But she had rushed in. Because she thought she was saving me. So no, Quint didn't know how I felt. He couldn't.
“I understand you've also taken another assignment,” Quint said. “Already?”
“I need to kill something,” I said, growling as I spoke. “Even if it's not the thing that killed Onda. I need to be active. Need to kill something. Anything.”
Quint could always veto it, but as he looked over at me, I could tell he was as lost as I was. While Onda didn't mean the same thing to him that she did to me, she was still important to him. He still valued and cared for her – as more than just a Ranger. As a person. And I knew that.
“I really don't know what to make of all this, Glyn,” he said. “I don't know if I should let you –”
“Either let me complete these missions or I'll complete them without your consent anyway,” I said. “Whether you give me your blessing or not, I'm going to be out there hunting, Quint.”
To complete a mission without consent of the Warden would likely get me into a lot of trouble. Perhaps even demoted and sent back to Chondelai in disgrace. You never disobeyed your Warden and in the past, I'd never even considered it. Quint never steered me wrong, and to even fathom the idea was well outside the norm for me. Quint knew I was one of the best Rangers he had – second best to Onda. But she was gone now. And he wasn't going to have me sent away for doing my job – even if he didn't approve.
I sighed and looked at him. “Look, Quint,” I said. “I'm sorry. I'm just all – I just need to keep busy. I need the distraction. The last thing I need to do is go sit somewhere and drink my sorrows away. I need to hunt.”
He looked at me a long moment and then nodded. “Okay then,” he said. “Maybe you're right.”
I gave him a nod and felt the darkness inside of me begin to swirl about. I was angry. Beyond angry. I would find the prick who took Onda from me and I would kill him. Until then though, I was going to kill everything that crossed my path.
I stood up to leave, but Quint stopped me again. “Please be careful, Glyn,” he said. “You dying won't bring Onda back –”
“But me living won't either,” I said as I walked out the door. Under my breath, I muttered, “And living isn't worth much without her here with me.”
~~ooo000ooo~~
The Xar'urs were a rare catch. And they were the reason I'd taken on that specific mission in the first place. They were small, rare, and brutal as hell. They hid themselves pretty well, living among the shadows, in sewers, in shrubs.
When humans heard them scurrying around, they likely assumed they were large rats and got out of dodge. Which was a smart move. If the humans ever got a look at the Xar'urs, they'd have nightmares for the rest of their lives.
The Xar'urs weren't interested in human blood though, so they stayed away from people for the most part. Every once in a while, I'd heard a story about somebody getting in the way of one of those nasty little creatures and that never worked out too well for them. No person I'd ever heard of, had ever run into one of those little monsters and lived to tell the tale.
No, what the Xars – as we called them – feasted upon was Dragonborn flesh and blood. And when they got hold of one of our kind, they feasted – nothing was ever left to waste. No bone. No tissue. No blood. Nothing. Like a school of piranha, they'd devour an entire Dragonborn in minutes.
Technically, they were like parasites – but they were larger than what people typically assumed when they thought of a parasite. And they could grow even larger in battle. A few of the Xars had been spotted and a colony had been rumored to be in Los Angeles. And while this would normally be a job for a team, I took it on by myself. My partner was dead and no one else would do. I was determined to find and clean out the colony on my own.
I approached the area where they'd last been seen – the place it was believed the colony had carved out a home. It was an alleyway much like the one I'd lost Onda in. I tried not to think about it too much, tried to push it out of my head and focus on the task at hand.
But damn it was hard. I kept seeing Onda's face flashing before my eyes. I kept hearing her voice. Her laugh. Felt her touch. All of the memories came rushing to the surface and it was killing me.
I also kept expecting the traitor from the Shadow Clan to jump out of the shadows like some jack-in-the-box from hell and try to kill me. In fact, I was half-hoping for it. I wanted to fight him. I wanted to fight him so bad, it hurt.
Eventually, we were going to fight and either he'd kill me or I'd kill him. There was no other way around it.
I had finally managed to quiet my brain and center myself when I heard something skittering behind a dumpster. Stepping forward, I pulled the dumpster back and found exactly what I'd been looking for. I'd found the entrance to their colony. There was a large opening in the brick wall of the dilapidated building – large enough that even I could climb through. This building must have been the place they called home – which meant there was probably an entire colony of those bastards waiting for me inside.
The right, smart thing to do would have been to reach out for backup. Because who knew how many of them were actually in there. And given the fact that they very probably outnumbered me by a significant margin, the odds that I would be eaten alive were pretty high.
As if my thoughts had summoned them, a pair of them crawled out of the hole, scowling up at me with their rat-like eyes. Sensing the threat, the creatures hissed just before lunging toward me. But I was ready and I had the upper hand. In one smooth motion, I drew my sword and sliced the head off one, and then the other.
More were coming, I could hear their feet scrabbling in the concrete tunnels. The good thing about the Xars was that they weren't all that bright. Given that I was the one standing outside, sword in hand, ready to lop off heads one-by-one as they came out of the tunnel, the upper hand was mine. It was almost too easy, I thought to myself.
As they appeared, I lopped off a few more heads, feeling like this could be a long night of what was becoming a monotonous activity. It was then that I heard a noise in the alley behind me. Turning around, I saw the Queen Xar standing behind me. I knew she was the queen because of her size. Unlike her minions, she was human-sized and had multiple eyes all over her head – all of them blinking at me. An amused smile crossed her face as she hissed at me.
“Foolish creature,” she said. “Coming here all by yourself. Do you know what you've stumbled upon, reptile?”
“Yeah, a bunch of dead rats,” I spat back. “Or at least, soon to be dead rats.”
It was silly, but we were exchanging petty insults – they hated being compared to rats as much as we hated to be called reptiles. It wasn't a fitting description for either of our kind. I wasn't a reptile, she wasn't a rat. More accurately, I'd say she was a mix between rat and spider, blended with some other mystical beings not otherwise seen in the world of man. They were creatures purely of Chondelai who'd carved out a niche.
“You have perhaps, killed a few of my soldiers,” she said with a shrug as she slinked toward me. “But there are many, many more where they came from. And you also have me to deal with, of course.”
Hissing came from behind me as more and more of the creatures scurried out of the tunnels, but I couldn't take my eyes off the Queen. She bared her teeth – tiny, pointed little daggers as sharp as knives – as she glided toward me.
Quickly sheathing my sword, I knew that there was no way I was going to be able to beat them all with a blade. If I wanted to survive, I only had one choice. A choice that was frowned upon to use where so many eyes could be watching – but there was no other option.
The bones in my body shifted and moved beneath my skin and I felt the burning in my chest as I shifted into my dragon form, quickly taking shape. With a single powerful swish of my tail, I threw the Xars who were gathering behind me down the alley. Some of them slammed into the brick walls of the building, their bodies cracking from the force of my tail.
“Amusing,” t
he Queen hissed. “But ultimately futile. We are legion, Dragonborn.”
I felt the fire burning in my chest, ready to explode. I was afraid of letting loose a blast of Dragonfire carelessly though, for fear of burning half the city down. I'd need to use it judiciously – and make sure I could take out the Queen in the burst. I flicked a group of the creatures who'd grabbed onto my tail, throwing them into the wall with all of my strength. There were so many of them though – I hadn't really thought things through. They were moving fast, swarming, and coming at me from all angles.
But I was moving, turning, fighting, smashing them with my powerful claws and tail – and then found myself pinned against the brick building. I was trapped. What seemed like hundreds, maybe thousands, of the Xars gathered, all of them anticipating a feast of dragon flesh.
The thought drifted through my mind that I might be going out that way. My only solace, was that at least I could be with Onda again – wherever she was.
I growled low though, I wouldn't dishonor her memory by giving up. If I was going to go down – which seemed likely at the moment – I wasn't going down without a fight.
I opened my jaws and let go a burst of my flame, igniting as many of them as I could. Little balls of flame scurried around, squealing and hissing in agony as they burned. But it wasn't enough. Even as they ran hissing and crying, burning to death from the dragonfire, there were more already gathering to take their place.
And more beyond that.
The line of Xars stretched down the alleyway as far as the eye could see. And the Queen simply stood amongst them, laughing.
The sound of the Xars squealing, steel ringing, and the pounding of footsteps in the alleyway made both the Queen and I look up in surprise. It was a familiar sound to me – one that caused me to curse at myself.
Quint and another Ranger – Dezo – rushed down into the alley, cutting down the creatures left and right. They waded into the fight to wipe out the Xars – or to save my ass, would probably be a more accurate description.
I shifted back into my own human form and although I was naked, I took up my sword once more. The three of us moved and flowed like the seasoned warriors we were, cutting down Xars by the score. Once we had the Xar on the run – the creatures were fleeing for cover – I saw fear in the eyes of the Queen.
Some of her most loyal soldiers stood to fight, to defend their Queen, but it was a lost cause. The three of us struck them all down, leaving just the Queen for us.
“Please,” she begged. “Spare my life.”
“Why should we?” I spat.
“I will never trouble you again,” her voice cracked with emotion. “Show mercy.”
Quint stepped forward, his face hardened, his muscles tensed. “No.”
With one quick movement, he'd lopped the head off the Queen. It hit the pavement of the alley with a wet, meaty sound, and it was all over. Hundreds of the Xar had escaped, but that wasn't our concern at the moment. We'd eventually have to exterminate them, but they posed no real threat to humanity, so that was for another time.
I looked over at Quint and Dezo and felt the anger in me – as irrational as it was – bubble up again. I turned to them, rage burning in my eyes.
“Damn you, Quint,” I said. “I had it under control.”
“Oh, is that what you call that?” he asked. “Because from where I stood, it looked like you were just about to have the flesh stripped off your bones.”
“Yeah? Well I did,” I spat. “I had it under control. I was under control.”
“If you had it under control, why did you shift? You know we're not supposed to shift where we can be seen,” he said and then very pointedly looked around at the buildings surrounding us. “And clearly, we very well could have been seen.”
Quint walked over to me, his jaw clenched and anger in his face. He pushed me against the building, holding me in place and stared me straight in the eyes for a long moment.
“I know what you're doing, Glyn,” he said. “You're trying to get yourself killed. And if that's your plan, okay, fine. I don't like it, but I'm in no position to tell you what to do with your life. But in the process of committing suicide, you could have left a nest of Xar in the city – along with their damn Queen – and put us all in danger. You did not have it under control, Glyn. You don't even have control of yourself.”
He stared at me for a moment and I had no reply. What could I say? I couldn't refute his words. I simply stared back at him and waited for the lecture to be over.
“We saved your ass,” he snapped. “A simple thank you would suffice next time.”
He let me go and the anger in me rose up, making me clench my fists. If he wasn't my Warden, I would have taken him down. But I respected Quint. Dezo, on the other hand, stood to the side of the alley with a cocky grin on his face.
“What are you staring at, man?” I shouted at him.
“A man on a suicide mission, that's what,” Dezo said, shaking his head.
“Come on, Glyn,” Quint said. “Mission is over. Let's head back.”
I stood where I was – basically pouting – and didn't follow the two men for a moment. For one thing, I was naked – I'd lost my clothes in the shift. But also, I wasn't sure I wanted to go back with them.
Maybe they were right. Maybe I was a man with a death wish. But wasn't it whether I lived or died my choice to make?
“Come on, Glyn,” Quint said. “I'm not going to ask again.”
Dezo smirked at me and tossed me the trench coat he'd been wearing. I mumbled a “thanks” under my breath as I covered up my body.
“You're welcome,” Dezo said. “For the coat and for saving your ass.”
Chapter Ten
Vanessa
“Where am I?” I asked as my eyes snapped open and I sat up abruptly.
I woke from a dream-filled sleep – one filled with dragons and fire and mystical lands that reminded me of fairy tales – and found myself in a bright room, lying in a bed that wasn't my own.
The familiar beeping sound rang in my ears and told me all I needed to know. I was in the hospital. Not because I was working – I was lying in a hospital bed. I looked down at the tubes and wires sticking out of me and saw that I'd been hooked up to a heart rate monitor.
I was no longer on the pediatric floor, I could tell that much. I was alone in the room I'd woken up in and realized that I was in the emergency room. I was alone and there was no one available to tell me what happened or how I'd gotten there. I picked up the call button, buzzed for the nurse and waited.
A few minutes later, a perky, young blonde girl I didn't recognize came in, flashing me a big smile.
“Oh, you're finally up, Ms. Diaz!” she said, a little too sweetly for my liking. “You gave us all quite the scare.”
“What happened?” I mumbled.
My head felt weird again – it was like there was something inside of it trying to hammer its way out. And hearing her call me Ms. Diaz grated on me. It didn't feel right – almost like it wasn't my name.
“Well, you were working on the pediatric floor when you had a seizure, and –”
“Wait, I had a seizure?”
“Uh huh,” she chirped. “Do you have a history of seizures, Ms. Diaz? I didn't see anything in your –”
“No,” I said. “Not at all. I've never had a seizure and have always been in very good health.”
As I tried to reconcile what she was telling me, I began to wonder if what I was experiencing was related to what happened in that alley.
“Well I'm going to grab the doctor and let him know you're up,” she said. “I'm Rebecca, in case you need anything.”
“Thanks, Rebecca,” I said absently.
I was counting down the seconds until she'd be out of the room so I could have a little peace and think things through. Not to mention the fact that I simply wanted to be alone. That was so not like me – I'd always been very sociable. But maybe I was still having some after-effects of what happened. It
was something to talk to the doctor about, for sure.
Rebecca scurried out of the room and finally left me in peace and quiet. I closed my eyes, trying to block out all the lights and noise of the hospital – and that's when I saw Glyn's face in my mind again. He was smiling at me, and that smile was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen in my entire life. In my head, I wanted to tell him I loved him, but that made no sense to me. I didn't know that man. Had no real connection to him – and yet, at the same time, it felt like I did.
He whispered, “I love you too,” and my heart, filled with joy, nearly exploded within my chest.
“Ms. Diaz?” a male voice said, pulling me out of my fantasy and back into that hospital room again.
I opened my eyes and stared at a middle-aged, balding man I'd seen around, but whose name escaped me. I'd worked with him at one time, I was sure of it. But I couldn't place his name for the life of me.
“I'm Dr. Paulson,” he said.
Right. Paulson. I remembered now – mostly. There were a lot of blank spots in what I remembered about him, but I did recall that he was a nice guy. Good doctor.
“I've looked over all your tests from your ER visit last night,” he said, “and I'm still not seeing anything else that's a real cause for concern. I think we might want to try an MRI...”
His voice trailed off as I fell back into my fantasy. I saw Glyn again, and this time, I knew I had to go to him. Had to see him. Talk to him. Tell him I was okay. It was almost like another person was inside of my head, telling me what to do.
“Did you hear me, Ms. Diaz?” the doctor asked.
“Uhh yeah, I'm sorry,” I said. “I think I'm going to have to pass on the MRI. I have stuff I need to do.”
The voice coming out of me didn't sound anything like me. Not to mention the fact that I'd had no intention of telling the doctor I didn't want the MRI. I was concerned about myself, but also felt the urge to leave, to find Glyn. The impulse was strong – stronger than my desire to figure out what was going on in my head.
And I thought that it was Glyn, not modern medicine, that would provide me with those answers.
No Such Thing as Dragons : Complete Series Box Set (Books 1 - 5) Page 32
