by Amelia Jade
Barnes scowled at him. He scowled back.
“What happened under the freeway?”
“I ran for a mile, maybe two, I honestly don’t recall. The prospect of being shot scared me enough that I didn’t pay attention. I finally decided to come back into the normal areas of the city. At that point I was attacked by someone clad in dark clothing. He was big, not much smaller than me. He had a knife.”
“So you…what, pulled out your sword?”
Corde sighed. “It’s a magic trick. I’ve told you this before!”
“It certainly seemed to cut through the brick wall okay. We have burn marks, and eyewitness testimony from passersby that they saw the tip of the sword just burst from the wall as you cut through it. Then you said you were going to kill someone.” The detective leaned in over the table, his jowls bouncing slightly as he slapped his palms on the surface for emphasis. “Around here, that’s a big no-no, Mr. …Corde. No last name?”
“No.”
“Makes it hard to track you then. Our records have nothing about you before the last time you were brought in.”
“Try checking a little farther back,” he suggested. By a few centuries.
The detective stood up, straightening his belt across his ample stomach and gave Corde another hard look.
“Look, just work with me here.”
“I’m not interested in becoming a police officer, but thanks for the job offer.”
Spittle flew from his lips as the detective sputtered for an answer. Corde rocked back slightly as far as his restraints would allow to avoid the cloud of descending liquid.
Behind Barnes the door flew open and Colonel Elin Mara strode into the room, decked out in her full military uniform, accompanied by Kallore and Vanek, both dressed all in black.
“That will be enough, Detective Barnes. I’m Colonel—”
“I know who you are, Colonel.”
“Then you’re aware that this man is coming with me.”
Detective Barnes opened his mouth, but a threatening growl from both Kallore and Vanek silenced him as the two imposing men glared at the rotund officer, flames dancing in their eyes.
Corde swallowed. He knew that the flames were there because of him. It was his fault.
I am so screwed.
Vanek’s eyes glanced toward him as Barnes began to undo the restraints. The message was loud and clear: You are fucking screwed. Idiot.
“Oh forget this,” he snapped as Barnes moved slower than molasses. He stood up, snapping the chain. Then with a twist of his fingers he dropped the cuffs from each wrist, the broken and mangled remains falling to the table with a loud clang.
Then, flanked by Vanek in front and Kallore behind, he left the room. Colonel Mara said something to Barnes and then followed them out, closing the door in the detective’s face. Corde grinned. She was pissed at him, but that was internal drama. Right now she was putting on a show for the department, letting them know they weren’t to mess with anyone who fell under her jurisdiction.
Like brothers, they would raise holy hell between them, but just as quickly band together against enemies. He wisely didn’t say anything, however, not wishing to tempt her wrath. It was already going to be painful enough.
“I feel like I just got out of one of these,” he muttered as Kallore pulled open the door to the back of a huge, black, heavily modified SUV.
The other dragon just glared, though there was humor contained in the look. He’d wisely waited until Colonel Mara was on the far side before he’d spoken.
“You’ve really fucked up now,” she snapped as Vanek slid in next to him, Kallore taking the front seat. “You three are the test, you know. The ones that will prove to everyone else whether we’re in the right or not about you helping us defeat the Outsiders. Every time you pull a stunt like this, it makes us look worse, and increases the chances they’ll shut us down.”
Corde looked away. “I was fighting the Outsider.”
Elin snorted. “Seriously, Corde?”
“I was fighting the Outsider!” he roared, the glass shaking as the cabin was filled with his voice. “It was waiting under the freeway for me. I hit it twice, splitting it open. It fled down the alley, and I pursued it. We were all alone, and I was going to kill it. It was weak. I had my sword—I went to slice it in half. At the last second it threw its own purple goop, its blood, whatever, in my face. I stumbled. Turns out the wall wasn’t to a building, it was just to block the alley off from the sidewalk.
“You told people that you were going to kill them.”
“I was talking to the Outsider. I was still blind. I didn’t know.”
Elin just gritted her teeth. “We need to kill one of these things.”
“What do you think I was trying to do?”
“Why were you out there in the first place?”
He told her all about the gang and what had been going on with them and Kylie.
“Where is she now, by the way?”
Vanek spoke up. “Back at the penthouse. I convinced her to stay there until I got back. She’s pretty distraught.”
Corde nodded his thanks.
“I’ll handle the gang,” Elin told him.
“It has to be peacefully,” he told her, catching her eye in the rearview mirror and ensuring she realized that he was dead serious about that.
“Not to worry. I have some contacts. They’ll find themselves doing hard labor for the next ten years. Charges of attempted murder against you should suffice.”
“Just like that?” he asked, astonished at the ease with which she was talking about dealing with the gang.
“Just like that. Don’t ask me if I’m breaking any laws to get them there, but we all know they’re guilty as sin. And,” she added, looking at him in the mirror again, “it will all be done peacefully.”
Corde nodded his thanks. Legalities didn’t overly concern him. In fact, they were a relative nuisance. He hadn’t had to obey any laws but the clan laws when he was younger. He knew they were scum, so they should pay. That was enough for him.
“Next time, come to me first about this sort of shit, okay? I have resources now, all dedicated to ensuring you three, and hopefully others, are ready to fight for us. Make use of them.”
“I will,” he promised, wishing he’d thought about that in the first place.
“You’re on your own about Kylie though,” she added almost apologetically.
He frowned. “If this is an ass-chewing, I have to admit Colonel, it could use some work.”
Elin shook her head tiredly. “Corde, if you fuck up again, they’re going to order me to put you back under. That’s more of a threat than anything I could say.”
Sitting back into the chair, he fell silent while contemplating her words. Back under. Back to sleep. Without Kylie. Bone-chilling cold settled into his limbs at the thought of being ripped away from his mate after being so close. If they put him back under, he might never awaken again. Certainly not before Kylie’s all-too-brief lifespan elapsed.
That could not be allowed to happen.
The car pulled up to the building that housed the suite he and Vanek currently shared. As they headed down the ramp to the underground parking his nerves started to fray. The sight of the private elevator sparked what he could only describe as fear in him.
Kylie waited at the top. He had one chance to convince her of what was going on, to prove that he wasn’t what she thought he was. If he screwed it up, then all hope was lost.
No pressure.
“Good luck,” Vanek said softly as he exited the SUV, the other two dragons remaining behind with Colonel Mara. “I’ll be back later,” he added. “Don’t go thinking you get the whole place to yourself now.”
Corde tossed him a middle finger and slammed the door.
“You can do this,” he said to himself, trying to pump up his confidence.
One chance.
Chapter Eighteen
Kylie
Why had she listened to
Vanek again?
The other dragon-man, alleged-dragon-man, had convinced her to just wait there for a bit until she could calm down and more details about what had happened to Corde could come out.
Kylie must be desperate if she’d listened. Had her desire to see people rehabilitated infected her so much that she would go to these lengths just to give someone a third chance? At some point she had to pack it in and realize that these types of people, the people like Corde, they just weren’t going to change! They never did. No matter what she did to try and help.
It was time to go, she realized. Nothing more could be done for Corde. He’d chosen his path and she had to let him walk it, even if it meant that she couldn’t follow. He was a grown man, not some teenager who could still be shown a better way.
Getting to her feet, she started shoving her meager belongings into the one duffel bag that she’d managed to salvage after her house had been initially ransacked. Everything she truly needed fit with ease, leaving room to spare. Tossing it over her shoulder, she marched out of the room and to the private elevator, punching in the code that would bring it to her so that she could be whisked away. By the time Vanek came back, she would be long gone.
It was time for her fresh start. She waited with her head bowed.
The elevator dinged and she stepped forward, just as someone was stepping out.
“Oh shit, I’m sorry!” she said as they collided.
Huge hands grabbed her shoulders and steadied her for a moment before letting go.
“No, it was my fault. I wasn’t looking where I was going.”
Her head snapped up. “Corde.”
“Hi.” He grimaced, his mouth working as he attempted to come up with words.
“Don’t bother,” she said tiredly. “I’ve heard it all before.”
“I’d like you to watch a video,” he said. “That might better explain some things. Can you give me that? After all I’ve done for you, will you just sit and watch a video? I promise it’s not some cheesy recording of me trying to convince you to stay. This is serious. It’s about why I’m here, and what I am.”
Kylie sighed. As far as requests went, it was pretty simple, and he had done a hell of a lot for her without asking for a single thing in return. Not to mention he wasn’t pleading with her. He’d never once asked for another chance. All he wanted to do was show her something. Was there, perhaps, a reason why he’d done what he’d done? Kylie smothered all sense of hope that threatened to worm its way into her system. She was not going to let herself believe that the video would change her mind. Because then she’d likely be disappointed all over again.
“Fine,” she said as the silence stretched on. “But then I’m gone.”
“Of course. Thank you.”
He showed her up the stairs to the second level and turned on the television. After fumbling with it a few times he got something hooked up.
“This is Fort Stark, about seven weeks ago. This is where I was before I came here. In the picture is Kallore, another dragon like me. It is quite graphic, so prepare yourself.”
Kylie watched the video, steeling herself for the worst. It was dark, obviously filmed at night. She watched two men run up to a car and start shooting at something unseen. Behind them stood the giant, Kallore. He pointed at them and shouted something, but they didn’t react in time.
Something—she could barely see what—emerged from under the vehicle. A flash of blue from each of the soldiers moved into the new person, and just like that they crumpled to the ground, seemingly lifeless.
“That is what I fight,” Corde said, his voice stiff and filled with hatred. “We call them Outsiders.”
The black figure lurched across the screen. Kallore tried to fight it, using some sort of whip that seemed to be made out of fire, but he was losing. The video switched abruptly to show several humans attacking it with guns, seemingly to no use. It advanced, and one by one the humans ran out of ammunition, running away, until at last a lone female remained. She tossed her gun when it was empty, and then used her pistol, before throwing that too at the creature.
“That’s Colonel Mara, Kallore’s mate.”
The camera flicked again, and she saw the whip lash out, larger this time. It grabbed the Outsider, hauled it back. And then something happened and abruptly a massive dragon occupied the spot. It battered the Outsider and then blasted it with a cone of flame from its mouth.
“That’s a dragon,” she said lamely as the video ended, showing the huge creature limping slowly after the black…thing. While the attacker had been hard to make out in the darkness, the huge beast from movies and video games was very easily identifiable.
“It is.”
“And you…you can turn into one of them as well?”
Corde dipped his head in the affirmative.
“What was that thing? The Outsider?”
Corde, who had been standing all this time, now took a seat on one of the couches across from her. The TV off to the left was forgotten, as was her initial drive to leave him and everything he’d told her behind.
“We don’t know much.” He paused, looking out the window toward the mountains. “I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to tell you, to be honest, so if you could act like I haven’t around the others until I get confirmation, that would be fantastic.”
She noted how in that scenario it presumed she stuck around.
We’ll see.
“I can do that,” she told him. Even if she left, she would keep it a secret. That wasn’t asking much of her either.
“They come from out there,” he told her, once more glancing to the west and the mighty earthen statues that rose to peaks high in the air. “Under one of those mountains is a portal. A gateway, I guess, to their home. It’s not on Earth, that’s for sure.”
Kylie listened with increasing disbelief as he outlined how the army had fought back, eventually sending a nuclear weapon through to the far side to try and destroy them.
“And?” she asked, leaning forward, needing to know more. “Did it work?”
“I guess. I’m still a little behind on the whole science thing. But these bombs give off some sort of bad…stuff?”
“You mean radiation?” Kylie wondered how he didn’t know even that much about nukes. Even she did, and she wasn’t a military junkie at all.
“Yeah. Anyway, that seems to be preventing them from crossing. Unfortunately, it’s going away really fast, and the portal I guess absorbed a lot of the bombs’ energy. So it’s a lot bigger now, meaning they can send through Walkers that are the size of the dragon you just saw.”
The matter-of-fact delivery of all the information threatened to kindle her disbelief into outright denial. He was just too calm about everything as he spoke. Kylie, on the other hand, could imagine what something the size of a dragon would do as it tore across the earth. The military would be hard-pressed to stop something like that before it killed a lot of people.
“And what about that blue light I saw when it killed the soldiers?”
Corde looked unhappy at the reminder. “That, as far as we can tell, is the Outsider ripping the lifeforce straight from their bodies.”
“The…lifeforce?”
“Their soul. Whatever you want to call it. The vitality that makes you alive. It just… takes it, and absorbs it, growing stronger in the process.”
She shuddered at the hideous nature. “That’s possible?”
Corde shrugged. “I guess. They aren’t from here. Whether they’re from another planet, or universe, I do not know. Nobody does. We don’t know how they do it either, but they do.”
“How come it didn’t work on the dragon? Kallore, you said?”
“Kallore,” he confirmed. “And it did. But we dragons are…different. We’ve got defenses that you humans don’t, since we’re not completely human to begin with. It pulled some of his lifeforce, that’s why he wasn’t able to go after it at the end. He was too weakened, and needed to regenerate.”
Kylie exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “This is all…well, terrifying, to be completely honest. But why did you want to show me this?”
“Because I want you to know what I’ve fought. Here, in the city. Twice now.”
Her brain automatically connected the dots. “You were using your sword against one of those things? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”
“Yes. But each time it’s outwitted me. Tricked me.” His face turned hard. “I think it’s a lot smarter than we give it credit for. One of them tried to kill Kallore with force. That didn’t work. So this one is trying to get rid of me using other means, by having me arrested.”
“You realize that means it can speak our language. It knows about us, right?”
Corde nodded. “I…I think it was working with the gang. It’s been stalking me; it must have seen them. When I tracked the gang back to their house, and then left while they tried to shoot at me, I found it hiding under the freeway, where we started fighting. Why else would it be there, Kylie?”
She didn’t have an answer to his question. Her brain was still trying to process everything she’d been told in the past half an hour.
She’d been waiting a long time for him to come back, and now she was presented with this fantastic story, and video proof.
“How do I know the video isn’t a fake?”
Corde rolled his eyes, and extended one hand. A sword of fire leapt from his palm as he closed his long fingers around its hilt. “Name something in the room you’d like me to cut through. Anything. The barstool?” he said, turning around and cleaving it in half with a casual backhand swing. “Maybe the little table and vase over here?” he stalked over to the small display table, and with a flick of his wrist the giant greatsword split both in two. Glass spit and sizzled as it was burnt, the vase shattering as it fell to the floor.
“Okay, okay!’ she raised her hands. “I’m sorry. It’s just…hard to accept.”
“I know, but you’ve seen the evidence of it yourself, Kylie. These are not tricks to entertain a child. This is real.”
She sat still on the couch as he extinguished his sword, wringing her hands together as her brain tried to rewrite everything she thought she knew. Everything that humanity thought it knew. Telling herself that dragons were real wasn’t just as simple as watching a video and seeing Corde wield a magic sword. It went deeper than that.