by N L Nold
“Where is Drogan?”
They continued looking between the men as their angry shouts went unanswered. The crowd began to close in on the bar blocking the exits.
The men were still slightly huddled frantically murmuring. Reign had enough, now was the time to act not to talk, besides if they waited much longer Drogan was sure to wake and be pissed.
Dealing with a fight from one side was bad enough they didn’t need an angry Drogan flanking them too.
Reign pushed off the wall and right towards the men. Making her way through the huddle and shoving past. Eerikki reached out and grabbed her arm, but as soon as rain shot a scathing look over her shoulder the fae quickly released her.
Maybe they weren’t as dumb as she thought. She crouched down and leapt on top of the bar. The gathered men suddenly went quite. She released her wings and funneled the power into the runes on each hand one taking on a white glow and the other encasing itself in black shadow.
“Now boys, I know you have all been here on fight nights before.”
A wicked grin split her face.
“I understand most of you are just dumb farm boys who come here for a drink and quick fuck but are you really stupid enough to think you would escape a fight with me with your life or dignity intact?”
Pausing for dramatic effect and sweeping her gaze across the room she noted the questioning glances on the men’s faces.
“I’ll give you one chance to walk away those who haven’t by the time I count to five won’t live to see another miserable day of your lives.
“One”
She forced the shadow up her arm.
“Two”
The light followed in a trail up her other arm.
“Three”
She spread her wings to their full width.
“Four”
The runes on her wings lit up. Four was as far as she got every man but her three supposed rescuers was gone from the tavern. Reign retracted her wings and released the magic as she leapt down from the bar with the grace of an apex predator. The boys stood there with varying degrees of shock and amusement.
“Patience isn’t a virtue I possess, and you were clearly not thinking with the correct brain for the job.”
Abban whispered under his breath.
“Drak me”.
Reign smirked and called over her shoulder as she began walking to the door.
“Maybe, if you’re lucky mage,”
Maikoh spoke up.
“Damn that’s one hell of a woman.”
Reign giggled to herself and walked out of the Trollip for the last time in her life or so she hoped. Walking out the front door as a free woman was the best feeling in the world.
Reign felt as if a weight was lifted off her shoulders. She breathed in the fresh night air closing her eyes and allowing her senses to expand to the world around her.
She felt her wings expand behind her, the chill of the night seeping into her skin and cooling the fire that constantly raged inside her.
She could hear the sounds of the night clearly an owl hooted in the distance, the wind whistled through the trees of the forest, and the soft gurgle of a nearby brook filled her ears.
She sensed the men behind her before she heard them, Eerikki was the first to speak. Directing his question to one of the other men.
“Are you seeing this?”
Abban’s voice came next colored with awe.
“She’s glowing”.
Soft footsteps sounded in the grass behind her, she could only assume Maikoh was approaching. Reign opened her eyes slowly exhaling through her nose at the same time.
She saw the world around her lit with the silver glow of her runes. She expanded her wings fully lifting and pushing down with all her mite rocketing into the sky. She could hear the men cursing in the distance as their voices faded on the wind.
Reign made a few sweeping circles around the tavern like she did during her normal training with Drogan. Looking towards the forest she was high enough to see the clearing to the north, the one she always dreamed about escaping too when she was up here.
Taking one last look at the tavern Reign flapped her wings and aimed to the north, towards hope, towards her future…
Chapter 9
Freedom
She felt a presence beside her as she journeyed toward the clearing looking too her left, she saw a beautiful pair of silver wings. The soft silver of the feathers almost glowed in the light of the moon overhead.
As the set of wings extended to their full width to glide over the treetops, she saw the fae they belonged to. Eerikki looked to Reign with that same glower she was beginning to associate with him. The wings accented him perfectly as fair as the fae himself and equally as beautiful. The exact opposite of the darkness that surrounded her and her own wings.
“I didn’t know fae had wings.”
Reign shouted across the sky.
“They don’t, at least not normal fae anyway.”
Eerikki looked natural in the sky like he had been flying all his life. He was completely at ease in the air his wings and body adjusting to even the slightest change of the wind.
“What do you mean by normal fae?”
He had peaked her curiosity with the statement. Reign had met a great deal of different people during her years at the tavern, dark fae, light fae, shifters of all breeds, and a few mages. She didn’t know why but Reign could sense magic in people.
She could see what type of magic they possessed and in the case of shifters how it manifested. Fae where unique as they either held light magic or dark magic but never both.
They were also different in the fact that the males where the only ones who possessed magic. She never understood why but her ignorance was born from circumstance.
She forced out her senses towards the fae. She felt his light magic and something else within him, it was powerful but nothing she had ever felt before.
“I can sense your fae magic, but you are something else as well, a hybrid but of what?”
Eerikki looked to her with shock on his face.
“You can sense my magic?”
“Of course, I thought all magic users had the ability to tell when they were in the presence of another.”
He shook his head at her.
“No Reign no magic users have that ability.”
Shocked by his revelation she looked away from him and towards the forest. There far below a white wolf ran amongst the trees matching them in speed.
Not far behind the wolf flashes of blue appeared and disappeared what she assumed was the mage.
The clearing appeared below her. She angled her wing down and circled the edges assessing for any threats, finding none she landed shaking out her wings before resting them against her back once more.
Eerikki was not far behind. Maikoh appeared from between the trees. Abban appeared behind her with a slight pop effectively making her jump and curse under her breath. She could hear the mage chuckle behind her so she popped out her wings causing him to fall backwards and land flat on his backside.
Maikoh shifted from his wolf laughing as he appeared in his human form.
“Well Abban who’s the pup now”.
Smiling to herself Reign addressed them both.
“Clearly both of you”.
That got a slight chuckle out of Eerikki and she had to admit she liked the way his laugh made her feel. It was soft and musical making her heart feel light and full of joy. Unable to help herself she looked to the beautiful fae and smiled.
In the short time she had been with these men she had laughed and smiled more than in the last ten years of her life. Eerikki noticed her smile and quickly put his signature glower back in place effectively breaking the happy spell she was under.
“Alright you three I think some explanations are in order. Who the bloody hell are you and what the hell are you doing here?”
Abban was the first to speak
“We are here for you Reign, today marks your twentieth yea
r of life and the day you return to rule your people.”
Unable to help herself Reign burst out laughing. Eerikki looked to Abban.
“I told you she would take it well.”
Maikoh elbowed the fae in the ribs.
“Shut up Eerikki like you would have done any better.”
Eerikki grumbled rubbing his side and stepping back to allow the wolf forward. Finally, able to compose herself Reign addressed the three males in front of her.
“This is a joke, right? You three show up on my birthday challenge me to a fight in which you lost miserably, and now you are trying to tell me I’m some kind of ruler. Does that about sum it up?”
Looking at each of the men in turn they nod Abban saying
“Yeah that about sums it up but we did not lose miserably, we let you win.”
He looked the fae.
“See she gets it”.
Reign let out another laugh turned on her heal and called over her shoulder.
“Well nice to meet you crazies, thanks for aiding in my escape. I guess I’ll see you around.”
Adding under her breath
“Hopefully the Drak not”.
She made it about five steps before a weight landed on her back shoving her to the ground. What felt like paws pushed at her shoulders shoving her body against the compact earth?
A large white snout came down next to her face and the beast emitted a low growl followed by a sharp bight to her shoulder. A normal human would be afraid. Reign was neither a human nor normal and she was pissed.
“What do you think you are doing? Get the Drak off me Maikoh!”
The wolf only clamped down harder she could feel the warm trickle of blood run down her shoulder.
“I’m warning you shifter, get off me now!”
A searing pain erupted under her right breast where the shifter signa that matched Maikoh’s sat, just as her body erupted in white flames. The wolf jumped from her back and Reign screamed as she turned to her side curling into a ball.
The flames grew larger and encased her entire body. She felt as if she was burning from the inside out every cell of her body lit up with an intensity that she had never felt before.
Her body began to raise from the ground causing her to hover a foot from the grass. She slowly uncurled herself as her wings erupted from her back. Reign floated there arms and legs spread wide, wings hanging as her body began to rise.
She was still floating but now she looked upon the two men and wolf that stood before her. Her blood stained the white fur of the shifter and the sight only fed her anger.
The mage and fae gazed upon her with awe and the wolf appeared to be smirking which only served to piss Reign off even more.
“You!”
The voice that came out of her mouth was hers but not, it came out ethereal yet dark. The wolf bent one knee and lowered his head to the ground, followed by the mage and fae kneeling heads bowed.
“What the hell are you three doing, if you think begging forgiveness is going to excuse Maikoh biting me you are so wrong!”
Eerikki raised his head enough to speak making sure to never meet her eyes.
“Valdraken we bow to you. Reign the last Valdraken of Taru, all powerful queen of the three magical nations. I Eerikki fae of the northern mystical forest pledge my sword, magic, and loyalty to you to serve as your trusted advisor, loyal servant, and loving mate.”
Reign shouted while holding her hand up palm facing the fae.
“Hold the Drak up!!!”
She couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“Did you just say mate, and what the Drak is a Valdraken, and queen are you all Draking crazy?”
She was screaming now attempting to refrain from panic. If she could have run, she would have but in her current state there was really nothing she could do. Speaking of her current state she finally decided to look down and again cursed under her breath.
“One of you three better explain what the hell is going on right now, what is grumpy Mc Fae over there talking about and why the hell am I dressed like this if you can call this dressed, I look like a cross breed half warrior half whore.”
Reign realized she was rambling but her inability to wrap her head around everything that was going on was making her a little crazy.
Abban had the gall to laugh, to actually laugh at her. If looks could kill, he would be dead, not just dead but no after life, every cell of his body incinerated dead. He murmured to Eerikki.
“I told you she would take it well.”
Reign looked between the three males before her noting the wolf still hadn’t changed back.
“I hate to break it to you Maikoh but staying a wolf isn’t going to save you, this is your fault, you caused this. You and your stupid wolf face and your stupid wolf teeth.”
Eerikki felt like it was a good time to interrupt.
“My Valdraken please allow me to explain.”
She held her hand up towards him once more.
“No Eerikki, the wolf is the one who started this and he is going to be the one to explain it!”
A voice in her head startled her.
“Yes, my Valdraken.”
She felt a push in her mind almost like the start of a headache. Deciding to trust the Shifter she opened herself to him.
Chapter 10
Maikoh’s beginning
Pictures flashed through Reign’s mind, not pictures but memories. She was unaware of how, but she knew the memories where Maikoh’s. At first the pictures flashed to quickly for her to comprehend.
Finally slowing she began to see the story he wished to show her. A small wolf cub peeked up at his mother a beautiful white wolf with a black signa on her chest. She knew from Maikoh’s memories this was his mother.
Images of the young pup and his mother continued to play through her mind. A happy pup who loved his mother very much. Months passed in her mind in seconds. Maikoh growing into an adolescent and learning how to hunt, running with his pack mates, and learning to fight in his wolf form. She had heard stories of shifters, never becoming human until they fully matured.
The pictures stopped at a serene clearing in the forest his mother lay atop a grassy knoll. What appeared to be other mothers of the pack lay beside her as their cubs played below. Maikoh’s mother looked upon her son with such love and pride Reign couldn’t help but smile at the feelings that where displayed.
The day changed to night and the cubs gathered around their mothers as Maikoh’s mother stood and spoke in the minds of the gathered pack.
“I Nizhoni leader of the great traveling pack have called you all here to recite the history of our pack for the young as is tradition before their first hunt.”
Maikoh’s mother was the pack leader, Reign couldn’t believe it did that mean her shifter was as well. Wait her shifter when had she decided that? The images continued to play through her head of the pack history until finally Nizhoni raised her head to the sky.
“We are the great traveling pack of Taru, charged by the first Valdraken as protectors and peacekeepers of the land. A great many years ago our world lived in chaos, the mages, shifters, fae, and humans where all at war. So much death and killing all over our great world.”
She looked to her son laying at her feet just as entranced as all the others by her story.
“The war became so brutal that the races risked extinction. Until one day a human woman came to the traveling pack and requested our strongest warrior to join her on a mission of peace to the Draken Mountains of the south.
The women was allowed to enter our lands because individually she was no threat. She stayed amongst the pack for several weeks earning their trust until finally the chief of the pack agreed to send a wolf shifter with her.
The shifter and human left the next day to travel to the mystical northern forest in hopes of gaining a fae companion, again after several weeks she accomplished her goal and the trio left to the eastern planes in hopes of finding a mage willing to
travel with them.
They were once again successful. The four unlikely travelers took a day to prepare and then started the treacherous journey to the Great southern mountains. The journey they took was long and fraught with peril on more than one occasion the group came close to meeting their demise.
The human women and her companions became very close on their journey they were no longer just traveling companions but friends and lovers.”
Nizhoni looked to the cubs before her as they expressed mixed expressions accompanied by awes and mumbled yuck. Nizhoni offered them a soft smile and with a shake of her head she continued on.
“After weeks of travel the group finally arrived at their destination no longer just a group of mixed races but a family filled with love, laughter, and hope. The group went to the Draken Mountains in hopes of finding the great dragon.