Free Seraph of Sorrow by MaryJanice Davidson Page B

kicked up behind you.”
    Jonathan groaned at his arrogance. He thought he was so clever, flying so low so fast!
    “Fire in the hole!”
    Jennifer’s eyes went wide at her mother’s voice, and she darted away. Jonathan looked up just in time for the grenade to go off.
    SPLAT!
    The explosion occurred two feet above him, spraying hot pink paint over an area twenty feet in diameter, with him in the center.
    “They call that the ‘Poltergeist,’” Elizabeth’s voice explained from the darkness above the cabin roof. “Sneaks up on you like a ghost, doesn’t it?”
    He spat. “You had no practical use for those!”
    “True, I only ordered one for a victory dance. I wouldn’t have done it on one of the Longtails. I had to hope it was you coming from the north. Of course, I knew it would be.”
    “Of course.” He lifted his head again, looked over his hot pink and neon green body, and slammed his head back down on the earth. Snowflakes landed in the pools of paint on and around him, shimmering softly in the strange colors like stars in an alien sky. “I assume you found Xavier and Gautierre?”
    “Wendy took care of both of them. We figured you’d use them for distractions, so she gallantly offered to cover the south.”
    “What about Eddie?”
    “With Jennifer in the water and me up here, I could spare Eddie to use your newolves for target practice. He still flinches slightly when he shoots, whether it’s a gun or a bow and arrow. Once he steadies his hand, he’ll be an amazing shot. Good training opportunity.”
    “He’d better watch himself around them.”
    “I’m not worried. Since you recruited them on a volunteer basis, I’m sure they’ll behave.”
    “Could you have the good grace to pretend this was difficult for you?”
    “Difficult for Jennifer, maybe. Dragon skin or not, I’m sure the lake was cold. And if she had missed you, I would have had to put some effort into my shot.”
    “What, you don’t have an electro-angel-pneumatic thingie?”
    “Sniper model. Only three rounds a second. Though the way you were coming in, one would have been enough. Were you trying to do a speedboat impersonation out there?”
    “Leave me alone.”
    “Very well. Jennifer, get a bucket of soapy water for your father, and a sponge. He’s not coming in the house until he cleans himself off. Same goes for the Longtails, though I expect it’ll be easier for them.” She pretended to sound severe toward her daughter. “Wendy was a more efficient shot.”

    It was more than an hour later before Jonathan came into the living room, clean but shivering inside his robe. A silver moon elm leaf, strung around his neck on a light chain, tickled his chest. The leaf, and the tree that bore it, was a gift from his daughter to all dragonkind. The touch of these leaves allowed (Xavier might say forced ) dragons to take human form under the crescent moon, and dragon shape under all other phases. It was a remarkable blessing for Jonathan, who could now pursue his career and family life on his own terms.
    Normally, he would be grateful to his daughter for making this possible. Not tonight.
    He sat down in his comfortable leather chair, which used to be his father’s, and glared at her as she relaxed on the couch. Her friend Susan sat on one side of her, covered head to toe in flour from making bread earlier, and her mother sat on the other. “You cheated.”
    Jennifer grinned back as her long fingers scratched behind the ears of Phoebe, their black shepherd collie mix. “Cheated? That’s a sore loser talking.”
    “You took dragon form waiting in the lake. A real beaststalker couldn’t do that. You ruined the simulation.”
    “Real beaststalkers improvise, Dad. They’ll come up with stuff we wouldn’t think of normally. That’s what I was simulating.”
    He turned to Elizabeth, who was comfortably seated next to her daughter with a thermos of coffee. “You told her to say that.”
    His wife took a sip. “I didn’t