Once immersed in the soothing bath, I started to feel sleepy but then another feeling took over: arousal. That man, so tall and lanky and yet so strong. He’d flipped that table as if it was nothing and I imagined what muscles he must have underneath his well-tailored clothes. I imagined slipping them off and seeing his green eyes glow with anticipation. His white hair would drift over my bare breasts like the soft lavender suds. Would he lean down and let his lips lap at my nipples like the warm bath water?
“Oh, god, what am I doing?” I moaned.
Lust was rolling through my body in intense waves and I wished Maalik could see me. More than that, I wanted him to burst through my bathroom door and take me right there. Maybe on the soft and fluffy bathmat. Or propped against the sink. Or hard up against the bathroom door. Or, best of all, there in the sudsy hot water with me.
I couldn’t help but touch myself. I needed relief. I thought maybe if I exhausted myself then I could actually fall asleep but nothing worked. Maalik was still on my mind and I was hot as ever.
In fact, I was registering a fever by the time I had gotten dressed for work. I knew I should call in but I just had to go in. JJ’s Bar was my best chance of seeing him again and I was drawn to it despite feeling hot and sick. So, I took a few aspirin and headed for the door.
Chapter Eight – Maalik
“It’s just a common cold, Balor. Further proof, we rushed the claiming of the land ritual.” I was certain the waves of sickness I felt were just the result of first contact with the germs that seemed always to surround humans. Luckily, I trusted my dragon blood would conquer the infection quickly. “It’ll be gone in a few hours.”
“And I keep telling you this isn’t some silly human sickness. It’s the mating call.”
I marched across the room and towered over my advisor. “Feel my head. It’s burning.”
Balor glared up at me and refused to raise a hand. “I’m certain it is not a fever, but I’ll find a thermometer if you need the proof.”
Proof. That was exactly what I needed. My head was spinning from all the strange occurrences and my advisor’s wild theories were not helping. Still, I waved away the thought of the thermometer. Human instruments could not measure dragon blood accurately no matter how similar our bodies were when we had shifted.
“Perhaps all you need to do is sit down and rest.” Balor pulled out a chair at the reading table and gave me a sly look.”
I spied the pile of ancient texts he had spent half the morning annotating and snorted. “I’m not reading any more of your fairy tales about the mating call. It is impossible that I am mated to this human, to this Cora.”
Saying her name had a strange, shivering effect on me, powerful enough that I couldn’t hide it from Balor. I swore out loud and strode away to comfort my aches by the fireplace. It didn’t help that I had never succumbed to a cold in my life. The symptoms I felt were clearly not my own but I refused to admit they were tied to that woman.
Balor muttered something that sounded dangerously close to: “ignorant, stubborn worm,” and disappeared until early evening.
He nearly made me jump out of my skin when I returned to the kitchen looking for a snack. My hunger was enormous and I could not quell it, no matter how much I ate. Balor was sitting at the kitchen table while he checked over the resumes of potential staff members and his voice snapped with frustration.
“We had a full grocery delivery this morning, enough to feed five dragons for two weeks, and now we’re down by almost half,” he pointed out.
“I know, I know,” I snarled. “I saw your notes.” I shoved away the comprehensive list my advisor had created about the mating call and sat down with another cold sandwich. “This doesn’t prove anything.”
The older man sighed heavily. “And that is no way to treat your hunger. What you need is a warm, fatty meal to finally satisfy your stomach. I heard there’s a local favorite, some kind of mesquite burger and steak fries. Doesn’t that sound better?”
I didn’t agree right away but I did put down my dry sandwich. “Have you found a potential cook?”
Balor sorted through the resumes and nodded. “But he won’t be able to start for at least a week.”
I glanced back down at my sandwich but couldn’t pick it back up. My stomach was noisily growling and I could practically smell the junk food that Balor had suggested. “Fine, let’s go.”
I should have known it was a trick but my head was still foggy and I had focused in on food as a way of blocking out other thoughts. I knew the suffering I felt wasn’t my own and, despite my best efforts at intuition, I could not find another source of the pain. It was that woman. She was struggling, I felt it keenly, and I was not willing to admit how closely my experiences were starting to mirror Balor’s notes about the mating call.
Then he pulled into the parking lot of JJ’s Bar and all my senses zeroed in on her.
“What happened to all your worries about her being something else? No more concerns about her disguising her true nature?” I asked in a hoarse voice.
“I’ll admit your intuition is the keenest I’ve ever come across, but I’ve never met a dragon who could share another’s sight. It is the sign of an intense connection.” Balor switched off the car and turned to face me. “Try to see through her eyes and then tell me this isn’t the mating call.”
I wanted to refuse but my vision was already darkening around the edges. I saw the interior of the bar, hands pushing open the door of the women’s restroom. Then everything went blurry. “She’s crying. Balor, she’s very, very ill!”
I didn’t wait for him to respond. I rocketed from the car and strode across the parking lot, only managing to slow myself down enough not to terrify the humans when I burst through the door of the bar. There I paused long enough, not sure which way to go, and Balor was able to catch up.
“I told you, Maalik. It’s what happens when a human doesn’t answer the mating call. She will grow steadily worse until she expires,” he whispered urgently.
We both saw Cora come out of the women’s restroom but Balor put a restraining hand on my arm and the bar owner was able to reach her first. It was clear her boss and friend was concerned and encouraging her to go home and rest. Cora argued but finally hugged her and, over her shoulder, spied me.
Her eyes went wide and Balor didn’t need my intuition to say, “quick, Maalik, she’s going to run!”
We watched as she grabbed her coat and purse from behind the bar and then tried to dodge out the back door. Quick as a shot, I was out the front door and running around the squat building. I got to the back lot just in time to see Cora wavering. Weakness was overcoming her and I sprinted to catch her before she collapsed.
“She fainted. Balor, quick, bring the car around!”
My advisor shook his head. “We can’t take a human like that. It’s called kidnapping, Maalik. Think!”
“Cora? Cora, can you hear me? You need help and we’re going to help get you better.” I practically shouted in my panic.
Her eyes fluttered open and her lips tried to form a wan smile but she couldn’t muster any words before she fainted.
“She saw it was me. She wasn’t afraid. We’ll take that as consent. Get the car!”
Balor rushed to comply before anyone saw us. I knew how it would look, but now that I had touched Cora there was no way I could let her go. As soon as my arms wrapped around her, all the suffering of the day, all the hunger and pain, disappeared. The feel of her smooth skin against my hands was all the cure I needed, and I hoped the same was true for Cora. Her eyes remained closed and her body limp, but I thought the color around her lips and in her face brightened.
“Here, let me help you,” Balor said. He’d left the back seat of the car wide open.
“No!” I lifted her in my arms and turned her away from Balor, shielding her with my body as I passed my most trusted servant. Then I laid her gently on the backseat and climbed in to cradle her.
Balor said nothing
about my fiercely protective actions. He jumped into the driver’s seat and sped us back to the mansion without a word. There it was the same, I could not stand the thought of anyone else touching her and I carried her inside myself.
Even safe on the long sofa in front of the fireplace, I could not let Cora go. I cradled her again in my arms and stroked her pale forehead. I wanted to let her recover and I knew I should give the human some distance from my foreign grasp but the compulsion to be near her was too great.
“This is it, Balor,” I admitted in a quiet voice.
“It is,” he agreed without a trace of ‘I told you so.’
I looked up at him in despair. “My mate is human? Can you even imagine the ramifications this will cause with my family?”
“Your father may be the proudest Devereux that ever graced our kind, but he too knows the power of the mating call. I witnessed it when he met your mother,” Balor said.
“But a human! They are so delicate, so soft. She will need strength and protection.”
Balor gave me a rare, warm smile. “She will have you. And me.”
When Cora began to stir, I tried to pry myself away. I shooed Balor back to the fireplace so we wouldn’t scare her, but I was only able to move off the couch and kneel beside her, holding her hand. I didn’t want her to panic and ordered us both to act casual. Her eyes opened slowly and focused first on the fireplace.
“I’ve seen that fireplace before,” she whispered. Cora squeezed her eyes tight and then pried them open again.
“She shares your vision,” Balor said quietly, confirming the link between us.
“Don’t scare her, for god’s sake, Balor,” I hissed, scooting closer to Cora.
Cora focused on him with a confused look of fear and then she found me. Her weak fingers gave my hand a tentative squeeze and then she smiled. There wasn’t a trace of fear in her dark blue eyes as she stared up at me. “You. I’ve been dreaming of you.”
Chapter Nine – Cora
I felt fine. Seeing the fireplace I had envisioned was disconcerting, and the thick-armed man standing in front of it wasn’t the friendliest face I had ever seen, but all the sickness and hunger was gone. And Maalik was holding my hand.
His silken white hair was frazzled and his glowing green eyes squinted at me with concern. I felt his worry and his protection, and suddenly it didn’t seem so strange to wake up someplace I had never been.
“I fainted?” I asked.
Maalik nodded. “I apologize for bringing you here without your consent but I needed to make sure you were safe.”
I smiled. It was odd but I had never felt so safe in my entire life. The magnetic pull I had been chasing was right there in front of me and I could feel it pulsing back and forth between us like a heartbeat. He felt it too, I was sure, as his eyes dropped to our joined hands then lifted to smile back at me.
“Let me get you some water,” he said. Maalik released my hand and jumped up.
All the feelings rushed back: dizziness, a blaze of fever, and aches that rolled through my body like an avalanche. Maalik sloshed water over the side of the glass he was pouring and looked back at me in alarm. Did he feel what I felt?
He spilled more water in his rush to return to me and he clasped my fingers tight before putting the glass in my other hand. “It will pass, won’t it, Balor?”
The older man cleared his throat, not wanting to get into details, but said, “It will.”
I marveled at Maalik because the instant he touched me all the sickness disappeared again. The water glass I held shook and he plucked it from me and set it on a nearby table. Then he took up both my hands in his and I felt as if I could fly.
He must have noticed me gaping at him because Maalik smiled and introduced himself formally. “My name is Maalik Devereux. I grew up far from here but in a culture that shares many similarities. In fact, my home looks much like this forestland.”
The man named Balor cleared his throat again. “Human, Maalik, she’s human.”
Maalik nodded at that and jumped up. “Right. I know in your world, Cora, identification is important. I’ll show you my driver’s license but also my signet ring.”
As soon as our touch parted, I felt incredibly ill. He felt it too and pressed a shaky hand to his forehead as he pulled open the drawers of an antique desk. Maalik found what he was looking for and returned to me quickly. Just the press of his knee against my thigh was enough to end the sick feelings and bring a rush of relief and peace.
My mind was crowded with questions but only one squeaked out. “Signet ring?”
He nodded. “The mark of my family. The Devereux clan is an ancient one.”
The heavy ring felt like an extension of him and its weight comforted me. I clutched it as Balor cleared his throat again.
“You must tell her everything, Maalik. There can be no secrets,” Balor said.
“Slowly,” Maalik snapped. “It’s not something you can just dump on a human.”
The two men began to argue but all I could focus on is how often they referred to me as human. Did that mean they were something else? It would explain the strangeness of them. Everyone in town had sensed they were different and my head spun to hear them confirming it with their rapid-fire fight.
“It’s not science fiction or fantasy. Humans know the truth but prefer to hide it amongst silly stories and myths,” Balor snapped. “She’ll know you’re not lying.”
“She’s had enough of a shock waking up here and seeing your face,” Maalik retorted. “Why don’t you let me ease into the subject.”
“Dragons are not a subject, Maalik. We are a fact. Tell her who you are.”
“A dragon?” The word sounded ridiculous coming out of my mouth but both men immediately nodded.
Maalik turned to me and took my hand, and I could not deny the comfort of his touch even as his words confused and chilled me. “I believe your culture refers to our kind as ‘shifters.’ I am a dragon who shares the human form. Our species are closely tied and have lived side by side for millennia.”
I pulled my hand gently from his, counting on the press of our legs to keep my sickness at bay long enough for me to think. They were crazy men. They had to be. There was no way dragon shifters existed, much less showed up in Argo Heights.
“The two kinds share similar societies and lives,” the older man said. “In fact, there are increasing instances of mates between the species.”
“We believe that is why you’ve been feeling so ill,” Maalik said. He, at least, had the decency to look embarrassed. “The mating call has matched us despite our differences.”
Mating? All the alarm bells of my instincts went off at once and I jumped up. No matter how safe Maalik made me feel, there was no way I was sticking around to hear about some twisted mating ritual. I ran.
The two men let me go but the sickness caught up to me in the grand foyer. I pressed the palms of my hands to the silk wallpaper and tried to keep going but the dizziness dragged me down. Maalik called out and I could hear them coming down the hall, so I stumbled through a tiny door and slammed it behind me. I was trapped in a small but elegant powder room but at least the door locked.
There was a soft knock on the door. “You’re dizzy, Cora. I feel it too. Your stomach is roiling, your head is pounding, and your cheeks are blazing like they are on fire.”
I looked at myself in the mirror and could not deny he had named my symptoms exactly. “So, you know I’m sick. What does that prove?” I asked.
“We are connected, Cora. I know you’ve felt it too. And you know that I’m speaking the truth no matter how crazy it might sound.” Maalik’s voice wavered with the same illness I felt. “Please, Cora. We’ve shared visions. You’ve seen that fireplace through my eyes. Think about it.”
I knew it. The same way I always knew where to go in my travels. He was the magnetic pull that had drawn me to Argo Heights. And Maalik was telling the truth. I could even feel how he had fought against it himself. He
, more than anyone, understood.
“It’s not some spell cast to trick me,” I said more to myself than to him, though I heard him chuckle through the door. “Yeah, I know, you’re a dragon, not a witch.”
“Your intuition is very impressive, Cora. You are not a typical human,” he said.
There was no use hiding in the tiny powder room. I unlocked the door and faced the men in the foyer. Balor tried to give me a friendly smile and he stepped back so I had a clear shot at the door if I wanted to take it. Strangely, I did not.
What I wanted were answers.
“Show me,” was all I said.
Maalik nodded but Balor stepped forward and protested. “No! She’s not ready.”
“It is a reasonable demand,” Maalik argued. He stepped towards me.
Balor grabbed his shoulder and held him back. “She’s not the typical human, Maalik, but she is still a human. Her psyche is fragile. Once she sees your dragon form she’ll, what’s the phrase they use? She’ll freak out.”
Maalik shook off the old man. “She’s heard the truth, now she needs to see it.”
I stepped forward and took Maalik’s hand as I spoke to the intimidating Balor. “You seem certain we are connected. So, if what you believe is true, then you know I can face anything as long as he is near me.”
Balor let one bushy eyebrow rise a millimeter. “And what if this truth crushes your reality and ruins your mind? You will hurt him, you know.”
Maalik snorted and our hands gripped each other tighter. I felt the strength emanating from him and flowing between us. Together our intuition sharpened and I smiled.
“You want us to bond against a common enemy,” I pointed out.
Balor let out a bark of laughter. “Very impressive, Miss Cora. I hope, for all our sakes, that your reaction to the turning is equally impressive.”
Chapter Ten – Maalik
Cora looked at me with her big, blue eyes and I felt a cold sweat break out on my brow. I hadn’t felt this awkward about the turning since I was a teenage dragon. As children, dragons are at ease with their existence and shift back and forth without issue. I tried to take a deep breath and remember that effortlessness but my nerves were all tangled.
Silver Dragon Page 4