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Both men grunted and held up their hands. Powerful woman that I was, I grinned and accepted their total surrender.

Chapter Fifteen

Mulan’s happiness had lost some of its shine after she spoke with her parents but her resolve was still in place. They didn’t believe her story about the jiangshi—no big surprise there—but the Wu Shaman threatened not to release him at all if they didn’t go along. After that threat, they came around.

She took Conn home and pampered him. I never asked a single question about what her pampering entailed but she returned a short thirty minutes later citing he’d fallen asleep.

Rasmus elected to sleep alone until both statues were gone from the foyer. He said he didn’t want to be a distraction to me. We both knew he would have been, so I had to be a grown-up and appreciate his thoughtfulness. Of course, his decision frustrated me too, but it had been my decisions that caused the fight between us to go on for so long.

I also was a big enough person to admit that we might have handled Zara differently if I had not gotten my feelings hurt. I might have inserted myself more strongly into his and Orlin’s plans for the female guardian. Not that I was blaming myself for my current crisis.

Sure, Ma would have blamed me, and Fiona might have as well. Both would have caved on the issues between me andRasmus sooner than I had. Did that make me more stubborn than them? Or did it simply mean I trusted my judgment over even his?

I had never encountered a man as powerful as Rasmus, even in his human state. Admittedly, Zenos was a close second.

The dragon mage returned late that evening. He strode into the foyer like a conquering king arriving home from a war. It was a shock when he didn’t immediately rail over the absence of willing wenches and bowing servants not there to greet him, but I saw the desire to do so in his haughty gaze.

While the guardians were reserved and secretive, Zenos displayed his power proudly. He also seemed completely unconcerned about the opinions of others. Since some would say that about me, so I could only admire him for it.

In terms of being annoying, he went beyond Rasmus, who annoyed me daily. Zenos managed to annoy me every time he opened his mouth.

But my dragon mage teacher told me truths that no one else bothered to share. He wasn’t trying to shield me from my power or myself. He simply told me what I didn’t know and let me deal with it as best I could. I had no words for how liberating it felt. He treated me more like an equal than any other magickal I’d ever met. Zenos earned my tolerance and gratitude by valuing my opinion and sharing information with me.

A questioning gaze that came ever closer warily shifted between Mulan and me sitting on a couch plotting and the now sheetless creature we had mostly concluded wasn’t a demon. There was still a little room for doubt but I was completely ready to make the call that we truly were dealing with a jiangshi.

Zenos grinned when he saw Mulan’s shaman staff back in its natural form. My face heated with memories of what it had been that day Zenos had flirted with me, but I wasn’t bringing up itsprevious disguise if he didn’t. The last thing that dragon mage needed was more embarrassing ammunition to use against me.

“I see things are finally normalizing. Did ya lasses figure out the big secret yet?”

Mulan glanced at Zenos and then at me. “Does he speak to us? What islass? Is it same thing asass? Should I zap him?”

Communications suffered when global translations didn’t work out well. Translating Zenos into something palatable was an even harder task. Also, the idea of Mulan zapping Zenos highly appealed to me, and I felt highly tempted to goad her into it. Mulan was definitely in a zapping mood. Luckily for the dragon mage, my maturity won out.

I kept my eyes firmly locked on Mulan’s serious gaze instead of looking into the dragon mage’s laughing one. “Zenos is very old-school in his English. Men areladsand women arelasses. He’s not trying to offend anyone. It sort of happens naturally for him in every conversation.”

“Fine. I will ignore odd speech then.” She turned to speak to the dragon mage again. “Greetings, Zenos of the One. I hope you are well today.”

The dragon mage’s smile was all kinds of wicked. “Greetings to ya as well, Mighty Wu. Ya’re certainly looking much better than the last time I saw ya. Have ya recovered from banging yer head?”

“Yes. Head is healed now.”

“And I appreciate yer polite greeting.”

“You are welcome. Aran taught me how to address you properly.”

I narrowed my gaze at his polite conversation with Mulan. He owed me one as well. “Tell me something, Zenos. Do ya always leave without telling anyone where ya’re going? I could have been worried about ya today, ya know. Ya are a guest in my home.”

“Well, now, I have a grand alibi for my time away but I fear it would be wasted on ya in yer current mood. If ya weren’t willing to accept the guardian’s excuses, ya for sure won’t be accepting mine. Yer Rasmus and I are not the kind of men who sit around with our thumbs up our arse. We’re men of action and that’s what we do.”

I grunted in disbelief. “Ya’re right, Zenos. I really don’t want to hear yer excuses, and I still don’t want to hear the guardian’s. But I’m extremely curious about how ya overheard the private conversation I had with Rasmus because that’s the only way ya could have known we discussed those things.”

“And I’m curious if ya told the Wu Shaman what ya did with her staff while she was wounded.”

Mulan snorted. “What wicked, disrespectful thing did the descendent of brash Irish god do with my shaman tool?”

I glared at her for playing along with his dirty joking. Conn was corrupting her. That had to be why she was acting like this. “I didnothing, ya traitorous twat. I would never touch yer tool without yer permission.”

Zenos smirked. “Don’t be fooled, Mulan. Aran turned yer massive cock on and pointed the bloody thing at me. I thought she was making a pass and asking how my manhood compared to it. But then she turned me down when I agreed to bed her. I think they call that sending mixed messages these days. Ya’d think I’d understand women, being immortal and all, but I don’t think it’s possible to understand females. Yer kind are a perpetual mystery.”