by Lily Cahill
She rolled her eyes. “All that bluster for just a little blood.”
“You could have warned him,” Felicity cut in sharply. Her fingertips brushed lightly over the skin that had been marred by the wounds. He couldn’t tell he had ever been hurt; there was no tenderness at the site. He reached up to catch her hand, squeezing it with his.
“I’m fine,” he told her. Her eyes softened, and he smiled. The sight of her brought him such peace. A moment ago he’d been so angry with the old witch; now he felt calm. It was like Felicity was his touchstone for all things good in the world.
The witch continued to shake the vial, not bothering to give either of them a response. Before their eyes, the liquid turned a bright, vivid purple. It was vibrant in a way the one in the hospital hadn’t been. Instinctually, Damien knew this was a good sign.
She held up the glass to the light, peering at it with squinted eyes, then nodded decidedly. “Right then,” she said. She took her hand off the vial, but it continued to float where she had held it, and then glided over to Felicity smoothly.
Felicity caught it in an outstretched hand. She inspected it, and Damien could see the emotions dueling over her face; relief, excitement, anxiety. When Felicity looked at the witch, she nodded decisively. “Thank you.”
The witch returned the gesture. “If I’m not mistaken, and I never am, you only have a few more hours to give the potion to that sister of yours. Which is very annoying because the rest of them are late, too.” She gave a long-suffering sigh. “Mr. Dragomir, why is no member of your family as prompt as one would hope?”
The rest of them. She couldn’t mean his brothers, could she?
“They’re coming?” He could feel Felicity’s eyes on his face, searching his features, but he couldn’t look back at her.
“I would hope so, since they argued about it long enough.” The witch got to her feet, hobbling back behind the dark counter. There must have been a stool or something that she stood on, as her weathered face suddenly popped up. She rested her elbows there and turned to watch a clock that he could have sworn had not been hanging up on the wall just a moment before.
“Who are you?” Felicity asked. She moved in close to Damien’s side, warm and strong. He couldn’t resist the urge to touch her and placed a hand on her back.
The witch sighed. “What a boring question. As if my name makes any difference.”
“Please,” Damien said. “Tell us.”
“I am no one. And everyone. I have been the guiding hand of kings and queens. I know the past, the present, and the future.” She turned her face toward the pair of them, and she looked ancient and otherworldly. Her eyes were cloudy and distant, like she could see far beyond them, beyond this conversation, this room, this town. “I wrote the prophecy which has dictated the course of both your lives.”
Damien’s breath caught in his chest. “What?”
There was a chime as the front door burst open, his brothers spilling in through it. They looked harried and angry, all three of them frowning and casting their eyes about.
Vincent saw them first. He took a step toward Damien then paused and gave Felicity a suspicious look. “Damien, are you okay?”
Damien nodded. He motioned toward Felicity, who was holding the vial. “I am. We both are. I want to introduce Felicity Morningstar.”
Felicity moved closer to him, and he knew she needed him, his strength, his protection. His fierce girl was intimidated, though she was doing her damnedest not to show it.
“What are you doing in here?” Arryn asked. He glanced around, and Damien saw him take in the room. It had changed, although Damien couldn’t say when. It looked as it had the day before, with shabby furnishings. Even the old TV with its rabbit ears sat in the corner.
Felicity blinked as she looked around, apparently just as taken aback by the changes in the room. It was one thing to fool him; shifters had their own kind of magic in their abilities, but they weren’t inherently magical, not like witches. He couldn’t manipulate the laws of the world as a witch could. To know that Felicity had been just as insensible to the changes going on around them as he himself had been spoke to the amount of power they had just witnessed.
He glanced around, looking for the witch, but she was nowhere to be found. This didn’t surprise Damien as much as it might have the day before.
She had written the prophecy. She had brewed the potion to save Felicity’s sister. She had told him to go to Felicity. He had so many questions, and from the look on Felicity’s face, she did as well.
“We almost walked right past this place,” Blayze said. He looked around, skeptically observing everything around him. “It looks like it has been closed for years.”
“We have to go.” Felicity looked up at Damien, her beautiful face screwed up in concern. “We don’t have much time. We need to get the potion to Joy’s doctors.” She turned to his brothers, shoulders back, chin high. She spoke calmly, sounding every inch the ruler she’d never intended to be. “I understand why none of you trust me, and I know what it will mean for all of your lives if I use this potion. It’ll be impossible for Damien to keep his secret about being a dragon, or a Dragomir. Once the press knows that Joy is alive, they’re going to want answers.”
“And I intend to give them those answers,” Damien interjected. He could feel his brothers’ eyes on him, heavy with surprise. He met them all head on, not flinching away. He was done feeling scared, or living a half-life. “I will keep your names out of it, if you prefer, but I would like for all of us to embrace this change, together. We are the last dragons on earth, the remains of the Dragomir line. I am ready to own that.”
Arryn frowned. “But the prophecy—”
“Don’t you see?” Felicity cut in. “It said you would follow your parents—but it didn’t say to death. Everyone has always assumed it meant death, but then the end of the prophecy makes no sense if you believe that. Maybe you’re meant to follow your parents into ruling. When new bonds are formed, and old sins forgiven.” She took Damien’s hand in her own. “That’s a prophecy on its own.”
Damien felt shock run through to his bones, as well as an incredible weight lift off his shoulders. She was right. She had to be right. Why would the witch bring the pair of them together and help them save Joy if all they were going to do was bring death or destruction in their wake?
New bonds formed and old sins forgiven. The Valdez’s betrayal.
Turning to Felicity, Damien caught her face in his hands and kissed her gently, once. “I love you,” he told her. “And I forgive your family.”
The room filled with a brilliant white light.
Chapter Thirteen
Felicity
WHEN THE LIGHT DISSIPATED, ALL five of them were standing in what looked like the break room of the hospital. Dr. Chen was sitting at a long white table, her fork full of spaghetti and halfway to her mouth. She stared at them.
“I was just …,” she looked down at her plate and then back up at them. “I was taking twenty minutes for dinner and you just … appeared.”
Felicity held up the bright purple vial, still clutched in her hand. Dr. Chen’s eyes tracked it, then flew wide open. Her fork clattered to her plate, forgotten.
“That’s the exact color described in the grimoire we were using.” She stood and walked around the table, coming close. “That’s it. Felicity, you’ve done it.”
Felicity could barely keep back the hopeful feeling rising in her chest. It would work, she was sure of it. The old witch was more than she appeared—she was something great and powerful, something ancient. And she had chosen to help them.
She looked up at Damien, his handsome profile. All of them.
Dr. Chen grabbed the vial and was already halfway out the door, talking about administering techniques, and did Felicity have more of this brewed or was it their only batch. The questions flowed over Felicity, and she heard and answered them in a daze. She was aware that she was following Dr. Chen down the hall,
and that Damien and his brothers were following her, but she didn’t feel connected to the moment. It was like she was floating above the scene, rather than experiencing it firsthand.
When they reached Joy’s room, her sister looked nearly as pale as the white sheets. There were dark bruises beneath her eyes. She looked like she was halfway to the grave.
“What if it’s too late?” Felicity asked between numb lips.
Damien didn’t answer, just kissed her temple.
There were murmurs behind her as a needle was inserted into the vial and injected into the crook of Joy’s elbow, but they sounded indistinct and muffled. Felicity blinked heavily, suddenly more tired than she could ever remember being in her entire life.
Her knees gave out beneath her. The last thing that she remembered were Damien’s strong arms reaching behind her shoulders to catch her, and then she was gone.
Sunlight. Felicity blinked and then groaned as it blinded her. She turned over onto her stomach so she could bury her face in her pillow.
Her pillow. It was her pillow. She sat up, glancing around her. She was in her room in the apartment above The Witch’s Brew. Everything looked as it always had, but she was strangely alone. She wasn’t sure what she had expected. Her memories felt strangely foggy, like she couldn’t sort them out clearly in her own head.
Damien had come to her, and they had—she blushed at the memories of what they had done after they’d first thought they’d saved Joy. And then she’d told off her mother, and gone to see a crazy witch, and—
She’d fainted while they’d been trying to save Joy. Was she okay?
Felicity threw off the covers and scrambled to her feet. Someone had changed her into an oversized T-shirt and pajama pants, and she didn’t bother to find anything more acceptable. It didn’t matter what she was wearing, only that she found her sister, figured out what had happened.
She barreled into the hallway, running toward Joy’s room and throwing open the door.
Empty. It was empty. It looked just as messy as it had before Joy had gotten ill, the same clothes still strewn about her floor. Felicity’s heart kicked in her chest. Had it not worked? Was Joy …?
“Felicity Maria Gloriana Valdez,” came a familiar voice calling from the living room. “Get your butt out here. Your boyfriend is on TV and the camera loves him.”
Joy.
Felicity bolted at top speed to the living room, where Joy was sitting on the couch, surrounded by an absurd amount of pillows on all sides. There was a saline drip connected to her arm, and she looked pale, but she was sitting up and talking and so wonderfully, gloriously alive.
Tears welled up in Felicity’s eyes, and she let them come. For once, she didn’t care about being strong. Joy was safe, having received a second miracle. Felicity moved in close, knocking away some of the pillows so she could sit next to her sister, tuck herself into her side.
She cried into Joy’s T-shirt, unable to stop herself.
“Miss Valdez.” Someone was talking, someone Felicity didn’t recognize. She looked up and saw a nurse in sensible shoes looking down on her with a slight smile. “I’m Nurse Marta. Mr. Dragomir hired me to take care of your sister. He’s barely left your side for the past day and a half, and before he left he swore to me you’d wake up while he was gone.” She nodded, small and polite. “Looks like he was right.”
“Damien hired you …?”
There was so much happening, and none of it made much sense. Felicity tried to clear away the cobwebs clouding her brain, but it was difficult. She felt like she’d been asleep for a million years.
Joy interrupted her train of thought. “He insisted on me recuperating at home, once I woke up, and Dr. Chen said it’d be okay as long as I had someone to look after me. Thus, Nurse Marta, here. You were so out of it, he just sort of stepped up and took care of everything. He would still be here now if he didn’t have the interview.”
Felicity looked toward the TV, where a sensibly dressed female reporter sat next to … Damien. Her boyfriend looked distinctly uncomfortable under the bright lights, but Joy was right. The camera loved him.
A surge of happiness went straight through Felicity. And he loved her.
“And we’re back with Damien Dragomir,” said the reporter, her voice overly bright and cheery. “After twenty years in hiding, Mr. Dragomir recently reappeared in the small magical community of Augustus, Pennsylvania, where he helped to save the life of one of the Valdez heiresses.”
Damien smiled stiffly, ducking his head.
“Damien, every school child knows of the magical uprising that took place twenty years ago. The Valdez coup was thought to have killed not only your family, but also every dragon in existence at the time. You’ve told us a little bit about your mother’s heroics, and how you and your brothers just barely managed to survive these past few decades. But tell me, was it a tough decision, to step forward and save the daughter of the man who was directly responsible for the worst moments of your life?”
There was a moment of quiet as Damien frowned, his brow furrowing. He seemed to be lost in thought, and Felicty’s heart ached for him. She couldn’t undo her father’s actions, and she couldn’t make right what he had done while leading the Valdez family. But she could do better, be better.
Their love was destined, prophesied. She couldn’t change Damien’s past, but she would do her best to build their future together into something beautiful.
He’d rule by her side, she knew. They’d reunite the lines and create a new order in the magical world.
“The short answer is no,” Damien said, finally responding to the question. The reporter looked taken aback, giving him a quizzical look. Damien smiled politely in return. “It wasn’t a popular decision among my brothers, which I think is understandable—after all, we’ve spent most of our lives in fear of the prophecy that predicted our parents’ deaths. But then I—I met and fell in love with Felicity Valdez, and I’ve found that it gave me a courage I didn’t have before. I would risk anything for her. So, no. Saving her sister was not a difficult decision.”
Felicity felt her eyes go wet again, and she dropped her head into her hands, smiling against her palms. There was a vicious poke into her sensitive side, and Felicity yelped, glaring at Joy without much heat.
“He sacrificed everything for you,” Joy said, a sly smile curling the corner of her mouth. “He saved me for you.”
Felicity could feel her face heating up. “Shut up.”
“I won’t! My big sister is in love with a total dish, and I am proud of her.” Joy was full out grinning, but her expression softened into something more serious. “I won’t forget this, you know. I’m done. I almost died, and I—I understand, now, why you were always nagging at me to change. I’m not a kid. I need to—I need to grow up.” She sat up a little straighter. “Is rehab still an offer on the table?”
“It’s not so much an offer as it is a mandate from the ruler of the magical world,” Felicity responded. “Which, as it happens, is me.”
Joy rolled her eyes, but she nodded. “I know. I understand. Just—please forgive me. I didn’t mean to ….”
“You’re forgiven.” Felicity didn’t even need to consider it. She loved Joy completely, unconditionally. “Just get better. Do you promise?”
Nodding solemnly, Joy said, “I promise.”
The interview lasted nearly another hour, with each Dragomir brother taking a short turn in front of the cameras. Felicity didn’t know Damien’s brothers well, but as each stepped forward to talk a little about himself, she felt intensely grateful to them. Blayze flirted with the reporter, the camera, everyone and everything. Vincent was reserved but polite, and Arryn was just shy of standoffish, but the fact that they had showed up, had owned their true last name in support of their brother, and in a way, in support of her—it meant the world.
Toward the end of it, Joy started to nod off. The nurse needled her to go to her room to rest, ignoring all of Joy’s protests until she f
inally gave in and shuffled away.
Watching her sister’s retreating form, still attached to fluids to help rehydrate her, Felicity felt stronger than she had in a long time. She’d done it; she had helped to save Joy when all the odds had been against her. She’d claimed her rightful place as a bargaining chip, a way to get access to the TV crews and cameras she needed to get out her message.
What was she going to do with that power, now?
She would have to move back to New York City, most likely, and take up the mantle. The systems had changed in the past twenty years, democratic elections were the norm and she and her family were more figureheads than anything else. That didn’t mean she was without responsibility, however. Her job would be one of diplomacy, of forging ties within the magical communities in other countries, seeking to unite the magical world at large.
She’d never felt capable of that, before, but now she had managed to find and make peace with the Dragomir prince. She was sure she could do anything, especially if Damien was by her side.
As if he knew she was thinking of him, there was the sound of the door downstairs as it rattled against its frame, footsteps on the stairs. Felicity could feel his presence as he got closer and closer, and she stood, eyes on the door, as it swung open.
Damien’s eyes found hers as soon as he was inside, and then suddenly he was there, inches from her, his hands tilting back her head so that he could kiss her deeply. His mouth moved against hers, insistent but sweet.
He pulled back only enough to rest his forehead against hers.
“You’re awake,” he breathed.
“That, or this is one hell of a dream,” she replied, smiling. She felt rather than saw him return the gesture.
His lips moved to her cheek, to just below her ear, to her neck. They kept up their gentle ministrations, and Damien murmured between his kisses.
“I was so worried when you passed out. Dr. Chen said it was just exhaustion, and when Joy woke up, she refused to stay put, or let you stay there without her.” He laughed a little, the feeling electric against Felicity’s skin. “She’s a bit of a pistol.”
