Rhiana. Michele Hauf

acrobatic move. She was indebted to Amandine Fleche for the summer he’d spent helping her to master the skills required to perform such tasks. For she constantly sought danger and answered its call.

      As well, the call to seek fire ever tempted.

      Scrambling to the edge of the cave opening, Rhiana pressed her back to the magnesium-flecked wall that arced and curved about the half moon of blackness. The entrance to hell, the villagers named any and all of the cave openings dotting the seashore.

      The scriff of her armor against stone was muted thanks to the leather tunic upon which the scales had been lashed. Paul Tassot had designed the armored tunic, fashioned from the iridescent indigo and violet scales removed from Rhiana’s first—and only—kill. The scales were impervious to blade, bolt and flame, though she rarely worried for flame.

      Many leagues of tunnels and snaking passages wended through the darkness, eventually forming the narrow tunnels that led to the penetralia deep beneath the heart of St. Rénan. Never before had more than a single beast nested within the caves at a time.

      Here, standing at the mouth to the cave, the vibrations pulsing in Rhiana’s blood amplified. Mayhap she had gauged the heartbeat incorrectly? Could there be…more than one?

      “Pray to St. Agatha’s veil there be but the one,” she murmured.

      This day she would not enter the darkness. She had but come to mark out her suspicions and verify what the entire fortressed village of St. Rénan feared. A dragon had once again come to nest in the caves that opened onto the sea.

      And while past years had proven little interest to the dragons—none had attacked the village for over a decade—this time it was different.

      Yesterday evening, Jean Claude Coopier, the village ferrier, had been snatched from his very boots by a vicious dragon. Indeed, Rhiana had noted the empty boots, still standing upright as if a man wore them, as she passed through the field of vivid pinks to the north of St. Rénan on her trek to the caves. Jean Claude had been the third villager taken in five days.

      Taken wasn’t exactly the word for…murder. A second man had been found—well, parts of him had been discovered at the edge of the forest. A third had been plucked up and dropped into the sea, never to be rescued.

      A carnivorous hell had settled into the caves.

      Dragons had ever troubled St. Rénan—the hoard drew them. Or it once had. For two years the caves had stood empty. Not since the summer of Rhiana’s training had she seen a dragon. The people had become complacent. The festive hoard-raids had flourished. Even youngsters banned from the raids had begun to trek to the massive caves to sneak about, and the very few returned with a glittering gold coin as proof of their daring. Of course, the youngsters were aware only of the hoard that lured the dragons.

      Two days ago, St. Rénan had battened down. Rhiana felt the changed attitude as a tangible shiver in her bones. The people feared. A fear which grew stronger every day, for this time, it was different. Never had the dragon so boldly hunted people. Once, a man need fear danger only should he stumble into the caves and upon a sleeping dragon. History told the creature had to be aggravated to attack. It must sense danger to itself or its offspring. And very little posed danger to a dragon.

      One dragon was easily endured, for the beast rarely remained long. Being social animals, the voracious rampants required the company of their kind while they were young and wily. Only the elder, maxima dragons chose to inhabit a hoard and nest for decades, never leaving, content to exist alone in torpor.

      Never, in Rhiana’s two decades, could she recall a dragon purposefully swooping down from the sky to snatch up a helpless and flailing body.

      No man in St. Rénan dared step forth to challenge the beast. Such boldness was the slayer’s vocation.

      Yet there did happen to be a slayer in residence.

      For many years Rhiana had felt a stirring in her blood. Mayhap, since the very day she entered this world near the warm licking flames of the massive hearth fire in the castle kitchens. The hearth was so huge a grown man could step inside it without bending his head and shoulders. The warmth of the constant blazing flame ever entranced her. Visits to her mother, Lydia, who worked in the castle kitchen, were long and frequently silent, for Rhiana would sit before the flames and become transfixed.

      When she was three and her mother would leave her to her stepfather’s care in the armory, Rhiana would sit before the glowing brazier. Once, she had grabbed for the entrancing flames. Paul, who had just turned to speak to her, let out a shriek and lunged to jerk her hand from the flame. The hem of her sleeve had frayed and burned, yet her flesh had not. Paul had never told Lydia, for he had been remiss in watching Rhiana.

      One would think Rhiana had learned a lesson then. But no, it happened on a few more occasions; each time Paul would remand her and shake his head. He’d lost his fright over her strange compulsion to flame, but never his astonishment.

      Fire chaser, her stepfather had taken to calling her, when no one else was around, for most would use it as an oath against an arrogant slayer. Ever enchanted by fire, and not afraid of harm.

      As for a fire-breathing dragon? This day, Rhiana would stand tall before danger and show it her teeth.

      Stepping out to the center of the landing, she marked her steps. Ten paces. Which made the landing about twenty paces squared. It likely served as a main entrance. There were dozens of openings in the rock wall that hugged the sea and stretched for leagues beyond Rhiana’s sight, though this was the only one she’d ever explored.

      The cry of a seabird soaring overhead distracted her momentarily. And in that moment the shadows within the cave grew darker. The entrance to hell had never before felt so ominous.

      Gifted with Lucifer’s flame… Or so legend told.

      Sage scented the air. Sweet and heady, a familiar scent, but never before in so voluminous a concentration. Ancient scholars said that sage could expand one’s lifetime to the point of immortality.

      Rhiana didn’t believe it. No one lived forever.

      The fine hairs at her wrists sprang upright. Sensing the ominous presence before seeing it, she lowered her gaze to search the black void. Crouching, she centered her balance. All power manifested in her belly, her female center. From there she drew up her strength.

      Tilting her head, she listened. The basso heartbeats pulsed out a tormenting tattoo.

      The distinct scent of the beast curled through Rhiana’s nostrils. It tasted bitter and warning at the back of her throat, and spoke on slithering hisses. I am here. You cannot stop me. Attack scent, that. Once before she had scented it, sharp like the sea, innate and feral. And once before she had vanquished the threat.

      Spreading her legs and squaring her hips beneath her shoulders for a firm stance, Rhiana reached behind her back and unlatched the crossbow from the leather baldric slung from shoulder to hip. Specially designed by Paul, and forged completely of steel, the crossbow bore not a sliver of wood that might easily be burned to ash. The string? Fashioned from finely braided dragon’s gut, as well, impervious to flame. A cumbersome windlass was not required to draw taunt the string on this precious bit of weapon. Flexible at rest, the dragon-gut was easily pulled to notch, yet shrank tightly for a forceful release.

      She notched an iron bolt into place. But she would not fire unless the beast proved a threat. It could be wandering in a sleepy daze, have mistakenly scampered out to the cave opening. Despite their deadly nature, Rhiana revered the dragons. Elegant, wondrous creatures of flight and flame, she felt an affinity toward the scaled beasts.

      “Not of hell,” she murmured in awe.

      ’Tis a wicked enchantment, surely, that birthed them. An enchantment that, much against her intuitive calling, lured her to arms.

      The click of curved ebony talons, stealthy, marking its pace upon the stone cave floor, told Rhiana this one did not approach in a somnambulant daze.

      She slid her free hand over the dagger secured