by JD Monroe
Taking a deep breath, Natalie only smelled cleaning products, as if someone had just scrubbed down the inside of the building. “Just bleach.”
Ruana shook her head. Her expression was creased, as if she smelled something foul. “There’s something wrong.” She shook her head. “Stay behind me.”
The interior of the building was a modified warehouse space. Wet streaks had dried in a haphazard ring beneath a surgical table at its center. A rolling tray was pushed against the table, and while it was empty at the moment, she could envision a row of gleaming surgical instruments.
They hurried toward a narrow hallway on the far side of the warehouse. Along the right side of the hall were small rooms sectioned off by curtains. Bloody footprints marked the ground from one room and trailed back into the warehouse.
Ruana stepped into the room, presumably where Erevan had been. Inside was a sparse, austere room with a toppled exam table and a cabinet pushed against one wall. Natalie opened the cabinet. Inside were rows of boxes of the sort of items she would expect in a medical office. Boxes filled with blue latex gloves, rolls of gauze. On the bottom shelf was a row of irregular glass bottles, all empty and clean. Nothing indicated how Erevan had ended up in such a state.
They peeked into each of the rooms down the hall, finding similar arrangements. However, the last room had an actual door. It was locked, but Ruana easily snapped the handle and pushed it open. Super strength was a perk of being a dragon, it seemed.
“Oh my.” She stepped back, covering her mouth. “You don’t smell that?”
Natalie looked past her. Inside the room were two more metal cabinets. She opened the first to reveal stacks of bagged plastic tubing and empty glass bottles. She opened the second, expecting to find more of the same.
Arranged in neat lines were dozens of irregular glass vessels. Each container looked like someone’s failed attempt at making a symmetrical bottle. Some were twisted, while others looked as if they’d been partially squashed. Each held glowing purple fluid that pulsed in a slow, heartbeat rhythm.
“What is this?” Natalie said.
Ruana cringed and stepped into the room. “It smells like death,” she said. She reached out as if she was going to touch one of the bottles, then yanked her hand back. “I’ve never seen this.”
“Should I take one?”
Ruana shook her head. “Don’t touch it. I’ll call for someone else to come check this out.” She backed out of the room.
At the far end of the hall was another door with a keypad mounted on the wall. Ruana ignored the keypad and broke the handle like the last door.
Together, they walked into a dim stairwell that led downward. It was quiet, with only the hum of fluorescent light fixtures filling the tense silence. At the bottom of the stairs, Ruana drew a sharp breath, then put her arm out to bar Natalie from passing. “I smell dragons. Wait here.”
Ruana made quick work of the next door, stepping out into a narrow hallway. Though she couldn’t smell whatever it was that had Ruana so disturbed, Natalie recognized the combination of disinfectants, latex, and bodily fluids that created the unpleasant smell of a hospital. She’d smelled it for months after her mother passed, even throwing out some of her old clothes because of it.
Ruana was gone for a minute, leaving Natalie in complete silence. Then she let out a gasp. She spoke rapidly, lapsing back into the native tongue of the dragons. Something crashed.
With her heart racing, Natalie dashed into the hallway, following Ruana’s shadow into another small chamber. She froze.
The room beyond the door was the terrible combination of a dungeon cell and a hospital room. Unfinished dark concrete walls seemed to swallow the harsh lighting. Dark splatters stained the walls and the floor below. But it was the room’s occupant that had Ruana horrified.
Instead of the clean exam tables from upstairs, a man lay on a T-shaped table with his arms bound out and away from his body. Tubes snaked around him like a spider’s tangling web, disappearing into his body and emerging full of dark red liquid. Two IV pumps loomed on either side of his head, both bristling with thin tubes that converged into a central line in his chest.
All of it would have been horrible if he’d been fully human, but he was part dragon, frozen between the two forms. His right leg was human, bruised dark over his sallow skin. Below the hip, his left leg swelled into a scaled blue limb. The leg was almost comically huge next to the human limb. Thick metal cables gleamed against the blue hide, secured on either side of the table. His right hand was half-formed, with the fingers from thumb to middle extending into twisted talons. And his head was malformed; the right side of his face was scaled, with a wet, red seam down the center as if he’d been stopped halfway through the transformation. Sharp teeth protruded over his lip.
“What is this?” Natalie murmured.
“I don’t know.” Ruana backed away, bumping into Natalie. They both jumped, and Ruana gripped her hand. “We have to get him out of here.” She brushed past Natalie. “There’s more doors.”
To their horror, there were four cells in the basement. Three were occupied with prisoners in a similar condition to the half-formed blue dragon. Trying to fight back her revulsion, Natalie examined the IV pumps by the bed. Printed labels on the bags bore familiar names like Fentanyl and ketamine. They were keeping the dragons heavily drugged, unconscious and unable to fight back. In a fifth room, they found a cooler full of blood bags, each labeled in an inscrutable code. They were draining the dragons dry, but what for?
Was this what they had done to Thea? One of the prisoners was female, but the copper red hair made it obvious she wasn’t Thea. Had Thea been an occupant of the fourth room that didn’t make it?
Her throat clenched as she tried to compose herself. “Ruana?”
“What?”
“My friend Thea isn’t here,” she said.
“That’s good.”
“But she could have been. They could have already…” She clapped her hand over her mouth.
The table upstairs, freshly cleaned.
Her knees buckled. Ruana darted forward, catching Natalie by the shoulders. Her legs felt shaky, but she could have lifted her feet off the ground and Ruana would have simply held her up. “Stop that.”
“Dragon thing doesn’t work.”
“I’m not trying it,” Ruana said. “Is there some magic you know that solves problems by losing your shit?”
Natalie’s jaw dropped. Her instinct was to be offended at the harsh rebuke, but Ruana was right. She took a deep breath to center herself. Thea wasn’t here. Uncertainty was painful, but it was better than finding her dead. “No. I’m sorry.”
“Look, I get it. I want to vomit my guts out. But whoever did this hurt my people. They hurt Erevan, and they got away. I want answers, and I want to tear their heads from their shoulders. Is freaking out going to help me accomplish that?”
“No.”
“Then knock it off,” Ruana said. She grabbed her phone and made a call. After speaking heatedly in Kadirai, she turned back to Natalie. “We’ve got transport coming to take us home. You’ll be safe there, and I’m sure someone will have more questions for you about what happened.”
“Home?”
“Where the dragons live. You’ll like it.”
Had he fallen asleep on the couch again? It felt like someone had tied his spine in knots from the base of his skull down to the crack of his ass. As he shifted, a host of aches exploded down his limbs and converged at the throbbing intersection between his temples. He opened his dry eyes to the unexpected sight of a polished silver lantern hanging over his bed. Fragrant incense smoke hung in the air.
What the…
He propped himself on his elbow to look around. A dozen beds covered in clean white linens surrounded him, each beneath an ornate silver lantern.
This was the infirmary at Skyward Rest, where the queen’s cadre of healers and their apprentices worked. The infirmary was usually quiet, so the cluster of
people murmuring at the far end of the room qualified as a commotion.
The sheets felt like sandpaper against his bare legs. His heart skipped a beat. Natalie lay on the bed next to his. He had a fleeting moment of concern that she’d been hurt, but she slept atop the sheets in her street clothes. One arm was folded under her head while she clutched her phone in her other hand. Her face was unmarked, and he didn’t smell blood.
How strange. Usually if he woke up next to a woman, she was naked. There was something soothing about seeing Natalie there watching over him. A pretty flush colored her cheeks. Stripped of her wary armor, she seemed so vulnerable. For a moment, he wanted to touch her, just to feel the warm softness of her skin under his fingers. But she already didn’t trust him and touching her in her sleep wouldn’t help that situation.
Instead, he gripped the bedframe for balance and reached across the aisle to poke her arm. She jerked awake and sat bolt upright. “Are you…” She fumbled to wipe her mouth discreetly. He suppressed a smile. “Are you all right?”
“I feel like shit,” he admitted.
“Yeah, you were in bad shape yesterday.”
Horror and humiliation fought for dominance over him as he remembered that she’d been there. The moments before his memory went black were blurry. Beale had done something to him. Then it was all fire and burning in his chest as his body changed against his will. Terror consumed him as his power surged out of control. He hadn’t been so terrified since he was a child, trying to control the dragon for the very first time. Then a thread of blinding white cut through the inferno. Even in memory, he could sense the pure, unwavering light. Had he overcome the transformation, or had his body given out?
Now with her eyes on him and her scent lingering in the air, his memory clarified. He had lost himself, writhing like a helpless creature as she showed pity. His cheeks flushed. “I told you to call Ruana, not to come in there.”
“I did call her.” She frowned. “And then I did what I thought was best.”
“You could have been hurt.”
“And you could have ended up like those three,” she retorted, pointing down the infirmary toward the cluster of people at the far end of the infirmary. She cringed. “Those two.”
He followed her gaze. “What are you talking about?”
She took a deep breath and told him what they’d found, filling his mind with nightmarish images of what she and Ruana had found in the basement. “You said three, then two,” he said, interrupting her description of the glowing purple bottles. “Did one of them…”
She nodded. “One of them didn’t make it here. The doctors…uh, healers, I guess, tried to bring him back but they couldn’t. They wouldn’t tell me, but…” She trailed off, pressing her lips together. “I got the idea. As far as I know they’re still working on the other two.”
“And no Thea, I assume.”
She shook her head. “Ruana said they’d comb through everything to look for clues to where she might have gone. But I’m going to be positive. She wasn’t there but she could still be out there.”
“Fehr n’asora,” a pleasant female voice chirped in Kadirai. “How are you feeling?”
“English, please,” he said pointedly. “She doesn’t speak Kadirai.” The tension in Natalie’s face eased. She even graced him with a hint of a smile. The tiny expression triggered a swell of pride that overwhelmed him.
The healer wore simple, pale blue garments of the Marashti order, wrapped around a slender body and tied with a darker blue sash. Dark blue tattooed dots swept across her brow to indicate her initiation into the order. She leaned over Erevan, pressing her hand to his arm. “My name is Devi Mara,” she said. A warm sensation like flowing water poured from her and swept over his body with a pleasant pressure.
“Are you related to Silvi?” Natalie asked.
The healer smiled and glanced over her shoulder. “Sort of. We are all sisters of the order.” Devi closed her eyes. The pressure intensified, and he felt the distinct sensation of fingers pressing into him, along his ribs, his lower back, even the bottoms of his feet. He tried not to squirm at the invasive feeling, which proved difficult when the phantom touch searched his groin with clinical precision. “I heard Ruana’s version of the story,” she said, apparently unfazed. “Can you tell me what it felt like?”
“There was this sound. Like a bell,” he said. “Then the change began out of nowhere. You know that first wave of…shit. I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine,” Devi said, smiling. “I do remember.”
“It felt like that. But wild. Out of control. The more I fought, the worse it got.”
“And these people…did they say anything? Did they give you any indication about what this power was?”
“Not that I remember. I was just asking questions. I tried to go past them, and then I heard that sound. Beale had a remote. When I smashed it, the sound stopped.” The prodding sensation ceased and Devi sat back on the edge of the bed. “Am I all right?”
“You feel sick,” Devi said. She waved her hand. “Karemani,” she amended as she shot a look at Natalie. “It doesn’t translate well. The energy in your body is what I would expect from someone who was ill, but there’s no disease in you. There’s a lingering energy around you I don’t recognize. I don’t want you to panic, but it smells like death. You’re not dying, but it smells like you are.”
That was the last thing anyone wanted to hear, especially from a healer. “I smelled it before.” He glanced at Natalie. “At her house.”
“My house?”
He nodded. “It had to have been the dragon who attacked you at the house,” he replied. “Do you have any idea?”
“I’m not sure,” Devi said. “I have a suspicion, but I must confer with my sisters before I say it aloud. I’ve also called for Sohan Shadowbane to speak to me.”
Erevan’s mouth went dry. “Why do you want to speak to him?” But he knew already, didn’t he? Beale took his blood. For a human healer to do what Beale claimed to do, he had to be using blood magic, and that was in Sohan’s territory.
“I’ll let you know if it pans out,” Devi said. She brushed off her hands. “You’re welcome to stay here for another night, though I imagine you might be more comfortable elsewhere in your own quarters.” She looked over to Natalie. “You as well. I’m sure you’d rather sleep in your own quarters.”
“Oh,” Natalie said. “I don’t have a place here.”
“Oh,” Devi said. “I assumed you would stay in the Emerald Wing. You are a hybrid, right?”
Erevan’s heart stopped for a split second as Natalie’s brow furrowed. “What?”
Devi looked back to him, then at Natalie. “I’m sorry…is that offensive? Hadilar, if you prefer. I hope I didn’t misspeak. My manners are better than my English, I promise.”
No, no. Shit.
“Did you say hybrid? What exactly does that mean?”
The first time the healer said the word hybrid, Natalie assumed she’d misheard, or that the woman had lapsed into her native tongue mid-sentence. But as Devi continued speaking, Natalie realized that she’d heard it with pinpoint accuracy. “What exactly does that mean?”
“Am I incorrect?” Devi asked, looking back and forth with an expression of discomfort pulling at her lips. “You are half dragon, yes?”
Erevan let out a breath through his nose and said something in Kadirai.
“Oh. You didn’t…” Devi pressed her hand to her mouth.
“You’re messing with me,” Natalie said. “It’s not funny. Not after all of this.”
Devi raised her eyebrows, the tattooed marks disappearing into the crease of her forehead. She reached for Natalie’s hand, and a pleasant, warm sensation rushed through her. She breathed deep, her eyes going silver like Silvi’s had. “Hadilar,” she said. “No question.”
“Is she serious?” Natalie glared at Erevan.
His gaze skated away before lifting to meet hers. He gave a slight nod. “Yes.”
<
br /> “I’m a dragon.”
“Half,” he said, as casually as he would have said her hair was brown.
“I’d guess on the father’s side, but I’m not—“ Devi said.
“I have to go,” Natalie said. Her head was spinning. The airy room was suddenly too hot and cramped with the healer’s words growing to fill the space.
She launched herself off the bed and hurried down the center aisle of the infirmary. Erevan called after her, but she ignored him. A pair of guards in dark uniforms opened the doors as she approached. It was only as she stepped onto the smooth stone floor that she realized she was still barefoot after kicking off her shoes to rest last night.
It didn’t matter. She had to get out.
Since she’d first realized Thea was missing, she’d felt the world slipping under her. It was only a tremor at first. When Thomas changed into a dragon right in front of her, the ground opened up. Things got weirder as she plummeted into a world where dragons and magic were real, like Alice without the magic mushrooms. She’d forced herself to accept it without thinking too much about it so she could find Thea, but this was too much.
She’d been too busy watching the injured dragons on the way in to notice the route they’d taken. Away was a good start. Heading down the hall outside the infirmary, she walked as quickly as she could without breaking into a run. Panicking people ran. She was not going to panic, even if the world had completely upended itself and left her freefalling into madness.
The wide stone halls were filled with people. Most were taller than her, making her think they were dragons like Erevan and Ruana. Some wore modern street clothes, while others wore flowing tunics in jewel tones and glittering embroidery. No one seemed interested in her beyond the casual looks that came with walking through any crowded place. That almost made it worse; she wasn’t out of place. Did she look like she belonged? Did they smell dragon on her?
And how insane had life gotten that she was even having thoughts like do they smell dragon on me?
The wide stone corridor intersected another corridor, this one lined in open windows overlooking a sunny courtyard. Desperate to get outside, she broke into a run toward a set of open wooden doors a little way down the hall.
