Maybe I should peek through his music collection again when he’s not around.
There were at least six heavy oak doors in the long hallway. Ash brought me to the third door from the stairs and opened it. “This is a guest room,” he said. “Don’t get excited. The Master will bring you along to your real bedchamber when he’s ready.” He looked at me as if he didn’t trust me. I couldn’t say that I blamed him. I didn’t exactly trust him either. We didn’t know each other.
“Thank you,” I said to him, making an effort to be polite even if he didn’t. “I’ll wait right in here for him to return and tell me what to do next.”
Ash nodded his head and then went away back down the hall and then down the stairs.
“Damn, he really dislikes me, doesn’t he?” I shook my head a little and then closed the door to the spare room, closing myself in.
The room wasn’t anything fancy or out of the ordinary. There was a four-poster bed in the center of it, with green and black bedding and sheer green curtains draping it nicely. There was a matching rug on the stone floor underfoot. How was this house built? I mused. Was it carved out of one giant boulder? I smiled a little, shaking my head some more. Garen clearly didn’t shy away from being ornate and extravagant; especially considering that he’d presumably lived in this mansion all by himself until I showed up on his radar. I wondered how he was so wealthy. Maybe the dragon lore is true. Maybe he has a room that’s literally full of gold. I haven’t seen the basement yet…
I looked around the room some more. There were some tall bookshelves that were full of books, and a desk with a comfy swiveling chair. No computer though, alas. I supposed it made sense to not have each room outfitted with a computer, though. Garen’s mansion wasn’t a hotel. He obviously didn’t work full time on his computer either, since it was left completely unattended in the den. I wished that I could find him in his office somewhere in the halls of this place, working a multi-line speakerphone. It just amused me to think about him conducting a board meeting. Was that what dragons did when they were ‘working?’
Finally, I decided to just grab a book and lie down on the bed reading until he was ready to see me again. I picked a book at random and got onto the bed. It was almost as comfortable as the one in the condo, but not quite. Garen evidently didn’t wish for his guests to be as comfortable as he was. Honestly, I couldn’t even imagine him entertaining guests. I supposed that a rich young man like him hosted parties and things like that, but then he wasn’t just a normal rich young man. There was always a cloud of danger around him, and I was sure that was why he kept everyone at arm’s length.
Chapter 7: Proving the Prophecy
Afternoon turned into evening and still there was no sign of Garen. I dozed off while attempting to read the random book I’d grabbed off the shelf – some historical military almanac that I had a hard time imagining Garen caring about. Perhaps it had been a Christmas gift. If dragons even celebrated holidays. I could imagine him putting up a Christmas tree even less than I could imagine him reading about American naval history. I don’t know how long I slept, but when I awoke the sky was dark. It wasn’t nightfall yet, but it loomed and there wasn’t any sign of his return yet.
It’d be nice to at least have an ETA from him when he disappears like this, I thought morosely. I didn’t think I could put up with this for too much longer. It really was no way to live. He was a smart and successful man, obviously, but he had a lot to learn about women and relationships if that was indeed what he intended for us to have.
Standing up from the bed, I placed the book back onto the shelf, hoping that it wasn’t supposed to be in some kind of order because I didn’t have the patience for that. There was a curtained glass door in the bedroom and I decided to try my luck and see what lay beyond it. As I opened it, I discovered that it led to a small balcony. It wasn’t the kind that fit any furniture or anything, but just to stand out there and get some fresh air was nice. I think they call this a Juliet balcony, I thought. Which is appropriate at the moment… Where’s my Romeo?
I resisted the urge to gag at myself. I didn’t need a fucking Romeo. That kind of thing was not for me. Standing there on the stone balcony, wind whistling around me, I hugged myself and looked up at the sky. Trees partially obscured it, but it was visible and that comforted me a little. The first few stars were starting to show themselves for the night.
Something large and dark green caught my eye as I admired the constellations. A dragon was flying in a sweeping circle over the park. He descended slowly, gliding closer and closer as he made his landing. When he was closer, I realized that it was mainly his underside that was dark green. His back, wings and tail were black. I knew at once that it was Garen, especially once he was on the ground and I could witness him shedding his scales for human skin. I’d never seen a black dragon before. His glowing green eyes had made it seem as though that he was a green dragon, but apparently…
He soon stood wearing his typical suit with a green necktie, which he straightened a little before stepping the rest of the way up to the front door of the mansion. I tried to watch him go all the way inside, but the balcony’s ledge blocked the rest of his entrance from my view. I leaned down so much in an effort to watch him that I felt myself go a bit dizzy from the head rush.
Finally, I thought. I don’t know what I would’ve done if the dragon had shifted into a stranger.
Not wishing to seem like I’d been miserably waiting for Garen’s return, I quickly went back inside and returned myself to the bed, snagging another book off the shelf as I went. I was lying outstretched on the bed with the book open in front of my face when the bedroom door opened.
I heard him enter the room and I did my best to just appear to be deep into reading my book. I couldn’t give him the privilege of knowing that I’d missed him. Even if only a little, and purely because I was bored. “I’m so sorry to have kept you alone here,” he said as he walked into the room. “Are you reading The Bible?”
My cheeks grew hot as I looked at the page in front of my eyes and realized that yes, indeed, I was reading The Bible. That hadn’t been on purpose. “Yup,” I said casually as if it was the most normal thing in the world to be reading that book cover-to-cover like a novel. “That David sure is interesting.” I lowered the book and set it aside on the nightstand. “Where have you been? Ash told me that you were on a conference call, but I take it that it wasn’t just a normal chat.”
He smiled at me – his fangs glistened somehow in the low lighting of the room – and put his hands into the pockets of his black dress pants. “It wasn’t normal, no,” he replied. “I ended up having to go sort some things out in person. Sorry that I couldn’t update you on that. What have you been up to? Just reading? Were you able to watch some TV like you wanted?”
I nodded, smiling in a way that wasn’t one hundred percent convincing. “Oh yeah, I watched some TV, messed around online a little, discovered that everyone around knows exactly who I am and what I’ve been doing.” My voice rose as I spoke, but I managed to keep it from reaching yelling levels. “I read about me on an aggregate site. People writing about all the reasons and ways that they want me to die.”
Garen raised his hands. “Hey, I warned you that people would start talking and paying keen interest. This prophecy is no laughing matter.”
“I certainly am not laughing. I see how that it was a very good thing that Ash and Brock tracked me down instead of the alternative.” I looked at him and sighed slightly. “I just wish that you wouldn’t keep leaving me in this limbo. Where do you go when you go to ‘work,’ for example? What do you do for a living? And if you say that you fight knights, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
He laughed softly and came over, sitting on the end of the bed. “I’m the leader, so I do what I was born to do: I lead. I mostly fight other dragons. Fighting humans is so 1500s.” He winked at me, still grinning his toothy grin. “I’d bring you along, but of course it isn’t safe for you t
o be out there, even with me. Something could happen to you.”
“But the problem is that if I just stay cooped up in here all the time, literally nothing happens to me. I need something to do. I feel like a prisoner here. Sure, it’s a really nice prison, but it’s still a prison.”
He looked at me thoughtfully then, appearing stumped by this situation, when I didn’t think it should’ve been a surprise to him. It was unrealistic for him to ever think that a young girl like me would be perfectly fine with just hanging out inside his mansion at all times. I shouldn’t have to ruin my life just to save the world.
“Would you like to go out to dinner with me tonight?” Garen asked me. “We obviously need to find a place that’s not crowded or in a bad area.”
“Neither is a good situation for a restaurant anyway,” I pointed out. I looked at him and nodded. “I’d like that. I’ve been trying to get a chance to get to know you better, after all. Please tell me your stooges won’t be tagging along with us.”
He chuckled and shrugged a shoulder. “I can tell them to hang loose tonight, if you like. They will still be around in case we need them, but they can keep their distance.”
Meaning they’ll circle around us from above, I thought. It was strange to me that he felt the need to always have his servants on guard for him, but a lifetime of leadership had likely led him to be this cautious. After all, he told me that his father had died. Did he die as a result of all of this dragon in-fighting? I wanted to know the answer to that, but I had a feeling that he didn’t want to talk about it unless he’d brought it up himself.
“I would prefer that, yes,” I said. “And I think they would, too. I don’t think they like me very much.”
Garen laughed at that, nodding. “I don’t think they like anyone very much,” he replied. “So don’t take it personally.”
“Brock did save me this morning, though. That matters. I don’t want him to not get credit where credit is due.”
I didn’t know if his servant dragons were paid for their work or if they had some other type of contract going on. They surely aren’t volunteers, I thought, though I had to wonder if they believed in him, and by extension his father, so much that they served him without any monetary compensation. The image of a room full of gold came to my mind again.
Garen continued to smile, his grin softening into more of a calm and caring smile. I felt for once that he was taking my thoughts and concerns seriously. “I will see that Brock is rewarded for helping you,” he promised. “Now let’s go get some dinner. You must be starved.”
I hopped up from the bed, eager to go out to grab some food with him, and not just because of the food. He stood up as well and we walked out of the room together, down the stairs and out the front door of the mansion. I turned to look at him, smiling wryly. “Are we going to fly somewhere, or…?”
He shook his head at me. “No, that wouldn’t be a good idea. It would be easier, sure, but we’d be seen.” He and I both knew that we’d be seen pretty quickly walking down the street, too, but we could be quite a bit stealthier that way. “I suggest that we walk as fast as we can without tripping, of course.”
With that, he gently held onto my hand and started leading the way out of the lagoon. He helped me into the boat and deftly paddled across the water, helping me out of the boat when we reached the opposite bank. Then he took me by the hand again and carefully hustled me along. I couldn’t figure out which restaurant he’d determined that we should go to, but I figured that he could use his special dragon sensors to pick a place. “Are you in the mood for something in particular?” he asked me as we walked along the sidewalks and down side streets, keeping alert and not taking the time to even glance at me, now that we were out amongst would-be villains and other possibly untrustworthy sorts.
I thought about it as I did my best to keep in step with him. He was much taller than me, and more used to this subtle way of walking around and working hard at not being conspicuous. What has his life been like? I was afforded the chance for a normal childhood and schooling, at least… But this has probably been all that he’s ever known. I felt bad for him. “I’m not picky,” I told him. Normally that wouldn’t have been true. I wasn’t the most adventurous eater. But for him, I’d make it easier. Whenever I could. It was the least I could do.
“There’s a diner up ahead,” he informed me. “It’s usually really quiet and mostly empty. And it’s the type of place that we could leave if we needed to.”
I had a feeling that he’d dined there before. “That sounds good to me,” I told him. “I could really go for a tuna melt now that you mention it.”
He chuckled. “We can certainly make that happen.”
The diner came into view. Unfortunately, so did a group of jean-clad thugs with glowing eyes. Their snarls gave away their position on the whole prophecy thing. I tightened my grip on Garen’s hand. “Garen…”
We’d stopped walking and the four enemy shifters slowly approached us. There was enough space in the street for them to fan out, and as they did so they began to change form. I knew that there was no way for us to outrun them without a head-start that they weren’t going to give us. I looked over at Garen and realized that he was changing form as well. Hastily, I let go of his hand as it turned into a massive set of black claws. I gasped as I looked up at him. He’d shifted into a black dragon!
It must’ve been a trick of the light when I saw him before, because there was no question now. There was no green on him; he was completely black. His giant eyes were still a glowing, ferocious green but the rest of him had changed into a black dragon. I’ve never seen a black dragon, I thought. I’ve only ever seen greens and reds and blues… The prophecy said that I would give him power. Was this the power he was talking about?
I didn’t have very long to think about this or be impressed, because the rival gang was still encroaching on us, cramping the street by the second as they also transformed into large, fire-breathing monsters.
“Tatyana,” Garen said to me in a deep, low growl. His voice was all dragon now. It somehow echoed even though we were out in the open. “Climb onto my back.”
“Oh no you don’t,” one of the other dragons said. “Not this time.”
He lunged for me, a blur of blue-green scales and glistening white teeth. I let out a scream as he snapped his enormous jaws in my direction, clearly trying to chomp me. I rushed behind Garen’s back and essentially climbed his spikes like a ladder – or more like a rock wall – and then clung to his long neck for safety.
The other dragons were noticeably smaller than him, appearing like younglings instead of the strong man shifters they pretended to be. They snapped and clawed at Garen, but he easily knocked them back with his immense snout and tail. Then he flapped his mighty wings, lifting up into the air and turning away. The other dragons soon followed suit but Garen flew as if high-power rockets were attached to his wings and we were soon far away from the Unbelievers. I closed my eyes as I held onto him, wishing like hell that this didn’t happen every time I went out somewhere. Garen and his men may have sounded crazy when they warned me about the perils of the prophecy, but they weren’t lying.
Brock and Ash’s dragon forms came into view as we continued to fly back to the mansion in the secluded lagoon. They flew in a small V formation with Garen and I felt better somehow. I at least felt safe with them around. The prophecy was true, at least about Garen and how he needed me to give him power… I still couldn’t see how I myself was supposed to help stop the world from ending, though. Maybe I just needed to spend more time with him.
“I’m sorry we had to cut our outing short,” he said to me as we landed and I carefully hopped off of his back. As I moved off him, his skin began to change, shrinking back to humanoid form. His suit and tie remained somehow completely untarnished; he didn’t even need to straighten his tie this time. I didn’t know how he did it.
“It’s okay,” I lied. “It’s probably for the best that we didn’t ju
st try to go in there despite the obvious adversaries.”
He raised his eyebrows at me and then laughed a little. “Adversaries is a great word for them, college girl.”
I sighed a little. “High school girl,” I corrected.
Brock and Ash landed in front of the mansion, shifting as they did so. Brock landed successfully on his feet like he did it all the time, while meanwhile, Ash fell on his face in the grass. I covered my mouth and tried not to laugh at him. I didn’t want to give him more reasons to dislike me.
“Are you all right there?” Garen called over to him, smirking a little because he could get away with it.
Ash clambered to his feet and nodded, adjusting his leather jacket on his shoulders. “Yeah,” he said in a low voice. He kept his eyes on the ground, embarrassed.
Garen turned to me. “Still in the mood for a tuna melt?” he asked. “We don’t have a diner here, but we do have a stove.”
Without even needing to be told, Brock took off again, walking this time back away from the mansion. Store run, I thought. “What kind of food do you keep in your kitchen?” I asked Garen as we walked inside the mansion. “I’m sorry, but I only ever imagine you guys going out and frying up people for dinner.”
He laughed, shaking his head. “No no. Not always anyway. We’re monsters, but we’re not monsters.”
As stupid as it was, I felt glad to be back inside his home and away from the dangers that lurked outside in the city. It wasn’t so long ago that I could walk around freely and enjoy the fresh air, the sights and sounds of Chicago. I’d taken all of that for granted, and now it seemed that I was never going to be able to live that way again. I’d have to learn to find enjoyment in entirely new ways of living.
At least riding on his back as he flew didn’t scare me as much as it did before with Brock, I thought.
Abducted By The Dragons: The Complete Series Page 6