“The explosion called Hot as Steele,” Reese added with a chuckle.
Steele didn’t react to hearing the nickname the other Drakon had given him because of his quick and volatile temper.
“Someone showed up at your hotel and you decided it was a good idea to shift, bust through the side of the building in the middle of the city and bring a human back to the Office?” Theo’s question was calmly spoken, but the emperor was clearly upset. Flames were visible in the blue depths of his eyes and each time the room grew quiet the sound of his beast chuffing in anger could be heard like an ominous whisper.
“Not someone, mummies. First there were two. In the blink of an eye there were twelve, then twenty. Every time I killed two, ten more appeared. I couldn’t fight them all, not in human form and not with her there. I had no other choice. They weren’t going to just let us walk out the door.”
But he planned to go back to that hotel or anywhere he thought he might be able to find those bastards, because without having to worry about Ravyn getting hurt, Steele could have scorched every one of them. Of course, the side of the building would probably have still been blown out, because his flame surge was not only hot as the bowels of the earth but traveled with the force of a torpedo and volcano combined.
“Why would mummies be in search of a cursed dagger? The curse should take care of its enemies without any help,” Shola said. “It doesn’t seem right to me.”
“Me either,” Theo agreed. He’d sat back, elbows on the arms of the chair, one finger moving over his jaw.
The emperor continued, “Tomorrow, Magnum and Reese will go back to the hotel to find anything that tells us more about these mummies.”
Steele immediately protested. “I’m not walking away from this.”
“I’m not telling you to,” Theo said. He didn’t have to say more because everyone in the room was thinking that if Theo had said that, there would’ve been nothing Steele could do.
But they were wrong.
“You have exposure to clean up and a dagger to obtain,” Theo said.
“I already bought the dagger from her,” he said.
Magnum shook his head. “You bought a half-million-dollar dagger that’s sure to kill you.”
“There’s still twenty-eight days left until the full moon. Besides, it hasn’t done anything to me yet and I’ve been pretty close to it. And it hasn’t killed Ravyn.” Although Steele wasn’t sure how much longer that would remain true, especially if the dagger was connected to why the Reaper wanted her dead.
“Look, I know you’re worried about exposure, but really, Theo, aren’t we past that by now?” Steele continued as he stared down the table at the emperor and then to Shola. “There’re people in Burgess who know preternaturals exist and then there are some who don’t believe. But not believing doesn’t make us go away. If we’re really here to protect them, shouldn’t we be doing so out in the open so that they know they have someone in their corner?”
He’d contemplate how Ravyn’s situation had brought him to that conclusion later. For now, he needed to get out of this meeting as quickly as possible.
“He’s got a point there,” Reese said.
Steele looked to the other Drakon who worked his nerves on a daily basis. He nodded to him and Reese shrugged.
“We’re not like vampires or witches or even the fae, who can use their glamour to look like humans. Each time we take on our true form we knock down buildings, destroy whole blocks. And if there are humans near, we risk causing a widespread panic at seeing a big-ass dragon walking along these streets. This isn’t the movies, Steele, and we’re not Godzilla,” Aiken countered.
“But this is a time of war,” Ziva said solemnly. “The Royal Blood is pissed at us for killing one of their own months ago. They’re going to strike back and what’re we going to do, stay hidden here in this mountain while they bring their creepy bloodsucking violence to the city?”
“But we’re talking about an Egyptian dagger and a few mummies,” Aiken said. “Not the freakin’ Royal Blood that’s at least eight hundred deep in Burgess alone.”
“It was more like a few dozen mummies and they were steadily coming, from where I don’t know, but there didn’t seem to be a pause button to their intro,” Steele told them. “What I’m trying to tell you is that I don’t think Robles having that dagger was a mistake. Isla’s doing deeper background checks on the guy and I’m certain she’s going to find something to help piece this together.” He was also hoping whatever she turned up didn’t somehow link to Ravyn.
“Okay, and say that she does find something and it connects to a bigger preternatural problem? We’ll come together and we’ll deal with that. But in the meantime, you need to deal with that human, who knows way too much right now,” Theo said.
Steele looked at him, wanting to say that Theo hadn’t been thinking along those lines when he’d let Shola stay here and then revealed not just himself but every one of them to her. He didn’t say it because he knew those were different circumstances and as it turned out, Shola was a demigoddess. That meant she wasn’t a normal human like Ravyn.
“I’ll handle it,” Steele said and stood, pushing the chair back. “But this is big. Those mummies were being controlled by someone or something.”
Bleu shook his head. “That’s ridiculous. Mummies have free will.”
“Right, but ancient Egyptians believed so much in life after death that they began mummifying just about everybody, especially soldiers to protect the tombs of the pharaohs,” Steele said.
“You’re thinking they’re being controlled by the curse?” Magnum asked. “Coming after whoever has that dagger.”
He
