by Celeste Raye
“Are you crazy?” I whispered in anger.
“Just daring,” he said with a wink in his tone and shook my hand off his arm, walking further toward the white shifter.
Her eyes were a deathly black, larger set than the males I had seen. In fact, I had never met a female shifter, though I had heard of their scarce presence on Dobromia.
He wings were long and feathered, as opposed to scaled like the males. She held a long spear in her right hand and wore next to nothing; a simple, golden armor covering her breasts and plate armor covering her thick, muscular legs. She looked feminine and yet strong, long lashes flicking up to Vaikrand when she caught sight of him.
“You’re a brave one,” she said in a sexy, smooth tone. She flicked her wings back as though tickled by his presence. She tilted her head back and I watched her beautiful square jaw take shape with envy.
“Stupid, I’m told,” he said with no small ounce of charm. With a quick gesture he called me to him.
I swallowed hard and stepped out from behind the great stone pillar. The female’s eyes widened, though I couldn’t tell her pupil from the oversized blackness that invaded her eyes.
It was clear that she recognized me as the missing prisoner and she looked back to Vaikrand with her jaw dropped.
“Stupid,” she repeated with a laugh. “Hello,” she nodded to me.
I raised a hand in a greeting and stood halfway behind Vaikrand, shyly avoiding the females gaze.
“Nephra, I need a favor,” he said in a playful, pleading tone.
“You always do,” she sing-songed back to him.
“I need to get in there,” he said, laughing into his hands at the ridiculousness of his request. I looked up at the immense wooden doorway and frowned at the female shifter. Whatever was behind the doors wasn’t making itself clear to me.
Nephra flicked her wings as if to straighten them out and shook her head. “Not a chance,” she oozed.
“I have leverage,” he warned with a grin, raising his finger to the air.
She cocked her head to the side and leaned back, crossing her legs as she stood. With a chuckle she said, “As in?”
“I could tell the D’Sharr what you stole from her when you were serving at the palace,” he cocked a mischievous brow, speaking of their king’s wife.
“You,” she corrected, “are banished.”
“Sorry,” I said slowly, now stepping out slightly from Vaikrand’s shadow. “Who are you?”
The woman looked me over with hesitation, as though I were an enemy to be squashed. As though she wondered why in the world I was traveling around with Vaikrand. Then something seemed to register in her eyes, a look of surprise subtly coming over her features. She frowned and looked back to Vaikrand.
The knowledge was shared between them was kept private, but whatever it was seemed powerful.
“I see,” she said to Vaikrand and then reached up to hug him, pushing her black curls behind her wings. She wrapped two beautiful arms around his neck and he drew her into an embrace. The white scales along her creamy skin gave her an ethereal quality that made me feel intimidated.
“She’s my sister,” Vaikrand finally said, turning back to me.
“Ah,” I said and looked the two of them over. “No family resemblance.”
“That’s because I got all the looks,” she laughed, then went serious again at the sight of me. “Literally a second,” she said as a warning to Vaikrand. “Then you have to leave.”
He swallowed, and the two exchanged another private look.
“Thank you,” he said and pushed past her to the door. “I trust you’ll warn us if a soldier should come by.”
She grinned at us. “If you say so!”
Vaikrand seemed amused by this and took my hand, pushing us into the mysterious room ahead. I thought of the strange exchange I had just witnessed and couldn’t help but think back on how Vaikrand said he had been banished for trying to steal food for his family. Why didn’t they banish her, as well?
We stepped into the small room and my eyes shot wide. “No,” I said, unbelieving, halting at the door and giving a pleading look. “You can’t use babies against me. That’s against the rules!”
He laughed and leaned against the back wall, crossing his arms in the process. “I don’t believe we ever established rules.”
I looked around at the oil painted walls: a rainbow of vibrant pastels. Blues and pinks and yellows. The floor was a soft, squishy substance that was covered by dyed fur. All white. Little babies were everywhere, as cute as little half dragon buttons. I couldn’t even deny that their little scales and tails made them seem that much cuter. Like a sweet little pet you just couldn’t put down.
“This is a dirty tactic,” I said with a laugh, looking down at the dragonlings with adoring, cupped eyebrows.
“I showed you the eggs,” he argued with a breath.
“Yeah,” I said in a sing-song tone. “Eggs are different. At least I could be creeped out by those!”
He blinked in surprise. I figured that to him the eggs probably were cute. They were precious; their life’s blood; their descendants. To me they just spelled trouble.
The little ones frolicked around the room with an indescribable joy. They shifted in and out of their dragon forms without any regard, probably unable to control it just yet.
One little boy with icy-blonde hair and aqua scales turned to regard a gingered, freckled red female with a smile. Upon seeing she was about to play a game with another little boy shifter, the aqua one ran toward her, shifting in and out of dragon form. His tail shrunk and grew as fast as a snap so that he tumbled down toward the girl, scaring her in the process.
The little boy stood up with chubby cheeks and a red face as the little girl stared at him in shock. When the silence broke, the little ginger pointed at him and laughed before trouncing off with another Weredragon.
“They’re called dragonlings,” Vaikrand whispered.
“Aww!” I squeaked out without even knowing it. I raced over to the icy-blonde boy as he cried and scooped him into my arms instinctively.
“Hello,” I said with a smile, bouncing him in my arms and tracing a finger over his sweet little tears. “My name is Athena,” I said. “What’s yours?”
“M-M-Marrek,” the boy sniffed out through his tears, perhaps even more embarrassed now that I had called attention to his cries.
“That looked like it hurt,” I said in my best ‘talking to a baby’ voice. “You must be pretty tough to take a fall like that!”
Marrek’s eyes beamed, a wide purple iris expanding with delight. A smile crept up his lips and spread to the apples of his cheeks. “Yeah!” he said, sounding more confident now. “I shift unduoua rinokra,” he said in broken English.
I giggled at the boy as though I understood and looked over to Vaikrand for a translation.
“He learned to shift at an earlier age than his father did,” he said with a grin.
“That’s amazing,” I said with a giant breath, covering my mouth in a proud mock-shock. “You want to show me?”
The little boy looked at me with a small amount of confusion and looked to Vaikrand, who translated to Dobromian for me. The little ones must have been learning English from some of our crew, I thought.
Marrek squirmed away from me and hopped into the air. I gasped for a moment and then watched as his wings fluttered out from his back in the blink of an eye and he soared easily to the ground. He flapped them with pride as he landed. I stared in wonder. The little one couldn’t have been any older than two years, yet he could do more with his body than I ever could.
I clapped in excitement and looked to Vaikrand with a smile. He followed my lead, clapping for the young boy before whispering something in Dobromian to him.
The little boy was plastered with a joyful expression and he tumbled off to the corner of the room.
“I told him to go get her,” Vaikrand said with a raise of his brow.
“You’re
bad,” I laughed. “So… this is supposed to change my mind, huh?”
“No,” he paused and suddenly the smile vanished from his face. He pulled me over to the only other door in the room and we stepped through. There were dozens of sickbeds filled with children. They were pale and gave shallow breaths like a discomforting echo that sounded only a few times throughout the room.
“This is,” he said.
I set my jaw and my eyes traced the perimeter of the room. I was a soldier, sure. But I had always, always been a baby person. Ever since I was little I had always liked being around children. And the sight of this was the most disheartening thing I had ever seen.
My heart sank over and over, like I was on a ride. I swallowed and stared down at my stomach; a creeping sensation flowing through my body that racked me with guilt and anticipation.
“I’ve seen enough,” I said. “Let’s go.”
“This is what’s happening to our young,” he argued. “They used to have nurseries all over the pit, and now the king has seen fit to stop feeding them. To supply food to his soldiers over our young.”
“You’ve made your point,” I snapped, looking away from the sight.
Just then, a young brunette walked in the room. Carol… No. Cora. She was one of the soldiers on my ship.
We locked eyes with a frightened intensity and she bit her lip. I went to reach for my gun, but she raised her hands in quick defense and shook her head.
“I’m just checking on the kids,” she said sweetly. “Just standing here, checking for fevers, and, you know,” she shrugged, looking away from us and teetering out nervously, “Talking to myself.” She laughed. “Again.”
“Let’s go,” I said and grabbed Vaikrand’s arm. As we made our quick exit, I turned to face Cora before we left, mouthing a silent ‘thank you’ to her and fleeing from the pit.
Chapter 10 - Vaikrand
Vaikrand
“Who could do that to their own children? Aren’t parents supposed to do whatever is necessary to protect their young? Like, isn’t that a thing?” Athena raved. “Does the king know about this?”
We arrived back at our camp two cycles ago and all through the morning she would rant and rave about the conditions in the nursery. She’d stopped sleeping. She ate meals with a guilty hesitance. Everything seemed, different now.
“Most of them are his children,” I answered simply, a shrug threatening to crop at my shoulders. “He knows. He’s the one doing this, Athena. This is how desperate we’ve become.”
The beautiful blonde ran her tongue across her bottom lip, continuing to pace in an incensed rage. I couldn’t say I wasn’t happy to see her furious. She stopped pacing and shot me an annoyed glare. “You shouldn’t have brought me there,” she said, her voice thick with emotion.
“No, that’s exactly what I should have done,” I said with a victorious smile. “Now you get it.”
Athena watched me smile and rolled her eyes; an irritated smirk creeping up the side of her lips as well. “You’re sick,” she said factually and shook her head.
“Admit it,” I chuckled, crossing my arms.
“Admit what?”
“You want to help,” I said carefully, watching her face contort as she began scrubbing off our latest kill before tossing the strips she’d sawn off onto the grate she’d created over the fire.
She stared down for a moment and inhaled deeply. Then she looked up at me and said, “I want to help. You win.”
“Then help me,” I said.
“Vaikrand,” she rolled her eyes. “What? What do you want me to say?” I went to speak and she raised a hand quickly to silence me. “You want me to give you the coordinates for the Earth, right? You understand why I can’t do that, obviously?”
“We need you,” I pleaded. “We need it. Please, Athena.”
“I knew it!” She fumed. “This whole time you’ve just been… using me! Worming your way into my life so that I would feel sorry for you!”
“No,” I said firmly and approached her, unable to grab her due to the severe pacing she had resumed. “Athena, that’s just what happened.”
“So, what do you want me to do? Betray my people? Not just my sister,” she scoffed, “but my entire race?”
“No,” I shook my head. “It doesn’t have to be like that. We don’t have to include the D’Karr.”
She braided her hair back and fastened it with a knot at the bottom before throwing it behind her shoulder. She huffed and looked at me stubbornly. “What does that mean?”
“We get the dragonlings and we go to Earth. I shift to a human form and… and no one’s the wiser.”
She frowned deeply and walked over to me, placing a patronizing hand on my cheek. “Sweetheart, those kids can barely stay in one form. Now you want to ask them to pretend to be human? No, no way. Besides, once MILLIE gets ahold of them, seeing us coming in from Dobromia…” She shook her head, speaking of her strange Earth organization. “They’ll know right away. They’ll want to keep you for testing. No.”
My eyes were downcast and I pursed my lips, sitting down by the fire and reaching my claws in to turn the meat.
“Then what?” I asked.
“Well,” she brushed a hand up against her bare arm and shrugged bashfully. “Lenovius,” she said simply.
“What about it?”
She blinked. “You know where it is?”
My stomach flipped. “Yeah, why?”
“Aurlauc told me the D’Karr was planning on sending the shifters there on a mission. They think there’s food there. If you can bring it back, maybe… I dunno… Like you said, maybe they’ll accept you back. You can give it to the kids.”
My eyes brightened and then dimmed immediately. “You’ve known this the whole time and never told me?”
“You hadn’t convinced me to trust you or feel sorry for you yet, remember?”
“No, no,” I laughed. “I’m impressed.”
“We’d just need a ship to get there,” she said thoughtfully, looking skyward as I removed our prey from the fire, laying it on a strip of seagrass to cool.
I swallowed hard and sighed outwardly. “Okay, now here’s the part where I say I’ve also been…” I hesitated nervously.
She looked at me with quizzical eyes; darkening irises as she noted the guilt on my face. “What?” she asked grimly.
“I found something,” I said.
With a breath, I scooped her into my arms and we flew out to the northern point of Westfall. We walked through the slanted spires down the mossy path and soon it became clear there was a ship in the distance.
“Is that a ship?” she whispered.
My eyes fell and I gave a nod. “That’s a ship.”
“Are we going to steal it?” she whispered, peeking ahead at the green hull.
“Why are you whispering?” I asked in a normal tone, my heart racing and the adrenaline catching up with me as I spotted an army of shifters in the distance, crowded around the ship.
“Shit,” I whispered and signaled for Athena to duck down. I crouched down to her and grabbed her by the shoulders, a terrified breath escaping my lips. “Run.”
She locked eyes with mine and we stayed like that, gripped by fear for just a moment before she nodded, obeying obediently and taking off back toward our camp.
I swallowed and felt a shake run through my core. I took to the sky and approached the ship carefully. The D’Karr’s army, just as I thought. I landed in front of them and saw my sister among them.
“Nephra,” I said coarsely as I landed.
The army of shifted Weredragons looked ready for a fight, but Nephra stepped out in front of the group.
“My brother!” she announced loudly to the D’Karr’s representatives. “See! He has found the prisoner in honor of our D’Karr’s wishes!”
My heart sank.
No.
“Nephra, what are you doing?” I seethed in a whisper through my gritted teeth.
She approached me
with watchful eyes. “It’s the only way to get you back,” she snapped silently. “Now give the girl to us.”
I stared out over the array of colored shifters and felt a nervous energy form among them due to my silence.
“He has the girl in captivity,” my sister called out before the crowd. “Right, brother?”
I swallowed and imagined the ways in which they would kill us both if I admitted she was with me: how they would kill my sister if I lied. My stomach flipped and I felt still as a stone.
“He has her,” came the sure tones of Khrelan, the navy shifter who had once been a dear friend of Aurlauc. Surely, he must have known this ship was there because of his friend. He must have known Aurlauc had tried to free her. And now he, the D’Karr’s favorite in lieu of his son, would get the glory for returning Athena to The Tower.
Without a word, Khrelan took to the sky and began flying south, back toward Athena, and I followed him quickly.
Within an instant the skies were darkened with shifters splaying their wings wide in an attempt to gain speed before the rest.
Khrelan was the first to land: navy scales buckling against the ground and a loud laugh forming as he grabbed Athena by the hair.
I roared out and my sister dug her claws into my shoulder in the air. I spun around to face her and she saw the pain in my face.
“Don’t do this,” she whispered. “You are all I have.”
“And she is all I have,” I struck back, throwing her away from me mid-air.
Athena fought against the navy shifter’s grasp and screamed a harrowing call as he whipped her around, grabbing her by the neck and raising her to the rest of the shifters.
A roar of applause formed among the crowd as they began to land, one after another like fallen stars. I set myself down in front of them and Athena looked at me with dead eyes, a false knowledge that her fears of betrayal had been right all along.
“Athena,” I said firmly and she set her jaw.
I watched as she reached for her weapon and screamed, “Athena, don’t!” just as the laser blasted into Khrelan’s side.
The shifter’s eyes went wide with a rage and a flurry of wings spread out before me as Weredragon’s swooped in to restrain the girl. They all knew that she was no good to them dead and so kept careful grips on her, even as she kept firing her weapon. A purple dragon grabbed her hard and finally let a claw release into her shoulder.
