This was a land of spiritual awakenings, of rejuvenation, home to an untold number of energy vortexes—intersections of natural, electromagnetic earth energy that humans here said had transformational properties. People came from all over the world to meditate, reflect, and heal here. And he’d witnessed their triumph hundreds of times.
If only it worked on dragons.
Alexander loved the heat and the rust-colored terrain as much as his dark heart could love anything—it reminded him of the volcanic environment of Paragon, the realm where he was born—but he was still waiting for that healing to kick in.
Before Maiara, before everything was ruined, he’d grown up in a palace among his siblings, a middle son of whom the royal family had relatively few expectations. And so as an introspective and creative child, he’d taught himself to sketch and paint. Art in all its forms had been his escape from the boredom that accompanied his privileged circumstances.
All that was over now. It was a million years ago, lost in the wreckage of his memories. His art did not hold the same joy or provide the escape it once had. Hell, if it did, if he had one way to lose himself, life might be tolerable.
He passed the sign at the entrance to the Church of New Horizons and cut the engine to his Harley. If his landlord didn’t hear the bike, he might make it inside without another awkward conversation about taking part in the classes at the retreat. He’d rented a room there for years but never partook in the spiritual hikes, meditation, or yoga. Actually, he thought the whole lot of it was bullshit. But the owner and landlord, determined to save his tormented soul, had never given up on trying to convince him to participate.
Nyx, who’d been flying above him for most of the ride home, landed on his shoulder and rubbed her cheek against his. “Yeah, yeah. I forgive you. I don’t understand you, but I forgive you.”
Silently Alexander walked his bike up the drive and parked it in his spot in the small lot, then crept around the side of the stucco walls of the southwestern-style building. He breathed a sigh of relief when he set foot on the stairs to his second-floor apartment until the sound of sandals on gravel preceded a cheery, “Hello, friend!”
Alexander closed his eyes and pivoted slowly to face the owner of New Horizons and his landlord, Master Gu. As usual, the man wore loose-fitting black pants, a long-sleeved red tunic that tied at the waist, and a silver braid that ran down the center of his back. One clouded eye stared unseeing into the beyond while the other looked straight into him.
His appearance gave him a stereotypical master of martial arts vibe, but the truth was David Gu wasn’t a master of anything. New Horizons was his invention, not an established religion, and until fifteen years ago, the guy had been a car salesman in Detroit. Somehow though, he’d established this retreat house and regularly filled it with people willing to pay top dollar for guided meditation, yoga, and learning how to harness the healing energy of the Sedona vortexes.
“Good morning,” Alexander said flatly.
“Your aura is muddled today,” Gu said, his brow dipping. “You need meditation and acupuncture to open your chakras and purify your qi energy.”
Alexander removed his sunglasses and gave the man a steady look in his good eye. He wondered what had tipped him off to his foul mood. Perhaps the rocks embedded in the back of his leather jacket. He tucked his glasses into his inner pocket. “My aura is top notch, my friend, and my qi is flowing like the piss of an incontinent badger. I think your aura reader is on the fritz today.”
Master Gu shook his head. “My aura reader is operational. Your bird, for example, has a beautiful spring green aura as she always does. Yours, on the other hand, is usually blue, and today it is dark gray and muddy.”
“My bird has an aura?” Alexander laughed. The guy was wackier than a two-headed javelina.
“Oh yes, a strong one. She’s the first, you know.”
“The first what?”
“Bird with its own aura. Normally, birds have a collective energy. All the same. Bright blue and white like the sky. Your bird is different.”
Alexander cast Nyx a sideways glance. She bonked his cheek with her beak. This bird was different all right. Immortal. Bound to him by a mystical force he didn’t understand, like two moons orbiting each other as they gradually drifted into the sun. Different was an understatement. Try tragic.
“Your aura just got darker,” Master Gu said with a tone of warning. “Staying like this is inviting misfortune into your life! The soul longs for balance. No one can endure spiritual pain forever. You must allow me to purify your qi before it is too late. I insist. I will do it for free.”
Rubbing the throbbing ache that had begun over his right eye, Alexander cleared his throat and found what remained of his patience. “Wow, you must be serious. I’ve never known you to offer a freebie to anyone.”
“I am worried about the darkness in you, Alexander.”
He nodded. “Bah. Who could have darkness in a wonderland like this?” He gestured to the postcard views surrounding New Horizons.
Gu stared at him, unblinking, which unnerved the hell out of him.
“I’ll think about it,” Alexander murmured despite his better judgment.
A smile warmed the older man’s face and he bowed. “As you wish. Don’t say I didn’t warn you if you wait and things go terribly wrong. The universe has a way of working these things out if you don’t deal with them yourself.” The man shuffled off toward the meditation center, gravel crunching under his sandals.
“For the love of the Mountain,” he muttered to Nyx, rolling his eyes as he bound up the stairs. “I need a damned drink.”
He reached the second floor and slid his key into the lock to his apartment. The one-room flat was perfect for him. Small, quiet, and with enough extra room to serve as an art studio. He pushed open the door.
And a man the size of a bull slammed into him. His head slapped the floor to the sound of Nyx’s screams.
The first thing Alexander noticed when he regained consciousness was the absence of Nyx on his shoulder. A twinge of dread shot through him, and he forced his eyes open and searched for her in a panic. He struggled against restraints that bound his wrists. If anyone had hurt her…
A dark, hulking figure stepped into his field of vision. Dark hair, dark eyes that always seemed to reflect fire even when there was none, and a physique expertly trained to inflict maximum damage. Alexander tugged harder against his bindings. “Gabriel.”
“Calm down, brother. We need to talk. It’s important.”
He blinked slowly, then swallowed past the rage in his throat. “Are you real?”
“Of course I’m real. What else would I be?”
He glanced away. Reality wasn’t always an easy thing for Alexander to ground himself in lately, and considering he’d smacked his head hard that morning, it seemed reasonable to check. Still, the familiar smoky scent that filled the room was definitely Gabriel’s. His brother was there, and that nugget of truth burned in his craw more than the smoke.
When their mother had cast them into this world, she’d insisted they settle in separate lands. Any extended amount of time in the same area would produce a concentrated magical signature their murderous uncle might use to find them and kill them, the same way he’d killed their older brother. It was why Alexander had settled so far from his siblings and eventually lost touch with most of them.
As many questions as he had about why his brother was there, his first priority was his pet. “What have you done with Nyx?”
“Who?”
“My hawk.” He growled, low and threatening. Threats were all he could make. Alexander had spent his childhood as an unwilling participant in Gabriel’s training regime; he’d only ever won a fight against the dragon once, and even then, there had been extenuating circumstances. On a good day, Gabriel could easily kick his ass. It had been a long time between good days for Alexander and even longer since he’d had a good meal. On the other hand, judging by the sheer size
of his warrior brother, Gabriel had maintained his peak physical condition. That didn’t mean Alexander planned to cooperate. Hell, no. There were more ways to win a battle than brute strength.
Gabriel’s dark eyebrows snapped together over the bridge of his nose. “The hawk is there with my wife.” He pointed toward a dark-haired and obviously pregnant woman standing by the window. Nyx was happily perched on her arm. Odd. He couldn’t remember the hawk ever intentionally acknowledging, let alone fraternizing with, another person other than he or Maiara.
Seeing her so comfortable with the woman caused a strange uneasy feeling in his chest. He made a kissing sound to call her to him, but she stayed where she was. Damn bird. Couldn’t get rid of her most of the time and now she was all chummy with his brother’s… wife?
Alexander’s head snapped up. “Wife? Did you say wife? You’re married?”
“And mated,” Gabriel said. A slight smile softened the harsh lines of his mouth. “This is Raven.”
Well, that was that. This had to be real. Alexander could never imagine a woman who would put up with his brother, let alone marry him. Raven was round bellied but otherwise reedy, with long hair the color of polished ebony, Mediterranean features, and light eyes that held wisdom beyond her years. An old soul. She smelled strange, unlike anything he’d ever encountered before. He took a deeper sniff. What was she? Not simply human, that was for sure.
She rubbed a circle over her beach-ball-size belly. “Nice to meet you. I apologize for the way my husband said hello. He thought you’d run if he didn’t knock you down and tie you up like an animal.” She gave Gabriel a disapproving look.
“He was right,” Alexander admitted. “If I’d seen him coming, he’d never have found me. Anyway, we’re supposed to stay apart, or hasn’t he told you?”
“She knows. And that’s why I’m here. I have news, brother. News that changes everything.” Gabriel dragged the other hard wooden chair out from the table and took a seat across from him. “Our forced separation is officially over.”
A chill crawled evenly along Alexander’s vertebra and made his scalp itch. He could not have heard his brother right. “What are you talking about?”
“We do not have to stay apart anymore. In fact, it would be an extremely bad idea for us to do so. Everything we were told when we left Paragon was a lie.”
As Alexander tried to process the revelation Gabriel had just shared—was it true or was this some kind of a trick?—he heard footsteps and turned his head to find Raven moving for the door, the hawk still on her arm. “I’ll update the others while you two chat.”
Alexander tensed. “You can’t take Nyx with you.” He growled. “She can’t go outside without me. She’s, uh, trained only for me. You might lose her.”
Raven’s eyebrows bobbed as if she’d never considered the idea that the hawk couldn’t go where it pleased. She nudged Nyx onto his shoulder. “She’s beautiful. You’ve taken great care of her. I’ve never seen a domesticated hawk before.”
He nodded at her, relieved to feel the familiar weight of the bird again. “Who else is here?” he asked, nodding toward the door. “You said there were others.”
“Rowan, her mate, Nick, and Tobias,” Raven answered lightly.
“Rowan is mated?”
Raven gave him a soft smile. “So is Tobias but his wife is not able to travel like the rest of us.”
Pain radiated from the center of Alexander’s chest, and he doubled over in his chair, his breath coming faster. “Everyone is mated?”
Gabriel grumbled, “Raven…”
She glanced in his direction and spread her hands. “I’m sorry, Alexander. I wasn’t thinking. I shouldn’t have unloaded that on you all at once.”
Sweat broke out on his forehead, and he swallowed hard. “Please leave.”
Raven backed away, and he heard the door open and close.
“She was just answering your question. She didn’t realize—”
“I know.” Alexander closed his eyes against the wrenching pain. “How far along is she?”
“About four and a half months.”
“Congratulations. I didn’t know dragons could impregnate humans.” He shook his head. “Is she human? Her scent is unfamiliar. I can’t put my finger on it.”
Gabriel’s expression closed off like Alexander had sprung a trap, and he found himself no longer staring into the face of his brother but a deadly dragon warrior. Whoa! That was a face he’d never wished to see again.
“I’m not here to talk about my wife.”
Made uncomfortable by the intensity of his older brother’s stare, Alexander shifted in his chair. “Why are you here, Gabriel? Really?” He’d had just about enough of this crazy visit. Enough of being tied to a freaking chair. And enough of feeling helpless. He lowered his voice. “You know as well as I do that I’m not strong enough to take you, but I am crazy enough to shift and wreck what few possessions I have here if you don’t get to the point and untie me now.” He leveled a deadly serious stare on his brother. “You may be stronger, but I’ve got a helluva lot less to lose.”
“I’m here to tell you we were wrong,” Gabriel said in a voice so low and gritty it reminded Alexander of asphalt. “About everything. Paragon. Mother. Brynhoff.”
“I heard you the first time you said it, but I don’t understand. How could this be true?”
“Eleanor didn’t send us to this realm to save us. She sent us here to get us out of the way.”
Alexander stilled, waiting for the punch line or at least an explanation. He hadn’t heard the name Eleanor in over three hundred years, not since he was a prince of Paragon and palace guests would address his mother as Queen Eleanor. It was disconcerting to hear it fall from his brother’s lips.
And he’d mentioned Brynhoff, the king and also his uncle, their kingdom having been ruled by brother and sister for millennia. Brynhoff had murdered Alexander’s eldest brother, Marius, at what was supposed to be Marius’s coronation. The bloody coup had been the last time he’d seen his parents or his uncle and had changed everything for him as well as his seven remaining siblings.
“What the hell are you talking about? Mother saved us. She used her magic to send us here. It would have drained her. It cost her life as well as Father’s.” Alexander’s last memory of Paragon was of his father, Killian, defending their mother from Brynhoff as her ring glowed and her magic plowed into him.
“It was all a lie.” A muscle in Gabriel’s jaw twitched.
“And you know this how?” He’d seen the coup with his own eyes, experienced the shock and terror of being cast between dimensions.
“I returned to Paragon.”
It was a good thing he was sitting down, because Alexander could’ve been knocked over with one of Nyx’s feathers at the confession. He planted his feet and scooted the chair back from the table, placing space between himself and his brother. “Why the fuck would you do that?”
There was a long pause while his older brother seemed to choose his words carefully. “I was dying. I thought magic from Mother’s spell book might cure me.” His eyes snapped to Alexander’s. “She was there, Alexander, on the throne, next to Brynhoff. She was ruling by his side. They call her empress now.”
A pounding pain started in Alexander’s temple. This couldn’t be real. If it was, they’d separated for no reason. Everything that had happened with Maiara was meaningless. He couldn’t accept that. There was too much guilt wrapped up in that package for him to bear.
“Why are you here? What do I care what’s happening in Paragon?” he said.
Gabriel’s mouth twisted. “She sent Scoria to kill us—me, my wife, and Tobias too.”
“Scoria was here?”
“Was. He’s dead now.”
“By the Mountain,” he swore. Scoria had been a fierce warrior, devoted to his mother. To Paragon. If he’d truly been in this realm and been defeated, then Gabriel spoke the truth.
“But Eleanor and Brynhoff will send other
s. Far from keeping us safe, separating us was meant to keep us weak and vulnerable. When we killed Scoria, we became a threat to Mother’s seat of power. You know what will happen next. Eleanor will try to pick us off, one by one. Our only hope is to unite and prepare an offensive so we’re ready for an attack.”
Alexander scoffed. “Won’t our collective magic make us easier to find?”
Gabriel shook his head. “What I’m about to tell you may be hard for you to accept, but you must.”
Blinking slowly, Alexander couldn’t help but laugh. “I threw myself off the side of a cliff this morning.” He watched his brother recoil. “What exactly do you think you’re going to tell me that I won’t be able to accept? I’m no one to judge.”
Gabriel nodded in understanding. “My wife, Raven, is a very powerful witch. She can use her abilities to hide us from Eleanor.”
Of all the things Alexander thought his brother might say, he was not expecting this. It explained why he’d clammed up earlier when Alexander had asked about Raven’s humanity though. Dragons were expressly forbidden from mating with witches. It was said that the offspring of such a union would be a monster capable of leveling Paragon and everyone in it. Dragon-witch pairings had been outlawed in Paragon since the early fourth century when the Witch Queen of Darnuith had attempted to overthrow the kingdom of Paragon.
He laughed. “A… a witch? You’ve gone and married an actual spell-casting witch?” He locked eyes with his brother. When Gabriel didn’t deny it, Alexander laughed, his eyebrows reaching for the ceiling. “And she’s pregnant! No wonder Paragon wants you dead. The favorite of the kingdom has shattered the crown’s most sacred edict.”
“I wouldn’t call it the most sacred,” Gabriel murmured.
Alexander grew serious. “I’m in no place to tell you what to do, Gabriel. If you came for my blessing, you have it. As for the other part, the part about Mother coming to kill me, let her come. She’d be doing me a favor.” He leaned back against the chair and closed his eyes. “Now untie me.”
The Dragon of Sedona (The Treasure of Paragon Book 4) Page 2
