by Amelia Jade
“No,” Zeke said, accepting the reality of the situation.
“I’m sorry,” she said, and she meant it. She truly did.
Zeke lowered a wing so that she could climb aboard.
***
They didn’t encounter any gryphons along their path to the border. In fact, to their surprise, they didn’t encounter anyone at all.
“This is weird,” Zeke said as he followed her directions to the Imperial Petroleum construction office, at the main camp for the pipeline. This was several miles back from where she had been attacked. “We should have seen someone, a Guardian at least. I wonder what could have distracted them?”
Amber shrugged, then realized he couldn’t see her. “I don’t know. Maybe they’re out looking for us? You should have been back yesterday, so maybe they’re worried about you.”
“I suppose that’s feasible.” Zeke didn’t sound overly convinced.
“Look, there’s a crowd,” she said as they descended.
Indeed, a number of people in navy blue uniforms were forming an arc as they descended toward the ground.
“Is that okay?” Zeke asked.
“I think so,” she said. “They’re probably there as extra security after I got taken. I’ll just make sure they stay close by, so if someone working for IPP did betray me to a rogue shifter, they won’t get me again.”
Zeke landed with a flurry of his wings, the gale force winds sending up a wave of dirt from the earth to batter against the men standing there. She noted how they barely reacted.
Amber slid from Zeke’s back, waiting to give him a hug. They had said their goodbyes in the air, so that they wouldn’t have to do so in front of anyone, but she still wanted to feel his arms around her one last time.
But Zeke stayed in dragon form, eyeing the assembled humans warily.
“Goodbye Zeke,” she said at last, dragging his attention away from them.
She couldn’t blame him for being distracted. They were all armed, and likely the largest group of humans he had ever encountered. It would be natural for him to be nervous. She doubted the guns could harm him through the scales, but she would still rather avoid finding out if at all possible.
“Are you sure?” he rumbled quietly, bringing his snout right down to her level.
“Yes,” she said, spreading her arms wide to wrap them to either side as he gently nuzzled her. “I don’t like it any more than you do, but I think it’s the only way.”
“I know.”
She kissed one of his scales and reluctantly turned to see one of the men step forward.
“Thank you, dragon. We’ll take it from here,” he said.
Amber nodded at Zeke and walked toward them.
She noticed that all the men behind the leader were eying Zeke, not her.
“I said thank you, dragon. You can leave now,” the leader said, pointing back toward Cadia.
“Is everything okay?” she asked. “He’s not going to harm you.”
The man ignored her, even as she was getting closer.
“Leave!” he shouted, and behind him the men brought their weapons up into a more martial pose. They still weren’t aimed at Zeke, but they were no longer down at their sides either.
Amber stopped, looking back and forth between the two sides.
“Listen to me!” she said, louder this time. “He’s just making sure I get out of here safely. Then he’ll leave. Trust me, you don’t have anything to worry about. I’m Amber Klose, I’m back, I’m unharmed. It’s okay, you can all stand down now.”
All along Amber had thought the men were police, but as she looked at their uniforms more closely, she realized that nowhere on them did it officially say police. So they must be security brought in by IPP.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Private company, brought in by IPP,” the man said, finally acknowledging her unhappily.
“Mercenaries,” Zeke said from behind her.
“So IPP hired you? And why are you all here waiting? Did you know I was coming?”
The man just gestured for her to keep walking. “Everything will be explained, ma’am. Just come with me.”
Amber looked around at the site. Something was missing. She hadn’t noticed it at first, but now that she was getting more suspicious, it suddenly jumped out at her.
“Where are all the workers?” she asked. That was the problem she had seen. There was nobody around. There should be trucks loading up with material, men yelling and swearing at each other as they tried to get everything done in half the time it should have taken. But the entire place was conspicuously silent.
“Come with me. Everything will be explained when you’re debriefed.” The man motioned over his shoulder and then at her.
Four men out of the dozen or so with him advanced toward her.
Amber frowned. “Nobody knew I was coming back. So how is it that you’re here?” she asked as the four men came closer.
Her mind was working fast now, and she took a step backward. “Tell your men to stop there.”
The man did nothing to stop them. Instead he looked back at Zeke. “This is no longer your concern. Leave, now.”
“Amber?” Zeke called out to her.
“I have a bad feeling about this,” she said, taking another step backward.
All the men suddenly raised their weapons and pointed them at Zeke.
“Come with me, now,” the leader said.
“No,” she told him, taking another step backward.
“Fine, I guess we’ll do this the hard way,” he said, snatching the pistol from his belt and pointing it at her.
Amber barely had time to scream before he pulled the trigger.
The gun cycled a round and she braced herself for the killing blow, the explosion of pain followed by nothing.
Out of nowhere a giant red curtain swept in front of her, stopping the bullet.
A voice thundered above the noise of further gunfire.
“HOW DARE YOU!”
She heard what sounded like the rushing of wind, and then suddenly the temperature rose. Through the vaguely translucent membrane she saw something explode, and that combined with the heat told her what had happened.
Moving to the side to risk a peek, she saw Zeke drawing a line in the dirt with his flames between him and the humans, driving them back under the intense inferno now raging. To their credit the men didn’t cower, but they were forced back, arms flung up over their faces to shield them from the heat.
“Leave, or the next time it will hit you,” Zeke rumbled angrily as the security firm appeared to be trying to reorganize itself.
Someone fired a gun.
Zeke growled and sent a blast of fire right at a knot of men near where the shot had rung out.
The group scattered, and all semblance of coherence was lost as Zeke followed through with his threat. She watched them either holster or throw away their weapons, running away from the enraged dragon. To his credit he hadn’t killed or even really singed any of them, despite the destruction his Dragonfire had wrought.
Once they were gone, the magnificent dragon—his scales a bright ruby red now, a reflection of his mood—turned to look at her.
“Are you okay?” he asked gently.
She nodded.
“We need to go. They’ll be back soon. They were waiting for you, and none of them were surprised to see me. They knew we were coming.”
“But how? Nobody told them.”
Zeke looked angry, a very terrifying look on a dragon. “Nobody told those gryphons either.”
“What do I do now?” she asked, looking around, trying not to panic.
“You come with me,” Zeke said firmly. “Back to Cadia.”
“What? But I’m under a death threat there!”
“It would appear you have much the same here. Someone does not want you talking about what’s going on out here, Amber. If you stay, there is nothing I can do to protect you. If you come back with me, I can at least he
lp. It’s your choice, of course. But I beg you, please trust me for just a little bit longer.”
Amber ran her hands through her hair, trying to make sense of all this.
“Just days ago, my life seemed to be on the right track,” she said aloud, beginning to pace back and forth as she talked.
As she moved, Zeke shifted his wing to keep it between her and the path the fleeing security team had taken. She noticed, reaching out one hand to run it tenderly along the thin membrane in thanks. Her hand stopped when she realized it was his newly healed wing. Her fingertips brushed lightly over the newer material, where it was a much paler red in a jagged line down to the edge.
“Now though,” she continued, turning to look at him, “I don’t know. It’s like it’s happening all over again.”
“What is?” Zeke asked, his head kept above the rise of his wing, watching for any signs of trouble.
More trouble, that is. Amber had had quite enough trouble for now.
“My life unraveling,” she said, then stopped as he looked at her blankly.
“Nine months ago, my father died.”
“I’m so sorry,” Zeke said, dropping his head momentarily to nuzzle it against her.
Amber leaned into it briefly, but then straightened. “Thank you. We were very close. My mother died when I was still a newborn. She had cancer, and she declined the treatments because they would have killed me.”
She steeled herself, willing herself not to cry over the sacrifice made in her name.
It was her choice. She knew what she was doing. You would do the same thing too and you know it.
Zeke made a strangled noise as he looked at her, likely trying to imagine what living with that knowledge must be like.
“Anyway,” she said with a wave of her hand, trying to keep herself calm. “When he passed, I was a wreck. It was bad,” she admitted, telling someone for the first time.
Oh, others had known, but she hadn’t actually spoken to any of them about it. This was the first time Amber had admitted how close she had come to the edge.
“Very bad,” she continued in a muted voice, walking closer to Zeke and leaning against one of his tree trunk-like legs.
“But you made it,” the deep dragon voice rumbled from above her.
“Yes.” She frowned. “But only by selling everything I had and moving out here, halfway across the continent, to the middle of nowhere. That was the only way I got a restart.”
She laughed, hating how close to hysterical it sounded. “Then all of this happens less than six months after I get here. Am I cursed?” she asked plaintively, looking up at him.
Zeke looked at her, then back over his wing for a moment, then returned his yellow eyes to her. “Well, think of it this way,” he said slowly. “You did get to meet me out of it all, which is pretty fantastic.”
Despite everything weighing down on her, the attempted kidnapping just now, the fights with the gryphons, the death penalty awaiting her back in Cadia, despite all that, Amber found herself laughing. It was a full belly howl that bent her over as her shoulders shook violently.
Tears streamed down her face as she tried to catch her breath.
She finally managed to get herself under control and looked back up at Zeke, whose eyes were darting back and forth between her and the view over his wing.
“What?” he asked innocently. “Was it something I said?”
Amber lost control again.
“Take me wherever you’re taking me,” she managed to get out, still shaking with laughter as she climbed aboard his wing. “I can’t believe I’m saying that, but you’re right, this is probably the best bet.”
“I know just the place,” Zeke said, lifting into the air.
Amber looked back behind her.
“As long as you’re close by, I’m sure it will work just fine,” she said, resting her head against him as they flew back into Cadia. “It will be just fine.”
Chapter Eight
Zeke
For three days he managed to keep her safe and hidden. He visited her every night. But on the fourth day, things began to change.
The three of them filed out of the Academy. These days they stayed in their dorms as often as not. The instructors had come to trust them, and from the time they were done with the day’s training until roll call the next morning, the cadets were free to do as they pleased as long as they didn’t cause any trouble.
What Zeke had done could cause trouble, but only if someone found out about it. He had been meticulous about ensuring that didn’t happen. In addition, so had the others who knew about it.
“Thank you again,” he said to Asher as they made their way toward the rows of stone circles behind the Academy.
The Frost Dragon shifter looked over his shoulder, ensuring that nobody was listening.
“I told you, don’t mention it,” he said quietly. “And seriously, I meant that quite literally, Z. I could get in just as much trouble as you for helping.”
“Sorry,” he said as they shifted. Zeke noted how each of them appeared to do it just a little smoother. He’d shared with them what he had discovered out in the forest, about the way he tried to contain his fire, to control it.
“So, Ash, what’s Quinn got prepared for us?” Dom asked as they hurled themselves aloft, headed for Asher’s house. It was the closest to the Academy, and also by far the nicest as well, so it had become the de facto gathering place for the trio.
Which is why it was also the perfect hideaway for Amber to disappear to while Zeke worked out a way to keep her safe.
“Well, for me she’ll have dinner prepared. You, on the other hand, will probably get a hello.”
Zeke chuckled at the lie. Although Quinn was no housewife, she did take a certain joy in eating a full meal. With Amber to help over the past three days, the cadets had been spoiled rotten when they returned. He was looking forward to yet another delicious meal, though he knew the three of them would also be helping to prepare it. They all worked as a team, and it was smooth going so far.
“You know what we need to do,” Asher said once they were aloft and able to speak freely.
“What?” Zeke asked.
“We need to find Dom a girl now.”
“She’s not my girl!”
“You are not setting me up on a blind date!”
The Frost Dragon laughed heartily at the immediate reaction from his friends.
“First off,” he began. “Zeke, you’re so full of shit if you don’t realize that this is the girl for you. I mean, I can see it. Dom’s pretty thick-skulled, but I think even he can see it.” Asher paused. “I think. Can you Dom?”
He turned to look at his blue-scaled friend, just in time to see a weak bolt of lightning shoot past his face.
“Uh-oh, we’ve angered him Zeke!”
Zeke shook his massive head. “No, you angered him my friend. I had nothing to do with it.”
Ash, flying in the middle, looked back and forth between the two of them.
“Shit,” he said dully as the other two laughed at his expense.
“Asher is right though,” Dom said after they had calmed down. “You and Amber are a thing. I see the same things between you two as I do between Ash and Quinn. Not that I see what the two of them do for either of you. They must be crazy, if you ask me.”
Flame and Frost met as the other two dragons hurled their breath weapons in front of Dom. They were all weak, underpowered things, the same way they would push or punch a friend in human form. No harm was meant by it, and they didn’t direct it at their friends either, always to the side or in front.
“Can you believe this guy?” Asher said, looking over at Zeke as the ground flew by underneath, their wings powering them on tirelessly.
“We definitely need to find him a girl,” Zeke agreed. “But finding one who will like him is going to be hard.”
“If it can happen to the two of you, it can happen to me,” Dom said fiercely.
“You see how p
assionately he says that,” Asher said.
“I did. It’s like he already found somebody. Do you have a girl that we don’t know about, Dom?” Zeke asked, half-teasing, half-serious.
“No,” Dom said too quickly.
Asher and Zeke exchanged glances, but they realized that this wasn’t a topic of conversation Dominick wished to pursue, so they let it drop. They were at their destination anyway, already beginning their descent from the sky.
Asher’s house had two stone circles, one in the backyard, and one on the roof.
Zeke dropped onto the roof while the Frost Dragon landed on the ground. In moments the pair were in human form, and as Zeke dropped down to the ground below with a slight bend to his knees to absorb the force, the rear door opened.
“About time!” Quinn said as she and Amber emerged.
“So sorry milady,” Asher said, bowing as he moved clear of the circle for Dom to land. “But we made the best time we could.”
“Sure, sure,” she said, practically throwing herself into his arms as he picked her up and planted a kiss on her lips.
Amber and Zeke approached more tentatively, each of them eying the other couple as well as themselves. When they locked lips, Zeke cracked a smile, all the while steeling his insides.
“That looks like fun,” he commented, nodding his head in their direction.
“Yeah, it probably is. Did you want to go kiss Asher next?”
The others burst out into laughter as they heard her speak.
“I—”
She cut him off. “Or are you going to get it together and kiss me yourself?”
Zeke moved before she was even finished speaking, his hands sweeping her up and off the ground, bringing her in tight to him as he pressed his lips firmly to hers. His cheeks burned slightly at the mock applause from the other three people present, but he didn’t let that stop him from doing his job of kissing her thoroughly.
“I think I have an answer,” Amber said, flushing as they broke apart for air at last.
“A partial answer,” he growled into her ear as softly as he could, so the others couldn’t hear.
Amber giggled and kissed him again quickly, before pulling apart. They were in a group setting after all, and Zeke didn’t fight it, though he did rest his hand on the small of her back, keeping her close.
