“And yet, somehow, all our peers look up to me, and consider you a laughingstock.” Bertram brushed a nonexistent speck of dirt off his sleeve, his heavy gold signet ring flashing as he did so. “If I may offer you a bit of free professional advice? Give up this ridiculous love affair of yours with this entirely mythical warrior. Perhaps you could take up a nice, quiet position in a local history museum? You'd make a simply splendid tour guide for schoolchildren.”
“I am so looking forward to seeing your face when I present my findings,” Virginia said. “I'll make sure the conference organizers reserve you a front-row seat.”
Bertram sighed. “Alas, the academic world is so prejudiced. Criminals are rarely invited to give keynote speeches. Are you aware of the maximum sentence for breaking and entering?”
“Are you aware of the maximum sentence for corruption and bribery?” Virginia shot back. “Because I know you signed off on the paperwork for this site, saying that it was of no historic interest and so suitable for building. And there is no way in hell you actually did that survey.”
Bertram went suddenly very still. “You found something.”
I am alone at midnight in the middle of nowhere with a man who has despised me for nearly a decade, with something in my pocket that is both going to professionally ruin him and incidentally cost his family a very, very large sum of money.
“No,” Virginia said, unconvincingly.
“You found something,” Bertram repeated. His eyes narrowed. “What? A mere trifle, no doubt. A coin, or an arrowhead. Nothing of significance.”
“Hah! You wish.” Virginia couldn't help the grin that spread over her face. “Oh, you are so busted, Bertram. This isn't just any old burial mound. This is Brithelm's burial mound, and I can prove it.”
“You found proof?” Strangely, he sounded exultant. “You must have found...it.” A hungry expression spread over his face as he took a step closer. “Give it to me. Now.”
Virginia backed away, fumbling for her crowbar. “Lay one finger on me and I swear I will brain you.”
“Are you threatening me?” Bertram chuckled. “How entertaining. I think that I would very much like to see you try it.” He kept coming forward, and Virginia kept retreating. “Come on, my dear delectable Virginia. D
on't be ridiculous. You have never been able to win against me, and you certainly won't now. Just give me Brithelm's gem.”
Virginia's palm was sweating on the handle of the crowbar. “You'll have to prize it out of my cold, dead fingers, you bastard.”
Bertram's eyes glittered oddly in the light. “Excellent.”
He lunged, and Virginia hurled the crowbar at him. Without waiting to see if it had connected, she whirled and ran, her boots pounding over the rutted ground. Over her own panicked breathing, she heard Bertram laugh, then a strange noise like an enormous tarpaulin flapping in a storm. Then—nothing.
As she wriggled back through the broken gate, Virginia risked a glance behind her. All was dark. Had Bertram switched off his flashlight, the better to stalk her through the night? She half-slid down the sloping hill to where she'd left her Range Rover parked next to the road, dropping her crowbar in order to fumble frantically for the keys. Expecting at any moment to feel Bertram's hands grabbing at her, she flung herself into the vehicle.
Only when she was finally barreling back down the twisting countryside roads at a thoroughly unsafe forty miles per hour did her galloping heart begin to slow. She drew in a deep, shuddering breath, checking her rear view mirror. No sign of pursuit. Maybe he hadn't had a car. Maybe he'd given up. Maybe he was just—her racing mind scrabbled for ways that rich, evil English aristocrats might deal with people who'd crossed them—on the phone, calmly placing a hit on her.
Okay, now you're just being ridiculous. Giving herself a mental shake, Virginia returned her attention to the road ahead.
There was a dragon in the middle of it.
Virginia had barely even registered the impossible shape when her reflexes took over, stomping hard on the brake and jerking the steering wheel. She had a brief impression of a wall of ice-white scales shooting past the side windows as the Range Rover fishtailed wildly, spinning almost out of control. With all her strength, she clung onto the wheel. In a stench of burning rubber, the car screeched to a halt, facing back the way she'd come. Virginia stared through the steam rising from the hood, her knuckles white on the steering wheel.
There's a dragon in the middle of the road.
There's a dragon.
In the middle of the road.
It's a dragon.
That can't be right.
Shock gave her a strange sense of detachment, as if she was just watching a movie. Everything seemed to go into slow motion, every last detail of the beast searing into her retinas. It was sitting upright like a cat, long white tail wrapped primly around its front—paws? Feet? Huge taloned things? Its horned head was at least twenty feet off the ground. The glowing orange eyes met hers, and the dragon's jaw dropped open slightly, forked tongue lolling out. It looked for all the world as if it was smirking at her.
The dragon unfurled its wings. The lean muscles of its back legs tensed, then it sprang into the air, its wings sweeping downward with a boom.
The sound broke her paralysis. She fumbled for the keys in the ignition, her nerveless fingers slipping. Before she could restart the engine, the entire car shook as the dragon thumped into the ground right next to it.
Virginia screamed as the passenger-side window shattered. She hurled herself out of the driver-side door as two sharp ivory talons thrust into the compartment. Then she was sprinting, running faster than she had ever run before in her life, away from the sounds of tortured metal as the dragon tore her vehicle apart behind her.