Chapter Three - How to Find a Dragon
Cyrene
The week that followed the audition is a blur. Erin, I heard, loved me and I was presented with a contract that I readily signed. The offers were coming in and the agency was booking some serious gigs for me. The days were spent with shoots in studios, shoots at different locations and more shoots. I got fired from my morning job because I had to go for shoots.But I was still working, juggling shifts with my other job. I wasn’t making any money from the modeling yet and the rent wasn’t going to pay itself. I told myself the Sufi adage “This too shall pass,” constantly. I knew good times were right around the corner, that things were about to change. I just had to wait a little while longer.
After my evening shift at the coffee shop, I come back to my apartment, ready to crash. It has been a long day with shoots all morning and work right after it. I get in bed, wrap my arms and legs around two pillows and stare out the broken window. And then it hits me: I have to find dragon hairs! The next coven meeting is in seventeen days and I have to score a clump of dragon hair before that. But the question is, how do I find a dragon?
I think hard, really hard, return to the grimoire, flip a hundred pages and then decide that this task should be left for the weekend when I finally have some time off.
During the next three days, I end up getting to know three other girls who have also been signed by GMA. They are all as fake as anyone can get, but they pretend to be friends with me and I play along. They plan to go to Greystone Manor, a place where the Hollywood royalty and the elite come to party. One of the girls, Maya, comes up with a bet to see which one of us can land the hottest guy when we go to the club. I pretend to not be interested, but I am determined to show them what I am capable of.
I check my purse and see that I am all out of love potion, so I make an excuse with the girls and tell them I can’t go with them today. They don’t mind either, naturally, they need hours to dress and doll up before heading to the club. We agree to go the next day, which happens to be a Saturday night. It buys me enough time to brew a love potion.
When I get back home, I instantly remember my dragon hair quest and I postpone that to Sunday because I have some serious business on Saturday night. I head to the kitchen and lay the ingredients for the love potion on the counter:
5 grams of moonstones
A cup of moonshine
A spoonful of rose thorns
A handful of nightshade
Adder’s fork
A strand of my own hair—this makes sure that whoever drinks it falls in love with me
I may not like being a witch, but I am a pro at brewing potions. This recipe is my own, a modified version of the original love potion. With this recipe, the charm wears off in just twelve hours, so by the time you wake up, the guy is already gone.
I place the Adder’s fork and a strand of my hair in a pot and place it on the stove, turning the heat high, until the tongue is absolutely burnt to crisp—this is for deception, a key ingredient. I crush the burnt Adder’s fork with the back of a spoon, turning it to smooth powder, turn down the heat and pour moonshine over it. The pot hisses as cold moonshine dances over its silver surface. Then I throw in the nightshade and rose thorns and let the mixture boil; meanwhile, I crush the moonstone in a grinder—they aren’t that hard. As the mixture comes to a boil, I turn off the heat and sprinkle the moonstone powder over it, twirling the mixture with a spoon. Perfect!
I pour the mixture into five tiny vials and then I am all set for tomorrow. I look at the grimoire lying on my bedside table, opened randomly from the middle and contemplate whether or not to try to find out something about the dragon thing. Then I close it and turn on the TV instead. I figure, if I am going to go through the grimoire, I might as well start from the beginning and study every page carefully.
On Saturday evening, I stand in front of the mirror, dressed and ready to go. I am wearing a tight black dress that falls to the floor—very witchy of me, I know—and puts my boobs, a fantastic pair of DD’s on display, my bra pushing them closer together. I let my hair loose, as usual, letting light auburn curls fall all the way to my waist, both at the front and the back. I look at my face up close, my freckles covered in powder as translucent as my skin, my lids heavy with simple green eyeshadow and black eyeliner, made heavier still by my mascara; I can scarcely keep my eyes open, I look drunk. I put on bright, pink, glossy lipstick and smack my lips one last time before I leave.
I meet up with the girls outside Greystone Manor. The line is very long, but we have the passes from GMA. We skip the line, people shouting at us and wave our passes in front of the guard’s face. He doesn’t stop us.
Although all four of us go in together, we keep a fair distance between ourselves when we enter. We are all standing at least an arm’s length from each other. None of us wants to share our spotlight, in this dark bar. The music is blaring through the speakers. The dance floor is filled to the brim and slowly overflowing, as drunk girls continue throwing themselves at guys. We make our way to the bar and order our drinks. Then we sit on the barstools and sip on our cocktails, eyeing the crowd, looking for the guy that we will try to win.
And then he enters. Maya almost coughs out her drink, choking, the instant she sees him. The guy is radiating heat even in the dark. He’s fucking radioactive! And then I realize that the girls have teamed up against me, trying to set me up for failure, not knowing what I am capable of.
Anna, one of the girls, swivels her barstool and turns to me. “Let’s start with you, Cyrene.” Maya and the third girl, Liz, nod in approval. “That guy,” she says, her manicured hand holding her drink, a long finger pointing in his direction.
I turn my head but keep my eyes fixed on the guy, as the girls giggle like a bunch of morons. “Two shots of vodka,” I say to the bartender and search blindly in my purse for a vial of love potion. The bartender pushes the shots toward me as I find the vial and clutch it between my fingers. Then I see the guy looking in my direction and wonder if he’s checking out the girls or me.
But he’s hot and I need to get laid—and win the bet. So I pour the potion in his drink, mix it with a finger and walk toward him with the drinks in my hand.
“Vodka?” I extend my arm toward him, pushing the glass towards his face. He pauses for a moment, looks at me and then smiles. His savage grin reveals rows of perfect, pearly white teeth that glow in the neon lights. As his lips part, I pour the charmed drink in his mouth.
“Dance?” He grabs me by the waist and leads me to the dance floor without waiting for my answer. I take my shot, turn around to see the girls gawking, quickly turning their eyes away from me. “I win,” I say to myself under my breath.
“Sorry, what?” he whispers in my ear, his breath hot against my neck. “Nothing,” I say and walk to the dance floor.
“You are stiff,” I say to him, trying to raise my voice high enough that he can hear me. He can’t. So I grab his hand and take him to the bar. We get a bottle of vodka and then walk out of the bar.
“Want a drink,” I say, offering the bottle to him. He declines. “More for me,” I wink.
“You are cute,” he says.
I laugh and take a swig from the bottle. We walk away from crowds, my heels clacking on the pavement. I know the potion has taken effect, I can see it in his eyes that he is smitten by me. I want to take him home, I want to take him, but I am tipsy and enjoying walking out on the streets of Los Angeles with him on my side.
I take off my heels and hook my arm with his.
“Want me to carry you?” He asks, smiling a brilliant boyish smile. It’s uncanny, really, how easy scoring him was. I wonder if he’s that easy in real life.
“No, I’ll walk.”
The moon is nowhere to be seen and the cars disappear like stars behind clouds as we turn another street into a residential area, not knowing where we are going.
“Let’s sit there,” he says, pointing toward a bench outside someone’s garden. I take another swig of vodka and sit next to him.
“Have a sip,” I say, “it will help you loosen up.” He shakes his head, but I get up and pour directly into his mouth from the bottle. He drinks, and then pulls me onto his lap. As I take another swig, he takes the bottle from my hand.
“That’s enough,” he says.
“I am hardly tipsy,” I protest, but he empties the bottle into the garden. Suddenly, a clearing between the clouds in the sky reveals the moonlit sprays us with moon dust and as I look into his eyes, I see him looking into mine. His eyes are blue, like sapphires, shining brilliantly. He pushes a stray strand of hair away from my eyes and cups my face in his hand, rubbing my cheeks gently with his thumb, wiping away the foundation.
“You are so beautiful, why do you hide it with this powder?”
I shrug, leaning my head back, letting my hair fall back. He pulls me closer, caressing my back, his hands soft as the wind.
“I am Dell, by the way.”
“Doesn’t matter,” I say, “you won’t remember any of this by morning.”
“Of course I will,” he says.
I lean in to kiss him. He keeps his mouth closed but doesn’t push me back. “Not now,” he says, “you are too drunk.”
For a moment there I am dumbstruck. He notices the change in my expression and begins to explain, “I just want you to be yourself when you kiss me.”
I force a smile. The potion didn’t work. How is that even possible?
“What’s your name?” Dell asks.
“Cyrene,” I say. “Cyrene Redwood.”
I try to wrap my head around it. The ingredients were the same as always. I gave him the spiked drink, poured it down his throat myself, so how can it be? How can the potion not work on a human?
Then it hits me.
I am not with a human. Dell is not human.
I am with a dragon, a Dragon Shifter.