I expected to wake and find Mori conked out beside me still, but I was alone in bed. I growled as I got up and tugged on a fresh shirt and black cargo pants then stalked down the hall to the bathroom.
Downstairs, Kate and Sabella laughing about something. But not Mori. Her voice was absent.
When I exited the bathroom, splashing cold water on my face to try and wash away the grogginess—along with my annoyance—I stopped at the top of the steps.
Mori, she was down there with them, I heard her voice this time. But not Tristan or Craig.
“Sounds like a party,” Craig grumbled behind me, yawning with a grunt.
“Usually is with those three,” I muttered. “Don’t like it.”
“You know what they’re talking about,” Craig stated. “You might as well just get it over with.”
“Not happening.”
“It’s going to have to happen eventually.” He gave me a nudge. “I don’t understand why you’re waiting.”
I ground my teeth but said nothing. “We haven’t decided yet what our official plan is,” I said, changing the topic. I also ignored his eye roll. “We should do that today.”
Steps sounded behind us. Tristan was running his hands through messy hair. “Think I came up with a plan last night, I mean Sabella and I did.”
“And?” I asked.
“And we’ll talk about it with everyone.”
“Did this plan come with a vision?” Craig asked hopefully as we made our way downstairs. “Preferably one that tells us how we’re going to kill Baladon and end this war?”
Tristan’s eyes flared yellow as we reached the bottom.
I tensed. “No, and that’s another thing we’ll have to discuss. Might as well go join them and see what they’re chatting about so damned early.”
“Don’t lie, we all know.” Craig winked at me.
“One of these days, you’re going to get sucker punched,” I promised him. “Just wait for it.”
“I can take you on any day, dragon boy.”
“Who’s taking on who now?” Kate asked, poking her head out of the kitchen and eyeing Craig and me. “No fighting in the house, Mama’s rule, remember?” She was smiling when she said it, but her eyes were filled with pain.
“No one said we’re fighting,” I corrected, kissing her cheek as I passed her. “But your demon over there is asking for an ass whipping.”
She raised a brow. “What’d he do now?”
Craig hugged and kissed her. “Not a damned thing. So, what are you ladies all so excited about this early?”
I glanced at Mori who was beaming at me. That smile meant she was up to something and my gut said whatever it was, I was going to hate it. Fury rose deep within me. Smoke trailed out of my nose. I went to stand beside her, kissing the top of her head as she wrapped her arm around my waist.
“What time did you wake up this morning?” I asked her.
“Oh, not long before you,” she said, but her shoulders stiffened with the obvious falsehood.
“You’re a terrible liar.”
“I didn’t need much rest is all,” she told me, failing to keep her voice light and carefree.
Kate shot her a look across the island telling me exactly what I needed to know.
“You were back out in the greenhouse, weren’t you?”
She shrugged. “Until I can fix the orb, that’s probably where I’m going to be.”
“We had to drag her out of there to come inside and eat some breakfast,” Kate confessed.
Mori crossed her arms with a huff.
Kate gave her a look. “What? He’s right, Mori, and you know it. Now is not the time to be prideful.”
“No,” Tristan agreed with a growl that quieted the rest of us down. “No, it most certainly is not.”
Sabella took his hand but didn’t meet the rest of our gazes as she started talking. “I guess we’ll get the bad news out of the way first.”
“I thought you said you had no new visions?” Craig asked.
“I haven’t… and that’s the bad news,” she muttered. “I haven’t had a single vision since we came here. Nothing. Not a blip. It’s like whatever was giving me that power, it’s just gone.”
Mori shifted on her feet. Before I could tell her that it appeared she wasn’t the one being affected by her lost connection to the realms, Kate and Craig started whispering heatedly back and forth, then he told her just to tell us.
“Tell us what?” I glanced from her to him, waiting for one of them to speak. “Kate?”
She frowned as she stepped back from the island and held out her left arm. She brought it up, then down as she always did to make the Vindicar shield appear. Except this time, nothing happened. She tried it once more and still nothing. “I noticed it two days ago.”
“And I’m losing my starlight,” Mori whispered, shaking her head. “He’s killed us by forcing us to run here. We’re powerless.”
“That’s not true,” I said firmly. “You said yourself there’s magic here. We just have to find it.”
“Yes, but having a seer, the Vindicar, and a goddess on your side sounds much better than maybe being able to find magic within herbs and other potions.” She ran her fingers through her hair madly. “And you? Can you even shift anymore? Any of you?”
“Haven’t exactly tried,” I said tightly. “We’re surrounded by humans.”
Tristan, Craig, and I all shrugged then watched as Craig, the demon amongst us, and the one for whom it was easiest to shift, attempted to change form. He breathed deeply, and his face scrunched, but after a few moments, he gave up with a snarl.
Tristan and I hurried out to the backyard and at the same time, where we both sought out our other forms.
“No,” I whispered in disbelief. “How… how is this possible?”
I held my hands out in front of me, not willing to believe that I was still in human form. My dragon was silent inside my head, almost like I’d never been one, to begin with.
I sucked in a lungful of air and let it out, happy to at least see my fire hadn’t gone, but wondered if it might only be a matter of time. A part of my soul felt like it had slipped away. I turned around slowly. Mori was watching us from the doorway. I’d been here before and was able to shift whenever the need arose. What changed?
“Baladon,” she said. “His darkness is destroying the realms and the power they hold. It’s no longer strong enough to reach across the boundaries to get to us here in this world.”
“So we’re nothing now?” Kate snapped. “Great, that’s great. What happens when he attacks us? He’ll kill us in seconds.”
“Only if we’re not prepared,” Craig told her. “It is possible.”
Kate gave him a doubtful look “How? We have no orb, no way to repair it, and no way to kill Baladon yet. If he were to attack today, what would happen?”
No one said a word. The hope I’d been holding onto all this time disappeared with Kate’s outburst. How could any of us stop a god the way we were? Lucy had been the witch, and Greyson the sorcerer. With them here, we might have stood a chance, found the magic we needed, but until we were returned to the realms, we were defenseless. And our peoples, what was happening to them while Baladon roamed free through the lands, draining the magic from them? Were they dying? Was he capturing them one by one? I made my hands into fists, anything to keep myself from losing what little control I felt I still had over my emotions.
“You mentioned a plan,” I said, looking at Tristan. “What is it?”
He led us into the kitchen, and once we’d gathered around the island again, he began. “We are not the only ones from the realms here in the human world. I say we track them down and find them. Tell them we need their help. Some of them might not even realize yet that their homes have been taken over.”
“But won’t they be as powerless as we are?” I asked, skeptical.
“Yes, but there’s a chance someone out there knows more about magic and the gods than we do,” he suggested.
“The coven,” Kate said excitedly. “I can contact them. They’re here.” She smacked herself in the head and took off, out of the kitchen. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of them yet,” she yelled and thundered upstairs.
“I can’t believe we didn’t either,” I muttered.
Craig nodded. “How do we find these others?”
“The old-fashioned way I guess,” Tristan suggested.
Mori suddenly grabbed my arm, grinning. “Or we send them a message.”
“All of them at once? How?”
She glanced toward the ceiling. “Stars, of course.”
“No,” I growled, and she rolled her eyes. “You finally admitted it yourself. You’re losing your starlight. If you use that much of it to send a message, who’s to say you’ll keep any of it?”
“That is not your decision to make.”
“Oh, so I don’t get a say if the woman I love is going to essentially destroy herself?”
She stood toe to toe with me as she shot back, “Not when you're a stubborn ass dragon who won’t agree to marry me.”
I clenched my jaw but said nothing.
Craig whistled in the sudden silence that fell over the kitchen.
Tristan smirked until Sabella whispered something to him and he stopped, glancing away.
I took Mori’s hand and dragged her from the kitchen out into the living room, so we had some privacy.
“What do you want from me, huh?” I demanded. “What?’
“I want you to marry me and get it over with, but you can’t seem to do that.”
“You know why. I’ve told you again and again why I won’t, not until we have no other plan.”
“We don’t if you haven’t noticed,” she yelled back even as I tried to get her to keep her voice down. “No. They all know what’s going on, they’re not idiots, and they all agree with me.”
“Of course they do.”
“Forrest, just please listen to me. I know what I’m facing. We all do, and no matter how long you hold out, the ending won’t change.”
“Why are you so eager to die?” I growled. “Why?”
“I’m not, but I will not stand by and do nothing.”
“And you think I am?”
“Yes,” she shouted, and I flinched back from the force of that one word. “Yes, I do. You’re letting your fear of losing me blind you to the truth. This is our destiny, and you have to accept it.”
My hands curled into fists, and I backed toward the hall. “No, I don’t.”
“Forrest,” she said, reaching for me, but I shook my head, backing away further. “Fine, but I’m sending that message to the others using the stars, tonight. You can either be there to help me or choose not to.”
My heart thundered in my chest as I turned and stormed out the front door. I had to get away from her, get away from all of them. I was so torn up inside over what I needed to do and what my instincts told me not to do. The second we bound ourselves to one another—game over. It wasn’t just the prophecy that had me worried, in all honesty. Baladon knew the same information we did, and the longer I held off—or so I hoped—the less chance he would seek to attack us anytime soon. We were a threat, but not a dire one.
I walked for hours, wandering aimlessly through the small town I first met Kate, when she’d slammed into me on her way to save Craig.
My steps slowed as I realized I stood on exactly the same street corner. All the memories came rushing back to me of that day. The fight in Lucy’s home that sent us to the Burnt World and set us on this path, to begin with. Who knew it would lead to an all-out war against the god of darkness in order to save the realms?
I’d just started walking again when something rustled in the alley to my right. I paused, turning just enough to peer into the shadows.
The sound came again, and I was considering investigating when a cat rushed out of the darkness and darted across my path.
I growled at it in annoyance but moved on. Eventually, I had to get back to the house and face Mori.
If our not being together was what kept Baladon from destroying us for a few more days, I’d take her anger.
That I could survive.
Her death, that would rip me to pieces.