Page 97 of Elven Throne

“Well looks can be deceiving, buddy,” Rowan snapped back. “I bet you know that better than anyone…”

After practically shoving the token in Rebecca and Maxwell’s faces for maximum effect—and still ignoring Maleine altogether—Rowan’s frustrated scowl morphed into a showman’s smirk now that he was once more the center of attention in the way he wanted to be.

Setting the token in his open, extended palm, he danced the fingers of his other hand over the coin, playing across its surface with a series of dancing taps and flickering flourishes. At first, nothing happened.

But then a gentle silver-white light bloomed around the token before fading out of existence again.

Rowan plucked the coin from his palm between thumb and forefinger and grinned.

Whatever type of spell he’d attempted, fancy or otherwise, it hadn’t changed a bit of the coin’s physical appearance. No trace of strong magic filtering through the air. No reaction whatsoever from their surroundings.

Rebecca’s deadpan stare remained. “That’s it?”

Unaffected by the staggering levels of cynicism, Rowan wiggled his eyebrows at her. “Watch and learn.”

With unbelievable swagger, he waltzed up to the dragon statue, paused for effect in front of the clearly marked slot where bored humans from anywhere and everywhere were to insert their tokens, then slipped the coin into it with a flourish.

The token pinged through the slot before clanging onto the top of the collected pile of other tokens just like it.

With a roaring whoosh, a whirring bolt of flickering flame burst from the metal dragon’s open mouth, heat and bright light spewing from the back of an inorganic throat.

Rebecca stepped back, partially in surprise that this part had actually worked, and partially so she wouldn’t miss whatever new trick the Kaskaskia Dragon had in store, which Rowan seemed so unwaveringly convinced he’d achieved.

The statue’s eyes did glow red for the full duration of those ten seconds, but that was it.

Then the whirring mechanism igniting the flames in the dragon’s mouth snuffed out, the eyes returned to their dull lightlessness, and all that remained were a fading heat and the faint sent of lighter fluid and hot metal in the air.

Maxwell snorted violently, his nostrils flaring.

Rebeca waited a moment longer, then glared at Rowan again.

The Blackmoon Elf merely grinned up at the dragon statue, nodded, then casually walked around the side of the glinting roadside behemoth. With another flourish, he spun on his heels to face his unwilling audience, leaned back against the dragon’s metal side, and folded his arms.

Particularly pleased with himself.

Maxwell’s next low growl was barely audible. “Can I rip out his throat now?”

Maleine cut in with a tinkling laugh. “Oh,pleasedo. I would love nothing more.”

Rebecca flashed the woman a sidelong glance. She’d almost forgotten they had a fourth among them.

But now that Maleine had made herself impossible to forget or ignore, as usual, the thickening tension among their little party returned with full force.

Rebecca could almost taste it. Everything she felt through Maxwell standing stock-still beside her proved the shifter was just as wary of their current situation.

She hadn’t thought this day could get any stranger, all things considered.

Then something actuallydidhappen.

A soft, thin flicker of silver-white light bloomed around the statue’s metal side against which Rowan leaned. With a harsh, grating squeal like twisting metal, something in the statue moved.

It was slow at first but quickly picked up speed, and then a panel door in the statue’s metal side fizzled away just in front of Rowan to reveal a dark archway in the ribcage of the Kaskaskia Dragon.

With all the pompous self-assuredness returned to Rowan’s smirk, he looked pointedly at Rebecca. “I did say there were layers to the process. Step one, right here.”

Well that was a whole lot of dazzle and flair for nothing.

She stepped to the side to get a better view of what lay beyond that newly opened archway. At first, she saw nothing but thick darkness. But when she leaned just a little closer, there was still enough daylight to illuminate a set of steep stone steps.

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