Swallowing hard, I pick up the pace, speeding ahead of the rest of the guys. “Boots?” I hear Landon call after me. “You all right?”
“I’m fine,” I reply quickly. “It’s just chilly out here. That’s all.” Thankful none of them can see the blatant fear on my face, I pull my jacket more tightly around myself. It is chilly—more than chilly, in fact; it’s fucking cold, especially for this time of year. A thick fog seems to have descended on downtown Edinburgh almost as quickly as we left the hotel, and it’s making me shiver. The address Lyle gave me isn’t really a proper address at all; according to him, the man we’re supposed to meet, who only goes by the name Nathan, lives under the bridge that passes over the Water of Leith.
We make our way through the thick mist in silence, each of us mostly lost in our own thoughts, and although the sun is gradually rising in the sky, it doesn’t burn off the fog like I would expect. In fact, the farther north we go, the thicker it seems to get. It gets to the point where I can barely see in front of my face, goosebumps sprouting on my arms. The feeling of a hand on my wrist makes me yelp, but my hand goes to my chest when I realize it’s just Shade, who has caught up to me in the mist. “Sorry,” he says, his hand slipping into mine, “didn’t mean to scare you.”
“It’s okay,” I reply. Shade’s hand creeps up to gently chafe my upper arm. The motion helps warm me up; sensing this, he pulls his body flush against his side. “Is everyone staying close?”
“Barely,” Landon gripes from somewhere behind me. “I lived in Scotland my whole life, and I’ve never seen weather quite like this.”
“So am I going to be the one to say it, then?” Hunter’s voice comes through the fog to my left.
“Magic, no doubt,” says Silas. “I’ll take that as a sign we’re heading in the right direction.”
“Are we, though?” asks Shade. “We could be going straight off a cliff and I wouldn’t be able to tell.”
“Boots,” says Landon, “you wouldn’t happen to have any light spells in that head of yours, would you?”
“Nothing I trust myself to cast,” I admit. Knowing what’s been happening lately, I might very well blind someone in the process. “Silas…?”
“On it,” the dragon shifter affirms. Flickering embers rise in his throat, illuminating his tall figure with a flickering glow reminiscent of candlelight. It’s not enough to burn the fog away, which is probably a good thing - starting a fire in public isn’t exactly on my agenda for the day - but it’s enough to at least get a better view of where we are. Turns out, we have indeed strayed from our path, at some point getting turned around completely. “Look,” Landon says, pointing down in the glow of Silas’ flames. “Let’s follow the river.”
Not needing to be told twice, the five of us work our way down the riverbank, becoming aware of the distant sounds of shouting and honking car horns. Clearly, this isn’t a normal weather phenomenon—an omen if I’ve ever seen one—and it seems to have already caused a couple of traffic accidents. The strange thing is that the sounds around us seem muffled, like someone draped a blanket over the five of us. Whatever this is, it was clearly meant to keep intruders out, particularly intruders of the shifter disposition.
After what feels like an eternity, we’re finally able to make out the form of the high metal bridge rising out of the mist. It’s imposing in its own right, and the fact that I can’t see what’s beneath it only adds to its eeriness. “Nice digs,” Landon quips. “It almost reminds me of—” But his voice is immediately cut off as something snatches him out of the mist, knocking the breath from his lungs.
“Landon!” I cry, pulling away from Shade and staring frantically into the mist.
The sound of a mighty roar pierces the silence, followed by a grunt in pain from the siren shifter. A dragon.
I roll my shoulders back. “Millie, wait—” begins Hunter, but I ignore him, whipping my dragon wings out and spouting a pillar of flame into the air. That lights up the world around me, giving me a view of the all-too-familiar dragon who is now shaking Landon in his jaw’s.
I may not be great with faces, but I recognize Silas’ father when I see him—and so, apparently, does Silas, who intensifies his own fire with a roar of dismay. I swoop in to rescue Landon, descending on the other dragon’s back with enough force to make his mouth drop open. Landon tumbles downward, shifting into his siren form just in time to plunge gracefully into the water. The element of surprise is only going to get me so far, however, and Silas’ father flings me off his back with one easy whip of his tail. Thinking fast, I use a blast of telekinetic magic to cushion my impact with the ground. “Boots,” Silas yells. “You okay?”
“Don’t worry about me,” I call back.
“Millie.” The pleading in his voice is enough to give me pause. “Don’t hurt him.”
A moment passes, and I nod. “I won’t, Silas.”
Shade has already leapt down the bank in his wolf form to help Landon out of the water, although to my relief, the siren shifter is more or less unscathed. Hunter, meanwhile, is standing in front of Silas to shield our light source from an unexpected blow. It’s up to me.
Flinging my arms out in front of me, I shift immediately into my witch form. Force fields are still a relatively new concept to me, but I know enough to do what I need to do. Summoning a fresh wave of energy, I conjure a spherical force field around Silas’ father and use it to carry him up and over our heads. I then launch it as far away from where we are as I can, not letting the barrier drop until I’m confident that the senior Aconyte has safely reached the ground. “That should keep him busy for a while,” I say, just as Landon and Shade reunite with us. Hurrying up to the siren shifter, I throw my arms around him. “You okay, Landon?”
“As good as I’ll ever be,” he replies, before turning to Silas, who is still staring in the direction I sent this father. “I’m more worried about you.”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to it,” Silas says flatly, before shaking himself. “Thank you, Boots. That was a close one.”
“That son of a bitch Lyle set us up,” Shade growls, his wolf eyes flashing. “This Nathan guy is working for Hawthorne, guaranteed.”
“Working for who?” comes a voice from in front of us. Just like that, the mist begins to clear, revealing a stout, bearded man wearing, of all things, a fanny pack. “Bold of you to assume I’d do anything for that bastard. Whatever problems you’ve brought here, that’s on you. You’d think the fog would be enough of a deterrent, but some people just don’t know when enough is enough.”
“You must be Nathan, I take it,” says Hunter, crossing his arms.
The man, Nathan, sweeps into a bow. “In the flesh and at your service… depending on what the service is.” His eyes land on me. “And who is this lovely specimen?”
I honestly can’t tell if he’s pulling my leg, so I ignore the question completely. “Lyle Morgan told us you’d be able to help us.”