There was no moon tonight, but the white dots of streetlights cascaded down the hill below us. Their light showed the rest of the world lay dreaming beneath the summer stars; the only signs of life were up here at the party of the century.My mother was desperately old-fashioned: the strains of a waltz floated out the open French doors from the ballroom. Of course the dragons knew how to waltz—most of them had been around since before the waltz was invented—but some of the lesser shifters looked nonplussed, eyeing the members of the formally clad orchestra as if they were aliens.“Better?” asked Luce.She leaned back against the stone beside me, but she wasn’t relaxed. She hadn’t wanted me out here in the open, but the ballroom was stuffy and I refused to be pawed any longer by lesser creatures looking to hitch their wagons to my star. Her dark eyes were never still, darting from one person to another, constantly assessing possible threats to my person.No one was armed tonight, of course, in the presence of the queen, not even my security chief, but Luce was a weapon all by herself.
