Spark of Lightning: Storm Warden Chronicles Book 1

by Jessica Gunn

Until, finally, I stood before him, Zezza still at my back pulling away.

  The armor-clad man in front of me looked fiercer than he had the last time we’d met. His white-blond hair had been pulled back, his facial features as angled as ever, but darker. Evil. In one hand, he held a large sphere outlined with dark blue and purple magic.

  Winter Court magic.

  But as Keir had control over my body, I couldn’t ask the obvious question.

  What was a bastard son of the Summer Court doing with Winter Court magic?

  Keir’s expression softened from seriousness right into a smirk as his eyes raked over me. “Now, Vera. No one said you had to get dressed up just to see me again.”

  My jaw locked even harder.

  “I like you much better this way, under my control,” Keir said. “You’re much more amiable. Now, pick up your dragon and keep hold of her. Follow me. We have plans in the fae weave to attend to.”

  Fae weave? Why go right there after barging his way into the dragons’ pocket-weave with a small army? Sure, a dozen fae seemed like nothing. But a dozen fae were more than enough to, apparently, take down most of the dragons’ population inside the Lair.

  Why stop now with just capturing Zezza and me?

  I didn’t get a chance to ask. Because in my continued silence, Keir laughed.

  “Much better, indeed,” he said. “Come. Before anyone else discovers where you are.”

  Chapter 21

  Keir commanded me to follow him all the way back to the beach. Zezza had given up on pulling me to a stop some time ago now and had settled instead on perching on my shoulder. She continually growled at Keir, although he seemed unfazed by the little car motor sounds.

  They weren’t exactly terrifying. I knew in my heart of hearts that she was trying.

  Magic him, I thought to her. Hit him with lightning.

  In response, she showed me an image of being struck by the same lightning.

  You haven’t hurt me yet, I told her.

  She once again showed me being struck by lightning—a bigger bolt this time.

  Finally, I understood her fear. Before, and when her scales rippled with lightning, it hadn’t been powerful enough to affect me because of our bond. But the magic she wanted to use on Keir would hurt a hell of a lot more.

  Although… I wasn’t so sure.

  I’m the Warden of the Storm, Zezza. When the time is right, hit me with your magic. I command you.

  I had to trust this was the way. I didn’t know how or why I believed this, but it felt right.

  Zezza and I had bonded. Her magic wouldn’t hurt me.

  “Stop chatting amongst yourselves, it’s rude,” Keir said.

  I shot him a glare as he looked over his shoulder at us.

  “Oh, what was that?” he asked, waving his hand in front of me. “Can you speak louder this time?”

  My lips loosened along with a bit of Keir’s hold on me. “What the hell do you need us so badly for?”

  He clicked his tongue as we kept walking down the wooden path between the jungle trees toward the beach. The humidity in the air clung to my skin and my dress stuck to my body uncomfortably. In the distance, sounds of battle ensued. Dragon roars, the crackle of magic being slung, and screaming. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before, and I could barely even react when walking through this battlefield.

  “As I told you before,” Keir said, his tone sharp and disappointed, as if he couldn’t believe he had to waste even a minute of breath on this explanation again. “I need to restore my honor with my court. They… don’t enjoy bastard children, the Summer Court. They’d rather a pure-blood sit on the throne.”

  I gritted my teeth together. “You’re not part of the Summer Court.”

  He lifted an eyebrow. “You’re suddenly an expert on the subject? A few days with dragons after a few minutes up close and personal with three types of supernaturals, and now you know everything? Is that the case?”

  My fists balled at Zezza’s sides as disgust roiled through my stomach. “I’m a quick learner.”

  Wait a second. My fists. It took every millimeter of willpower within me not to look down at them or make a scene. But I could move my hands again. Sort of. I couldn’t seem to let Zezza go or drop her, but I could move my fingers.

  Keir’s control wasn’t total.

  Why the hell wasn’t his control total?

  Because your name isn’t only Vera Varrone. I just hadn’t accepted the rest of it yet.

  “Then you’ll know that yes, I am not solely of the Summer Court,” Keir continued, and we began walking to the shore again, ignoring the sounds of war around us. Through breaks in the canopy, I saw smoke rising and magic being scattered across the air.

  “Winter too,” I said as the dots started pulling themselves together. “You’re not a human bastard, are you?”

  His smirk widened. “No. My sweet, sweet summer mother got herself pregnant during a fling with the enemy weeks after she married. An affair with the King of the Winter Court.”

  Heir to both sides, but also bastard to both. No wonder he needed to regain some honor fast to back up his power and claim. That still left one question. “How do I fit into this?”

  “You’re the Warden of the Storm,” Keir said as he gestured widely at the island around us. “Queen of all of this no matter what the royal dragon family has to say about it. This is all yours, and they all know it. I wasn’t aware of your title when we first met at Lunar Royale, but I’ll admit this is quite an interesting turn of events. Winning your name surely was the best decision. I’ll have to thank Kristian for inviting you to the game when I next see him.”

  He stopped and turned to me as our steps breeched the sandy beach. The ocean was only a few hundred feet away, and with it, the portal to another weave. Where had they come from? The fae weave? Or Boston?

  “Now imagine the Warden sides with the Winter Court,” Keir said. “Imagine in the place of the elves that used to support both courts, we have the Warden of the Storm and all of dragonkind with her. Imagine we have Kristian in our back pocket because of it.” With each new item, he held up a finger. “If I do all of that, I’ve built up a pretty pyramid of successes and several walls of protection to boot. The Winter Court becomes invincible and all-powerful, I become king, and you get to live.”

  My eyes narrowed on him. “I’ll outlive you no matter what happens here today.”

  Keir chuckled. “Silly little girl.”

  I ground my teeth together to keep from speaking or swinging my fists. But one other thing he’d said had caught my attention as well. “Why would taking me back to the fae weave put Kristian on your side? He has his own court of vampires. His own center of power. He won’t give that up.”

  “For you, he will.” Keir’s eyes met mine and held my gaze. He felt powerful and sure of himself. And confidence in the hands of a powerful and misguided man never ended well for a woman.

  “Why?” I managed to ground out without playing my hand.

  Keir lifted a finger and ran the tip of it down my cheek. “Because you’re a spitting image of his former lover. Almost like her doppelgänger. Another Warden of the Storm. And if my guesses are correct, your little King of the Night Court isn’t convinced you’re not actually her.” Then his gaze slid to Zezza, who reached out with her snout to bite him. Keir pulled his hand back before losing a finger. “And then there’s you, little one. The key to it all. The two of you are walking targets and don’t even know it.”

  Oh gods. Is that why Eli was so upset at me asking about previous Wardens? Because one was tied to Kristian and happened to look like me?

  “Vera!” someone shouted behind us. Eli.

  Three pairs of boots scuttled to a stop somewhere behind me. The sound of steel being pulled from sheaths echoed throughout the night.

  Keir’s eyes went dark as he called his magic back around him like a cloak. “Leave us. Vera is coming willingly. You have to let her go.”

  Co
nfusion overtook me, but my muscles, including my mouth, had frozen over again. They have to let me go? Since when?

  “Let her go, fae,” Eli spat, his tone deadly.

  “Keir,” Elena said. “She called him ‘Keir.’ She obviously knows him if she’s willingly by his side.”

  No! I wanted to scream. I don’t want this! Zezza, go to Eli. Go there and keep ready. But as much as I thought the words, I was still holding Zezza in a tight grip.

  I couldn’t let go.

  Keir spoke up. “You can turn and face them, Vera. Tell them how you’re going with me back to the fae weave to take your rightful place in the Winter Court.”

  Screw my damn body that wasn’t my own right now. I spun on command and said, the voice my own, but the words not, “I’m going with Keir back to the fae weave. To take my rightful place in the Winter Court.”

  Please, God, let at least one of them, even Tharin, be smart enough to realize that verbatim was bullshit.

  Sure enough, Eli’s eyebrows rose… then narrowed. “You’re forcing her.”

  Keir shrugged beside me. “You can’t prove anything. When it comes to the Warden, the choice to go or leave is hers no matter what you’ve told her before. They’ve lied to you, haven’t they, Vera?”

  I… didn’t know if the choice was mine or not. Eli had called it destiny. But knowing that Keir thought I had a place at his court—even if it was as a puppet and a pawn—and that Kristian’s old lover had been a Warden too…

  “Vera?” Keir prompted again.

  My mouth loosened. “I don’t know if I’ve been lied to.”

  “But we do,” Elena spat, waving a hand at me. “Don’t you see, Eli? This was all a ploy—a trap to get the fae here to attack us! They couldn’t kill us all before and now they will without a struggle because of this traitor!”

  I wanted to argue with her, but Keir had locked down my body again. My breathing grew heavy as my chest heaved and I fought against his hold with everything I had. My fists balled once more at Zezza’s sides.

  Eli’s eyes dropped down to my hands for a moment, then immediately back up. “Let. Her. Go.” He lifted his sword, ready to run in and attack. But he’d seen my fists, hadn’t he? He knew I could move them, right?

  Zezza, now. Hit me now.

  Zezza shook her head.

  ZEZZA. I command it. Hit me with lightning.

  Eli took a step forward. “You won’t be getting out of here alive, Keir.”

  Tharin followed Eli’s lead. After rolling her eyes, even Elena followed suit as well. Their magic flared to life around them, wreathing them all in magical auras of energy the color of their scales.

  Keir’s spear appeared beside me, the sharp end pointed toward my friends. “Then you’d better be prepared to kill me.”

  This was it. The moment.

  I put all my willpower into focusing on my body. “Zezza, now!” I ground out past gritted teeth.

  Zezza’s body shook and rippled with lightning so fast, and so brilliant, that I had to shut my eyes against the light. Then, with a loud crack of thunder, that lightning burst out from her tiny little body like she was the heart of the storm itself, sending shockwaves out around us. It knocked her out of my grip and me backward into Keir, causing us both to lose our footing. We tumbled together, intertwined, until we hit a tree and sprawled out on the ground.

  The second we landed, I slid away, cutting my knees on the wooden path that led into the jungle and rushed to stand. Then I pulled up my balled fists. White-hot lightning crackled around each finger. Wind swept up around us, sending my hair this way and that, along with the ends of my dress. I paid it all no mind.

  This was the real tempest.

  This was my real power.

  Rage welled up within me as I gazed down at Keir. For stealing my name. For trying to steal and hurt Zezza. For breaking his way into my friends’ home and planning to use it to start a war and take over every world out there.

  My feet lifted up off the ground of their own accord.

  “Holy…” The exclamation had come from Tharin, who was looking at me like he’d never seen anything more beautifully terrifying.

  Good. Let them fear my power and keep this from ever happening again.

  Keir stared up at me, his mouth agape and his eyes wide.

  “Stay the hell away from my dragon,” I spat at him. “All of you.”

  “B-But your name,” Keir stuttered. “I won your name.”

  It was my turn to smirk. “You got half of it.”

  “You lied.”

  Shaking my head, I lifted one of my lighting-covered hands in front of me and watched the magic crackle. “I did not. My name is Vera Varrone. And I am the Warden of the Storm.”

  Palm open, I shot the lightning magic directly at Keir, who threw up a shield of his own magic at the same time. The two energies battled it out as Zezza came to perch once more on my shoulder. I could feel the way my lightning and hers began to mingle, the both of us powering each other up.

  We weren’t just bonded or connected by fate. But by magic too.

  She’d known it all along. And, like the sea serpent in my trial, she’d been waiting for me to accept my destiny—our destiny—all along.

  The next thing I knew, Eli was beside me. He still had his sword drawn, but his free hand was out, also pumping magic at Keir’s shield. It couldn’t last forever, not against all of our magic. Especially if Elena and Tharin joined in.

  Keir shouted, “No! This is not how this all ends!” His scream turned into a roar as he dropped his spear and put everything he had into his magic. The force of his Winter Court magic, cold and stark and unforgiving, lashed back at Eli and me, sending us tumbling backward as we lost what ground we’d gained.

  My back slammed into another tree along the path, knocking the wind out of me. Zezza had jumped out of the way just in time and was now peering up at me from my lap. That was fast. I must have blacked out a bit. “Shit. Ow.” Zezza’s snout slipped under my arm, lifting it up. “Okay, okay, I’m coming.”

  But an arc of purple magic split the air in front of us. Eli pushed me out of the way just in time, but in doing so, I’d lost hold of Zezza.

  Then a cry of pain broke my heart.

  “No!” I screamed, scrambling back the other direction through magic-burned sand. Zezza lay a few feet away, bleeding from one side, her wing burned by Winter fae magic. “You bastard!” I scooped Zezza into my arms. She was looking up at me and still breathing, but every inhale was accompanied by a small whine of pain.

  Tharin appeared suddenly in front of us. He’d thrown down his sword as well and, in its place, a mass of thorny vines and large leaves grew around him, protecting us.

  “Move!” Eli growled, almost inhumanly, as he righted himself. I turned just in time to watch blue and gold scales slide across his shoulders, up his neck, and over his face. His form grew twice over in size, three times over, until what emerged from the transformation was a ten-foot long storm dragon.

  My breath stopped as I watched Eli shake out his wings and then charge at Keir’s shield, his mouth open and energy building inside of it. Eli was magnificent.

  With a mighty roar, Eli’s magic shot out of his dragon form’s mouth. I rushed to meet him and added more of my own power with one hand, the other still cradling Zezza’s little body. Between the both of us, the strength of our magic and a bond in fate, Keir’s shield dented. Splinters cracked along the dome. And then, with one last push of lightning from Elena and a burst of green magic from Tharin, the shield shattered completely.

  Eli lunged for Keir as Tharin’s vines wrapped around his arms, pinning the fae to the ground.

  “Wait! Don’t!” I shouted, reaching out as Eli shifted back and held his sword at Keir’s throat. Zezza growled in my arms.

  Keir laughed. “See? Vera does choose to come with me. We’re all bound by elven law, the three of us. It’s Vera’s choice.”

  “Shut up, Keir.” I called the power of s
torms around me again, cocooning Zezza and I. I wanted this to be over and to get her to a healer immediately. But outright killing Keir might have unknown consequences.

  For a moment real fear crossed Keir’s eyes.

  “I’m not going with you,” I spat at Keir before turning to Eli. “And we’re not killing him. Keir’s amassed soldiers from both the Summer and Winter fae courts. He’s probably gone against direct orders from his lovely mother, Summer’s Queen. And given his real identity as a bastard of both courts’ royalty, I think we should let them deal with his pathetic excuse for an existence.”

  Keir’s brow furrowed. “You’d not see me dead? Even while your dragon lay dying in your arms?”

  “Oh, no.” I sent a few shocks of lightning his way. They coiled around his wrists and neck, sparking some. “I’d kill you myself if I could for hurting my dragon and my people. But I think bringing you home to face your kind is a much worse fate.”

  I wasn’t in the business of death and killing people. Poker games? Sure. Stealing? Occasionally, when I had to. But I didn’t want any more blood to be spilled on Lair soil than already had been.

  “Call off your men, Keir,” I ordered. “Now. Or I’ll walk you into the Summer Court myself and explain everything from you wandering around Boston unattended to you trying to break elven law.”

  I wasn’t sure exactly what “breaking elven law” meant, but I could take a few guesses based on my limited knowledge of the elves and the guys’ previous exchange regarding me. Like, for one, how I knew the elves had at one point existed but hadn’t interfered with the human worlds for far too long.

  “You can’t make me do anything,” Keir said. Whatever fear had appeared in his eyes before was gone now.

  “But I can,” Eli said before lifting his sword and driving it clear through Keir’s shoulder. The fae cried out, agony filled the air. Blood spewed from the wound as Eli withdrew the blade. “The next one won’t miss.”

  “Fine.” Keir’s face fell and he looked utterly defeated. It was pretty shameful, really. And something sat a little uneasily within me about letting him go free at all. Almost like… it was what he wanted.