by Jessica Gunn
She turned her head from me and flew out of my grip, nudging the door open with her snout before disappearing inside.
“Um… Okay?” I said, watching her go.
Eli followed her with his eyes as well. “She’s upset.”
“Clearly.” A pit formed in my stomach and sloshed around. What happened? She was jealous earlier, sure. But not like this.
Eli reached out a hand between us, I thought to put a reassuring hand on my shoulder, but he paused halfway through the motion. “Check on her. I’m sure she cannot stay mad at you for long.”
“And now she’s mad,” I mumbled. Mostly to myself. This wasn’t Eli’s fault. Or necessarily mine.
At least, I didn’t think it was.
“Vera, have faith.”
My eyes met his and for a moment, they were soft. Understanding and concerned all at once. “You know,” I said, “people keep telling me that in different ways lately.”
He nodded. “And for a moment up there today, you had it. It was clear as day and I barely know you.”
Same for everyone on this island. Except for one.
I glanced toward the door. “I should go be with her.”
“You should. But before you go.” Eli leaned back, shifting his weight. “Tonight they’re holding a welcoming feast in your honor. A grand feast for the Warden of the Storm.” He sounded almost mock grandiose about it.
“A big to-do affair?” I asked, an eyebrow raised.
“Optics count as much in your world as they do here,” Eli said. “My father will be in attendance. The rest of the royal court as well.”
My eyes narrowed some as my view swung to the volcano in the distance, the top of it just visible over the trees here at the cliffside. “Do they all live up there? In the volcano?”
“Yes, the royal family and the oldest dragons do.”
“I only ask because the village doesn’t scream royalty,” I said as gently as I could. “That’s all. I figured they must be living somewhere more… more…”
“Like a palace?” Eli offered.
“Yeah, exactly.”
He rubbed a hand on the back of his neck thoughtfully. It was all I could do to stay focused on his face rather than the corded muscles of his arms. “I suppose in a manner of speaking the volcano citadel is like a palace. But it’s not like the ones on the mortal weave, Vera. And despite our positions as Guardian and Warden, I pray to the gods of old that you never have to go there.” His brows knitted together, creating an altogether too dire look. I didn’t like this. I wanted stoic Eli back. Or happy Eli like back in the hatchling nursery.
But I also wanted to know what he meant, and why Zezza had gone out of her way to show me a cavern entrance into this citadel.
“Why?” I asked as softly as I could, trying to convey my curiosity without prying too hard.
“Because it’s hell.” His fists balled and his whole body seemed to tense before relaxing after several moments. Then Eli simply shook his head. “As it is a feast in your honor, you are expected to make an appearance and meet my father and mother. I do not think they will ask more of you tonight.” He pointed to the door. “I had someone drop off a dress for tonight that will be suitable for the affair. Please wear it and bring Zezza with you. She is a rare sight in her own right, one to be celebrated too. There aren’t many storm dragons like herself left, the kind of dragons my family descends from. I will be by in a few hours to escort you to the Hall.”
I blinked. What the hell happened? A cool bead of sweat slid down my spine. Maybe I really shouldn’t have pried further. It was like my question had flipped a switch in Eli.
“Okay,” I finally said when I’d gone through several responses and deemed that the only good answer. “Thank you.”
And then he was gone, leaving me to my wonderment and a hard sort-of-conversation with a baby dragon.
I entered the cabin and shut the door behind me, peering through the kitchen into the living room area. Zezza sat perched on a massive pillow, looking out at the ocean.
Oh, yeah. Definitely got a toddler going on moody teenager right here.
Slowly, I approached her, making sure to clear my throat and make some noise so I didn’t accidentally startle her.
“Zezza?”
She let out a heavy exhale. A dragon sigh. Tiny plumes of smoke blew out from her nostrils and intertwined with a smattering of lightning crackles.
I sat down beside her and leaned my head forward on my elbow, making our eye levels even. Her reptilian eyes met mine.
“Hi,” I said.
She just looked at me.
“I know you’re upset.”
Nothing. No response at all, not even a blink.
“They told me I had to having a riding lesson. Although it was really more of a flying session than anything else.”
Zezza huffed again and turned her attention back toward the crashing waves on the shore below our cliffside cabin.
My eyes narrowed as I lifted a hand to run down her scaled back. “Is this about Bux?”
Despite her best and adorable efforts to give me the cold shoulder, her back arched like a cat’s. Then she turned and nudged her snout against my arm. In the motion, I saw from her perspective me flying with Bux high in the sky. I heard my shrill of happiness from her point of view, before she, in the past, looked down and away, and trod off into the forest.
I frowned. “Zezza…”
She replayed the clip.
I pulled away from her. “Zezza, please. I understand, okay?”
She swung her head to me in an unmistakable look of, “Oh, do you now?”
I let out an exasperated sigh and climbed into the huge bay window beside her, resting my back against the wall. “I get it. Jealously. I watched both of my sisters be the prize children my parents always wanted. I grew up with it for over twenty years before cutting ties and going away.”
The cutting of the ties might have been forced, but the point still remained. What Zezza was going through right now was totally normal. But maybe I could have done something better to have avoided it.
“Next time, I’ll take you with me into the air,” I said. “If they make me go flying again.”
Zezza shifted on the windowsill to face me, laying her head on my knee. She peered up at me with her cobalt-and-gold eyes. I’d never seen a more innocent yet ancient-looking being than her. It was the only way to explain the weight of the look she was giving me. The look she always gave me. As if she were a thousands-of-years-old dragon trapped in the body of a hatchling.
Honestly, after everything that’d happened since the meteor had crashed and changed everything, I wouldn’t count the hypothesis as wholly improbable.
I patted Zezza’s head as I talked. “Zezza, you changed my life. I didn’t expect you at all and yet you’ve changed it for the better. I may be this Warden figure and that means I’ll have to protect the entire island and the Storm. But that does include you. You’re mine, Zezza. In a connection I don’t understand the full depth of.” I leaned closer to her, hopeful. “But you do, don’t you?”
She once again projected the image of me shouting with happiness.
“Zezza.” I lifted her up by her shoulders and held her in front of me like I would a real child. “You make me just as happy as flying with Bux did. You stole my heart the day you hatched, a heart I wasn’t even sure I still had, to be really honest with you. Which is more honest than I’ve been with any other living creature in any weave.”
She tilted her head at me.
“Yes, I’m telling you the truth.” To prove it, I closed my eyes and focused on the way Zezza could send ripples of lightning across her scales… and focused on summoning ones of my own. Lightning crackled around my fingertips and danced, not harming either of us. “See? Our magic is one and the same. You’re a part of me just as I am a part of you. I understand that now. But I have to learn the ways of this island too. And the other dragons that live here. This is our home now.”
For a long moment, there was no response from her. Just her continued stare into what felt like the core of my soul.
Then her jaw dropped open into her toothy dragon grin and she squirmed her way into my arms.
Just as she had my heart.
My own little storm dragon.
Chapter 19
Zezza and I sat in the bay window for most of the afternoon, watching clouds go by over the tropical paradise outside and practicing my magic a little. Given that we both had the word “storm” attributed to us in some way or another, I was a little leery about trying to do too much inside.
By the time the sun started its descent into the horizon, I was able to spark lightning to my fingertips at will and weave mini arcs of it crackling through the air. Zezza and I also tossed spheres of air back and forth to one another until she got a little too excited and smacked her tail into a sphere a little too hard. The ball of air slammed into a vase on the kitchen counter and sent it shattering to the ground. She sheepishly watched me clean it up.
“It’s okay,” I said for the hundredth time as I deposited the broken pieces of glass into the trash bin. “Things happen.”
When darkness began to rise outside the windows, I ventured back into the bedroom and browsed through the closet once more. Sometime during our training today, someone must have placed the dress Eli had told me about into my closet because this hadn’t been here last night. I laid the garment on the bed as Zezza hopped up. She inched closer, sniffing it before settling down.
“What do you think? Will it be pretty?”
She looked at me like she hadn’t the faintest idea.
“Right. Let’s see for ourselves.”
I unzipped the bag and my jaw hung open. The dress was made from a fabric I didn’t recognize and it rippled in the light, changing from bright gold to cobalt blue and every shade in between. As mutable as a storm and every bit as graceful. I slipped into the curve-hugging gown, the length of it ending just past my knees, and the sleeves down past my elbow. It was elegant, functional. And a powerful sight to behold as I spun in front of the bedroom mirror.
A soft knock came upon the door.
Eli.
“One minute!” I yelled, quickly fixing my long hair into something presentable. After slipping on the beautiful sandals that had accompanied the dress, I scooped Zezza up onto my shoulder and went for the door. “We both have to be on our best behavior tonight. We’re going to meet the king and queen!”
Zezza made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a human scoff. I glanced at her. First the cavern stuff and now this.
“Why do you dislike them?” I asked her.
She didn’t respond. Maybe that was too difficult a question to ask a dragon who could only respond through simple images and feelings.
I’d think about how to ask her again later. With one last look in the mirror, I swung open the front door and found Eli waiting outside. He was dressed in a black tunic and pants, each with gold embroidery, and an overcoat with more of the same design. Dressed like this, the only scales visible were on the backs of his hands and a few on his neck. He seemed to have less there than Tharin, but the spectrum of manifestations seemed to fit with how werewolf shifters presented in human form too.
I wondered what their dragon forms looked like. So far, I’d only seen real dragons and the Speaker’s shifted dragon form. Could Eli turn into as large of a dragon? Did he look sort of like Zezza since they were both descended from storm dragons?
If he hadn’t transformed back on the mortal weave while fighting Kristian and his vampires, I doubted I’d see it here. Maybe it was only a defensive thing. Or maybe neither he, Elena, nor Tharin had transformed at all to try to keep from drawing too much attention.
“Hey,” I finally said, smiling from ear to ear. “This dress is beautiful.”
Eli grinned and rubbed the back of his neck. “I was hoping you’d like it. I didn’t make it or anything, but… I wasn’t sure how extravagant it was going to get. I’m glad it’s subtle.”
I chuckled. “Extravagant? What exactly is happening tonight?”
“A banquet. But dragonkind is known to get showy about a lot of things.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “So mounds of gold and treasure? Is that a real thing?”
Eli extended an arm. “Not all the stereotypes are true. It will be a party. Lots of music and dancing and an extravagant meal. The advent of another Warden is a celebrated affair.”
“What happened to the last one?”
Eli hesitated. I wasn’t sure why I felt the need to ask that in that very moment. But I didn’t think it was too weird a question.
“I just mean because you said ‘another,’” I said quickly, foot in mouth. “Obviously, it was a long time ago, right?” Maybe Eli didn’t know.
“A while ago, yes,” he said slowly, his gaze turning upward toward the top of the volcano just barely visible in the distance. “I wasn’t born yet, but my father had already begun his rule. To be honest, not a lot is known. At least by everything I’ve heard.”
There was something he wasn’t saying, evident in the way he kept his eyes away from mine. Zezza nudged my shoulder, as if she knew. Eli had said dragons had a genetic memory of sorts.
“Did she die young or something?” I asked. “Was there a war?”
For a long moment, Eli didn’t answer. Then he sighed and turned to me. “Just the Supernatural War. Wardens are born, though, not made. She didn’t die in the Supernatural War. We can look into it more after the banquet if you’d like to. I’m sure there are records in a library here. But I’d advise you to not ask about these things tonight.” He smiled warmly. “It is a night about you, after all.”
That didn’t quell a single anxious thought or curiosity. He knew more than he was saying, but I was beginning to get the impression he wasn’t keeping things from me maliciously.
“I’d like that. I want to learn as much as I can about your world and my role in it.” And maybe a few of the secrets the royal family and dragon elders were apparently keeping.
What would Eli think if he knew I had a secret of my own? I wasn’t sure how to even bring up my nighttime expedition up the side of the volcano. Or even if I should.
“Then we will.” Eli held his arm out to me. “Shall we, then? The banquet hall is down in the village.”
I wasn’t going to get any more answers right now. So instead of asking more questions, I took Eli’s arm and let him lead me down through the jungle.
Eli had been right: Dragonkind really did know how to throw a celebration. I wasn’t sure what I had been expecting, but it hadn’t been this.
The banquet hall, a large building near the center of the village, had been decorated with magic floating candles and sconces to illuminate several long tables filled with the feast I’d been promised. A small group of musicians played a few string and wind instruments in one corner opposite a roaring fireplace to chase away the chilly nighttime air. The band’s soft but upbeat tune carried joyfully, mixing with the scent of the fire and cooking meats to create one remarkable atmosphere.
The tables had been arranged in a fashion allowing for an empty space where people could dance. Some already were. And at the end of the space, lifted on a dais, was a single table and four throne-like chairs. For the royal family, no doubt.
“Wow.”
Eli chuckled. “Just ‘wow’?”
I laughed and gestured around us. “I mean, this is amazing.” It really was. In an odd way, probably assisted by the familiar sights and the realization that dragonkind and their culture really weren’t so different from life on the mortal weave, the Lair was beginning to really feel like home.
“The night’s only just getting started,” Eli said. “But I’m afraid I have to leave you here. Tharin should be in shortly and you’ll be seated with him and his family.”
My brows furrowed, but then I remembered the dais for the royal family. There were only four seats.
&n
bsp; “Yeah, makes sense,” I said, trying not to sound too disappointed. Tharin was nice and everything. But he wasn’t Eli. Maybe I could use this time to get to know him better.
Eli bowed his head only slightly—something he’d never done before when we’d been alone or with Elena and Tharin—and then ducked out of the room.
I walked the length of the space alone, petting Zezza’s head as I went. A few of the baby dragons from the nursery were here too. They followed along behind us as Zezza chirped and trilled excitedly.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a large shadow rising up one wall. My heart stopped in my throat. What the hell?
Then one red draconic head rose above the walls and peered in on the celebration from above the open roof. Another few heads rose.
The dragons. True, adult dragons. Even they were here.
I gulped. They were here for me.
A sudden feeling of unease swept over me. I gripped the top of a chair to steady myself.
What if Eli had been wrong? What if I was just one of those random mortals who’d happened to get magic after the meteor strike, and that magic had just happened to be storm magic?
Or worse: What if Eli was right… but so were my parents? Maybe I was the Warden. That didn’t mean I’d succeed. That didn’t mean if war was coming, I’d be able to keep dragonkind safe.
Even Zezza had gotten hurt in my care, and I’d had her for fewer than twelve hours.
Tears stung my eyes. I swallowed them down. Elena was here somewhere, and I wouldn’t let her see me doubting myself. Not to mention the dozens of others in the room.
Whether I could or could not do what Eli was convinced I was fated to do could wait for another day. Tonight, all I had to do was… Well, I wasn’t sure. But it in no way could be more difficult than being thrown into the ocean with a sea dragon.
“Vera!” Tharin called as he weaved through the crowd. “There you are. Eli said you’d be by the entrance where he’d left you. I was beginning to get worried.”
I chuckled. “Where would I have gone? I don’t really know my way around yet.” Except I’d snuck out to the volcano and the door with the weird elven runes. Would that person I’d seen there inform Tharin and the others?