“Only fourteen points, and I used my best weapons. What has gone wrong with my life that I find myself here, at this time of year, cold even when it’s sunny? I am unwanted, undesired, and alone,” he said aloud. No one answered him, which was exactly what he expected. All too frequently he’d found himself on the outside of the family that was made up of Baltic and Ysolde, and their two children. Even Pavel, Baltic’s right-hand man, was a part of the family, whereas he, Baltic’s oldest friend and once (for about two minutes) mate to the lovely Ysolde, existed on the fringes of their attention. He’d never felt so ghostlike and insubstantial as he had the last few months. Lately, there were days when he didn’t even bother to slip into his corporeal state.

A woman with long blond hair bustled into the room, speaking as she did so. “… told him that we do too have to worry about it, but will he listen to me? No, he won’t.” Ysolde de Bouvier stopped in front of Constantine, a toddler perched on her hip. “Honestly, there are times when I could just whomp him on the head with the nearest blunt object.”

“If you’re speaking of Baltic, I would be happy to be of service. Bashing him over the head is always high on my list of things to do,” Constantine said, rising and making a formal bow before chucking the child under his chin. Constantine had a love of babies that led him to making secret forays into the child Alduin’s chambers, bringing toys that he thought would amuse.

Alduin said, “Uncle Connie!” and held out his arms for Constantine.

“Lovey, Uncle Constantine doesn’t want to hold you, not after you’ve been helping Uncle Pavel make baklava. You are one sticky little boy, and are going to have a bath just as soon as I’m done here.” Ysolde set the boy down and gave him a look of mock regret before turning a smile onto Constantine. “Good morning. Why do you look so sad?”

Constantine affected a martyred look. “Baltic was here belittling me.”

“Pfft,” Ysolde said dismissively, whapping him lightly on the arm as she did so. “Since when do you let that upset you?”

“No one wants me,” he found himself saying. Part of him cringed at the words, but the other was a bit relieved he had finally spoken of the darkness that had claimed him of late. “No one even likes me except you.”

“Of course people like you. You’re smart, and you have a good sense of humor, and you’re handsome as all get-out. Just look at you! You’re all broad shoulders, and pretty browny-gold eyes, and your manly stubble could make any woman swoon.”

“Does it make you swoon?” he asked without hope.

“No, but I’m madly in love with Baltic, so I don’t count.” She glanced down at his feet. “Wallowing in self-pity never did anyone good. Do you have a moment, or are you busy planning something with your blow-up doll? If so, please let me have a little talk with you first. It’s really most important. No, lovey, leave the sheep alone. Uncle Constantine doesn’t want to have to clean honey out of that faux sheepskin before he uses his toy.”

“It’s not mine,” Constantine started to say, but stopped because he made it a point never to lie to the woman who had claimed his heart so many centuries before… and then stomped all over it in her mad dash to fling herself into Baltic’s arms.

“Of course it’s yours. I was in the sex toy shop with you when you bought it. But that’s of no real matter. I want to talk to you about this curse.”

Constantine frowned. “The one afflicting the dragons, or is there a new curse?”

“No, that’s the one.”

Alduin clasped the deflated sheep to him with a cry of delight. Both Ysolde and Constantine ignored the sheep’s plaintive baa. “We’ve had a message from Aisling Grey—she’s mated to Drake Vireo—that they have a Charmer planning to break the dragon curse by using Asmodeus’s ring.”

“Did they find the ring, then?”

“I gather so, or they wouldn’t have a Charmer lined up to break the curse. Now they’re looking for something that belongs to Asmodeus to use to help break it… a talisman of some sort.”

Constantine scratched his chest, wondering if he should make his daily declaration of love to Ysolde now, or if it would be better to wait until Baltic was around. He decided on the latter—it was usually worth an irritation point or two. “What has this to do with us?”

“I told Aisling that you’d get the talisman.”

He gawked at her, outright gawked, something he never did. “Ysolde—”

“Now, hear me out,” Ysolde interrupted before he could express his displeasure at the idea of her volunteering him for any such act. He was a wyvern… or at least he had been. He once led the famed silver dragon sept, with well over five hundred members! He was no mere flunky to be sent after a trifling artifact, and he told her that.

“It’s not trifling. It’s hugely important.”

“I do have some standards, after all,” he said stiffly. “Just because I don’t actually lead a sept anymore doesn’t mean I don’t have important demands on my time.”

Ysolde pursed her lips and raised an eyebrow at the deflated sheep.

Constantine sniffed again and looked away.

“I know you have lots of important things to do,” Ysolde said soothingly. “But don’t you see just how ideal you are for the job? For one, you think well on your feet.”

He had opened his mouth to protest, but at the words of praise, hesitated. “This is true. But—”

“And you can blink in and out of the physical world, which no other dragon can do.”

“Yes, but—”

“Not to mention the fact that you are clever enough to get in and out with the artifact before anyone even knew you had been there.”

“Again, you speak the truth, but I must point out—”

“And you would be saving all dragonkin,” Ysolde ended triumphantly. “You would be a hero!”

“I’m already a hero,” he protested. “I am the wyvern of the silver dragons! I fought the dread wyvern Baltic—”

“Whom I love.”

“And defeated him at the gates of Dauva—”

“Which he rebuilt.”

“And gave my life for yours,” he finished with a dramatic sweep of his arm. “That act alone makes me a hero.”