Draconas finished the washing up, swept the floor, and laid the table ready for tomorrow’s breakfast. He gave no sign that his dragon ears had overheard every word between husband and wife. He stayed up to keep Rosa company until Anton returned. The smith came home early; the moonlight he’d expected had not materialized, for the sky clouded over and rain began to fall. All three went to bed.

Draconas lay awake, listening for Rosa and Anton to fall into slumber, which both did very shortly, for the day had been long and hard for both of them. Creeping out of his bed, he went to stand over the couple, who slept in each other’s arms.

The house was dark, but his dragon eyes could see the lines of care and fatigue etched on each face, and he thought how he—the little girl—helped ease those lines, at least for a little while. Someday—maybe someday soon—he would sneak away and not come back. And they would never know why.

He would leave them as he had left other humans in his past. Others who had cared about him, cared about him deeply. Others who had never known why he had walked into their lives, only to walk right back out.

He tried to avoid saying goodbye. That always called for explanations. Easier on all parties if he just simply disappeared. As he cast the enchantment over Anton and Rosa that would insure that they sleep throughout the night, he told himself that if he could bring them news of their daughter, such news would help ease the pain of his disappearance.

It was a nice thought to carry with him.

The night was dark, for the sky was cloud-covered and drizzling. The streets were empty. The Blessed imposed a curfew on all citizens and the monks walked the streets at night, their fell presence presumably warding off whatever temptation anyone might feel to break the law.

The monks roamed the streets wherever whim or madness took them. Draconas would sometimes travel for blocks and never see one and then run into groups of them skulking about in an alley. Avoiding them proved easy, for they carried lanterns and he could see them coming long before they could see him. Sighting other shadows flitting past in the night, he guessed that he wasn’t the only person in Dragonkeep out on some furtive mission. Two such shadows stood in a doorway, locked in an embrace.

Draconas had dropped the image of Draca the minute he left the house and shifted his illusory form to become one of the monks, borrowing the features of a monk who had attacked Marcus when he first entered the city. If Draconas did run into one of the Blessed, they would find his face familiar.

At the sight of the cowled figure of Draconas, the two shadows in the doorway fled.