Excerpt from Barrow’s Journal – My Year with Dragons
When a dragon takes a mate, the passion, especially the physical, is almost impossible to deny. Once that bond is formed, a dragon and its mate cannot bear to be apart long, nor can they bear to resist touching each other when they are alone. This passion softens over time as the dragon and its mate learn to control their needs, but it never fades.
Tasha sat in a chair close to a cauldron that bubbled and emitted a purple light. Lady Superior and the two other coven members, Arabella and Jeremy, were pouring bottles of various ingredients into the cauldron. It made her think of a high school production of Macbeth, yet she didn’t laugh. She could feel the magic in the room, like an eerie charge in the air that stroked her skin and made her shiver. Vasili stood behind her, and she could sense him frowning even though she couldn’t see his face.
“We are almost ready,” Arabella said. “The last thing we need is . . .” Arabella gave Lady Superior a look.
“Oh, yes, that one.” Lady Superior cleared her throat and then said to Tamsin, “Be a dear and go play your new song on the piano for our guests.”
Tamsin looked like she wanted to question this request, but with a sigh, she went to the small grand piano in the corner of the library. Tasha blinked. When had there been a piano there? She hadn’t noticed it.
The piano bench creaked as Tamsin got comfortable and began to play. A simple string of notes, clear and pure, came out in a haunting melody that left a hum in the air. Then she pressed one of the dampener pedals, and her left hand began to play in perfect harmony with her right.
There were no words to the song, yet as Tasha listened, she began to see a life, hers with Vasili, as if the song played out their future. He was on his knees in the dark, bound by chains, bleeding. He roared as shadowy figures gathered around him and white fangs pierced his flesh. Then she saw herself, lying half dead, wounds upon her neck and arms, mere feet away from Vasili. She couldn’t save him, because she couldn’t save herself.
As the song faded and the notes slowly died, Tasha came back to herself. Tears streamed down her face. Lady Superior got up from her chair and came toward Tasha, holding a small glass vial. Without a word, she collected a tear that fell from Tasha’s cheek. Then she went to Everett, who stood, like the others in the room, rooted in place by what he had seen in his head. He was pale, his eyes full of dark pain as he stared at Tamsin.
“She will never be yours, Mr. Belishaw. You will live alone until your last breath,” Lady Superior murmured. A tear escaped Everett’s eye, and she reached up to capture it with the vial before returning to the cauldron and pouring the tears inside.
“What was that?” Tasha dared to ask.
Lady Superior replied without turning around. “The tears required for our spell, one from the subject and one from a dragon.”
“No, I meant the song.”
“Oh, that is a possible future. Tamsin plays spells into her music. That particular song allows a listener to see one of their many possible futures, though none are guaranteed. Fate is still somewhat bound by free will. Your future can only be because of something you decide. Therefore, a particular fate is only possible given your choices and your decisions in any moment.”
“Only a possible future,” Everett whispered to himself, his gaze locked on Tamsin. She was staring back, her heart in her eyes.
“So what I saw . . . it’s not going to happen?” Tasha pressed a hand over her heart as she tried to push away the pain of the vision she’d seen.
Vasili placed his hand on Tasha shoulders. “What did you see?”
She breathed a sigh of relief at hearing his voice. He was here. He wasn’t dead.
“What I saw is not going to happen,” she promised both him and herself. She wouldn’t let it. Lady Superior had said she had free will, that her decisions could stop a particular future from occurring.
Lady Superior stirred the contents of the cauldron, causing smoke to spill over and creep across the ground. Then Arabella dipped a blue bottle into the cauldron and pulled it out. A clear liquid was visible in the bottle. She passed it to Jeremy, who held it in his hand. Then he closed his eyes and murmured something in a strange archaic language.
The bottle suddenly glowed. Arabella unwrapped the Heart of Sorrows and held it out as Jeremy poured the glowing substance over the sapphire. Small sparks blossomed over the stone’s surface, but rather than die away, they drifted up in the air like silver fireflies.
Lady Superior pointed her finger at Tasha and spoke to the glittering sparks of light. “Her.”
The sparks shot straight toward Tasha. She flinched, instinctively shutting her eyes. Tiny cold prickles touched her face, and then she was falling through the darkness. Falling. Falling.
She landed on her feet in a snowy world. Everything was quiet around her, and then she heard some distant singing.
Dragonsong. Somehow she knew she was in the land of dragons, not the world that she had been born into, yet it felt like her own world was but a breath away, as though an invisible veil separated the dragons from the world she knew. The air tasted sweet, and the snow was warm as it fell around her. It was like a strange upside-down world, where not everything made sense. The distant evergreen trees covered in thick snow were almost a light blue rather than the rich forest green of her own world.
The songs of the dragons were still far off, but she could make out the words in the way she had when Vasili had sung earlier, as though she’d always known the language of dragons.
Love binds with dragon strength,
Love grows with a human heart,
Thine enemy will give thee new life,
So thy mate will waken and fly again.
Tasha struggled to walk through the deep snow. Time seemed to pass differently here, the snow falling slower than it should.
“Tasha . . .” A voice spoke her name. When she turned around, she saw Marina behind her, wearing a heavy blue velvet cloak trimmed with white fur. She pushed the hood back and approached Tasha.
“Marina? Do you hear the dragons singing?”
“Of course I do—it is my song,” she said. “The one they sing to remind me.”
“Remind you of what?” Tasha knew she had a short time to ask all of her questions, but for some reason, she couldn’t remember why time was short or even how she got there.
“It’s to remind me . . . and remind you,” Marina said.
“Remind us of what? Are you trapped here? Can we free you?”
Marina cupped Tasha’s face. “It’s to remind you of who you are.”
“That I’m Dimitri Drakor’s daughter?”
Marina shook her head. “To remind you that you are me.”
You are me? Does she mean I am . . . Marina?
As if hearing her thoughts, Marina nodded. “We are one, Tasha. I am you, and you are me, if only forgotten. I used Dimitri to bring me back to the world, but I was only mortal. Our dragon lies waiting for you in the Heart of Sorrows. You must wake and join with her, or Vasili will die. The ancient dragons have foretold his death in hours if you do not.”
“But how?” Tasha demanded. “I don’t know how to join with a dragon.”
The world of snow began to fade into a white fog all around her, and Marina could no longer be seen. “It takes an act of sacrifice.”
“Sacrifice?”
“Sacrifice . . .” The word wrapped itself around her before it too faded away.
Vasili stared at Tasha’s unmoving body, his dragon pacing restlessly in the back of his mind. Tasha had collapsed the second the spell took effect, and all three witches involved in the spell had gone rigid, their eyes glowing with a pale blue otherworldly light.
“That’s not at all disturbing,” Magnus muttered sarcastically. Randolph elbowed him. Everyone else stayed quiet except Tamsin, who fidgeted nervously beside her grandmother.
“How long will the spell last once it’s cast?” Vasili asked.
“Only a minute or two,” Tamsin said.
“What does the spell do, exactly?” asked Everett.
“I’m not entirely sure,” Tamsin admitted. “It’s a memory spell, sort of. In a human, it goes to a core memory, one that the mind may be shielding. But with Tasha, well, she is not fully human. I don’t know what she is.”
Not fully human. What does that mean? Vasili wondered. Her father had been a dragon; maybe some of his dragon bloodline was in her even though she had no dragon bonded to her.
Suddenly the three witches spoke in unison, their voices deep and cacophonous, as if they were a thousand voices chanting all at once.
Love binds with dragon strength,
Love grows with the human heart,
Thine enemy will give thee new life,
So thy mate will wake and fly again.
The three witches slumped over in their chairs. Tamsin caught her grandmother before she collapsed.
Tasha suddenly bolted up from her chair, gasping. Vasili took his mate in his arms, and she began to cry as she shivered and burrowed against him.
“Tasha, are you all right?”
She wouldn’t look at him, so he lifted her face with his fingers under her chin. Tears clung to her lashes, and she blinked rapidly. Her lovely topaz eyes were bright gold now. Dragon gold.
“It’s me . . . ,” she whispered in a shaky voice with a rich Russian accent. An old Russian accent. One he thought he’d never hear again.
She lifted a hand to his face, her fingers freezing as though she were holding ice.
“It’s me, Vasili. It’s me.” It was a voice he recognized, but he didn’t understand how it could be. This wasn’t Tasha’s voice.
“Marina?”
“Yes, my heart. I’m buried deep inside, but I am here. She is me. Since the beginning, we have been one.”
“You are Tasha . . . and Marina?”
Tasha nodded. “I promised I would find my way back to you. I have kept my word.” Tasha shuddered, and the gold swirled away from her eyes. She gazed up at him in confusion.
“Vasili? What happened?” Her voice was hers again, not Marina’s.
Vasili stared at the woman in his arms. His mate had somehow been reborn? Tasha had been Marina this entire time? But Marina had always been so aggressive, and a force of nature, while Tasha was in many ways different. Marina was a stormy sea, Tasha a deep flowing river. Marina was born for battle, and Tasha was born to explore and discover. They were so vastly different he could not reconcile them.
“Mr. Barinov, this is highly unusual,” Lady Superior announced. She smoothed her hair and eyed him and Tasha before she stood. Tamsin and the other coven members also rose to their feet.
“I don’t understand,” Vasili said. “Tasha is Marina reincarnated? How is this possible?”
“It can only be an ancient dragon spell, one so old that even we were not aware of it. Marina tied her soul to the nearest living dragon other than you.”
Flashes of the fight came back to him, fresh and clear, painful as ever. The grief and rage at what had happened to Marina left him trembling.
“Who did she attach herself to?” Vasili clenched his fists, trying to contain his pain and anger.
“Dimitri Drakor. Through his mating with a human woman, Marina’s spell gave her a chance to bring herself back as Drakor’s child. She may look like your enemy, but she is Marina reborn.”
“Good God,” Everett said, amazed.
Vasili stared at the witches and then down at Tasha. He had no words, none. The anger and pain bled away, leaving him strangely hollow, confused. He’d never lost his mate. She’d found her way back to him. It explained so much, and that emptiness inside his chest began to fill with heat and joy so suddenly, so swiftly, that it caught him off guard. He released a soft breath.
“I think I need a minute to be alone,” Tasha said. She pulled free of Vasili’s arms and rushed from the room. For a long moment, Vasili stared after her.
“You must go after her,” Lady Superior said. “She won’t feel like herself. The spell will leave her unsettled for a time. She should not face that alone.”
Vasili nodded to the older witch in thanks and chased after his mate. He caught Tasha in the upstairs hall and stepped in front of her, blocking her path. Tears streak down her cheeks, leaving glistening paths on her skin.
“Tasha.” He cupped her face in his hands.
“Am I? Or am I Marina? I don’t know who I am anymore. I don’t . . .” Her words faded, and she began to cry again. Vasili’s heart fractured. He would’ve given anything to take her pain and confusion away from her.
“Please don’t cry, little one, please.” He pressed soft kisses to her head and held her tightly in his arms. He absorbed every tremble and quake into himself, wishing he could cure her, heal her, give her whatever she needed. He would think about what this all meant later. The only thing that mattered was Tasha, and right now, he wanted her feeling better.
“Tell me what I can do,” he said. “Command me, mate. Let me help.”
She rubbed her face against his chest, her hands curling into fists.
“Take me away. Make me forget all this.” She spoke in a muffled voice against his chest.
“Come with me.” He had an idea. He led her back down the stairs toward the door Tamsin had shown them that led to the back gardens.
Tasha halted as he tried to lead her toward the field. “What are we doing?”
“You asked me to take you away.” He turned back to her. “Let me show you how to fly.”
Tasha stared at him with wide eyes as he held out his hand. “Fly?”
“Do you trust me?” Vasili asked.
She nodded slowly and placed her hand in his.
“Then let me steal you away.”
They walked out into the field as the sun began to kiss the horizon and the sky turned blood orange. Vasili let his dragon ripple to the surface. As he changed, he kept his focus, and when he was done, he lowered his head toward the small human female.
My mate.
That was the only thing that mattered to his dragon. Tasha, Marina—names were transient things. She was his mate, a fact he had never doubted, even though his human soul had, but his dragon forgave him for that. Humans were, after all, far less perceptive than dragons.
Vasili crouched down low, bringing his head level with his little female. She reached out with hesitant hands, first touching the tip of his snout, then stroking down the bridge of his nose and coming up to caress his cheek. He leaned into the touch. Though his hide was thick, the touch of his mate was something he could always feel as though she were touching human skin.
“You’re so beautiful,” Tasha whispered. “The most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
He saw his reflection in her eyes, and she smiled, leaning against his left front leg. When her hands stroked over his frill, he let out a huff of pure contentment. She explored him a moment longer before he nudged her hip with his tail, urging her to climb up on his shoulders.
“Oh my God, you want me to . . . ?”
He nodded and waited to feel her clamber up his body and sit between his shoulders.
“What do I hold on to?” she asked.
In answer, he ruffled his frill, where his hide was stronger, and she clasped it. Then he moved slowly to the top of the hill and flapped his wings before he jumped into the air. They caught an updraft and surged skyward. Tasha squealed, and for a second he feared she had fallen, but her hands still held him tight. He kept his body level and slowed down as he spiraled around the valley. Together they watched the world as it was bathed in rich gold light, the way it appears only on rare evenings.
Let her feel free, his human thought inside his head. Let her feel free to be whoever she wishes with me.
He soared a while longer until he was certain Tasha was feeling better. Then he landed by the woods where he had spotted a stream that led to a tiny waterfall. He waited patiently for her to slide off him before he transformed back into his human form. Tasha ran to him, and he held open his arms, catching her.
“Thank you, Vasili. Thank you,” she whispered before her lips found his. They came together like lightning, the touch of their mouths more electric than ever before.
Tasha pulled at his sweater, and he lifted it off his body. Her hands were frantic to undress him at first, but he caught her face between his palms and kissed her, slowing everything down. He could feel her eager breaths against his cheek, and their hearts began to beat the same rhythm. They’d done it so often before, this sharing of heartbeats, but he knew it was something Tasha hadn’t experienced yet in this life. He wanted to take his time and make sure she enjoyed every moment of their joining.
Vasili? Her voice was clear inside his head.
Yes?
Everything has changed, hasn’t it?
The way I feel about you hasn’t. You are my world. He swallowed tightly as he owned the truth of this fact. She was his everything. Always had been.
How can I be when I don’t know who I really am?
He nuzzled her neck, kissing her softly. You are who you’ve always been. A different lifetime doesn’t change that.
How could he explain it to her? Her soul was still hers. The name it now bore, the life it once lived—none of that mattered in the end. She was simply herself.
Love me? she questioned in his mind when she kissed him back hungrily.
Always. He had gone to his death loving her, and he would do it all over again if he had to.
In a slow dance of subtle movements, their clothes soon littered the grass, and he was carrying Tasha to the ground, lowering her beneath him. It was cold all around them, but his elevated body temperature would keep her warm. Tasha lay on the ground and held out her hand to guide him down on top of her. He took his time, was as gentle as he could be as he settled between her thighs. He had made love to her a thousand times before, and yet this felt like the first, felt like the one time that mattered most. He kissed the tip of her nose, her forehead, her closed lashes, whispering sweet words to her as he entered her body. She gripped him tight, her wet sheath welcoming him and her sigh of bliss a symphony to his ears.
His dragon wanted to sink his teeth into her shoulder, hold her down and take her, to remind her of their passion, of the years they’d spent together. But there would be time enough for that rough passion. Right now, the human part of him wanted to savor her sweetly.
Vasili rocked his body against hers, and Tasha’s hands dug into his shoulders while her thighs gripped his waist. Above them, the evening sky bled into the hues of twilight, and the forest stirred to life around them. The world itself seemed to sigh and wake with Vasili and Tasha’s lovemaking. The magic in the forest had been dormant for so long, but it couldn’t ignore the presence of these two magical beings within its shelter as they created love between them. The purest magic was always drawn to love, and theirs was strong tonight in this hidden glade.
She shivered beneath him and cried out as she climaxed before biting his shoulder, and Vasili experienced the most intense climax of his life. It overwhelmed him, changing him to the very core of his soul. A lifetime—two lifetimes—of her flashed before his eyes. Marina . . . Tasha . . . Marina . . . Tasha . . All of her was there before him, and all of her was beautiful. Her lips danced along his skin in light kisses as he caught his breath. When he rolled to the side and pulled her against him, he gazed up at the blanket of stars through the opening of the trees overhead.
“Do you feel better?” He ran his hand over her silken hair as she laid her cheek against his chest.
“I feel a little more like myself. It’s like even though she and I are one person, we can’t both fully be present in my head. Either she is there or I am. Does that make sense?”
“Yes, I suppose it does.”
“Do you wish it was her instead of me? Do you want her back?” Tasha asked, her voice more hesitant.
Vasili held her closer. “You are the same person.”
“But I’m not. She is the one you lived with, the one you loved for so many years. The one you almost died for. You’ve known me for less than a week.”
Vasili lifted her head so she met his gaze. “I understand your confusion, but I do not share it. I may be the only man who’s ever been blessed to fall in love with his mate twice. Falling in love with you, Tasha, that was a gift beyond measure. All of my guilt, my doubt about betraying Marina’s memory, it’s gone. I know you act differently, your looks, voice, and mannerisms. But ask yourself, had you been raised by your father instead of your mother, would you be the same person? Had you been raised in Russia instead of America, would you be the same person? Had you been born a thousand years ago instead of a few short decades ago, would you be the same person? You and Marina are the same soul that has experienced two wildly different paths in life, and I love all versions of you, my mate. Every single one. You could be reborn over and over and I know I would love each new incarnation of you as much as the one that came before.” It was the truest thing that could ever leave his lips.
She laid her head back down on his chest. “What happens now?” she asked.
Vasili chuckled. “I honestly don’t know. My nephews are on their way to London. If you want to, we could go meet them. But I will understand if you don’t wish to, because of your father.”
“No, I want to meet them. My father is . . . well, that’s a problem I’ll have to face another day when I’m ready.”
“Then let’s get you dressed and return to the house. I don’t want anyone to be worried about us.”
Vasili helped her stand, and they collected their clothes. Once dressed, he stood there, laughing softly as he plucked bits of grass and twigs from her hair.
“I look like a mess, don’t I?”
“An adorable mess of a woman who has been well fucked on the forest floor.” He didn’t miss the way her eyes heated at those words.
“I really love it when you talk dirty to me,” she admitted with a blush.
He couldn’t resist kissing her again. “Good. Because we dragons are primal. We mate fiercely and tend to be ‘dirty,’ as you called it. We see no reason to feel shame for who we are.”
Their lovemaking in the forest had been such a different thing for him, but he had loved it as much as when he’d claimed her roughly. The way he had gently possessed her body and how her surrender had been that much sweeter—it had been different, but just as lovely.
“Tasha, I—” There was a loud pop, and pain lanced through his chest. He growled and staggered as he clutched his upper body while blood poured through the cracks between his fingers.
“Oh my God, Vasili!” Tasha tried to catch him, but she was suddenly pulled away by a shadowy figure.
Vasili fell to his knees, pain blurring his vision. When it cleared, he saw a man—no, a vampire—holding his mate by the throat. The pale-faced man with glowing red eyes sneered as he gripped Tasha like a child would a ragdoll that he might throw at any moment.
“I have your mate, dragon. You have been shot in the chest with an iron bullet. You won’t die, but you cannot change. If you come along willingly, I won’t kill her.”
Vasili curled his hands into fists, but the dragon inside him was already weakening. There was no way he could fight now and not get Tasha killed.
The vampire smiled, his lips tainted with blood and his fangs gleaming in the moonlight. “Good.”
Vasili’s body seemed like it was being pulled apart cell by cell. He roared in defiance before everything around him winked out of existence.