by SJ West
Seneca exhaled, causing a plume of smoke to billow out from his nostrils before he turned around to retake his seat.
“Now,” Gregoire said to me, sitting back down, “please tell us why you have traveled all this way.”
“Thank you all for allowing me to speak with you,” I said, feeling slightly nervous now that I had their undivided attention. “As many of you undoubtedly know, the Vankarans and Fae have shared the same island for hundreds of years. The Iron Wall was built to keep us separated from one another, and we have lived in peace since the treaty was signed. Unfortunately, the queen of the Fae, Nuala, has invaded my side of the island. With the help of your rogue dragons, she has taken control of our capital, Iron City. Since these dragons are helping her, we lack any sort of defense against their superiority in the air. Nuala’s attack came as a surprise and our military was ill prepared for such an invasion. We lost many of our troops in the first assault, but I have secured support from Queen Sora of Kamora for more ground troops. However, this still leaves us vulnerable to attacks from the dragons under Nuala’s control. I have come here to humbly ask you for help. We have no other way to defend ourselves from your brethren on our island.”
“Well,” Gregoire said sounding troubled, “I seriously doubt the Queen of the Fae is in control of our kind. I fear it might be the other way around.”
“Yes,” Dracen agreed, “I have the same worry. Your brother has been waiting for such an opportunity to enslave the humans. I am certain Nuala is simply taking his direction and will eventually fall victim to her own greed in this matter.”
“Brother?” I asked Dracen. A picture of the red dragon who sat by Nuala’s throne when I first visited her flits through my mind.
“Tyr has always been a thorn in my side,” Gregoire grumbled. “I have no doubt he is behind this war against your people. He can be very persuasive when he wants to be. His complete contempt for mankind can only mean that he is using this Nuala to further his own agenda.”
“It’s also quite possible he plans to use Vankara as a starting point,” Dracen said. “I’m sure you know about the plagues which have decimated much of the human race around the world.”
“Yes, we are aware of what has happened,” Gregoire said.
“Maybe Tyr was instrumental in that as well. If he does plan to enslave humanity, what better way to do it than to weaken them first before attempting to conquer them one nation at a time.”
Gregoire nodded. “It is very possible what you say is true.”
“Then will you help us stop them?” I beseeched. “I know your own war was over the possibility of doing the same thing. I would like to ask for your help in preventing it from happening now.”
Gregoire is silent for a moment as if weighing the pros and cons of helping me.
“Before you commit to something,” Seneca said to Gregoire, “perhaps you should ask her what she is hiding from us first.”
“You sense she is being dishonest about something?” Gregoire asked.
I looked at Seneca and saw that his gaze was fixed and his eyes narrowed on me.
“I’ve told you everything that I know,” I said. “I have nothing to hide.”
“I sense that you seem to think you are telling us the truth. Yet, there is something about you that isn’t quite right,” Seneca said.
“Are you trying to cast doubt on Sarah’s worthiness because of my defiance?” Aurora asked her father.
“No, little one,” Seneca said gently to Aurora, “I am not that shallow. I am simply cautious in placing my trust in someone who is more than she appears to be.”
“You’re making no sense, Seneca,” Cassius grumbled. “Either she’s lying about something or she isn’t. Which is it?”
“All I can sense is that she isn’t telling us the whole truth, but that she might not even know it herself,” Seneca answered.
“Has her memory been altered in some way?” Runa asked, sounding curious about such a thing like a true scholar wishing to uncover the truth.
“It’s possible,” Seneca admitted. “But I have no way of discerning the true reason.”
“I have not sensed anything in Sarah to make me think she is lying about herself,” Aurora said in my defense.
“And you are a child,” Seneca said patiently. “You are still learning how to read the emotions of others, which is an ability that will grow over time. What I sense in your companion is real, but it is something I have never encountered before. I’m not sure how to solve the problem. As things stand now, I cannot give you my support in this matter. Not until I know what it is you are concealing from us first.”
“But I’ve told you everything that I know,” I argued. “How can I tell you something that, apparently, I don’t even consciously realize that I know?”
“That is not my problem to solve,” Seneca said. “I am simply saying that there is more to you than you even know. What you do with that information is your choice. Perhaps you should ask Dracen to explain things further. I sense he knows exactly what it is that I’m talking about.”
I looked over at Dracen and saw a troubled frown mar his otherwise handsome face. He kept his eyes averted to the ground and seemed to be refusing to look up at me. I reached out a hand to draw his attention but that simple gesture soon proved to be futile.
Just as I was about to touch his arm, I noticed that my hand looked like it was fading from existence. I quickly looked down at the rest of me and saw that I appeared to look more like a ghostly apparition than a real person.
“Dracen!” I said in alarm, not understanding what was happening.
My cry finally drew Dracen’s attention to me, and he gaped with a mixture of worry and shock.
“Oh no,” he said, reaching out to me with both of his hands as if he thought such an action would stop what was happening.
“Well, well,” Cassius said as all the dragons simply sat and watched me slowly disappear. “He’s finally breaking his silence after all these years.”
“Strange that he would pick this human to do it for,” Runa said.
“He never was one to waste his magic though,” Gregoire added in. “He must think she’s worth the effort.”
“Or it’s a warning,” Titus said. “Perhaps he is telling us not to trust her.”
“Either way,” Seneca said. “He will be able to help her learn the truth about herself.”
I looked back at Dracen and saw tears mark trails down his cheeks.
“I’m so sorry,” he said to me just as I felt something grab hold of my soul and pull me away.
Darkness surrounded me, and I faintly wondered if I was dead.
“You are not dead,” Aurora reassured me.
I felt a terrible chill in the air around us. I heard Aurora take in a deep breath and watched as she blew out a stream of fire that did little more than light our surroundings for a few precious seconds, but that was all the time I needed to see what was standing right in front of us.
A great white dragon with piercing blue eyes stood only a few feet away, staring straight at us.
As Aurora’s flame ended, throwing us back into the shadows, it spoke.
“Greetings, shifter,” he said.
“Who are you?” I asked. “And why have you brought me here?”
“You may call me Vincent,” the white dragon replied. “That is the name my human companion gave to me when he was alive.”
The sadness in Vincent’s voice at the mention of the human he was bonded to instantly brought to mind the solitary dragon Dracen told me about. The one whose heart was broken when he learned the true price of immortality.
“How did you bring us here?” I asked.
“We dragons all have a small bit of magic we can wield,” Vincent said. “I have been listening to your conversation with the others. It sounded like you might need some help in gaining their support.”
“Why would you help me?” I questioned.
“Because Seneca can think more
of himself than he has a right to,” Vincent said, sounding disgusted by his brother dragon’s superiority complex. “No disrespect to your father, little one. But, he can be somewhat overbearing at times.”
“I completely agree,” Aurora replied.
“Vincent, is there any way to have some light in here?” I asked. “The darkness is a bit disorienting to me.”
“Yes, of course,” Vincent said, like my need for light hadn’t actually occurred to him. “My apologies. I’ve been in the dark for so long I’ve become accustomed to it.”
Vincent blew out a small ball of fire and lit a large pile of wood a short distance away.
It was only then that I could see we were in a large underground cavern. It was obviously located within or underneath one of the mountains on the island. I looked to my right and saw a small stream, which could mean only one thing.
“Are we underneath the volcano?” I asked.
“Yes,” Vincent said as he laid down on the stone floor.
I felt my head cock of its own accord as I looked at Vincent.
“Why are you white?” I asked. “If you’re a fire breather like Aurora, shouldn’t you be blue?”
“I was blue, once upon a time,” Vincent said. “But I’ve been living in the dark for so long my scales and wings have turned white.”
I looked at Vincent’s chest and saw a gold scale just like the ones each member of the council had.
“Does the gold scale mark you as an immortal dragon?” I asked, seeing no other assumption to make.
“Yes. All who pass their test receive one.”
“What was your test?” Aurora asked, sounding curious to know what exactly had to be done to obtain immortality.
“It’s different for every dragon,” Vincent told her. “But none of us speak about what our particular test was. That is only for us to know.”
“Well, I won’t be taking any type of test,” Aurora said resolutely. “I have no desire to outlive Sarah.”
“I would have chosen as you have too, little one. Unfortunately, none of us knows when we are being tested. Otherwise, I would have purposely failed so that I could have died with my Henry.”
I looked over at the pile of wood. It looked like a jumbled mess of broken tree trunks piled haphazardly.
“Why do you have so much wood down here to burn if you prefer the dark?” I asked.
“I favor having my meals cooked before I eat them,” Vincent answered. “Fish taste better to me after they’ve been roasted over an open fire for a short while. It makes the skin rather crispy and delicious.”
I could certainly understand Vincent’s reasoning. As if the fish knew we were speaking about them, a couple jumped up through the surface of the stream before diving back into the water and continuing on their merrily little way downstream.
I returned my attention to Vincent.
“How can you help me, Vincent?” I asked.
“I can help you recover the memories you have lost,” he told me.
“What memories?” I asked, completely dumbfounded by what he was referring to. “As a child when I was April Pew?”
“No, the memories of your life before you became April Pew.”
“How could I have been someone before April Pew?” I asked. “I was adopted when I was a year old by the Pews. I was just a baby.”
“And yet,” Vincent said, tilting his head slightly to peer into my eyes, “there is a part of you that is none of the people you remember being. A part that has been hidden from you for a very long time.”
“But why?” I asked.
“That, I do not know. Only you can uncover the truth. The memories are still within you, shifter. They’ve simply been buried so deeply your conscious mind can’t retrieve them.”
Dracen’s tear stained face flashed inside my mind.
“Dracen knows, doesn’t he?” I asked Vincent, but I already knew the answer to that question.
“Yes. But he’s placed a spell on his own memories to keep them hidden from others.”
I tried to think back to all the dreams and visions that I couldn’t explain. I remembered a dream of me standing on top of Ledmarrow Mountain and a man coming up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist like a lover would, and then another one of Dracen and me playing chess together.
“How are Dracen and I connected to one another?” I asked, knowing that could be the only explanation. “What was I to him in this other life?”
“Only you have the answers to those questions,” Vincent told me. “But I can help you pull them up to the surface of your mind.”
“Sarah,” Aurora said, her voice sounding worried. “Maybe these memories were buried for a good reason. I have always felt that Dracen only has your best interest at heart. If he helped you forget things about your shared past, perhaps they are memories that are better left alone.”
“But I can’t live not knowing what they are,” I replied. “Now that I know for certain they exist, I have to find out what happened. If I don’t do this, the other dragons won’t help us. You know that. We need them if we’re going to have a chance at taking Iron City back from the Fae.”
I looked back at Vincent.
“What do I have to do?” I asked him.
Vincent spread his wings out, then folded them in front of him to make a canopy of sorts.
“Come closer and I will weave a spell which should help you remember your past.”
I hesitated for only a fraction of a second before walking towards Vincent. Once I was close enough, he folded his wings closer together to completely encapsulate me.
“Rest your forehead against mine,” Vincent told me, lowering his head as far as he could to make it easier for me.
I inhaled deeply before leaning in towards Vincent until our foreheads touched.
“Are you ready?” He asked, giving me one last chance to back out.
“Not really,” I said in all honesty. “But I don’t believe I have a choice, Vincent.”
“Then let us find what has been hidden from you, shifter. And hope that the knowledge does more good than harm.”
I felt a warmth enter my body as Vincent began to weave his spell around me to retrieve my memories and hoped that his last words proved to be true.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I heard the laughter of a little girl mingled with that of an older woman’s. The child’s giggles echoed against the corners of my mind, warming my heart with a forgotten joy. A picture began to form within my thoughts as Vincent helped me retrieve a long lost memory. As I continued to hold my forehead against his, I found myself crossing my fingers hoping what I learned in the next few moments helped me understand who I truly was. Where did I come from? What caused me to forget my first life?
I felt the sensation of running, as if I were experiencing the memory first hand. My lips stretched into a smile as my counterpart in the memory looked over her shoulder at the beautiful woman chasing her. She had long blonde hair that was naturally wavy and bounced against her shoulders as she ran after me. Her smile made her face practically glow with happiness.
“I’m going to get you!” The woman laughed with her hands pointed towards me, wiggling her fingers teasingly.
“No, mommy. No!” The child me laughed, secretly wanting my mother to catch me and tickle me as threatened, but doing my best to get away from her.
“Then you better run faster!” My mother warned.
I continued to look over my shoulder, watching my mother while I ran as fast as my little legs would take me. Suddenly, I tripped over something in my path and ended up sprawled out onto the stone floor. My dress helped cushion the fall to my knees, but the palms of my hands scraped against the cold rock, scratching them and causing pain.
As I squeezed my eyes shut and began to cry, I felt a pair of large, warm hands gently pick me up off the floor. I was quickly cradled in the gentle embrace of a man’s arms and held securely against him.
“Oh, Kira,” the man said
to me, his voice sounding familiar, “are you hurt, my little love?”
I rested my head against the man’s shoulder, but kept my eyes shut as I continued to cry from my small wounds. The man held me close as he began to carry me somewhere.
“Is she hurt?” My mother asked worriedly. I could hear her quick footfalls keeping up with those of the man holding me.
“I think the fall scared her more than she’s physically hurt,” the man said soothingly. “I’m sure she’ll be fine.”
When I realized whom the man speaking was, my first instinct was to pull my head away from Vincent’s to stop the memory and collect my thoughts. But I didn’t. I needed for the child me to open her eyes and confirm what I thought I knew.
“Kira, my love, daddy needs for you to open your eyes.”
Even through my tears, I could make out Dracen’s face clear enough. He looked just the same in the past as he did in the present. As he smiled at me, his face full of concern, I knew without any doubt that he loved me unreservedly.
For whatever reason, the surprise of discovering Dracen was my real father faded quickly. Obviously, I held that information within my subconscious somewhere all this time. Having it finally come to the surface of my mind was actually something of a relief, like a pent up sigh that was finally released.
Dracen sat me down on a hard surface, and I saw that we were in a kitchen. The sound of bird’s singing could be heard from the open window above a hammered copper sink. The soft glow of sunlight filled the quaint little kitchen, but I knew the outside world was simply an illusion. It was the same illusion Dracen had in his sitting room when I first met him. I knew, without having to be told, that we were actually inside Ledmarrow Mountain.
Dracen took my little hands into his, looking at the minute scratches across each palm. He shook his head in dismay and sighed.
“You know you shouldn’t be running down the tunnels,” he said in a slightly chastising voice. He brought my hands underneath the faucet of the sink.
“Aqueous,” he said, magically causing clear water to suddenly flow from the faucet head and onto my hands. Gently, he washed off the dust and small rocks from them.
