I hoped being in the greenhouse would calm my quickly fraying, nerves, but as Mama Lucy and I worked at gathering the herbs we would need for our journey, all my thoughts turned to what we would face once we left the safety of her home.
My gut was in full rebellion, and I sipped at the soothing tea Mama Lucy brewed for me before she left. We needed salves and a few enchantments, things to aid us on our journey.
A journey to the cursed lands of my family.
I drained the tea and waited impatiently for it to take effect, but after a few minutes it seemed futile, and I gave up. I’d have to face my future at some point.
As I cleaned up the tea and the cut-up herbs, the tattoos on my arms gave a pulse of blue light.
I stopped what I was doing to watch, but it didn’t happen again, though the faint outline of the marks remained. Gently, I traced my fingers over the patterns on my right forearm, feeling the power in my body.
The beast shifted and moved as if sensing its time to break free and spread its wings was close.
“Not here,” I whispered to it, pleading for it to wait. “Mama Lucy would kill me if I destroyed the greenhouse and garden.”
The beast huffed in annoyance, but I felt it settle back down—alert, but calm.
Once the herbs were in my leather satchel, I left the greenhouse and ducked inside. I heard the water running upstairs, and assumed the guys were still cleaning up and changing. Mama Lucy always kept spare clothes left behind by the previous kids in her care, just in case.
I set the leather satchel on the dining room table and headed upstairs to find a fresh change of clothes of my own, my boots, and anything else I could think of that might be useful.
Which wasn’t much. I’d never planned on going on some portal jumping adventure.
Ever.
I opened my bedroom door and froze when it was halfway open.
My jaw went slack, and all I could do was stare at the shirtless half-demon in my room. Either he hadn’t heard me open the door, or he didn’t care that I was getting a full view of his muscular back and broad shoulders.
I nibbled my bottom lip and studied every inch of that bare skin I could see.
Craig was already attractive in my opinion, but now he was even more so. Tattoos ran down the right side, intricate runes that looked similar to the ones on my arms. They were beautiful and dangerous.
But it was when he shifted, and the light changed on his back that I noticed the crisscrossing of scars along his back. They ran from his shoulder blade down to the top of his cargo pants.
The skin was mangled towards the center of his back, and I covered my mouth so as not to make a sound. The pain he must’ve gone through to get those had to be immense.
Another long-jagged scar ran horizontally, starting near the first set of scars and disappeared around his left side.
“Consequences of a demon learning to use magic.”
His growling voice startled me, and then he turned. There was a smile on his lips, but it didn’t meet his eyes. His chest was as sculpted as his back, and he held the clean shirt in his fist, not yet pulling it over his head.
The scar that started on his back ran around to his navel, as well as the tattoos that covered part of his chest.
“See something you like?”
I shook my head, face burning hot, and quickly turned away. “Sorry, I uh, I didn’t expect you to be in my room.”
“Closest to the bathroom to keep an ear out for Forrest,” he explained, still not putting his shirt on. “I don’t mind you staring at them. The scars.”
I nodded but didn’t move from the doorway or look up.
His boots thudded across the floor and appeared in my vision.
“Kate, really, it’s fine.” With two fingers under my chin, he gently lifted my head, so our eyes locked.
The first time we met, I was amazed at how intense his gaze was, but now I saw so much emotion roiling around in there, lost in a swirling storm of pain, hate, and something else I wasn’t sure I understood.
My breath caught, seeing how close we stood together. I felt the heat from his body hit mine, and my eyes darted to his lips.
His smirk told me he caught the movement and I cleared my throat, taking a large step away before I did something stupid.
Like, kiss the crap out of him.
“You weren’t supposed to learn magic?” I said, trying to distract myself.
“No. It’s seen as cheating.”
“But you did it anyway?” I swallowed hard, and mentally yelled at him to put his shirt on, but he seemed extremely comfortable walking around without it.
“I had to do something to stay alive.”
“And when they found out, they what, whipped you?”
He arched a brow, and I felt worse than I had a few minutes before.
“That’s horrible. I’m so sorry.” Unsure why I did it, my hand reached out and traced the length of the long pale scar at his side. Goosebumps broke out on his skin, and I heard him suck in a deep breath, but he didn’t pull away.
“And this one?”
“That was courtesy of my cousin, Reginald. Don’t worry, I paid him back in kind before I left.”
My hand stayed on its path, around to his back and up the mangled scars. From there, my fingertips glided over the tattoos.
The runes on my arms pulsed with power as if in recognition of the markings.
His body shifted, and he pressed his back into my hand.
In that moment, I wished the rest of the world would go away. Facing down a plague and saving the world was not as appealing as staying here in this spot with Craig. When I made it around his shoulder and to his chest again, his free hand caught mine, holding it flat over his heart where the tattoos stretched across. His pulse was quick, but strong, matching the rhythm of my own.
We had a connection. It was warm and inviting, like curling up on the couch for a cozy day by a fire. Even the dragon within me lifted her head and seemed to growl in approval.
I was comfortable around him, and I’d never been like that around any guy, not that I ever dated anyone.
Ever.
“Kate.” He growled my name, and though his voice was rough, it moved like a light feather touch over me.
He leaned in, bending lower as I lifted my head and stood on my toes. His lips brushed mine sweetly, and I kissed him back, lingering until reality crashed back into me and I pulled away.
“Sorry, I uh… I’m not sure what got into me.” I roughly cleared my throat and ran my hands through my hair. “I should let you finish getting dressed and all.”
He smiled. “I’ll go to a different room so you can have your space.”
I managed a nod, not trusting myself to say anything else.
His shirt in hand, he walked out, but not before throwing me a look over his shoulder. One filled with promise that whatever we started here was far from over.
I closed the door behind him and hurried to my closet. I pulled out a pair of dark khaki pants, my brown hiking boots that laced, a t-shirt and a light green and brown flannel to go over it.
I had no idea what the weather would be like in the dragon world and decided I’d rather be over-prepared than not. I set out a few extra shirts and pairs of thick socks to take with me. I hoped we wouldn’t be gone for more than a day, but there was no telling what we’d find.
Once I was changed, and my boots were laced up, I pulled my hair back in a tight, long braid that hung down my back to keep it out of the way. I made sure to grab the shard of the shield, and found an old velvet pouch that used to hold a necklace, and tucked the shard in it before shoving it deep into the knapsack.
Smoothing my hands over my head as I racked my brain for anything else I might forget, I studied my reflection, my green eyes that reminded me so much of my dad’s.
“I hope this is right,” I whispered to my reflection, but I was really talking to him.
I longed for a way to talk to him again, but Mama Lucy said if he reached out to me once, he might do so again, but I couldn’t go looking for him. That could open a whole other can of problems we weren’t ready to deal with.
Glancing around my room, my gaze fell on my sketchbook. It was moved. I reached out and moved it back, wondering what else Craig had looked at while he was in my room. Thinking of him and our brief kiss made my lips tingle.
I touched them with my fingertips, and smiled. If only this was a normal situation between a guy and a girl, and not a dragon and a half-demon. Giving myself a shake, I crammed my spare clothes in my knapsack and glanced around my room one more time. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt like I wasn’t going to see it for a while.
My bag slung over my shoulder, I stepped out of my room at the same time Forrest stepped out of the bathroom, cleaned up, and wearing fresh clothes. “I’m assuming Craig let you out of the chains long enough to change?”
“Don’t worry. Your witch’s magic is strong,” he assured me with a growl and held up the chain, tugging on it for emphasis. “I’m still your prisoner.”
“I’d take the chain off if I knew you weren’t going to try and drag my ass to your dad.”
“I admit I was a bit rash at saying so, but you have to understand the position I’m in, Kate. I’m a prince of my people and you, by the laws of our land, are a traitor.”
Grabbing the chain between his wrists, I dragged him along behind me towards the stairs. “And you expect me to be okay with that? I didn’t even know what I was until a few days ago and you’re going to be judge and jury? And what about this plague? You seem to keep forgetting what’s coming to kill everyone.”
“I have not forgotten, nor can I forget my duty.”
“Screw your duty,” I muttered, secretly hoping he’d trip as we went down the stairs.
“My duty is the same as yours.”
I froze, the dragon in me lifting its head to snort in anger at him. “Don’t,” I warned.
“I’m merely pointing out that since you are a Darrah, your first concern should be to your clan, to the dragons,” he insisted. “You might have grown up here with the humans, but you were meant to be with your own kind. Not running around with a witch and a bastard half-demon.”
I tugged the chain harder, and with a curse, he stumbled over his feet down the last few stairs. “Mama Lucy saved my life. She’s the one that kept me safe all these years from my own kind.”
“We don’t know for certain what happened that night with your father. It could have been an accident.”
“An accident?” I laughed sharply. “How could it have been an accident?” I wanted to jerk on that chain so hard it made him land on his ass, or worse, hit his head on something hard.
His blank stare told me he had no idea either, and was grasping at straws. “Whether you believe me or not, I am sorry for the loss of your parents. I truly am. I do not wish to see a dragon harmed, and if you continue to let Craig guide you, you will find yourself neck deep in trouble.”
“Why don’t you like him?” I asked, walking to the dining table so I could pack the herbs in my knapsack. “What did he ever do to you?”
“He’s a half-demon. That’s enough,” he scoffed, rolling his shoulders as if he could catch something from being in the same house as Craig. “And I do not approve of you being so close to him. It’s not natural.”
My face grew hot remembering just how close we’d been in my room, and I lowered my head.
“Why do you look guilty all of a sudden?” he asked curiously.
“I don’t.”
“Yes, you do.” He sniffed the air around me, and I backed away, but it was too late. His sharp, narrowed gaze told me he knew Craig and I had done more than talk a few moments ago and his lip lifted in a snarl. “He has touched you.”
“It’s no business of yours,” I snapped. “Stay out of it.”
I tried to storm past him, but he caught my arm.
The same familiar jolt of belonging shot through me as it had the day on the street when I barreled into him.
My heart pounded, and my dragon sat at attention as a strange longing filled my being.
Forrest was a dragon, and now that mine was awakened, it sensed his. I felt it stirring inside his body the longer he held onto my arm. His energy thrummed against mine, and in that moment, I wasn’t staring into his eyes—I stared into the eyes of his dragon.
“I know I have not made things easy,” he whispered, “but I do know we must stop this plague from harming our people. I will fight for you, Kate Darrah, I will. I need you to know that.”
“I want to believe you,” I replied softly, my brow furrowed, “but, how can I?”
“What do you see in my eyes? Do you see an enemy?”
His bright blue eyes glimmered with the life of his dragon, and I couldn’t deny the kinship he gave me. The connection I sensed between myself and Craig was different than what I felt now with Forrest. This was familiar, and on same strange level made me feel like I was home.
I blinked, and my gaze lingered over his chiseled face, how those blue eyes stood out against his darker skin.
Tattoos snaked up towards his neck and disappeared beneath the collar of his t-shirt before reappearing out of the sleeves. Markings of his clan. I knew it without having to ask. They jogged a memory in my mind, and the marks on my arms started to make sense.
All dragons were marked for the clan they belonged to, designating their bloodline. Guess mine had been made invisible by the bracelet I wore since I was a child.
Without a word, I reached up and undid the manacles around his wrists. “Don’t make me regret this,” I told him, and shoved the chain in my knapsack. “Just in case.”
Forrest rubbed his wrists. “I will not betray you again, Kate. You have my word as a prince.”
“How about you help me find the rest of the shield and seal the plague away for good? We can worry about all the other crap later.”
The dragon in me said I could trust him, even though I was still angry with him. Red flags shot up in my mind, but we needed his help. Craig wasn’t from the dragon realm. Forrest was, and with him, we’d be able to find our way around faster and hopefully avoid any trouble.
I felt his eyes on me as I organized my pack just for something to do.
Craig whistled as he trudged downstairs a few minutes later and paused when he saw Forrest without the manacles. “You sure you want to do that?”
“We need him, and though he decided to be an asshole once we returned home, he did help us in the Burnt World,” I pointed out. “Don’t worry, I still have the chains.”
I told them I was going to the kitchen to find some bottles of water, but really, I needed to get away from their stare-down. Whatever bro talk they were having without words, I did not want to be a part of it.
I had enough things to worry about, like finding a shield broken into possibly hundreds of pieces, and sealing a plague spawn back in its cage.
Yup, that was more than enough for me to deal with.