The three of us talked for a good hour and then Rachel signed off so she could get herself some dinner before going to bed and Ian and I went for a walk around the estate. By now the fog had dissipated and we were left with a cold, cloudy start to the day. I went to the house to visit with Ciara and her babies and we sat on her bed while I cradled little William and stared out her window at the dark purple and blue clouds. The wind was picking up and the clouds were starting to get closer and it made Ciara extremely nervous.
“I wish there was something I could do to help. I heard Edan’s speech this morning and the resounding show of support he got from everyone but he’s my husband and I should be standing with him!” She grumbled irritably but I rubbed her arm and shook my head.
“No, your responsibility is to your babies. You have to stay in here with them and protect them. Let us do what we can outside. Edan will come for you if anything bad starts to happen.” I assured her and she shot me a fast, wide-eyed look.
“Do you think anything bad will happen? These are the same men that came to look at my paintings? They seemed so harmless! A little creepy maybe but no threat to me or anyone else.” She said in disbelief and I sighed and shrugged.
“They needed to be invited onto the property and your art gave them the excuse they needed to get that invitation. I believe they came to look around and see how hard it would be to take it back. “
“You mean to see if there was a dragon on the property.” She interrupted and I nodded ruefully.
“Yeah, I think so. And my gut is telling me that they’ve chosen now to make their move because you and your children are at your most vulnerable, thus making the Laird vulnerable. You have to stay out of sight otherwise it might put Edan and your entire family at greater risk.” At my words she nodded reluctantly and hugged little Alexandria closer. There was a shout from outside that was repeated by a few other voices, and from inside it sounded like ‘incoming’. At the one word Ciara gasped and clutched my hand tightly as I rose to my feet.
“Be careful Kailani, please. And don’t think bad of me for saying this, but please do whatever you can to protect my husband.”
“I will, I promise. Take care of your Mom little ones.” I bent down to lay William on the blanket beside Ciara and then gave her a quick, tight hug. As I walked out the door, she crossed herself like only a Catholic would and I heard her pray the words,
“Protect thine heart, Kailani Alikae Williams.”
I ran outside through the kitchen door and headed for the coastline where the blue and purple clouds seemed to hang. When I got there, every single person on the estate was lined along the cliff edge and my blood ran cold. When I got closer, I could hear Edan shouting,
“Spread out everyone! This is our land, not theirs and they will feel the wrath of the Highlander if they try to take it from us!” He shouted to the long line of people who stood along the edge of the cliff as the wind whipped them in the face almost painfully. At his words, everyone spread out a little more, forming a long chain that stretched almost the entire half of the fish-bowl. Below, on the wet and rocky sand, two Fae, in their familiar human glamour, stood looking up at them, dressed head-to-toe in black and Hugh wondered if these were the two that had been here under the pretense of looking at Ciara’s artwork, or if all Fae looked the same.
“Out of our way humans! This was our land first. Consider this an immediate eviction notice.” One of the Fae called up and Edan snorted with a dark chuckle and a clench of his fists.
“Over our dead bodies! This is our home! We will not leave just because you told us to!” He shouted back and a mighty gust of wind whipped up wet sand and shot it straight up the escarpment into his face, making Edan stumble backwards a step or two, coughing and sputtering.
“You weak, inferior humans think you can stand up to us? What power do you have to stop us?”
“They don’t need power, they have me!” I shouted down to them, stepping between Edan and Ian with a supportive squeeze of both men’s arms.
“You?! You are nothing but a weak female. Useless!” They dismissed me easily and I smirked as I started down the path towards them. I didn’t have the slightest clue how or what I was going to do once I got down to the sand but I would not stand back and let them threaten these warm, wonderful people who had welcomed me into their extended family without a moment’s hesitation.
“You know, not long ago I shared that opinion. But not anymore. And I have you to thank for that. Without the threat of your arrival, I never would have pushed myself and learned all about what I’m capable of.” As I spoke, they watched me progress one step at a time and I clutched the dragon charm that was around my neck. The charm heated in my hand as though the closer I got to the Fae, the more ready it was to do battle with them.
“You delude yourself human if you think you can defeat us!”
“Hey, wait a minute. You’re different.” I called suddenly, pointing at the shorter of the two Fae and his shoulders stiffened and he straightened up in regal indignation. “You, I already know. I threw you out of the Laird’s private quarters. But you’re new.” I pointed between the two men as though I didn’t have a care in the world, and above me, all of the Cameron clansmen looked at each other questioningly. What was I doing?
“What does it matter? We are here now and we demand you vacate these premises or be forcefully removed!”
“Now, now. No reason to get testy. I just find it interesting that you say I’m no match for you, and yet your friend didn’t come with you like he did when you came to look at Mrs. Cameron’s paintings. Why is that, I wonder?”
“SILENCE! That is none of your business, mortal!” The taller of the two roared, suddenly very angry - I’ll call him Tall-and-ugly - and I raised my eyebrows slightly. How far could I push before they snapped? Before they did something reckless, maybe even careless? I didn’t know what these Fae were capable of, but then they didn’t know me either so we were on a somewhat level playing field.
“He didn’t happen to stop by here the other day did he? As a blackbird?” I was reaching with that question but given the runes that were protecting the lane-way, the only way a Fae would have been able to get onto this property would be either up the cliff wall, or by air. And there had been something unnatural about that bird…
“We can take many forms! We are Fae! We are all-powerful!” Tall-and-ugly gloated, his every word dripping with arrogance and I rolled my eyes.
“Uh-huh. And that’s why I turned him into a crispy critter and his lifeless, feathered body went out with the tide.” I stopped walking at the base of the path, my toes almost touching the wet sand that would trigger my change and I watched the two Fae turn incredulous gazes to me. I now had their full attention, they no longer remembered that we were almost surrounded by bodies above us and that was just fine with me.
“Impossible! No human has the power to defeat us!” He roared again, completely incensed, and the wind whipped up around us, sending sand and ocean spray everywhere, and above us a clap of thunder sounded, shaking the ground we all stood on.
“Temper, temper. But then, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Your friend put up a good fight, and he did get his claws into me. Once.” I smirked, doing my best to keep my tone carefree and blase simply because it seemed to drive the two in front of me crazy.
“You wouldn’t be alive if he’d gotten a hold of you, human! He would have ripped you to shreds!”
“Not quite. See, I’m not completely human.” I gave the charm hanging from my neck one final squeeze for good luck and as I stepped onto the sand I said a quick spell and when my flash of light faded, I was in full dragon-form but much bigger than what the Camerons were used to seeing. The Fae weren’t the only ones capable of casting glamour spells, and after talking with Gran about them, I’d done my homework!
Ian stood up on the cliff with everyone else and he swallowed hard and fought the instinctive urge to step back when he saw just how big I was. I wa
s easily three times the size I had been when he’d first seen me in dragon-form and even with the clouds in the sky, the dull grey light made my scales glisten. He could only guess that it was some kind of magic spell that made me appear so much bigger, but damn, I was one formidable-looking dragon right now. And he clearly wasn’t the only one who thought so.
“No! That’s impossible!” The two in black fell back from me in astonishment, and in that moment, the wind stopped and even the waves, far out at low tide, seemed to stop, making Jamie and a few others exchange uneasy glances with Hugh and Edan.
“I thought I sensed something different about you when I first saw you.” The tall one found his voice again and he sneered at me. “Too bad, much like the humans, you are still inferior to our own race and you will cower before us!” He bellowed and everyone above watched in fascination as my legs visibly trembled for a second, but I did not go down which appeared to push the Fae’s temper into a whole new realm. “Bow and cower before me you insulant lizard!” He screeched and the wind and waves once again whipped into an almost unbearable frenzy. A bolt of lightning shot from the sky directly at me and I quickly dodged out of the way, breathing a stream of fire at them as I started to circle around. They dodged out of the way of my fire, splitting up and I swung my tail into the path of the shorter of the two just as he started to get past me.
“Ah, ah, ah. You’re not going anywhere.” I told him, my voice echoing in everyone’s head and Ian’s eyebrows shot up in surprise as he exchanged a glance with Edan beside him. I could talk using my thoughts? Since when?!
“Your kind are long since extinct dragon! Why would you risk your survival for these wretched, worthless humans?” Tall-and-ugly called out to me, trying to switch tactics and I snorted hot air at him, lowering my head closer to the ground so I could see him.
“The only ones here who aren’t worth their salt are the two of you. These people have lived on this land for centuries, working the land, making it their homes. What have you done with it? You abandoned it, moving on to more luxurious places I’m sure and now you think you can just come back and take it from them? Totally not going to happen!”
“This used to be your land too but you left it just as we did. Your ancestors high-tailed it out of here in fear of what we would do to them if they were still here when we came back. You would have been wise to have stayed away too.”
“So far you seem to be all talk and not a lot of action. I think my ancestors were more worried they would have fallen asleep listening to you go on about how mighty and all-powerful you are, than of what you would do to them.” While we traded barbs back and forth Stephanie looked over at Ian, standing on the other side of Jamie from her.
“Ian! What is she doing? Is she trying to get herself killed?!” My friend called to the doctor and he shook his head wordlessly, his gaze glued to the three of us. My fangs were enormous and the fire I’d shot at the two Fae had been so hot, the line of sand that had been under it had turned to glass. If he survived the day, he was going to go down and salvage that artifact, he promised himself.
“You would rather die protecting these humans and this puny piece of land?” Short-and-silent asked me incredulously and I swung my head around just enough to see him.
“If it’s so puny and worthless, why do you want it so bad?” I fired back.
“Enough! You bore me dragon!” Tall-and-ugly shouted suddenly, his hands fisting at his sides and I smirked. Clearly his temper had a short fuse.
“Couldn’t agree more!” With that, I spread my wings and was airborne, sending huge gusts of wind pushing downward on everyone with each flap of my wings and the Cameron clan let out gasps, some in fear, some in appreciation as I rose up above them and started to circle around the two down on the sand. Bolts of electricity shot from Tall-and-ugly’s hands as he tried to hit me but I kept moving and shot fire down at them whenever I could, making them dodge and dart around like scared insects. An errant bolt missed me and hit the face of the cliff, making the ground tremble and Hugh called for everyone to step back as some boulders came loose and tumbled down into the bay.
It clearly pissed me off that the bolt had hit the ground so close to my friends because I let out a very dragon-like scream, diving down and snapping at the two who dove for cover at the last moment. Fire sliced across the sand between them and steam billowed up from the ground as the wet sand reacted to the heat. Thunder boomed overhead and the wind howled and when the steam and blowing sand cleared enough for everyone who was standing along the edge of the cliff to see again, what they saw wasn’t pretty.
Huge, jagged pieces of glass protruded from the ground where the wind had whipped up the flaming sand, mist was circling around like it was caught in a tornado and I was in the process of diving for Short-and-silent. He jumped out of the way, or tried to but my claw grabbed his foot and he screamed when I lifted him off the ground and took him up into the air with me.
“What’s the matter? Don’t like heights?” I taunted, sailing higher and higher up into
the clouds.
“Don’t drop me! Don’t drop me!” He kept pleading and if I’d had eyebrows, they would have gone up in mock surprise.
“Why? Can’t you fly? Your friend just told us not that long ago that you can take on any shape you want. Well, now’s your chance to prove it.” I released his foot and he screamed as he plummeted towards the ground and everyone up on the cliff gasped. Short-and-silent wasn’t quite so silent as he fell and his screams were enough to make everyone close their eyes to avoid witnessing the inevitable landing. But his scream stopped abruptly and when everyone looked again, he was hovering face-down, his body suspended in the air a foot above one of the sharp pieces of recently-created-and-probably-still-pretty-hot glass that protruded out of the ground.
“Hmm. Not quite what you were expecting, huh?” I asked, circling around again and Tall-and-ugly stared at his companion in open-mouthed shock.
“How did you do that? You don’t have that kind of power.” He stammered and I glared at him, swooping down low towards him.
“You don’t know what I’m capable of.” I snapped my big teeth at him and he jumped out of the way. “You wanna know what I’ve just learned about you? You’re not the all-powerful, all-mighty Fae that you’d like everyone to believe you are. You can harness certain aspects of nature maybe - like the weather, or turning into a particular animal - and use it to your advantage but you aren’t part of the all-powerful God-like Fae that you’re pretending to be. Your friend could change into a blackbird and very likely spy on people, maybe steal things. You can harness the weather, and your other friend here, who is about to kiss the sand if he doesn’t impale himself first, I think is the same. There’s an awful lot of lightning flashing around for him to be much different.”
“You speak as though you are better than us but you’re not! Do you know what your ancestors were? You were no different than these humans’ cats and dogs. Pets if you were lucky enough to find a Fae that would care for you - otherwise you were nothing but filthy, disgusting scavengers, forced to live in cold, dark and wet places as far away from us as you could get.”
“Well, it’s a good thing I’m not one of them, isn’t it?” I banked to the side to avoid another lightning bolt but this time it got me in the tail and I screamed in pain. Up on the ledge, Ian tensed, his heart in his throat and he opened his mouth to shout out to me but before he could get the words out, I swung around and attacked again and the Fae fired another bolt of electricity at me. This one hit me in the flank and I wobbled and crashed on the ground.
“Kailani, no!” Ian shouted in anguish, but before he could even think about moving, Edan had an arm like a steel bar across his chest.
“No! Ian, you can’t go to her. Not right now. She’ll be okay.” To everyone else he shouted, “We have to do what we can to help! Grab whatever you can and let’s become a big pain in these fairies’ sides!” Everyone started looking around themselves for rocks
or sticks or anything that they could throw and as they found suitable projectiles, they launched them down into the bay, attacking Tall-and-ugly, and even Short-and-silent, who was still suspended in the air where I’d left him.
I staggered to my feet and shook my head. My side hurt but I blocked the pain out as I realized my friends were trying to help me. Which I loved them for but at the same time I wished they’d stay out of it. Up until this moment, I’d had the full attention of both Fae, meaning they’d leave everyone up on the cliff alone. Now, they were being reminded of their presence, and as I watched, Tall-and-ugly turned to the cliff, his expression positively livid.
“I’ve about had enough of these little games! Vacate or die humans! We will obliterate every structure on this property and you with it and we will keep your precious dragon for ourselves! She will come in handy, I’m sure!” Lightning shot straight at the cliff’s edge in front of Ian and Edan and both men jumped back just in time, falling to the ground as it shook beneath their feet. Boulders crashed down the escarpment where they’d been standing and, in what was clearly a white-hot flash of rage given the sound of the shriek I let loose, I spun around and shot a stream of fire at Tall-and-ugly who just managed to get out of the way before it hit him. He hit the sand hard and turned, redirecting the wind so my fire came back at me. I couldn’t move fast enough thanks to the lightning bolt that had hit me so I did the only thing I could do and closed my eyes and grimaced as the fire rolled over me. My scales helped to deflect some of the heat and subsequent pain from the flame but it clearly looked scary from above because I heard Ian’s terrified shout from somewhere above me.
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