Yes. Because he was right, she would overanalyze and she was already tempted to chicken out. It was hard enough to try on her own and fail to change. So much seemed to be on the line with this one.
Not giving herself a chance to think, she tore out of her skirt and hopped into a pair of jeans. She sat on the floor to tug on socks and her new running shoes, then grabbed a black zippered sweatshirt. Then she removed the opal necklace with care and laid it out on her dresser beside her small jewelry chest. She went into the bathroom to run her brush through her hair a couple of times, and she yanked the length back into a scrunchie.
Dragos appeared in the bathroom doorway. He had kept the jeans on and changed out of the Armani shirt, into another black T-shirt that molded to his muscled torso. He wore black boots and had a gun holstered at his waist and a sword strapped to his back.
She drew up short at the sight. “Oh-kay.”
“It’s just a precaution, Pia. We’re leaving the city,” he said. “We’re not going far, the gryphons are going with us, and we’ll still be well inside my demesne, but you’ve got to get used to this. Going out armed is a fact of life now.”
“Of course. It’s just another thing to get used to.” She looked at the holster. “A gun?”
“It’s for any trouble we might run into on this side of the passage. They’re safe enough to pack if you don’t fire them on the other side.”
She grimaced. “I guess I’ll adjust.”
“You’re doing more than fine with all this,” he told her. “I’m proud of you.”
She smiled at him as pleasure welled. She figured it was a measure of how far gone she was that his praise could affect her so. But she also suspected he didn’t offer praise lightly or often.
“All set?” he asked.
“Yes.” This time when he reached for her she was ready for him and took hold of his hand.
Bayne, Constantine, Graydon and Rune were armed and waiting for them when they went up to the roof. She looked from one to another. They were relaxed and alert and gave no hint that being called out before dawn was anything unusual. Graydon winked at her and she gave him an uncertain smile.
She hadn’t envisioned having quite such an audience when she tried to shift again. She struggled to not let it matter but the terrible sense of exposure from earlier that day came back, turning her nervousness to fear.
Dragos walked with her to the center of the roof. Some signal passed between the men that she didn’t catch. The four sentinels shifted into gryphons. She lost all sense of fear as wonder overcame her and she stared. They had the body of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle. No drawing of a gryphon she had ever seen had quite managed to capture their strange majesty or fierce dignity. They were smaller than Dragos in his dragon form but still huge to her eyes, each one’s sleek muscled body the size of an SUV.
Dragos’s Power shimmered at her back. She turned and looked up at the bronze and black dragon and forgot all about the gryphons. He bent his immense, horned, triangular head down to her. She spread her hands over his snout, eyes shining.
He gave her a very careful nudge and whuffled. She pressed a kiss to the warm hide between her fingers. He picked her up, gathered himself on powerful haunches and launched from the Tower.
Just as Dragos had promised, the flight was short, which was good since it was so unpleasant. She kept her eyes closed so she didn’t have to look at the cityscape scrolling by underneath. She breathed through her mouth in an effort to control the nausea that welled as they took to the air.
After five minutes or so the violent nausea subsided and she felt herself acclimate to the flight. They had already passed over the Hudson and crossed into New Jersey, the gryphons winging in a protective formation around them. It was not long until they banked and began to glide downward.
She tried to make sense of what she was seeing. The spray of electric lights that blanketed the land broke up ahead of them, and a darker mass rose up ahead of them against the night sky. She asked, What is that?
First Watchung Mountain, said Dragos. This is a short, tight passageway along a deep ravine. Hold on.
The sense of land magic came on fast. The gryphons fell back as he went into a steep descent and glided very low. They passed between trees that topped the edges of a ravine. She could have sworn Dragos’s wingtips brushed the rocky edges on either side.