Games of Fate (Fate Fire Shifter Dragon Book 1)

by Kris Austen Radcliffe

  Dragon flamed the engine. It kept chugging, and the cable wound tighter. The beast smashed a steel bar down onto it again and again.

  Dragon strained forward but Ladon couldn’t come any closer. He stopped just out of reach.

  “Leashed by your pet,” Ismene said. Her finger flickered when she tapped Rysa’s forearm.

  Rysa stretched out her hand. The wind carried his scent to her and she picked it out even through her aunt’s stench. She focused on it, calling it, wanting nothing more than for their fingers to connect. “You woke up Dragon,” she whispered.

  “Your mother left a note.” Ladon pulled her wedding band out of his pocket. “Told me what to do.” He tried to smile as he touched his chest. “All these centuries and I’d never figured it out.”

  Ismene stroked Rysa’s cheek.

  The winch’s engine coughed and stopped but the cable still wound around Dragon’s leg and shackled him away from Ladon.

  And from Rysa.

  Ladon shuffled forward. He winced and his jaw hardened to granite. The closer he moved toward Rysa and the farther from Dragon, the more his light dimmed. Ladon turned phantom before her eyes, dying little by little so he wouldn’t have to die all at once when Ismene Burnerized the woman he loved.

  Dragon’s hide erupted in mad, desperate patterns, but they, too, were bleached. Both their bodies withered. Their souls would crack and she knew where all the blood in her visions came from—things Ladon thought long gone, horrors he thought controlled, would rupture. Their minds would tear into writhing bits of wrath and vengeance. And someone would put a bullet in his neck.

  “Let her go, Ismene. You can leave. We won’t stand in your way. She doesn’t have to be like you.”

  “Maybe I don’t want to be their queen anymore, Ladon-Human.” Ismene seared a finger across Rysa’s jaw.

  Rysa refused to flinch.

  Her aunt clucked. “She’ll hunt. She’ll end it all. For me. For you. For my sister.”

  “Let her go,” Ladon pleaded again. Even pale and bleached, his neck reddened.

  “Ladon!” Rysa shouted. Maybe he could escape. Maybe he could control it. “Promise me you won’t let the rage take you! And that you’ll do what needs to be done. Promise me right now you’ll survive this! Because I need to know. I need to know you’ll be okay.”

  “No!” His stony face turned ice cold. “Let her go, you damned Parcae witch!”

  Ismene trailed a finger over Rysa’s neck like a surgeon marking before surgery. “Murderer,” she hissed.

  “Please don’t,” Rysa whispered.

  Ismene closed her eyes. Her lips parted. The interior of her mouth glowed and a nauseating, orange light built behind her teeth.

  “You can’t turn her!” Ladon yelled.

  Ismene’s mouth snapped shut.

  He stepped backward, closer to Dragon. “She’ll die.”

  Ismene’s head pivoted and her eyebrows danced with equal parts confusion and annoyance. “I’m the future-seer! I know what to do.”

  “Mira stitched her past.” He pointed at Rysa. “Look! You may see what-will-be now, but you will always be the past-seer of the Jani Prime.”

  Dragon yanked on the cable and moved a little farther down the deck. Ladon inched closer.

  Foam ate away her mother’s stitching. Rysa gritted her teeth and cringed under the onslaught of Ismene’s frothing seer, but the veil fell away from Rysa’s past. Abilene, Texas, through her mother’s awareness:

  Sandro Torres watched the dusty courtyard through a high window. “You are the Lady Ismene’s sister. Your safety is my priority.” He had already snapped a Burner’s neck and took a bite to his shoulder to keep Mira safe. He healed their wounds and oscillated his calling scents, and Mira knew the Burners couldn’t smell them as long as she stayed against his body.

  But he lied. He didn’t protect her for Ismene. He protected her because she’d become more important to him than any of the Shifters with whom he worked.

  So Mira stitched. She couldn’t save her sister. She couldn’t save the Shifters who had taken them in, but she could protect this man from her brother and his malevolent spawn.

  Sandro held her close. “Why does he do this?”

  In the courtyard, Ismene’s life bubbled away into caustic bitterness.

  Mira buried her face in his chest and tried desperately not to hear her sister’s screams. She’d have two weeks with him, on the run, before she told him to go. For his safety. But Alessandro Torres had been a warrior for a very long time and he refused. They would be, at least for a while, a family.

  The vision clicked off.

  Ismene screamed. “You are half Shifter?”

  Rysa’s father was a healer. A warrior.

  She yanked against Ismene’s grip. Shifter. She wasn’t just a Fate. She was much more. They could plot and manipulate all they wanted, but she had always been more than the Jani Prime realized.

  Rysa Torres, Fate and Shifter.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  The thing scorching into Ladon’s being was about to transmute him into a Ladon-shaped monster. It would look like him—mostly like him—but it wouldn’t be him. It wouldn’t beat with the heart of a man. It would drone with the buzz of a Burner.

  And he’d set fire to the planet.

  He clawed at his neck. “Damned Burners,” he growled. “Burn it out!” he yelled.

  “Will that work?” Rysa asked.

  Dragon rocked back and forth. I do not know, he signed.

  Ladon slapped his hand over the wound. “I need a knife.”

  “Has this ever happened before?” Rysa asked. What was she supposed to do?

  Mira shook her head. “It’s been in him too long already.” She crawled closer. “You need to pull it out, honey.”

  “Don’t let me turn,” Ladon said. He gripped her hand. “I’ll hurt you. I’ll hurt Dragon. I’ll hurt everyone.”

  Through the eyes of a nameless victim, the future gave Rysa a vision more terrible than any she’d yet seen—Ladon crouched on the rubble of a distant building, his eyes a burning vicious red visible to all. He imposed his will onto the Burner chaos in his blood. He curled his fingers into a tight claw and set fire to a chunk of concrete sitting on his palm. Behind him, Dragon’s hide swirled with the flames of a demon. Ladon roared and the beast jumped over his head with triple his current speed and strength.

  They had to get the venom out now.

  Rysa’s healer, working with her seers, knew how and where the venom changed Ladon’s body, even if she couldn’t read the venom itself. Ismene’s injection invaded Ladon’s cells and altered his chemistry. It set every protein on the verge of ignition.

  “I can get it,” she whispered.

  A new, phantom sensation hit her nose—the putrid rotting of Sister-Dragon’s blackened corpse.

  Rysa flinched but she didn’t let go of Ladon. She wasn’t going to let a horrid future happen. She’d pull the venom out of his shoulder.

  Ladon doubled forward. “Let Dragon take care of me. You can hear him. He can bond to you. You’ll both be safe.”

  “Don’t say that. You don’t know that.” She cupped his face with her free hand and made him look at her. “You can fight this! We can get it.”

  Derek watched Ismene as he uncoiled the cable from around Dragon’s legs. In the street, out in the lessening rain, AnnaBelinda and Sister-Dragon circled her aunt.

  Ismene sat up. Steam hissed off her shoulders and she turned her face toward the clouds. A loud, vicious screech filled the air.

  Sister-Dragon vanished. Mira backed away.

  Dragon, still disoriented and swaying, stayed between Rysa and Ladon, and Ismene. Rysa placed her hand on his haunch and the beast’s hide calmed. He dropped his head low and nudged Derek closer to his side.

  Rysa cupped Ladon’s wound. Her hand heated, and she used her healer to pull at his cells. The venom wiggled, but she worked to force it back toward the bite.

  It danced in
his veins as if mocking her, as if it knew exactly what it was doing, and it evaded every tug and grab she made.

  Ladon howled again. “I won’t hurt you….”

  “Then don’t. Fight with me.” Her palms heated to the point she felt as if her skin would blister. “Ladon, please. We can do this together.”

  Bits of the venom crystallized and exploded below his skin. He cringed and his lips curled. “Damned Burners,” he said again.

  The venom twisted and lurched around her attempts to yank it out. She had to focus, had to—

  Dragon’s snout touched her shoulder. An image pushed into her mind—sinuous tunnels, a layered maze. She couldn’t see the wound. “Dragon! Don’t blind me. Don’t—”

  Veins. Understanding filled her mind as beautiful gift from her present-seer. Dragon was giving her the structure and pattern of Ladon’s body. His arteries. The push and pull of his muscles. The windings of the injection.

  Dragon’s perception mapped. Her seers navigated. The venom snarled like a rabid animal, but it couldn’t escape their combined efforts. It tussled with her, both angry and random. It exploded parts of itself in an attempt to disguise its way. She blocked it anyway, and called its bluff.

  Dragon bolstered her abilities and showed her the way. She followed his map, outflanked the venom, and stopped it cold.

  She hooked it.

  In the street, Sister-Dragon roared as AnnaBelinda knifed Ismene’s side. Ismene wrapped her hand around the dagger protruding from her hip, and whipped the already imploding blade at AnnaBelinda.

  Sister-Dragon caught the hilt and slammed the knife into the pavement.

  The ground buckled. The shockwave rolled under Rysa and Ladon, but she held on.

  Venom pooling in the wound was as red as Ladon’s blood but phosphorescent and glowing. Rysa flattened her palm over it and drew it out.

  AnnaBelinda hooked her legs around Ismene’s neck and flipped her to the pavement.

  Ladon clutched Rysa’s waist so tightly her ribs creaked. She couldn’t breathe, but she concentrated, ignoring her own pain, and hovered her palm over his shoulder.

  On her hand, four drops of red liquid rolled around like scarlet mercury. Ladon gasped. He lived. She wasn’t going to lose him.

  A whine rose from the venom.

  “It’s imploding,” Ladon croaked.

  He grabbed for her waist again but her seers took control and she dodged. Her fingers closed around the red liquid. Her palm spasmed. The venom’s power stung as if electrified barbed wire wrapped around her arm, but it didn’t feel hot. It felt ice cold, as if it sucked away all her heat.

  Dragon swiped for her, too, but her seers flared and she dodged again.

  Naked Burner venom would destroy Salt Lake City. Murder Ladon and Dragon. His sister. Smear her mother across the—

  Mira had her, one arm around her shoulders and the other plunging a knife toward her free hand.

  The knife pricked. A welt of blood appeared on Rysa’s ring finger.

  Fate blood stabilized Burners. Calmed their chaos and gave them threads of past, present, and future. Shifter blood made them more of what they were. More volatile. More explosive.

  Rysa was both.

  The venom began to shrink into itself.

  She poked her bleeding finger into the red bead of venom. It stopped, frozen, and the whine momentarily silenced. Rysa yanked back, but a drop of blood stayed behind. The venom lapped at it, feeding like some damned animal.

  Its color darkened. A ripple traveled across its surface.

  But the whine started again, quieter and less frantic but still piercing. Still Burner.

  Rysa knew the truth, even if she didn’t want to admit it—chaos could not be constrained. Slowed, yes. But not controlled. If it couldn’t have Ladon, it would have her. Shifters always died. But so would the venom.

  “Not you. It can’t be you.” Ladon didn’t plead. He wouldn’t. But she saw his need—and love so deep it still surprised her, even after all they’d shared.

  If she let in the venom—if she licked it off her hand or let it in through the prick on her finger—Salt Lake City would still stand when the sun’s rays broke through the storm clouds at dawn. But her mornings would vanish from the future. She’d never wake to Ladon’s smile and his kisses and to him loving her with all the intensity they shared at the cave.

  She saw Ladon and Dragon shattering. They’d become the brutal anger she’d glimpsed before and there’d be bullets. “Don’t make them kill you! Promise me. Ladon—”

  “Not you!” Ladon roared. He clutched his shoulder as he staggered to his feet. “You do not have to be Parcae! You are not bound! You’re not—” He dropped to his knees again.

  She reached for him but he held her at arm’s length.

  “I will have what I want, Rysa! I will have you.” His skin blanched again—he hurt and without her, he’d also die. “You’re smart enough to fix this,” he whispered.

  Out on the street, AnnaBelinda slammed Ismene’s face into the pavement. She pulled another knife, ready to pierce the Burner’s heart. Ismene hissed out a sound very similar to the whine of the venom in Rysa’s hand.

  She looked down at it. Concentrated chaos might not be constrained, but blood-diluted chaos had been contained for twenty-three centuries.

  Inside Burners.

  “Stop!” Rysa held out the venom for Ismene to see.

  Dragon lifted his sister-human off Ismene and her aunt bolted across the street.

  AnnaBelinda shouted and punched Dragon’s forelimb until he dropped her. He flamed, but she also ran for Rysa.

  Derek stepped in front of his wife. “Honey.”

  Ismene stopped an arm’s length away. “You’re giving it back to me?”

  Rysa called her seers. She didn’t see Ismene but she saw the one path that didn’t lead to burning. Or her own death. “You will contain it.” She stepped closer. “And you will stop killing. No more, Ismene! You’ve caused enough harm.”

  Ismene’s back stiffened. “Why should I pay you a penance?” Ismene pointed a finger over Rysa’s shoulder, toward Ladon. Her face scrunched into a tense mask. “You forgave him.”

  Ismene was jealous. It bubbled off her with her seers. Jealous of the family the Dracae represented. Jealous that Rysa had the man she loved and Ismene didn’t.

  Jealous and petty, just like a Parcae.

  “Why?” Rysa’s fist tightened around the venom. “Because you’re no better than Faustus,” she yelled. “Because I refuse to die just so you don’t have to take any responsibility.” She waved the venom at Ismene and its whine grew louder. “Figure it out! And when you do, I will forgive you, aunt.”

  Ismene pursed her lips into a defiant line. “I have no control over the Burner within me.”

  “Then you ask for help and you accept what’s given to you. But if you harm my mom, I will find you. The Dracae will be the least of your worries.”

  Mira touched her sister’s arm. “Please, Ismene.”

  Rysa opened her hand. Ismene bent forward. She watched both Rysa and the liquid, and her head tipped at the Burner angle as she listened to it whine. She glanced up, assessing Rysa. Her face changed, her eyes taking on an acceptance Rysa had never seen in a Burner before, and she licked the venom off Rysa’s hand.

  Her skin changed, calmed, and a cooler tone moved from her lips across her face and down her neck. The rain no longer exploded when it hit her skin. Her Burner stench diminished, and its acid notes cleared.

  Her features lost some of the Burner gear-and-pulley strain, and she turned her eyes to the clouds.

  Mira touched Rysa’s arm. “I’ll take her. I’ll take Addy, too. We’ll protect her.”

  Her mom wanted to take on the task of overseeing a Burner? “Mom, the sickness. Can you do this?”

  Mira’s seer flared. “For now, yes.” She squared her shoulders and nodded at her sister. “There are other Jani triads besides the War Babies, honey. You have family. Both
mine and your father’s.”

  Rysa took her mother’s elbow. “I won’t be Jani, Mom. Not after Faustus killed all those people in Chicago to get to me.” The burnmetal bracelet slid down her wrist when she held it up. “Not after everything he did. Everyone he hurt.” She nodded toward Ismene.

  “I understand.” Mira bowed her head toward AnnaBelinda. “Dracas-Human.” Then to Ladon. “Dracos-Human. The Jani family will no longer cause you pain. Of this we swear.”

  Ismene snarled. Mira’s grip on her arm tightened and she looked down at her sister’s hand before looking up at Ladon.

  She nodded once, then turned away.

  “Mira.” Ladon pulled her mother’s wedding band from his pocket.

  All this time, Rysa had been both Fate and Shifter and she never knew.

  Mira slipped on the ring. “Tell him I’m waiting.” She took Ismene’s hand.

  “Mom?”

  Mira looked back.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Ismene’s seers thundered. “If another thread had been followed, you would not have activated yourself.” She lifted her arms to the heavens. “Fate or Shifter, you are the first. The Jani Prime did find the cure.”

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Mira dropped out of the unfinished ceiling grid-work by the central elevators. She lowered herself carefully and cradled Adrestia against her side with an arm around the other Fate’s waist.

  Ismene screeched and pointed. “You married a Shifter?”

  Mira jerked as she set Adrestia against the wall. A vicious, rasping shriek ground from her throat.

  Burndust. Rysa’s mother had snuck out of her uncle’s bonds and inhaled burndust to power her body so she’d have the strength to pull Adrestia from the Burners.

  Ismene shook Rysa. “I was supposed to have my Shifter. Me!”

  Next to Dragon, Adrestia pitched forward. She carried something big and heavy in her hands—a wrench. The Burners had stripped much of her skin. Dragon sniffed at her head and touched her shoulder, then took what she offered.