Red Dragon was still huddled in the booth where Kyrie had left him, and looked around with huge eyes, as if he expected everyone in the diner to shift shapes and devour him.
And he says he wants to protect Tom, Kyrie thought, and shook her head slightly at the absurdity of it. It has to be a joke. Perhaps not his joke, but the Great Sky Dragon's.
She pushed a cup of coffee in front of him, and poured coffee into it from the carafe and just as she was thinking that no matter how many packets of sugar Red Dragon put in it, he needed protein and she ought to have thought of it, Tom set a plate in front of Red Dragon, containing two whole wheat buns and what appeared to be a triple hamburger and a whole lot of cheese.
Considering that she knew very well how Tom felt about Red Dragon, Kyrie felt her heart melt. Tom was like that. He would give up his own shirt to clothe someone else, even if it was his mortal enemy. This both scared her and made her think her boyfriend was the best person in the world.
Red Dragon looked sheepishly at Tom who said, "Protein. After shifting."
The young man nodded at Tom and picked up the burger with shaking hands, while Kyrie looked up at Tom and gave him her warmest smile. He looked worried enough, but he winked at her, before returning behind the counter to fool with the grill or start preparations for the next dish, or whatever it was he did back there half the time. Kyrie was quite contented to leave the cooking to Tom, and most of their clientele seemed to approve of the decision.
She turned back to Red Dragon, who was wolfing down the burger.
"I can't call you Red Dragon," she told the creature who faced her, clutching the burger tightly as if he were afraid she'd take it away. "Do you have a name?"
Red Dragon blushed and paused, caught just after taking a bite, his mouth full, the burger awkwardly in his hand. "I'm . . . My name . . ." He blushed darker and looked down at the burger, setting it slowly down on the plate, as he hastily chewed what was in his mouth. "My name is Conan Lung."
"Conan?" Kyrie asked. She didn't know whether she believed it, and she almost laughed at the idea of this man, who was shorter even than Tom, much slimmer, and—definitely—no barbarian hero, being called Conan.
"I . . ." He sighed. "My parents used comic books to improve their English, and they liked Conan."
That he was descended from the sort of people who thought that their son was likely to grow up to be a barbarian hero, might explain his delusional thoughts of protecting Tom. Might. She doubted anything could fully explain that.
"Right, then, Mr. Lung," she said. "What I want to know—"
"Call me Conan," Conan Lung said, quickly, and in the sort of undertone that implied he expected a rebuff.
"Right then," Kyrie said, thinking to herself she hoped the creature wouldn't think they were the best of friends, now. In his last foray into their lives, he'd chased them all over town and he'd helped catch and torture Tom. She knew that like all cowards, he could be exceptionally cruel in a fight. And she didn't want to have him at her back in a dangerous situation. In fact, she didn't want to have him anywhere that she couldn't keep a sharp eye on him. "You said you came to protect Tom?"
Red Dragon cast a fearful look at Tom, then another back at Kyrie. "The Great One said that I must come and protect the young dragon," he said, and bobbed a small bow, as though just speaking of the Great Sky Dragon must entail a need to kowtow. "He said I should answer for his life with mine."
Kyrie frowned. Conan sounded terribly earnest and she didn't think just now, scared as he looked, that the man was capable of lying so convincingly. However, having met the vast golden dragon that was master of all other Asian dragons in the West, she couldn't imagine his sending Conan to Tom as a protector.
"You're . . . He told you you're to protect Tom? You're a bodyguard of sorts, then?"
Conan bobbed his head again, then shook it desultorily. "Not . . . a bodyguard. My . . . my fighting is not all that could be desired. But I am one of the Great One's . . . you know? One of his vassals. I'm supposed to . . . to report to him what's happening around . . . the young dragon. To . . . to call him if needed."
"Do you mean," Kyrie started, narrowing her eyes, "that you are spying for the Great Sky Dragon? That if there is any trouble . . ."
"He can be here in no time at all," Conan said. "He tried telling the young dragon to beware, but the young one didn't seem to understand him, so I am here to protect him." A bite of the burger and a fleeting look under his annoyingly thick and long lashes at her. "And . . . and you. By making sure the Great One can chase away any enemies before they can harm any of you."
"But protect us from what?" Kyrie asked. She didn't at all like the idea that the Great Sky Dragon had effectively planted a spy among them. She wasn't sure she trusted his intentions or his ideas of what was proper. And she was very sure she didn't trust the Great Sky Dragon, himself. A creature more than a thousand years old—and from what Kyrie understood, the Great Sky Dragon was several thousands of years old—would have seen generations come and go. What would others' lives be worth to him?
Oh, he could have killed Tom, three months ago—killed him in such a way that even the amazing healing power of dragons would not have reversed. And he'd chosen not to. But how did Kyrie know that it was ever a choice? How could she know that under what must surely be an alien honor code, the Great Sky Dragon hadn't been forbidden from killing Tom then? And how did she know that he didn't mean to make up for it now, by setting a trap in which Tom would be caught and killed?
She looked towards her boyfriend, who was leaning on the counter, chatting animatedly with Rafiel, and again felt a sick lurch at her stomach. In place of the family she'd never known, she had a man who loved her and who was—she believed—one of the best people in the world—dragon shifter or no. And she had friends: Rafiel and Anthony, and a young man named Keith who was, now and again, a part-time waiter at The George.
Kyrie was not willing to give up any member of her chosen family, nor any corner of her domain to shadowy creatures whose life span might be many times as long as hers, but whose moral compass left much to be desired.
"Stay here," she told Conan, as she got up, collecting the carafe. She must talk to Tom and Rafiel and try to figure out what they should do with Conan and what the Great Sky Dragon could be trying to do.
Whatever it was, they would be in as much danger as she would be—perhaps Tom would be in more danger, in fact—and she couldn't make a decision for either of them.