Ash Bringer (A Storm of Fire: Paranormal Dragonshifter Romance Book 1)

by Courtney Leigh

  She scored her nails down my arms, panting rapidly until she reached her peak. I could feel her climaxing and devoured another cry when I pressed my lips on hers, feeling the tremble of her voice muffled behind our kiss. She moaned against my mouth, her muscles tense beneath me as her orgasm tore through her. My own came over me in waves, exploding between us like kindling that had blown too close to an open flame.

  Beneath my skin, the fire lit up with a faint glow that illuminated veins across my chest and arms. Looking at Everly, I could see the same veins on her neck and along her breasts as if the energy between us had joined amidst the intense climax.

  Admittedly, I was taken aback by the surge of energy that bound us in our release. I felt her in every way. Some ways were unpleasant. Memories I’d never known sent emotions through me that weren’t mine. My hand slid along her side, the tips of my fingers gliding over the rough flesh of her scars, and suddenly I could sense the discomfort and the terror that once accompanied them.

  Still deep inside her, I lifted her into my lap, kissing the bend of her neck. Her hips rocked toward me, her breath heavy in my ear. I explored her scarred back with my hands, imagining for a moment how much she had to overcome to live with those marks. To endure them. To tattoo them the way she did. To meet every obstacle the world threw at her with fists clenched. Every one I threw at her. She felt pain like any other and she faced it like she and it were competitors in a deadly contest to see who could end up on top. For the first time in decades...centuries even...I felt challenged. I felt...as if I could be beaten…

  Once the physical sensations had subsided into something manageable, Everly seemed to awaken from the trance she’d entered as soon as we kissed. She drew back, looking into my eyes as if she was in disbelief. Her brows furrowed and suddenly she pushed herself away. Not violently, but with hesitation, as if some part of her wanted to embrace me while another wanted to never see me again.

  She crawled off the bed, making sure she was fully clothed, and closed her cardigan over herself for added coverage. I looked at her body, eager to taste it again and imagining the full, flawed beauty that lay beneath that thin cotton. I could have slept beside Everly all through the night. I could have slipped into the deepest dreams, breathing in her scent until the sun rose, but I didn’t.

  The moment her slightly intoxicated mind woke from its daring dream, Everly retreated from my room, wordless and disappointed. Or so she pretended to be. I felt every emotion and thought surging in me like they were my own. She hadn’t left blaming me, but blaming herself as if she’d betrayed her own judgement by giving herself over to the beast. I played at being in control all the way until I heard her descending the steps, but once she was gone, I rolled over onto my back, staring at the ceiling in utter bewilderment.

  Everly was a human. Mortal. But I’d started a game with her that was slipping away from my control. What I’d wanted in the beginning had changed into something entirely different and entirely more difficult to obtain. I found myself fishing for more. I wanted her. Her heart. Her soul. I wanted all the things I shouldn’t. I licked my lips, savoring her essence. My skin was still prickling at the thought of her breath on my neck. Her nails against my skin.

  What the hell are you thinking? I asked myself.

  I’d intended to make her body mine from the beginning, one way or another. I never intended for her to claim me in the process.

  26

  Draven

  . . .

  I slept through the night with a head full of nightmares that weren’t my own. I was conscious of that, but it didn’t change what I experienced. I moved through places I’d never been. Saw people I’d never met. It was all a blur, like watching events through curtains of thick fog, but what I felt was clear.

  Valley Veil Orphanage was written across a plaque on a concrete wall where I stood in front of a large building tagged with graffiti. I started to move toward the building’s metal double doors before I heard voices in the alley alongside its right side. At first they were casual, but as their volumes rose, so did my interest. I walked toward them, searching that hazy world for the commotion.

  Rounding a corner where a large, green dumpster blocked part of a wide passage, I found a group of kids in front of a chain link fence that divided the backyard of the orphanage from the street side. Two young girls and a boy stood on the other side of it, facing me as I approached. They all seemed to be dressed in oversized, hand-me-down clothes that looked to have been worn by many others before them. They were oblivious to my presence, continuing about their business like I didn’t exist.

  The boy was a Pike. He was larger than his companions with a build too thick for his age and a face framed in rough, scaly skin. Small spikes were starting to protrude through his hair and yellowed eyes stared forward at the subject of the kids’ interest. A girl. She was wearing a denim jacket that was four sizes too large for her scrawny frame and she was standing with her back against the fence to face them. Mousy, brown-blonde hair was a mess around her shoulders.

  “So you’re the girl from Crescent Cove,” one of the girls said, a head of short, orange hair in a nest atop her head like a pile of grated carrots.

  The girl turned toward the fence, facing the street where I stood. Her arms were crossed firmly around her body, an angry scowl on her youthful face. Her eyes flicked up momentarily toward the top of the fence as if she was thinking of jumping it. I caught the stormy grey of her irises then. Those eyes were cool against her pale skin and filled with the same vigor that I knew in the adult Everly.

  “They said you got burned up,” the girl said with a curl in her upper lip that made her look as if she was itching for a fight. “They say you’ve got scars all over your body.”

  Everly turned back to face the kids just as the girl reached out as if to try and snatch the young Everly’s collar. Everly recoiled, closing her jacket tight.

  “Come on,” the other girl said. “Show us.”

  “They say you look worse than a Pike,” the Pike boy laughed with an irritating snort.

  “I wanna see,” the carrot demanded, taking a quick hold of Everly’s arms.

  “No!” Everly said, her tone desperate and fearful.

  She spun around and tried to climb the fence only to be violently torn down and thrown onto the damp asphalt. The girls ripped Everly’s jacket from her body before pinning her on her stomach, arms outstretched on either side of her as they held her down.

  “No! Stop it!” Everly cried.

  The orange-haired girl pulled a pair of scissors from her back jean pocket and slit the back of Everly’s shirt open with a victorious grin. When the fabric fell away I could see the gnarly, vividly red scars that painted her back. They were freshly healed and what the wounds left behind were much more than physical now. Everly wept, losing her fight as the group gawked with disgust.

  “Shit,” the Pike boy said. “She is worse than a Pike.”

  The other girls let Everly’s arms loose and she just lay there motionless.

  “The Draak who burned your town must have really hated you,” the carrot said, slipping the scissors back into her pocket. “Leaving you alive with those scars is worse than killing you.” She burst out laughing. “At least your parents are dead. I think they would have sent you to the orphanage anyways if you looked like this.”

  Everly’s eye twitched with rage. She leapt up and quickly lunged at the first person in her path. With a loud shriek, she slapped the Pike’s face so hard the boy stumbled to one knee. As the others moved in to intervene, she reached out and grabbed the girl’s orange hair in her fist and wouldn’t let go as the others tried to restrain her again.

  Kicking and screaming in a wild frenzy, Everly scratched at the girl’s face and then thrust her own head back against one of the other kids’ noses when they tried to wrap their arms around her from behind. I smiled faintly at the familiarity of her behavior, watching that scrawny little girl take on three larger opponents like a wi
ld animal who had finally gotten a chance to face her abusers.

  When one of the girls landed a hit across Everly’s face, she rolled to the ground and scurried into a run.

  “Get her!” the carrot shouted, massaging her sore scalp.

  Everly leapt up on the fence, climbing like a monkey, but the Pike boy grabbed her ankle and threw her down with a force that could have broken her tender bones. She writhed as he tried to restrain her, kicking her foot up into his groin. The others began kicking her like cowards while she was curled up on the asphalt. She didn’t scream. She shielded herself with her arms, but bit the pain between her teeth without a sound.

  Tears wet her cheeks. Her body shook, unable to move anymore as she lay there bruised and beaten. The kids walked off, proud of their heinous act, leaving Everly there to rot in her own pain.

  Two women came bursting out of a door to the left of the commotion and ran toward her, both gasping at the sight. Closing my eyes, I felt myself spin into a different place in time just before the two ladies came to Everly’s aid.

  I was in what looked like a small, empty warehouse where rain dripped through the ceiling and made puddles on the concrete floors. It was night. Yellow lights were sparse above, making the warehouse a collage of shaded and lit areas. I heard a door slam and from the back of the warehouse came two figures. I felt her there before she even came into the light. The other was a large, thick man with rough, Pike features framing his squared face and lining his broad shoulders. Taurus. He walked fast, each step heavy and echoing. Behind him, trying to keep up, was a teenage Everly, her hair a mess of shoulder length strands pulled into a ponytail. She looked stressed, reaching out to grab Taurus’s jacket sleeve.

  “You said you’d teach me!” she said. “You can’t just stop now because I hurt myself.”

  “You cracked four ribs,” Taurus said calmly, his voice a deep drone that echoed through the building. “We can train when you’re better.”

  “I’m better. I swear. Please.”

  “Everly,” Taurus turned suddenly. “You can’t go further until you’re healed.”

  “No one else waits until people heal. I can’t learn to survive if you’re taking it easy on me. It’s been months, now teach me!”

  “I won’t hurt you,” Taurus said, taking her shoulders in his hands.

  “No, but everyone else will. Come on, Taurus. Every time we go into town they look at me like I’m meat, and I can’t be anything more than that unless I can get stronger.”

  “You’re not going into town again. We’re moving into the sector.”

  “What? How?”

  “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that it will be safer.”

  “Either way, bordering areas are still dangerous and I’m not moving into the cities. I need to know how to be strong.”

  “You are strong. You have to see that.” He stepped away from her, taking a deep breath and letting it out on a defeated sigh. “If you need this, then I’ll continue training with you, but you’re like a daughter to me, Ever. I won’t see you getting hurt again.”

  “I can go to the Chain Rings,” she said with a nod. “I can do it. We can even get money for it if I win.”

  “No. That’s not a life you want.”

  “Then what?”

  “I’ll train you, but not so you can go looking for conflict. Understand?”

  Everly sighed sharply. “Fine.”

  Raising a brow, Taurus watched the attitude bleed through Everly’s stance.

  “You sure you’re not acting like this because of what happened with Kallum?”

  Suddenly, Everly’s demeanor changed. She folded her arms over herself, grinding her teeth with a mix of what looked like anger and humiliation.

  “Fuck him,” she hissed.

  “Language.”

  “He’s an asshole.”

  “Did he do something?” Taurus said with concern.

  Seeing the way his muscles tensed, I was inclined to believe he was ready to track this Kallum person down and rip his arms out of their sockets.

  “Did he touch you?” he asked.

  “No,” Everly rolled her eyes, her tone dropping. “He saw my scars and said I was ugly. Well, not in those words, but he might as well have said it.”

  “Were you undressing in front of him?”

  “We were making out, Taurus. I wasn’t gonna...I mean I might have. Ugh, it’s not as if it’ll ever happen again. Let it go.”

  “Having sexual relations with boys is—”

  “It’s not happening again. We don’t need to talk about it.”

  “Alright,” Taurus said, placing a hand on Everly’s shoulder.

  She shrugged him off and marched toward the warehouse door, arms still crossed guardedly.

  Skipping ahead in time again, I found myself in a town that seemed quiet at first. Paved streets wove through small buildings and houses. I looked around at the practical arrangement of things and deduced that this town wasn’t for farmers and traders. This place was a place for travelers, betters, and thugs.

  From a building to my right came a couple of men in worn, brown coats. They were laughing, perhaps a bit intoxicated, and whistling at passing women, but not for long.

  Out of the shadows came a lean figure in a hooded, black coat, like a cat pouncing on its prey. A woman. She moved like a perfectly focused, hard-hitting fighter, hooking her arm around one man’s neck to gain leverage to kick the other one in the chest hard enough to throw him against the wall and knock him out cold. His body slumped to the ground as the woman’s attention moved to the other. With a swipe of her leg, she knocked the man’s feet out from under him and snatched a blade from her boot. Crouching over his body, she held the steel of her knife to the man’s neck and tossed her hood off. Long tresses of greyed, lavender-colored hair fell in a loose braid over one shoulder.

  “What the fuck?” the man said, suddenly sober with his hands raised in surrender.

  “Taurus Black,” Everly hissed. “I know you’re the officer that turned him in. Where did you take him?”

  “I handed him over to Raven Heights.”

  “The prison?”

  “Y--yeah that’s the one. I don’t know if he’s still there, but that’s the last thing I did with him.”

  “Why?”

  “Lady, he killed a Draak. A real important one. He confessed.”

  Everly looked aggravated at the mere thought. She pulled the knife away to punch the man in the face hard enough to make him whine like a child as blood spewed from his nose.

  “Fuck!” he griped. “Who the hell are you anyways? Taurus is just a Pike. What do you care?”

  “Doesn’t matter what he is. I’m more than willing to kill for him,” Everly said.

  “Really? You gonna kill an officer? You’ll go to prison, too.”

  “Tell me how to get him out,” Everly demanded, pressing her blade to his chin with more force.

  “There’s no way you’re getting him out of Raven Heights. The Draakir took full control of his sentence because his crime involved an Ash Bringer. Those guys are protected by bigger laws than you can fathom. You might as well enter the Red Race.”

  I could see the idea sparking in Everly’s head.

  “Why? The race is for property and money. Why would I enter?” she asked, eyes narrowed.

  “Because if you win, then the Draakir has to grant you a favor or some shit. It’s not too well known because idiots can only think about money, but the race is for any request. Whatever you want. Get him pardoned, you know?” The man laughed, looking Everly’s feminine, slender body up and down. “Better be sure you really are willing to kill for him. Maybe die for him, cuz you won’t win. Not against people like that. They ain’t got nothing to lose.”

  I could see Everly’s stormy eyes deepening with thought. She slipped the knife into her boot and threw her hood back on and just then I felt it. I sensed her mind make the decision that would bring her to me.

  �
�There’s the difference,” she muttered. “I have everything to lose.”

  27

  Draven

  . . .

  The next morning, I stood in front of my window, staring out at the yard where I could see the foal below, trotting clumsily across the grass of the smaller of the two paddocks. Everly was there with Ronan, who was leading the young horse . She looked calm. So calm that part of me wondered how much she even remembered of the previous night. The smell of bourbon on her breath made me skeptical, but then again, no virgin would wake feeling the same after what I’d done to her. She had to know. She had to be aware of it and yet she strode the pen, focused on that foal and Ronan as if nothing was bothering her while I stood wondering how to go about the day with the taste of her still on my lips.

  I’d experienced more than I bargained for. I’d taken Everly’s body. Her mind. Her emotions. All of it was fresh inside of me like a wound that had just been opened. I slipped on a white shirt and a pair of black jeans and boots before strolling down to the dining hall to grab an apple or something to occupy my mouth. I feared that if something wasn’t in it, I’d just pursue Everly instead. Standing at the table was Lukan, eyes blankly staring across the room and arms crossed as if something was troubling him. I slowed my pace, eyeing him suspiciously.

  “You look like you had an even more exhausting night than I did,” I said, grabbing an apple and pulling out a chair. I sat down, lifting my feet onto the edge of the table.

  Lukan took a deep breath and picked up a glass mug full of black coffee. “I’ve been thinking about the gala,” he said, taking a sip.

  “Have you now?” I said, biting into the apple.

  “I think it’s an unwise way to go about things.”

  “How would you go about them? Burn them all down?” I smirked.

  “Wouldn’t you?”

  I shrugged. “Ares believes he can avoid war with the rebels and outlanders if he invites them in and gives them shiny gifts.”