Luminous_A Reverse Harem Urban Fantasy

by Katie French

  I would save him. I had to save him.

  The ground trembled. I lost my balance and fell on my side. Righting myself, I prepared to jump into the hole headfirst, but it was too late.

  The shaft was collapsing, huge boulders and dirt shaking loose from the sides and dropping to clog the path.

  “No, Dad!”

  I threw the sword to one side and clawed at rocks as they roiled in a whirlpool of dirt.

  The ground shook again. The earth beneath me dropped a few feet. I plunged down with the rocks and dirt that buried my legs. Dust formed a cloud that enveloped me in an instant. My eyes, nose, and mouth filled with it, but I didn’t care. Blindly, I kept digging, rocks flying overhead, even as they rolled back down, burying me further.

  Dad couldn’t be gone. He was just behind these rocks.

  A deafening roar pierced my ears, and I didn’t know if it was the mountain still rumbling or a dragon protesting. It could have been either, and it made no difference. A rock would soon do me in. They were still falling around me, clanking, settling, making a comfortable grave that would lie close to Dad’s.

  I coughed, choking on the gritty dust that coated my throat.

  A rock hit my shoulder, sending a jolt of pain across my back and down my spine. Instinctively, I ducked and wrapped weak arms over my head. Coughing, tasting dirt, and struggling for one last breath, I was glad to follow Dad into death.

  My awakening was violent.

  The contents of my stomach rose up my throat, and I vomited. Someone thumped my back as I wretched, cleaning my windpipe from all the dust I’d inhaled.

  When I finally stopped, arms wrapped around me from the back, pulling me to a sitting position.

  I wiped at my face with hands that seemed to merely dangle from my weak arms. I couldn’t see who was holding me, couldn’t see past my nose.

  “I thought you’d died,” Tom said from behind me. “I thought I’d lost you.” He held me tighter, pressing my back to his chest as if he would never let me go.

  “M-my dad,” I choked and promptly went into a coughing fit.

  “I’m sorry, Lila. I’m so sorry.”

  He’d lost his mother, too, but it was impossible for me to muster any sympathy. He couldn’t have loved that evil woman. He couldn’t.

  My tears made mud that I smeared on my face when I tried to wipe them away. I cried for a long time before the throbbing pain in my shoulder registered. All the while, Tom held me, rocking back and forth, his chest rumbling a soothing tone that was completely inhuman.

  I was so consumed in my grief that I’d forgotten about Santiago. It wasn’t until the rhythmic flapping of wings reached my ears that I lifted my head and looked around.

  Light from the rising moon reached us where we sat on a patch of moss a distance away from the collapsed tunnel. A large indent of loose dirt, looking like a giant’s footprint, was all that could be seen of it. Trees around us swayed with a breeze that helped clear the dust away. It seemed like a normal early summer night. Yet inside, my heart was crumpling into a million tiny pieces.

  Turning my head, I saw Santiago’s broken body lying motionless on the forest floor.

  “Santiago,” I whispered.

  I disentangled myself from Tom and crawled toward Santiago. My sword lay discarded to one side. It should have been buried in the rubble, but Tom must have pulled it out along with me somehow.

  Flinching at the pain in my shoulder, I collapsed next to Santiago, took his hand, and whispered his name. He was pale, his lips turning blue. Was he… dead? God, had I failed him the same way I’d failed Dad?

  I pressed my ear to his naked chest and listened. His heartbeat was weak. I struggled to my feet, searching the sky for the rhythmic flapping I’d heard.

  “We’re here,” I called.

  I foolishly waved my uninjured arm at the sky, but the dragons didn’t need my help. They were headed straight for us, probably able to see every detail even in the dim moonlight.

  With a glance over my shoulder, I checked on Tom. He was lying on his side, a grimace of pain on his face.

  “Tom?” I said.

  “I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine,” he said, curling his legs toward his stomach and taking slow, deliberate breaths.

  Were they both going to die? And where was Ki? Had something happened to him, too? And what about Frank and the others?

  A moment later, the brown dragon that had saved us and a bigger dappled one landed in a small clearing a few paces away. The wind from their wings buffeted my hair and sent dust flying from my clothes.

  I held a hand up to protect my eyes, while still trying to drink in every detail of the beautiful creatures. The brown dragon carried a pack in one of its talons. As soon as it touched the ground, it shifted and disappeared behind a thick tree.

  The other one, a massive creature, bigger even than Tara had been, stood more than twenty feet tall. It was so big it barely fit between the trees that rose around us, wings buffeting branches as it settled. Its skin was an almost golden color with darker ridges between its scales that resembled tiger stripes. His shape and spiked tail reminded me of Santiago’s dragon form.

  It shifted with grace and speed, as if it had been doing it for a very long time. It didn’t miss a step from the moment it landed on its talons, and started running on human feet in our direction.

  It was a man, which I should have guessed from the sheer size of his dragon form. He was naked from the waist up but—unlike Tom, Ki, and Santiago—the lower half of his body was still covered in scales, making him look like some sort of merman or Aquaman himself.

  That was actually a possibility? Then why had Tom, Ki, and Santiago flashed me at every chance they got? In any case, I was glad this man had the ability. It was one thing to see guys my age naked, but a whole different thing to be scarred for life by the sight of a middle-aged man.

  “Hijo,” he said, dropping to his knees in front of Santiago.

  Hijo? Didn’t that mean son in Spanish? Yes, I was pretty sure it did.

  The man’s eyes brimmed with fear as he checked Santiago’s vitals, but some of his color returned when he detected signs of life.

  “Vas a estar bien, Santiago,” he said, laying his hands on his son’s chest.

  The man—Santiago’s father—closed his eyes and went very still.

  This was no time for prayer. Why had the brown dragon, whoever it was, brought back this useless man? To administer some sort of dragon last rites or something?

  As if on cue, a guy wearing a pair of low-rise jeans came running from behind the thick tree and joined us. He knelt next to the praying man, his expression expectant. He had no shirt or shoes on, but at least he’d had the decency to bring pants. Apparently, he couldn’t do the scaly-pants trick either. In addition to the pants, he’d also brought two blankets, one of which he quickly draped over Santiago to cover his nakedness.

  I was struck by how much he looked like Ki. Same glossy, black hair and bronze skin. Same high cheekbones. Was he Ki’s brother? Cousin?

  “What’s he doing?” I demanded.

  “Quiet, girl,” the young man ordered.

  Girl? He couldn’t be but a couple of years older than me. Who did he think he was?

  I cared what happened to Santiago. He had gone into the cave and faced Tara to help me, my friends, and… Dad. A knot formed in my throat, but I forced it down. I couldn’t fall apart right now. Santiago and Tom needed help.

  True, I was new to all this dragon business and I didn’t understand their ways, but we needed to take them to a hospital. No weird dragon rituals mattered at the moment, even if they were sacred to the creatures.

  I’d just opened my mouth to protest when the man’s hands began to vibrate at a staggering speed. I shook my head, blinked, and looked again. His hands were still moving in a blur. A rock must have hit my head after I passed out.

  The man’s eyes began to glow. I leaned back. Something more than praying was going on here.

>   Brown-Dragon Guy gave me a raised eyebrow as if saying, “watch and learn, girl.”

  I pressed my lips together, aware it was time for me to shut up, even if I found his expression annoying.

  Like his father’s hands, Santiago became a blur, too. For a moment, I feared he might disappear. I couldn’t understand what was happening, how this—whatever it was—would help. I just prayed it would.

  Twisting my hands together, I knelt there, watching, for what felt like hours. No one said anything as Santiago remained nothing but a blur in time. Unable to distinguish his features, I couldn’t tell if he looked better or not. How much longer? I wanted to tell the man to hurry and help Tom, too, but I was so out of my depths.

  God, Santiago had to be okay. All three boys had to be okay. After what we’d been through, I felt some strange affinity to them, and I was sure it would devastate me if anything happened to any of them.

  I prayed harder.

  Just when I thought I couldn’t take it anymore, the man’s eyes stopped glowing and his hands slowed down. Gradually, Santiago came back into focus, the edges of his handsome features sharpening, then settling into perfect stillness.

  His previously pale face now beamed. His cheeks were flushed, and his lips had regained their pink color. The gashes on his neck had mended, leaving behind only dry blood to prove they’d ever existed.

  “Despierta, hijo,” the man said, brushing back Santiago’s brown locks.

  Carefully, he pressed a thumb to his son’s forehead and spoke a few words in a language I didn’t understand.

  Santiago’s eyes sprang open. He took a sharp inhale and sprang to a sitting position. He blinked, disoriented, his eyes darting from one expectant face to another.

  “Papá?”

  His father pulled Santiago into a tight embrace and held him, shuddering with relief. I clasped my hands over my mouth to stifle a sob as one of my many concerns fell off my shoulders.

  “Franco, you need to help Tom?” Brown-Dragon Guy gestured toward Tom, who lay shivering on the ground in a tight ball.

  Santiago’s father, Franco, pulled away from his son, a murderous expression on his face.

  “Que se muera,” he said in a low rumble that would have let any unsuspecting bystander know he wasn’t human—scaly pants aside.

  “No comprendo.” Brown-Dragon Guy pointed at his ear and shook his head.

  “I said, let him die,” Franco translated.

  “What?” I exclaimed. “No, you have to help him. Do your blurry thing on him. He’s hurt.”

  Franco turned his dark gaze on me as if noticing me for the first time.

  “You are the reason my son almost died,” he accused.

  “Dad, no,” Santiago said.

  “Me?” The word came out in an incredulous whisper.

  His response was a murderous look.

  “I’m the reason?” I rose to my feet and glared down on him. “Why don’t you try blaming Tara Palmer instead? Why don’t you try blaming yourself and all those other dragons hiding in your mirror island? You knew Tara had abducted a bunch of teens and still did nothing. You knew what she was up to and let it happen. Your son came here of his own accord to help. Clearly, he fell far from the tree. He’s by far a better person than you—not to mention a braver man.”

  Santiago lifted his chin, giving his father a satisfied sideways glance.

  “Go back to where you came from and keep being as useless as you’ve been so far,” I snapped. “I’ll figure something out on my own.”

  And with that, I whirled and went to Tom.

  He was still curled up, covered in the second blanket Brown-Dragon Guy had brought.

  As I knelt by Tom’s side, a hushed argument started behind me, but I ignored it. Dragons, aside from my three dragons, didn’t mean anything to me—not if they could act this callously.

  Tom, Ki, and Santiago had been watching over me since this started. I could see that now. They’d been trying to warn me and keep me safe even against their elders’ orders. They seemed the only decent ones in the bunch. Well, and maybe Brown-Dragon Guy, too.

  I leaned forward, lowering my face to his. “Tom,” I whispered.

  His blue eyes opened and looked at me for an instant, then lost their focus.

  “I’m so sleepy,” he mumbled, closing his eyes again.

  Sleepy? Could he have a concussion? Oh, God! My mind raced, thinking of ways I could get him out of here. Maybe I could build a cot with tree branches. Maybe he would be able to fly for just a bit and then—

  Santiago and Brown-Dragon Guy knelt on either side of me.

  “Fang can carry him,” Santiago said. “I’ll carry you. We’ll bring him to the hospital. We can say there was an accident and—”

  “I’ll heal him,” Franco said from behind us.

  We all turned to look at him.

  Fang—a nice Chinese name for a dragon—didn’t seem surprised by Franco’s change of heart. Judging by the knowing smile he wore, it seemed liked he’d expected nothing less from the man.

  I was still angry at him, but Tom came first. So I moved aside and let the man work his magic. The day of reckoning for his inaction would come soon enough.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Tom carried me on his back as he flew toward the moon.

  His wing was as good as new, and if he’d had a concussion, it was healed now. Santiago, starlight reflecting off his golden hide, flew to our right. Fang was on our left while Franco led the way. We were headed to Mirror Island where the few survivors had been taken by Ki and his father—after a series of events that wasn’t clear in my head yet.

  My hair flew backward in the wind, the same as my tears. Dad was gone, and I would never see him again. It was what my brain told me. My heart, on the other hand, refused to believe it. He could still be alive. Somehow.

  I leaned forward and rested my face on Tom’s long neck, looking for comfort. The sound of his deep breaths as air traveled to his lungs relaxed me somewhat. Absentmindedly, I caressed him, marveling at the smoothness of his scales as my hand traveled downward. There was no shade of blue to match the sheen that glinted off his wide shoulders. He was magnificent.

  Twisting his head to one side, Tom glanced at me. There seemed to be smile in his tight-lipped dragon expression, a glint in his blue eye that let me know he liked my touch. Would I ever get used to his eyes peering at me from behind that mythical face?

  The stars twinkled against the black sky. For a moment, I wished we could disappear into outer space and forget about the horrors we’d witnessed tonight.

  We had cleared the forest and were now flying over the lake. The moonlight reflected on the waves, winking at us. My lighthouse was visible but dim. It hadn’t been lit in God knew how long, the consequences of which I could not think about now.

  Franco dived and flew closer to the water. Tom followed suit, and so did the others. A light spray of water hit my face as Santiago playfully dipped a talon into the lake, breaking the placid surface. He winked a golden eye at me, coaxing a reluctant smile from my lips, then rose back up to our level. Watching him, it was hard to believe he’d been at the brink of death. He was back to his usual self, and the happiness this caused me was surprising to say the least.

  A strange whoosh made me sit up and abandon the solid comfort of Tom’s neck. I peered ahead, searching for Franco, but he was nowhere to be found. I was about to ask where he’d gone when Fang beat his wings faster and plunged toward the lake. Oh, God, was Fang following Franco underwater? I panicked. I didn’t want to go under the lake, not at this speed.

  Fang kept plunging until he was mere inches from the surface, then, abruptly, leveled off. He beat his wings twice more, propelling himself forward. Suddenly, his head disappeared.

  I gasped and watched as the rest of his elongated body was sucked in like a spaghetti noodle through an invisible mouth.

  Santiago went next, then Tom, and when I blinked again, we were landing on the same sandy be
ach I’d visited earlier.

  A group of people stood by the shore, about twenty of them, most I didn’t recognize. I slid off Tom’s back, jarring my injured shoulder as I hit the sand. I winced in pain. My balance was still off from my busted eardrum, but I knew that would heal. Fang had suggested Franco fix me, too, but I wouldn’t let Mr. Scaly Pants set his hands on me. I didn’t need his help.

  Now that I was here, the weight of the sword in its scabbard at my back reassured me.

  “Santiago!” A tall woman and a girl of about twelve peeled away from the group and ran at Santiago.

  He shifted into human form and the woman, who I assumed was his mother, wrapped him in a blanket, then a tight hug.

  “Estoy bien, Mamá,” Santiago said, then ruffled the little girl’s hair as she wiggled her arms around his waist and squeezed.

  A feeling of longing filled my heart at the sight on Santiago’s loving family. I’d lost half of that joy seven years ago and, today, I’d lost the remaining half. I put a hand on Tom to steady myself. I couldn’t give in to heartache now—not in front of those who had stood idle while Tara Palmer destroyed so many lives.

  Ki pulled away from the group next. He had blankets for Tom and Fang, who gently held them between their teeth and took a step behind me so I couldn’t see them shift. Ki ran nervous hands down his torso as if removing imaginary dust. His feet shuffled on the sand as he stared down.

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help more,” he said. “My dad and my brother…” A muscle in his jaw twitched. “They came to Barimont Bay to talk to Tara, but instead found me hauling kids out of the cave. Dad got mad and brought me back. At least we took the other ones out.” He shrugged.

  He was apologizing? He had no reason to feel embarrassed.

  “Ki,” I started, but he interrupted me.

  “I wanted to—”

  “Just be quiet,” I said, and threw my arms around his neck.

  He staggered backward a little, but quickly steadied himself and returned the hug. His warmth seeped into me, reaching the coldness that had started to settle in my core. He held me without saying a word, caressing my hair in gentle strokes. When I pulled away, he wiped away my tears with his thumb. His gaze brimmed with worry and something else I couldn’t decipher. For a moment, I was struck by his handsome features, his empathetic nature. I wanted to step into his embrace again, but I took a reluctant step back as his father approached us.