Page 278 of Dragon Slayer

“Are you?”

“Oh, um…” She had to sound decisive with this crowd. “Yeah, you could say that. I’ve worked hard at it.”

He murmured a noise she read as approving. “We will go riding tomorrow.”

Another surprise, more lurching than the motion of the elevator. “We will?”

“There’s a stable, and I asked for horses to be stalled there.” A note of imperiousness. A prince, after all. “I wish to take Val riding, and you shall come with us.”

“Oh.” Her heart bumped, part excitement, part worry. “Will they let you take him outside?”

“Do you always worry about what you’re allowed to do?”

She sighed.

He smiled again – more of a smirk. “I can do what I want. Will you come with us?”

“Of course.”

“Good.” The elevator arrived and the doors slid open. “Wear something appropriate.”

It wasn’t until she was back in her room that it hit her: Vlad the Impaler telling her to wear something appropriate. Then she laughed so hard she almost choked.

~*~

She expected her dad to show up at some point, but it didn’t mean she was glad when a knock sounded at her door just after eleven. Exhaustion dragged at her, and she was beginning to feel sick to her stomach, but she’d stayed up on purpose, leaning back against the headboard of the massive four-poster and trading texts with Donna. Donna was dead serious about calling in the National Guard. Mia hated that she was only just now realizing that her boss actually cared about her beyond her ability to warm up a horse.

She fired off another text to her mom, too, a quick check-in. She’d texted her before she boarded the plane in Colorado, her first chance to reach out, and told Kate she wason the way 2 see Dad. By the time they’d landed, she’d had twelve missed calls. Guilt gnawed at her, but she had no idea what to say to her mother; Kate couldn’t help her now, and Mia wanted to be as clear-headed as possible right now.

When she heard the knock, she set her phone aside on the nightstand and called what she hoped was a grudging “come in.”

Edwin cracked the door first, and peeped slowly around its edge before he finally shoved his whole head inside. He looked ridiculous. “Hello, dear. I wondered if I might have a word.”

“Fine.”

He came in smiling, though careful, walking gingerly across the carpet and settling in a claw-foot chair that looked two centuries old. He sat like an old man, legs spread so he could settled his linked hands between them, shoulders rounded beneath the white lab coat he still wore. Mia had a sudden, disturbing vision of herself like this, flabby and stoop-shouldered, hair thinning. Maybe it was because his brain was so industrious; his body had withered under the strain of all that thought. Or maybe it was just genetic. Had Mom’s genes been enough to stave off his? Or would this be Mia, frail, and old before her time?

No, she realized with a sick inner laugh. She’d be dead long before she went gray and thin.

God.

“I hope you find your room to be comfortable,” Dad began.

“It’s very nice,” she said without emotion.

“It’s west-facing.” He twisted his fingers together until they went white. He still wore his wedding ring, she saw. “I thought you might enjoy seeing the sunset.”

She didn’t respond.

He studied her a moment, expression strained. Then he slumped a little more. If possible, the lines on his face deepened. “Mia,” he said, weary, “I know you’re furious. I know you probably hate me. But can’t we – can’t we just talk? Not as doctor and patient, but as father and daughter?”

She had to take a few breaths. Then, as calmly as she could: “You have to understand that there’s nothing you can say at this point. You know that, right? This isn’t just about us, Dad. It’s not father-daughter problems. What you’re doing here – I can’t get over that.”

He looked terribly sad. “Is this really an issue of a wider morality for you? Or is it just about the prince?”

“I–” She hesitated, and that killed her entire argument.

“Mia,” he sighed. “I know that you–” he winced “–have come to care for Prince Valerian in some way. But darling, he’s nearly six-hundred-years-old. He’s killed people, maimed them,drank their blood. He can manipulate minds. He was a sultan’s concubine. How could you ever possibly believe anything he says?”

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