Henchgirl (Dakota Kekoa Book 1)

by Rita Stradling

  All of the men were dressed in the type of suit you could not even have shipped into our island chain. Black, sleek, tailored perfect.

  The two dracon women looked almost ridiculous; the one from the beach was wearing a dress with the biggest collar I had ever seen. I mean, I bet it looked good on the runway, but in real life, their dresses looked bizarre. They obviously did not’ agree, gazing around like they were blessing us with their disdain.

  My grandfather, who had already begun to walk away, stepped back to us.

  There was a long moment when everyone just stared at me and then I realized that I was supposed to answer Braiden’s question.

  Bobby gave me a look signaling that I needed to yank my head out of my butt.

  “He’s… yeah, I think that boy is okay. I know the paramedics said it was a clean break when they took him away.”

  “I am losing my touch,” Braiden said with a barking laugh that could give Bobby’s chuckle a run for its money. “I thought you were human.”

  “She said she was,” Vern said.

  “What was your name again?” Braiden asked, though I had never told him.

  “Dakota,” I said.

  The full-blooded dragon’s gaze did not waiver from me, and beside him, Vern looked on with equal intensity, but instead of interest, Vern’s look was clear, unfiltered anger.

  The dragon’s voice was smooth, beautiful, the kind of voice that lulled you to sleep; yeah, the endless sleep. He said, “I am surprised your senses are so dull, my son. This one has quite a quantity of power. George, your family has certainly grown more intriguing since the last time I visited. You say this one is your granddaughter, not your daughter?”

  My grandfather, who I had never heard called by his first name before, lifted a shoulder dismissively. “Power is only as useful as the aspect it is channeled through.”

  “What is her aspect?” The dragon said, not turning his attention from me. It was as if his gaze was wrapping around me, tighter and tighter.

  And distantly, I wondered what my grandfather would answer the dragon. I believed that some part of my grandfather was proud of me; he had taken such care to train me himself. He had always taken an interest in my aspects. He could say the obvious that I could not only sense people’s souls, I could uncoil them, drain emotion. I was strengthening the art of manipulating emotions and memories, something much more difficult. He could even mention my second less used aspect, saying that shooting targets became too simple for me when I was twelve, that I had a sniper’s eye and a steady aim.

  What he said was, “She is a singer, her aspect is her projection.”

  Only my years of training stopped me from stammering ‘um, what?’ It was a mark of the clear and unquestionable leadership that my grandfather held over all of us that none of my sisters even blinked in confusion. If anyone else had said it, I could imagine the unending bout of laughter that would have come out of Lorelei and Bobby, even maybe Stacy.

  A singer? It was like my grandfather did not even know who I was.

  “I do love entertainment. You must sing for us,” one of the dracon women said, the one I had not seen before, her voice held a touch of sarcasm; as if she had a hard time believing that I was talented.

  I would be insulted, if she wasn’t right. I stammered out, “I haven’t practiced in a while.”

  “Her sister here,” my grandfather said gesturing to Clara, “Has a much more useful aspect. Her aspect is her beauty.”

  The group turned to Clara, and just like a million times before, when men saw my older sister, I was forgotten. But for once, I was grateful.

  I walked away from the group with Stacy all but clinging to my waist. Staggering over to where my uncle and Lorelei were trying to maneuver my mother’s bulk into a high-back leather chair at a cocktail table. My mother was either asleep or close to it. Her dress looked tighter, as if the massive liquid consumption made her bloat like a water balloon.

  When the chair finally stopped tipping from my mother’s awkward weight, Lorelei turned to me with a gleam in her eye. She whispered, “So Dakota, are you going to do a performance for us? How about singing that one you did the other day, what was it… ‘drowning in buckets of beer, now I have no fear’? That was beautiful…” She shook her head pretending to be misty-eyed.

  Bobby, who had been present for this latest embarrassing, somewhat drunken performance chipped in, “Yeah, please do. You almost moved me to tears last time.”

  I mock glared at my younger sister and uncle, “I would, but I need to polish my craft.”

  Bobby patted my shoulder and as if to comfort me he said seriously, “Sweetheart, you can’t polish a turd.”

  “That is so disgusting,” I said, laughing so hard the sound startled me.

  Lorelei and Bobby joined me laughing wrapping me up in their warm laughter, and the layer of ice that seemed to have crystallized around me melted just like that. Maybe Clara was right, why shouldn’t I enjoy my night? So my life was falling apart like a dead flower, I still had a couple people that could make me laugh.

  “Let’s go dance.” I said, surprising myself again.

  My younger sister Stacy grabbed my arm and pulled it back a bit awkwardly.

  “Stacy?” I said, looking back at my little sister.

  Stacy was staring back at the group we had just left. When I glanced over I was pleasantly surprised to see Clara talking with Braiden McCormick.

  “Don’t leave me,” Stacy said, she was looking directly at the dragon. Stacy was only ten, no one expected her powers to develop for at least a year; Lorelei’s still had not inherited her own aspect. However, Stacy looked like she knew exactly what the dragon was and it terrified her.

  A flash of memory from the time I was just a year older than Stacy overwhelmed me. Looking into the giant red eyes and scaly snake nostrils of the gleaming reptilian full-dragon, I heard my father gasping in wet labored breaths at my feet. In the air I smelled the distinctive unforgettable mixture of the blood that dripped down my face combined with the sickly sweet smell of the dragon’s hot breath. My child’s hand had reached out as a power, a power I did not know I had, surged through me…

  My hand lifted to my heart terrified that the rate would accelerate to the tell-tale beat of an oncoming panic attack; but the thumping was steady. Yanking back into the here and now I grabbed Stacy and pushed her back so she could look at me, probably a little too forcefully. I leaned down and whispered, “Don’t look at him.” I didn’t know why it struck me as so important, essential, but keeping my sister from attracting the dragon’s attention was my first instinct and if my last five years as a soldier taught me anything, it was to trust my instincts.

  A spike of terror rose in my sister’s little soul. It was my fault.

  Using the excuse of smoothing down Stacy’s dress, I touched her arm and dragged her terror out of her body and into me. It felt like drinking, if you could drink through your fingers like straws. Prickly uncomfortable energy waves pulled from my sister’s thin arm into my fingertips. Great, terror was the last thing I needed to store, but it was better than letting my sister marinate and stink with it.

  My first thought was to pop open the little hatch on my ring and feed the fear to my grandfather. My grandfather consumed fear, he thrived on it; but I hesitated. Was I still allowed to funnel emotions into him? Was this direct portal between us still even welcome? I had so taken for granted being loved by him, being indulged by him; it was my first reaction to open the portal every time I fed on another’s emotions.

  But my grandfather had well and truly dismissed me today, made it perfectly clear to the entire family that my five years of favoritism were over; that my glory had not only fled me, it had been taken out with the trash. No one openly said it, but I received enough smug looks that it was clear not only did all my cousins, aunts and uncles know I was yesterday’s garbage, they loved it.

  My sisters and I were introduced like we were the least important and lo
west relations my grandfather had invited, and everyone, even his guests, saw it. My grandfather did not want any tie to me, least of all a direct connection. Knowing it would take hours to dissipate, I kept Stacy’s fear.

  Bobby spun Lorelei in and around other chatting cousins and into the dance floor where a couple other groups of my cousins, aunts and uncles and their spouses were waltzing around a vampire quartet as they played. Bobby and Lorelei danced with total abandon; and I thanked all that was decent that I made Lorelei change her dress.

  I led Stacy out, spinning her around until she was giggling. Before the song was over, however, my half-brother cut in.

  “Hello Dakota and Stacy,” Deagan said formally. He was tall, and had pretty much a male version of Clara’s face, as they were fraternal-twins. While his looks were so like Clara’s, his soul could not be more different. He put on a sympathetic expression, but his soul sparked with amusement as he said, “Dakota, I am so sorry to hear about your demotion, you must be devastated. But I’m thrilled to hear that you’ll be coming on as my assistant soon, how’s that for a silver lining? Sibling bonding time, how splendid.” He offered me his hand like we were some sort of business partners.

  I took his hand, smiled and let Stacy’s terror slip through my palm and into his. “I’m sure you’ll be a great boss, bro,” I said with as sweet a smile as I could muster.

  Deagan smiled, his amusement extinguishing. “Thank you, I will try to be,” he said, tersely.

  “Are you going to say hi to mom?” I asked even though I already knew the answer.

  “I am very busy right now,” he said.

  “Of course you are,” I said.

  He nodded before hurrying away from me.

  Feeling much better after releasing the fear-energy, Stacy and I started doing the twist and I ignored the mocking looks that my family members shot at me. Before, my sisters and I could always be as silly as we wanted. We had never been second guessed or openly mocked before, my aunts and uncles were just a bunch of sharks scenting blood.

  The dragon and my grandfather had returned to the dais and were, surprisingly, speaking to my cousin Ashley with rapt interest.

  Surprise, surprise, I did not know Ashley was capable of saying anything interesting.

  When I spun around again, I noticed that not only was Clara and Braiden dancing beside us, someone else had come up without me noticing.

  Vern.

  Great.

  He stood on the dance floor, but instead of dancing, he was just glaring at me.

  Freaking weirdo.

  I just kept twirling my sister, making her giggle. Trying to spin as far from Vern as possible, I headed toward the back of the dance floor; but when I turned, Vern had walked straight through the dancers, coming toward me.

  “Dakota, Dakota!” Stacy said, and I realized she must have been calling my name for a while. “Dakota, you’re making me dizzy.” she giggled as she flopped her head in an exaggerated circle.

  “You pretend to be a human during the day,” a cold voice said from directly behind me.

  “Maybe,” I said dismissively, not turning around to where I knew Vern was standing. I tried to maneuver Stacy further into the crowd of dancers, but Stacy’s feet had rooted to the floor and short of picking her up I could not get her to budge.

  “You’re a liar,” he said.

  “Can I help you with something?” I snapped at him.

  “I’m considering it,” he said, again, angrily.

  Seriously psycho.

  Stacy peered around me at Vern then smiled at him, which shocked me, Stacy usually hid around people she did not know. I probably took too much fear out of her. “Hi,” she said, smile wide across her face, “I’m Stacy.”

  “My name is Vern,” his voice said.

  I spun just in time to see a little smile on the platinum haired half-dragon’s face, as he looked down at my sister. When he looked back up to me the expression immediately turned cold.

  Now that my dampener was off there was not a doubt in my mind that he was a half-dragon, if I thought it was possible to be three-quarters dragon, I would say that Vern was that. If I had not first been so overpowered by his father’s soul, his would have staggered me.

  Maybe his mother was a one-eighth-blood dracon, but he seemed even more than that.

  “Stacy, go check on mom,” I said pushing her back. It was weird; she hesitated, as if she wanted to talk more with the half-dragon. “Go Stacy,” I ordered her.

  She looked up at me with confusion heavy on her little features, but after a second she walked off toward where my mother was snoring, head down on the cocktail table.

  “Hey psycho,” I said, looking up to return Vern’s cold look, glare for glare. “Don’t talk to my sister.” I meant the words, but they came out shaky as the power of his soul slammed into me, constricting around me and threatening to push me back physically.

  He was powerful, too powerful, more than my grandfather or any other half-dragon I had ever met. I had an urge to buckle forward, but kept upright with intense concentration.

  What was he?

  He could not be a full dragon, his soul just did not have that type of density, but he was so powerful. It felt like up until this moment he had been holding back the immensity of his soul, but now he was lashing it out at me.

  Was that even possible, to control one’s own soul? To use it like a weapon? If I did not have my aspect, I probably would still feel the force of his power lashing against me. As it was, I was three seconds from face-planting.

  All I needed to do was what I always did with my grandfather, ease into it. Let myself adjust.

  When I could finally stop staring like an idiot, I looked up to see a smug grin on his face.

  “Don’t you have better things to do? I don’t know, like: maybe light houses on fire or torture poor defenseless animals?” My voice amazed me with its scathing calm, as if I had detached the sounds from the insanity in my head or more likely from any remnant of sanity.

  He stepped toward me, closing the distance. Too close. “No,” he said, “I prefer bigger prey.”

  Um, gulp.

  I summoned the years of practice to remove all expression and concentrated on being blank. Hoping that he wasn’t like my grandfather, hoping that Vern could not sense my fear. I walked past Vern and shot a disdainful look over my shoulder. “If you’re not going to dance, you should probably get off the dance floor.”

  My message, that he looked ridiculous just standing in the middle of the dance floor, completely went over his head. Instead, his gaze combed over me; he took his time looking me over, and for some reason, possibly the fear of being in his draconic sights, I did not walk away. When his gaze met mine again, there was an edge of mockery in his smile. “No, thank you,” he said and then just walked away.

  Egotistical psychotic jerk! I fought the automatic compulsion that raged through me to run after him and tell him that I wasn’t asking him to dance. That I would rather dance with my aunt Glenda than him, a fate possibly worse than death.

  Glenda’s soul, as if conjured by my snide thought, brushed against and crept down my back with its spindly tendrils. She was directly behind me. I turned, knowing that if Glenda wanted to talk to me there was little besides dropping into an all-out sprint for the door that I could do to stop her. Tempting, however, I had little enough dignity left without running in my dress and little heels.

  Glenda’s face held an expression of such rage, I was dumbfounded. But her soul wasn’t enraged, it felt like it always did, hungry, eager. When she spoke her hushed voice was as angry as her expression, “I am humiliated, completely humiliated that I have a niece ignorant of how to correctly speak to guests, let alone Wyvern Manderson,” she said the name like it meant ‘the king of the world.’

  I had heard the name before, frequently; he was mega famous for… something. A little shocked I said, “Wyvern Manderson?”

  “Yes, you were just speaking to the Wyvern Mand
erson. You have perhaps single-handedly managed to humiliate the family in front of one of the richest and most powerful dracons in the world. Let us just hope your grandfather doesn’t ever discover how much you shamed the family.”

  Her eager soul made me guess that she wouldn’t really be that disappointed if my grandfather found out.

  She smiled at me, oh you tasty fly, and said, “It is such a relief to me that you will be under my tutelage, Dakota. I know your rude behavior is not completely your fault; it is father’s indulgence of you that has made you so pathetic and useless. At least now your grandfather recognizes that you truly need my guidance. Look at Ashley; she is a stunning example of poise, grace and beauty. It is no wonder that father selected her instead of you to represent the family in front of the most important guests likely to ever visit our little island.” Glenda raised her hand in a gesture to Ashley, who was actually laughing with the dragon.

  If that was what I was supposed to be aspiring to, I would pass.

  Glenda leaned in and I could smell some sickly sweet perfume wafting into my face. She whispered, “The way you act now, not even the poorest and most powerless dracons will want you.” The comment should not have stung, but it did.

  Then the truth of the whole situation really hit me: I had just called Wyvern Manderson, a very famous and powerful dracon who was probably my grandfather’s better, a psycho. I had always avoided anything to do with dracon hierarchy and politics, yet even I had heard of his name.

  How could I have not known it was him? I had seen his pictures a thousand times on the cover of The Draconic Times and all the tabloids more often than not. I had even glanced at an interview about him in the Wealth and Power magazine while waiting for my turn with the dentist, though I do not think I read it.