by JD Monroe
Erevan’s phone vibrated against his hip. He bit his lip and pulled it out. “I’m sorry. I’m following up on a tip.” The message was from Shanira, a junior officer.
Shanira: Zenyr’s dead. Looks like his house burned to ash a few days ago. Just got into his email account at the Island – left it logged in.
“Shit,” Erevan muttered. When Rosak gave him a stern look, he explained the tip from Thea. “He’s dead. Probably Tahin cleaning up after himself.”
“Two Kadirai helping this monster,” the queen said. “Vazredakh,” she swore. She stood, prompting everyone in attendance to stand. “Thank you. Consider my request. Should you choose to take my offer, you will be kept apprised of developments. Otherwise, I expect you to return to work at the Skywatch on Monday.”
“Yes, su’ud redahn,” he said politely.
“You may go. Rosak, a word.”
At the queen’s dismissal, Natalie and Erevan left room. His nerves crackled as they walked quietly through the great hall. He paused, stopping in front of Natalie. “Don’t let her pressure you.”
Natalie tilted her head. “Pressure me?”
“If you don’t want to stay,” he said. Hope sprang up in him. Despite facing Dornan and his cruel magic, Erevan was more afraid than he’d ever been as the question spilled over his lips. “Do you want to stay?”
She surveyed the area, then approached the thrones. Oh no, he thought as she climbed the steps. To his relief, she sat on the steps in front of the large metal chairs. She spread the flowing skirt over her legs and looked up at him. “I’m torn.”
His heart sank. “How so?”
“Since my mom died, I’ve just been treading water. Just getting by. Waiting for something to happen and light the way. I don’t have plans for my life. I hoped something would come along and push me in the right direction. Things felt good when I was working for Thea and Perry. But it was just treading water, only a little easier.” She patted the stone next to her. With his heart racing, he sat down, close enough that his leg pressed against hers. She smiled and placed his hand on her leg, covering it with her own. A gentle pressure enveloped him. “All of this happened, and I found out that there was something in me that I never even knew existed. Power. Strength.”
He smirked. “You threatened to shoot me within twenty-four hours of meeting me. I’m pretty sure you had some of that before you found out what you are.”
She laughed, a warm sound that he could have listened to all day. “Maybe. But this is different. Maybe this is what I’m meant to do. Maybe all of this was the push to get me onto the path.”
He hesitated, squeezing her leg lightly. “Does that mean you’ll stay?”
Her eyes widened. “It’s happening so fast.”
“It’s okay.” His chest ached as rejection sank sharp talons into his heart. “You don’t have to stay.”
She lunged forward and kissed him. Her lips lingered on his, nipping at his lower lip. “I didn’t say no, silly,” she said as she withdrew. Her warm gaze locked on his. “When we were down in that place, I felt like you were mine. When I was channeling that power to break the crystal, that’s what made me strong. You were mine, and I had to protect you.” She shrugged. “Maybe this is crazy. I know I don’t get to claim you, but—”
“You do.”
“What?”
“Get to claim me,” he said. “If the magic says I’m yours, who am I to object?” He would gladly be hers. To be desired by someone so fierce and beautiful was a joy he hadn’t thought possible.
“I don’t think it works that way,” she said. He silenced her argument with another kiss. “But, I could be wrong.”
“So you’ll stay? With me?”
“Your room is very small,” she teased.
“I’m sure we can find something more suitable to your regal tastes,” he replied. He teased his hand across her thigh, down the gentle curve of her leg until he found the hem of her skirt. She shivered as he ran his hand up her bare leg.
“We’ll definitely get caught here,” she said, tilting her head as he kissed her ear, then nibbled the side of her neck.
“I guess you better make up your mind soon. We could go to my room and think about it more in-depth.”
“Look who decided to come home,” Thea said, peering over her cup of coffee.
Natalie’s cheeks flushed with guilt as she froze on the steps. Fresh from the shower, she wore her bathrobe and had her hair twisted in a towel atop her head. “I thought you’d be at work.”
“First client is at ten.” She was sitting on the couch with an iPad in her lap, though she seemed far more interested in teasing Natalie. It was good to have her home, occupying the quiet stillness. She’d regained some of her color, and her gaunt cheeks had filled out somewhat. “Late night training?”
“Something like that,” Natalie said.
“I’m sure you’re getting very good at dragon riding,” Thea said, raising her eyebrows.
“Thea!”
Her friend smirked into her coffee, then took a sip. “I don’t blame you. He’s easy on the eyes.”
“How are you feeling?” Natalie asked, desperate for a change of topic.
“You don’t let me have any fun.” Her playful expression evaporated. “The same. No dragon.” She set the coffee down. “I’m not complaining. I didn’t change often, at least since I came here. So it shouldn’t be a huge loss.”
Thea had finally come home a week after returning to Skyward Rest. She’d needed a few more days to recuperate but insisted on returning to work at the gym as soon as possible. To her surprise, Thea didn’t want to use her compulsion on Perry. She told him she’d been stricken ill while out of town for family business and apologized profusely for not being in touch. After a steak dinner and a movie, Thea had come home with her hair messy and suspicious lip-shaped bruises on her neck. Mysteriously, they’d both been in high spirits the next day and all was apparently forgiven.
“They’re still working on a fix,” Natalie said.
Thea tilted her head. “It’s okay, Natalie. If they figure it out, great. Either way, I’m here. I’m not going to waste that with wishing for something I can live without. I have a good thing going here.” She raised her eyebrows. “Even if you’ve been ditching me for a dude.”
“I’m so not—"
Thea laughed. “You seem happy. I’ve never seen you this way.”
“I think I am,” Natalie replied. “Not just him, although that’s been wonderful. It’s all of this. The world is so much bigger than I realized.”
“I’m glad,” Thea said. “I mean, your replacement sucks and still can’t figure out how to operate the stereo, so if you decide to give up on saving my people from certain doom, I’ll have a job for you. Perry misses you, too.”
Natalie chuckled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
She’d been spending many of her evenings with Erevan, though she hadn’t officially moved to Skyward Rest. She’d accepted the queen’s offer of a small room in the Emerald Wing, barely more than a closet with a cot. It was somewhere to lay her head after a long night of training. But she wasn’t quite ready to throw herself entirely into their world.
After getting dressed, she drove to the Skywatch offices. Though the queen had suggested having her new task force situated right there in the compound, Erevan and Sohan had pointed out that it would be far easier for them to make contact with sources from within the city, instead of having to drive half an hour every time.
The top floor of the building had been converted into their headquarters. It was still a work in progress, with half a dozen mismatched desks arranged in an open bullpen. Still, it made her feel important to swipe her card into the building and walk to her desk, complete with a nameplate on it.
Right next to her much-adored nameplate was a cup of coffee and a folded white paper bag. She smiled at the sight and peeked inside. A foil-wrapped lump was in the bag. Judging by the tantalizing smell of egg and bacon, it w
as a breakfast wrap from the food truck a few blocks down the street.
The culprit stood across the room, staring at the large whiteboard that took up half of the long wall of their shared office space. His teeth tugged gently at his lower lip as he perused the notes and papers they’d stuck on the board with magnets. She preferred to catalog and put everything into digital form, but Erevan swore he thought better when he saw it spread out this way.
Natalie had learned a great deal working with Erevan over the last few weeks. He liked his coffee sweet and would never turn down a taste of her coffee, particularly if there was caramel involved. He also hummed quietly while he worked, but only if he thought no one was paying attention. And maybe the most important of all, – she had learned that her infatuation was not a simple crush born from the insane week that began their relationship.
If anything, her attraction to him had grown. It was hard to resist, especially at moments like these, when he was lost in thought. His powerful arms were folded across his chest, giving his dark t-shirt a workout. She’d gotten spoiled that first week, seeing him without a shirt constantly. Still, her imagination was vivid enough—and with frequent, nightly refreshers—to supply a pleasant image.
But more than that, he was a good man. Every day, he checked on the other Kadirai who’d been taken. He’d personally gone to Thosrin to thank her for her help and apologize for Lilya’s capture. And he had been delicate, to the point of irritating, with her arm after Dornan’s attack. For two weeks, he had assumed the responsibility of covering it in that smelly ointment and ordering her to bend each finger in turn. He shouldered the weight of many things that were not his burden, revealing the tender heart beneath the hard exterior she’d first seen.
She sampled her coffee—a caramel mocha, a solid choice—grabbed her papers, and walked over to him. “Seeing anything?”
“Nothing new.” He sat on the edge of the desk, leaving room for her to join him. For the sake of the other team members, they avoided excessive PDA in the office.
In the evenings, they’d continued to train with Sohan at Skyward Rest. In their off-hours, Erevan worked on more advanced battle techniques, while Natalie trained her own elemental ability. She was getting strong, much to Sohan’s delight. The nights when they trained together often ended with them sweating and breathless in the barracks.
She settled for sitting close to him, her thigh pressed to his. They’d grown so used to the others’ presence that the magic in them reached out instinctively. His presence was a reassuring embrace, even without him touching her.
She had printouts of Zenyr’s email and text messages. It had taken a week to cut through the red tape to access the accounts, and another few days to find the right person at the phone company to lean on. A well-placed persuasive talk from Erevan had granted her access to his accounts, but that left her with thousands of messages to go through.
Cross-checking all of it against Thea and Zenyr’s phones, she’d managed to put together a list of significant phone numbers and who they belonged to. They hadn’t had the same luck with Dornan’s accounts – they hadn’t even managed to figure out where he lived yet, and the computers they’d recovered from his facility were heavily encrypted. She suspected that he’d conducted business in person or over the phone, leaving as little of a paper trail as possible.
She was feeling like a regular CSI agent, at least if they ever did a CSI: Dragon edition.
“Zenyr was definitely a big piece of the operation,” she said. “I’ve got a connection to him or Tahin with most of the victims so far. They were both members of multiple organizations that catered to Kadirai in the area. In Zenyr’s case, running the Island gave him a database of members.”
“And we never picked up on it,” Erevan said. “I feel so stupid.”
She shrugged. “You told me yourself that Wanderers move out of the area all of the time. You have no way of knowing that something went wrong as opposed to someone just deciding to move out of town. They also didn’t all come from this area.”
That was another tangled web. Only eight of the victims they’d brought back to Skyward Rest actually lived in the Asheville area. Most of them came from surrounding cities, with one having been taken all the way from Richmond, Virginia.
“Which means we have more like Tahin and Zenyr to find,” Erevan said. He pinched the bridge of his nose and cursed in Kadirai. She’d also learned a few key phrases in Kadirai, curse words chief among them. “Who could do this to their own people?”
“I don’t know,” she said. She rested her hand on his knee. “We’ll find them.”
He covered her hand with his own. “There is talk of calling for a meeting of all the dragon queens in Ascavar. If that happens, I guarantee that our lives here will change a great deal.”
“Change isn’t always bad.”
He gave her a look. “Imagine Valella and Eberand in one body. Now multiply that by ten. A meeting like that will be a disaster. I fear it may eventually go as Sohan suggested; sending us into battle. You and me. I sometimes wish you had not been dragged into this. But then I would have never gotten to know you.”
“And you’re stuck with me now.”
He spared a glance over his shoulder. She followed his gaze. Their other teammates were gathered over another desk, talking animatedly with their backs to them. Erevan smirked, squeezing her leg as he pressed his lips to hers, trapping her lower lip between his own. Warmth melted over her as she leaned in.
“If that is my fate, I accept it,” he said. “I would rather have no one else ride me.”
She snickered against his lips. His eyebrows lifted. “Oh, come on. You know you set that up.”
He burst into laughter. “This is very serious,” he said, struggling to smooth out his expression.
“Clearly.”
His smile eased into a warm expression. “Whatever happens, I remain yours. As long as you would claim me.”
“Then you are mine.”
“Well, I hope you don’t change your mind when you see who arrived yesterday,” he said. “Some of Sohan’s old friends…let’s just say they make me look like a runt. They’ve been working that whole sexy, manly dragon thing for centuries.”
She laughed. “Are you worried about me trading you in for an older model?”
“One of them has biceps as big as my head.”
“But they aren’t you,” she said. “And they didn’t bring me breakfast.”
“Full disclosure…I might have tasted it. To make sure it was safe, of course.”
“I knew you would. And that’s why I like you.” She kissed his cheek, grazing across his cheekbone. “Now, we have work to do.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
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Continue reading for a sneak peek at Wings of Thunder,
Book 3 of the Dragons of Ascavar series!
Perhaps it was the wine talking, but Aryath Silverbrand had never been as relaxed as he was in the human woman’s hands. Several days of moving heavy cargo in both his dragon and human form had left him aching and sore. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought the woman was casting a spell on him as her nimble fingers untangled the tension in his muscles.
He let out a deep breath, sinking deeper into the plush seat. The humid air of the bath house was thick with the intoxicating blend of incense and dark red wine. “What would it cost for me to take you home to Tahlan-Lev with me?”
The soothing massage stopped. The pretty woman cleared her throat. In a pronounced accent, she said, “Not for sale. Am sorry.”
Sitting bolt upright, he turned to look at the human woman. Her plain features were furrowed. It had not been so long since his kind enslaved humans for their own profit. If his grandmother heard him say such a thing…
With his cheeks burning, he bowed his head. “My a
pologies, that is not what I meant.”
Laughter erupted from the other side of the room. “Silverbrand, do not apologize.” Pelah Galesworn opened one kohl-lined eye to regard him. Instead of a massage, the female dragon had opted to have her hair washed and styled. Dressed in matching linen tunics, two human women stood behind Pelah, combing her long dark tresses. “You have done no harm to the creature.”
He frowned at her choice of words. At least he and his fellow dragons were paying well for the luxurious service. The dent to his purse would surely alleviate some of his guilt. The masseuse tapped his shoulder and resumed her work, but he couldn’t let it go.
The trip to the bath house was a much-needed reward after several days of exhausting travel and tense business deals that morning. Houses Silverbrand and Galesworn had both built their fortunes on mining and metalwork. Together they had delivered a large shipment of fine weapons to one of the queen’s outposts on the southwestern border of Adrahl, the lands of the Stormflight dragons. With the job completed, their small contingent had retreated to the small city of Desh.
Desh was a town inhabited mostly by Vak, the humans that lived alongside the Kadirai, the dragon shifters that Aryath called kin. The elegant bath house was out of place amidst the dusty sprawl, but there was enough traffic on the trade roads and flight paths near Desh that the innkeeper kept a steady business of Kadirai guests.
The bath house mimicked the finer homes in the bustling capital city of Arvelor. The ornate carved stone of dragon homes was approximated with painted plaster, with bright tile mosaics depicting aspects of the Skymother, the Kadirai goddess. It paled in comparison to even modest Kadirai homes, and Pelah Galesworn had said as much when they arrived, her full upper lip curled in a sneer. But Aryath appreciated the effort and had complimented the innkeeper to make up for Pelah’s slight.
“How does your companion fare?” Aryath asked, hoping to move on from the embarrassing exchange with the human woman.
Pelah sat up from her cushion, prompting the two Vak women to scurry behind her, each with a glossy lock of hair in their hands. Their expressions were irritated as the woman settled herself with the regal bearing of a queen. “He is uncomfortable,” she said. “It is nothing a sister of Mara cannot deal with when we return to our home.” She tilted her head, prompting another annoyed look from the serving girls. “These trade trips have become rather dangerous. If my mother trusted anyone else, we would simply pay someone else to handle them.”
