Free Ancient Magic: a New Adult Urban Fantasy (Dragon's Gift: The Huntress Book 1) by Linsey Hall

to the monk who’d crushed the last demon’s skull.
    Three other monks approached us. All were breathing heavily, fear in their eyes.  
    Around us, the rest climbed to their feet. The interior of their cathedral was a mess. Turned over tables and shattered chairs littered the ground. At least none of the torches had started a fire.
    “Thank you,” the tallest monk said in Irish. “We were overwhelmed. Our warrior brother is away on a pilgrimage. We were not prepared for an attack. Normally, he would protect us. Though we are supernaturals, we do not practice our skills.”
    “It was our pleasure,” Aidan said, his voice smooth.
    Our pleasure? It was hard to reconcile that this was the same guy who’d torn off a demon’s head with his beak. Either way, I’d want him at my back in any fight.
    “Do you know why the demons were here?” I asked in Irish.
    “No. We only speak Irish, but they did not speak our tongue. They seemed to be demanding something, but I do not know what.”
    So they hadn’t gotten the information they’d come for because they couldn’t speak Irish. Good. “Do you often have attacks like this?”
    The monk nodded. “Thieves and raiders come every few years. Sometimes as infrequently as a decade. It was worse with the Vikings, but even modern brigands would like to steal our holy relics.”
    He gestured to several large chests that sat at one side of the room. My dragon sense tugged at me as I looked at them. Logic said that they were full of golden goodies. My sense for treasure confirmed it.  
    Oh, how I’d love to poke around in those chests. Though my personal brand of treasure ran along the lines of quality leather goods and sharp, pointy things, I couldn’t help but get a tingly sense of desire whenever I saw gold. I’d always feared that if I took some, I’d really turn into a FireSoul, crouched on my horde of gold like Scrooge McDuck.
    “You think they were here for the gold?” I asked, though I doubted it.
    The monk nodded. “It’s what most thieves want.”
    True enough.
    “But why are you here?” the monk asked.
    “We’re looking for the Scroll of Truth,” Aidan said.
    “Ah, yes. An interesting document.” The monk folded his hands in front of him, the long brown sleeves of his robe draping to the floor. “That was stolen long ago. But we do not know where it is.”
    “Could you provide us with any information about it?” Aidan asked. “We’ll return it if we find it.”
    I wondered if he was telling the truth.
    The monk stared hard at Aidan. Perhaps he believed him, because he began to describe the scroll. The wood of the rollers, the colors of the inks used, what was written inside.
    I listened with half an ear, but I no longer needed that type of detail. Now that I wasn’t distracted by the demons, I could focus on my surroundings. I tried to push the pain to the back of my mind.
    This was where the scroll had been written. A thousand years ago, somewhere in this dark space, a monk had sat crouched over one of the little tables, painstakingly scratching out words on vellum. It had taken years; I could almost see it in my mind. Just being in the place where so much effort had been poured into the scroll set my dragon sense alight.
    I laid a hand on Aidan’s arm, trying not to think about how big and hard it was, and gave him a look. I hoped it said, We’re good here.
    He seemed to get it. When the monk trailed off, he said, “Thank you. That was very helpful. We’ll let you know if we find it.”
    The monk nodded. We said our goodbyes and left. I tried to keep my gaze off the chests full of gold as I limped out, but I didn’t succeed. I needed a twelve-step program or something.
    We took the stone steps that wound down the mountain. It didn’t take us long to make our way back to the little dock.  
      “I want to look at that wound now,” Aidan said as we climbed onto the boat.
    It hurt badly enough that I removed my arm to show him.
    “That