Immersion (Apalala Clan Book 1)

by Dzintra Sullivan

  “Dragon,” the middle man hissed with nothing but hate.

  “Where?” Ladon looked around, left and right, laughing as he caught sight of his own midnight blue wings. He was the darkest of the brothers, and nearly all of his wings and scales were a Prussian blue color. “Ohhh…” he laughed again. “You mean me?” Bringing his wings above the water line, they extended with an impressive width well over ten foot. The water dripping off them gave the same impression of a full moon glistening upon a midnight ocean.

  “You’re going to die, dragon,” the middle man spat the last word as he grabbed a double barrel shotgun from the side clip on the boat. Sighting up Ladon, he took a breath to calm the nerves.

  Bang.

  The bullet left the barrel of the gun at the same time Arach hit the opposite side of the boat, causing the middle man to lurch forward and shoot himself in the foot. The shriek of pain that left his mouth caused nothing but pleasure in Ladon. “Maybe Volos has it right with this ‘pain is pleasure with balls,’ because that was fucking pleasurable for me.” He laughed speaking to Arach who had joined him on the same side. They watched the man collapse onto the floor of the boat, blood pooling and rolling across the base. His cries of pain increased tenfold as he looked down to see he was missing three toes and a side slab of his sole.

  “Fuck you, dragon ssscum.” One of the other men shrieked, the anger causing his wings to shoot forth, and his face to elongate into a large yellow beak. “No more fucking hiding, you and the ressst of your ssscaled ssshark fuckersss are dead.”

  Ladon paused and creased his brow indignantly. “I have never fucked a shar—” he stopped and laughed, “… well…” his head tilted as he grinned widely, “… there was that one time… but she was of legal age and we were both drunk.” He winked. “Ahhh… good times.”

  “You’re the lowest of the low, dragon ssscum.” The man placed a large silver tube into the water and pressed the button, sending another sonic shock down to the Oasis. He pressed it again and again, the psychotic laughter that escaped his beak had a weird lisp to it as he threw his head back and kept his finger on the button.

  Boom. Boom. Boom, the shots continued.

  What’s going on up there? Attor asked as the booms came in thick and fast from above. You’re supposed to be stopping it, not increasing it, Ladon.

  I’m getting it done, Attor. Found your drill-bit yet, dick whistle? Ladon threw back to his brother in an attempt to let him handle things his own way.

  Attor and Ryu had just come around the corner and spied two orange colored mini-submersibles. They looked like a small jet boat and on the top Attor could see one small dome, and inside the glass was what appeared to be one male per submersible. Ryu nodded at Attor’s hand gestures to come up at them from behind. He wanted to see who he was dealing with before he wrecked their party.

  Attor was right up on the first submersible, he reached out and tapped the glass. The face that turned around was one that he knew. He was from C.O.D.E.—it was Payton’s boss, the man who had stood at the top of the stairs and sent stares of death down upon him and his brother. Mr. Embah was what Payton had called him. Attor shook his head as he waved his finger to Mr. Embah in a tsk, tsk, tsk, fashion. Embah flipped him the bird and using the mechanical arm he lodged a small tube of explosives into the hole. A burst of bubbles from the rear of the submersible showed he had thrust forward and jammed it in deep and hard into the hole. He looked back at Attor, he brought his fingers clenched together and made a boom sound with his mouth as his fingers extended in a mock explosion.

  I’ll give you a fucking boom, Attor bellowed with rage as he threw himself on top of the glass dome and started pounding on it.

  Punch. Punch. Thump after thump, he continued to throw direct hit after direct hit, not stopping even with the sight of his own blood was seeping into the water around him.

  Crack.

  Attor grinned as a small split appeared across the top of the dome. “Oh, now it’s getting real, you feathered little fucker. Better know how to swim, because when I get hold of you, I ain’t letting go,” he said with his face up close to the glass. By the look of fear on Embah’s face he could lip read and wasn’t fond of the water.

  One more punch and Attor’s closed fist went into the chamber. In that second Embah had reacted with fear and turned into his full phoenix body, so when Attor’s hand opened and closed around Embah’s throat it was covered in feathers. With a cry of rage he reefed the phoenix from his now broken submersible and into the deep all engulfing ocean. Pulling his face right up next to him, the anger raging through Attor right now had caused his muzzle to extend and his pupils to change. Embah’s face widened with shock as the bubbles of life-giving air launched out of his mouth with a scream.

  Ryu was so engulfed in what Attor was doing he didn’t see the other submersible drive away. It wasn’t until he heard the explosion behind him that he realized the orange machine was in the distance. The look of horror on Attor’s face as he watched the tube activate—sending a massive crack up the dome and quickly snaking out in a death-bringing web of fractures—was all encompassing.

  “Fuck,” Attor yelled as the water began to rush into the dome like a waterfall. Second by second the cracks widened and became more deadly. Embah took advantage of this moment of distraction to kick out with his foot, a bloom of fresh blood around Attor’s stomach where Embah’s talon had gauged deeply, caused Attor to lose his grip and the phoenix to make a break for the surface.

  Ladon, the dome. It’s broken. The clan… Attor struggled to comprehend what he was seeing, it was already a third full and the clan were screaming and bellowing with fear as they fought to find a safe way out, without getting caught under debris and the falling glass shards from above.

  I’m coming, Ladon replied as he looked to the man with the weapon in the water shooting sonic shocks down to his crumbling home. “Sorry, I don’t have time to play.” With a blink, he swum over, reached up and dragged the phoenix into the water, tucking the body under his arm. With a quick movement he snapped the neck, tossing the dead, half-feathered, flesh back into the boat. The other man had jumped and was swimming for the shore. Arach volunteered to locate and eliminate him. By the color of the stupid one who shot his foot off, his blood loss would be his death very shortly anyway.

  Ladon flicked his tail and dove down, passing by a sporadic flow of clan members making their way to the surface, some sporting looks of shock, others bleeding and broken from fighting free of the crumbling dome. Ladon shook his head as fear threatened to blacken his view.

  Scale up. You eat pussy, you’re not A PUSSY, he scolded himself. You’re a warrior, a prince, a protector… so scale up and go protect those that are yours! His own words dispelled the black from his eyes, and with a flick of his wings he was diving deeper with the speed of a lightning strike.

  The sudden feeling of nothing but air surrounding you caused Volos to momentarily freak, until he remembered he had wings. As painful as that change had been, he was all dragon and what a magnificent beast he was. The perfectly mixed colors of a blue blizzard that had swept across the chlorophyll green of a freshly grown field. Volos beat his wings causing a down draft that made James take cover from the leaves and debris being thrown around.

  Volos shot up the tree like a scaled jet, and as he hit the cloud level he tilted his body and arched back toward the tree line. He’d forgotten how amazing it felt to fly. He loved spending time under the water’s protection, but the feeling of air rushing past your scales brings a freedom that can’t be explained unless you’ve experienced it.

  A loud shriek caused Volos to focus just in time to move as the Phoenix attacked. He winced a little, looking down he saw that while he’d moved the talon had made contact with his belly, and a small amount of blood was bubbling to the surface. Volos looked to locate the bird that had drawn blood, only to see it lining up Payton who was still holding on to the top of the large tree. The phoenix looked at him th
en back at Payton, her head flicking between to the two of them.

  The Phoenix was slightly closer, and as it shrieked it tucked the feathered wings back against his body and flew—flew for Payton. Volos’ adrenalin erupted in a battle cry as he took off for the same destination. Volos saw he wouldn’t make it to Payton first, so with a small tail adjustment he went after an intercept.

  “Oomph” the sound expelled from the beast’s beak as Volos flew directly into its side, sent it down into a spiral toward the earth. Volos saw James’ eyes locked on it, and was off to follow. Taking a deep breath, he beat his wings slower and flew to the tree. He had no words in dragon form, but he hovered as close as he could without the wind causing the branch to snap, he lowered his head and waited for Payton to climb onto his head and down to his back.

  Payton was terrified as this massive beast lowered its head only a few inches away from her. She looked down and saw the floor drop away deeper as her head swam. The black she had been fighting off for hours was rushing at her like a tsunami, her fingers loosening as she started to fall back.

  “Help me Volos,” was all she whispered before she blacked entirely out and rolled out of the treetop like a ragdoll. Volos saw her eyes rolling and moved lower in anticipation of her passing out. As her hands released the tree, her body fell backward and rolled to the left, straight over Volos’ head and down to the middle of his back.

  He was unable to fly fast with her body precariously balanced on his back, but with the delicacy of a hummingbird. Volos lowered to the ground and let Payton, who was now regaining consciousness, roll down his wings and sit on the ground—the firm, unmoving, unwavering, solid ground. Volos was satisfied as he saw the color returning to her cheeks. When she had fainted her skin was an unhealthy shade of eggshell white.

  A rustle was heard in the trees to the left, Payton jumped to her feet and stood beside Volos’ shoulder, her hand up on his scaled skin as she waited to see what was happening. Volos snorted an approval of her touch as he swung his large head back toward the noise, he was about to change back but thought twice in case they needed a quick getaway.

  Payton could hear the growling of a wolf as she saw the rear of a large feathered beast back out from the tree line, its one wing up in a pose of surrender, the other wing hung broken at its side leaving it unable to fly.

  “Why?” the beast hissed at the wolf who had now come into view, his head low, teeth bared and growling with an unhinged anger. The phoenix continued, “If you had killed her at the ssstart, thisss woudn’t be happening,” the beast spat. “Ssshe wasss alone, all you had to do wasss bite,” he mocked the wolf.

  The wolf growled louder as he took a few steps forward, forcing the phoenix to step back further toward the edge of the ravine they had landed on.

  The phoenix’s hand went back up. “Okay, okay, okay, how about you jussst kill her now and we will call it sssquare?”

  A second even more menacing growl erupted from the wolf’s throat as the phoenix looked up and saw four more wolves step from the tree line, all growling, all focused on him. The phoenix’s eyes went wide and took another few steps back, the edge was only a single step away from his feet. He looked down to the water below, the jagged rocks that jutted out like a plethora of sharp stone spears, waited to claim the life of anyone who tried to jump the eighty-foot waterfall into its watery mouth.

  “No killing, okay?” the phoenix’s tone turned into a screech. “I jussst wanted the fucking dragon dead. Isss that too much to asssk?”

  “Yes, it is.” Payton stepped out from behind Volos’ shoulder of protection, she raised her hand to silence the protesting rumble already coming up from Volos’ chest as she centered her eyes on the feathered beast. “What gives you the right to kill anything? You, yourself, are a magnificent creature. How dare you try and kill another magnificent beast just for being different.”

  “You ssstupid little girl, so full of righteousssnesss, and correctnesss, yet you have completely misssed the point. Your puny little human brain issn’t capable of processsing true warsss. Warsss fought on the wrong doingsss of another era. I will forever carry my familiesss war with me. I will forever hunt and murder the dragonsss for the deathsss they have causssed in my blaze, and the blaze of other phoenix familiesss,” the phoenix spat as he spoke with the hatred inbred for generations. “I will not ressst ‘til the last dragon isss dead.” The last sentence was growled as the feathered beast locked eyes with Volos, a momentary understanding that this war would last for as long as the two-species existed.

  Volos blinked as the sound of a deep menacing growl caused him to turn his head. James launched himself into the phoenix with the power to take them both over the edge and plunged down toward the awaiting rocky spears.

  A yelp caused Payton to turn and hide her head into Volos’ scaled chest. His pack members had changed back to human form and run to the edge, calling out his name with fear and terror. Payton looked over her shoulders as she heard the scream that confirmed his death.

  The woman stood there naked and exposed to the world, the shock making her shake uncontrollably, as her brother’s body laid dead at the bottom of the ravine.

  “I am so sorry,” Payton whispered.

  The woman glanced at her, Payton saw heart-wrenching pain. She knew what it looked like, she’d seen it in her own eyes when her grandmother had passed. The woman stayed silent as she turned and followed her pack, descending the ravine down the cliffs. They were now on a body retrieval mission and James ‘Silver Wolf’ Paxern had sacrificed his life to save them all.

  Payton would look out for the funeral notice, she wanted to go as a sign of respect and thanks for the ultimate price paid.

  Ladon, the dome. It’s broken. The clan… Volos heard Attor’s voice and his heart stopped.

  His clan. His dome. His brothers.

  Volos lowered his head and scooped up Payton without her permission and they took to the air. She slid to the place between his wings, sat astride his shoulder blades and hung on around his neck. Volos did a quick circle as he looked down the ravine. He could see the lifeless body of the wolf lying in a pool of blood, but he couldn’t see the phoenix—there was no sign of the phoenix’s body at all.

  He hoped the bastard was dead, but without sighting the body, he couldn’t be sure. Volos took a deep breath and thrust his wings powerfully in the air, his clan needed him and damned if he was going to let them down.

  Ladon slid next to Attor as they held up a large sheet of glass, the clan were crawling out as fast as they could. Ladon gazed around and he saw the Oasis was virtually full and despite all they were doing to get everyone out, he could see a couple of bodies caught under shards of broken glass and fallen rock walls, the lifeless gaze they had confirmed to the brothers they were already dead.

  You’re injured, Ladon said to Attor as the trail of blood still snaked around his chest.

  Nothing life threatening, but the bastard got away, Attor growled with frustration. Have you got this? I’m going to check the other side of the dome.

  Ladon nodded as Attor let go and took off.

  Volos hit sand hard, he had chosen a secluded corner of the beach, it was daylight and the sight of a dragon on the beach would cause quite a stir. Payton slid down between his shoulder and his chest. Her feet touching the sand signaled to Volos that he could change back. As his body shimmered and rippled, Payton watched his tail seemingly be swallowed up in his back, the large thick legs of a dragon were thinning out to be that of a muscular male. Volos kept his wings and had maintained more scale coverage than if he was wearing his leathers. When he had forced the change in the tree, his leathers were destroyed. Volos felt leaving more scales over his torso left him not quite as exposed.

  “Are you hurt?” he asked Payton, his breath was ragged from having to change twice in quick succession. Full skeletal reassignment could take it out of even the strongest of dragons.

  “I…” her words were shaky. “I don’t think so…�
� She looked at her arms, trails of blood traveling down toward her wrists. “Just cuts and scrapes, nothing’s broken.” Looking at Volos, she paused then launched into his arms, her tears flowing freely as she sobbed hard against his comforting hug.

  Volos wrapped his arms tightly around her, she felt so right against him. Payton was an extension of his soul—she was him without balls. Volos grinned at his own awkward joke while looking down at her. “I have to go, my brothers and the clan need me.” Seeing her with tears running down her cheeks was ripping his heart in two, but he had responsibilities as well. She wasn’t hurt and others might need him more right now. “Do you understand? My family are at risk, I must help save my clan. I will be back before you know it.”

  “What if…” her breath hitched as she held him tighter, “… what if you don’t come back?”

  “Oh, sweetheart…” his voice was pure love, his heart opened and the feelings poured out, unhindered by the politics of their situation, “… I have found my heart in you. Without you, it will not beat.” He leaned in and kissed her forehead tenderly. “You have a dragon for life with me.” He reached down to tilt her head back when he continued, “If you want me.”

  Payton jumped up into his arms, wrapping her arms around his neck and kissed him deeply. “Yes. Yes, I want you, you big oaf.”

  Volos laughed. “Oh and while I’m gone, go visit Kylee. She’s at the Campbell River Private… and when I last checked on her, she was broken but going to pull through.”

  Payton gasped. “She’s alive?”

  “Indeed.” He nodded.

  “But the bird said…” Some fresh tears flowed.

  “He lied. I found her and called the medics. She will live, but I’m sure she’ll heal faster with you at her side.”