be caught. And then Aaron was there, enquiring after her injuries.

  “Almost gone,” she answered distractedly, shaking up her sleeve once more to show him the healed skin and the bruise-less flesh.

  Aaron took her hand, staring. “So quickly? That’s incredible! Mike, do you see this?”

  Michael, who was sitting astride a chair beside Iona, glanced over, but Danna would not look at him. “Iona is an excellent healer,” she said lightly.

  “I have excellent tools,” Iona said dryly. “Her quick recovery is a mixture of the herbal ointment and the Dragul’s own self-healing powers. So Dmir -- the healer -- tells me. I certainly don’t heal at that speed, even with the ointment.”

  “How fast then?” Michael asked. “If you had suffered those injuries, when would they have healed to this stage?”