Pursuing Flight

by C. I. Black

  “Let go.” She wrenched against his grip but didn’t have the strength to break free.

  “Not going to happen.”

  “She said let go.” Werner jerked toward them, but one of the guards dove at him. He stepped into the attack, letting the man grab his arm, and slapped his palm against the guard’s cheek. The guard screamed and thrashed against Werner’s grip.

  Another man fired his Taser at Werner. Nero swept a gust of wind and knocked the barbs off target. “I’m not your enemy.”

  “You’re not my friend,” Werner growled.

  “I won’t go back.” Becca wrenched harder, her rage and fear giving her power.

  “You’re not going back.” He had no idea where back was, but he had the distinct impression it wasn’t the facility she’d just escaped from.

  That’s a lie. You’re one of them. You’re the devil’s master, you’re—

  Another blast of pain shot through him and her exhaustion weighed down his muscles.

  Shit. He couldn’t fight all of them. He had to get out of there, with Becca, and—

  And what?

  Mother, he had no idea. He couldn’t think straight, and he’d never not been able to think straight.

  He tightened his grip on her and bolted down the walkway. Becca twisted in his grip, the pain from her ribs and cracked collarbone screaming through him. They reached a narrow street with vehicles parked on one side, leaving enough space for a single one-way lane. The sizzling magic of the gatelock flickered, indicating he was drawing close to the edge.

  “Let go,” Becca hissed, her tone dark. The tendons in her knife hand and up her forearm flexed with the effort to rip free from his grip. She wasn’t going to go with him, and she wasn’t going to abandon Werner.

  Another guard screamed and dropped while two more lunged for Werner. Nero shot a blast of wind down the walkway and shoved one of the men on Werner into two others. If Werner could escape, Nero could go after him later without having to deal with a dragon-controlled facility. Once he’d dealt with Becca, of course.

  One more gust, and Werner could run.

  Nero shot another blast, but a snap of agony exploded through him and his power faltered. The wind capturing Becca’s knife arm vanished, and she wrenched free.

  “You’re not taking me back.” She lunged at him faster than he would have thought possible, given her injuries and exhaustion.

  He leapt back, his foot hitting the icy curb, and stumbled into the road to catch his balance. The sizzle of the gatelock vanished as if he’d stepped from one room to the next. Becca glared at him, her eyes wild and hard with determination and her breath misting around her head as if she really were a red drake from before the Great Scourge. She was mesmerizing, everything about her capturing him, breath, body, and soul.

  His thoughts stuttered. He’d been there before. Had experienced this moment before… not this moment but this… sensation?

  Another man screamed. Nero’s gaze jumped past Becca’s shoulder to Werner. Bodies littered the ground around him. Whatever his earth magic was, it was powerful. He’d incapacitated half a dozen men within a handful of minutes.

  Shit. Yes, ideally Werner needed to escape as well, but there was no way Nero would be able to deal with both him and Becca at the same time. Not without help. And there was no way in hell he was letting anyone, not even Raven, see how Becca affected him.

  “This is my nightmare, my brain. I control you.” She lunged at him.

  He heaved to the side and whipped a lasso of wind around her knife arm. She kicked at his knee, but he yanked his wind and jerked her to him, her back to his chest. With a hiss, he summoned a gate under their feet — please, Mother, let it take them to the safe house — and shot a final gust of wind at the three remaining men on Werner.

  Becca wrenched against the wind holding her, and the black nothingness of the gate enveloped them as the three guards on Werner were shoved five feet back. Werner glared and yelled at him, then bolted toward them as the world turned black.

  Heavy, consuming darkness pressed against Nero’s senses. Up and down vanished, the weight emanating from Becca dragged at Nero’s muscles. Then his foot hit solid floor and the gate released them into the front room of what used to be a convenience store, on the main floor of a converted house, and now was his secondary safe house.

  Thank the Mother his gate had taken them where he’d intended and had positioned him a few feet from the side wall, with him between her and the way out. Everything would have become more complicated if he’d gated them to Raven and the new intake.

  Becca gasped, and a flash of pain cut into him. His wind vanished and she ripped free of his grip.

  “I’m done being a prisoner.” She lurched away from him, stepping into a beam of streetlight cutting through a crack in the boarded-up windows, away from the door. Her dark eyes were too wide, her heart-shaped face too pale, and her black hair was matted and hung at uneven lengths, adding to her feral look. It hurt looking at her. No one deserved to have suffered like that.

  “You’re not a prisoner.” But she was probably crazy, which meant—

  “And I’m not crazy. This is a nightmare. It isn’t real.” Her gaze jumped over his shoulder to the door, and her eyes narrowed. “You’re not real.”

  “I am real.” Was there even any point? He’d thought trying to convince her of the truth was the right answer. Everything… almost everything said working with her was the best option, but he could feel her confusion whirling with the exhaustion and knew it was only a matter of days, if not hours — if not already — before the soul sickness consumed her mind. The greatest kindness he could offer her was a quick death. And now his chest hurt even more.

  She widened her stance, ready to fight. “I won’t make it easy on you.”

  “Nothing about this is easy.” Mother, this was why he’d created the puzur. She was innocent. She hadn’t deserved what Zenobia had done to her. None of the mages the Asar Nergal had been forced to kill in the last couple of weeks had deserved that fate. But if he let her live, the sickness would consume her soul, and her magic could endanger others and would certainly endanger his puzur.

  “I’m only a danger to the monsters in this nightmare.”

  “But this isn’t a nightmare.” Why was he even trying? What was wrong with him? She’d had a dragon’s soul inside her and couldn’t accept it was real. She’d seen his wind and felt the woolly darkness of a gate. If that didn’t prove the truth, then just telling her it was real wouldn’t change anything.

  “You honestly expect me to believe those monsters, those… dragons—” The hand holding the knife trembled and her will clenched tighter around his essence, slicing agony through his head. “It wasn’t real.”

  “It was.” And he was so sorry it had happened.

  “You can’t be sorry. You’re one of them—” This isn’t real. It can’t be real.

  Her trembling increased, physically and mentally. Her thoughts were shards, disjointed, fracturing and refracturing, cutting into both of them.

  “I’m Becca Scott! I am Becca.”

  “You are.” If only he could fix this. Mother, he wanted to fix this. But what had been done to her couldn’t be undone, and if he let this go on any longer, she was going to take him and everyone he cared about down with her. He was stronger than this. He was the dugga, doyen of the Major Black Coterie, and an ancient drake. He’d do what needed to be done. He always had.

  “Get out of my head!” She lunged at him, her essence surging stronger through him, a whirlwind of broken glass.

  He jerked to the side, caught her wrist with a wind rope, and wrenched the knife from her hand. With a roar, he swept the blade toward her heart, and an inferno exploded in his chest. His muscles froze, clenched in place, the knife a hair’s breadth from the front of her hospital gown, and every cell in his body screamed to protect her.

  Protect.

  The fire in his chest grew, searing over his limbs and into
his skull.

  Protect her. With everything. To his last breath.

  Mother, no.

  It wasn’t possible. He’d felt this before, welcomed the elation, the resolve, and the surety of soul. And he’d been crushed by it two thousand years ago. But that time before hadn’t felt as if every nerve had been touched with acid, or as if this resolve was encased in iron and unbreakable. It had been hot, sultry, and quietly certain. He’d known the truth in the core of his being. It had been strong and solid, but this… this was as if an unrealized missing connection had suddenly been completed, and all the world’s electricity was raging through him, wild and out of control.

  Except there was only ever one. That was the way it worked.

  Only one.

  He’d already found her, and his inamorata was already dead.

  Becca scrambled back. “I said get out.”

  The exhausted weight emanating from her surged, and the fire in his body froze into agony. The muscles in his chest and left arm seized and the tremor swept through him, beginning a convulsion.

  “Get. Out!” Desperation filled her expression, her body taut and trembling. The impending convulsion threatened to consume her, as well.

  Nero’s knees buckled, and he couldn’t focus long enough to summon even a hint of wind to hold himself up or break his fall.

  Inamorated. He was inamorated again. To a human.

  A soul-sick human.

  She punched at his head, her will squeezing both of their essences tight. He raised a hand to block her strike, but his thoughts muddled between brain and body. Her fist slammed into his cheek. Something cracked. The room twisted and the threatening darkness rushed around him.

  His other cheek hit the floor before he knew he was falling. Becca grabbed the knife from his hand and bolted to the door.

  “Wait—” His vision blurred and darkened. He was going to pass out. He had to stop her, had to protect her, had to—

  Mother. Inamorated again. It wasn’t possible.

  9

  Becca bolted out the door before the monster, with his dangerously alluring presence and impossible magic wind, could grab her again. Her movements were jerky as she fought to run against her spasming muscles, and the cold stung her cheeks and bare arms and legs. On either side of her stretched an abandoned street with tired, three-story brick stores crowded close to the edge of a sidewalk that was half broken concrete and half snow bank.

  Left or right? She couldn’t see a light in any of the nearby buildings, and the store across the street from her had a broken sign and boarded-up windows.

  She ran left, as fast as she could, ignoring the cold, the agony of her seizing body, and the bite of ice and broken sidewalk on her bare feet. If this was still a nightmare, she couldn’t give in and stop, and she couldn’t risk banging on doors and begging for help. That wouldn’t work. Of course, just running wouldn’t help, either. The prison was her mind, and she couldn’t escape from herself.

  But a part of her wasn’t sure anymore. That monster— no, the devil’s master — God, she’d recognized his thoughts and essence the moment she’d seen him and hadn’t been surprised he’d exuded intense, raw masculinity. A part of her had sensed that the moment his thoughts had appeared in her dreams. He’d been determined to convince her this was real. And God help her, a part of her wanted him to be real.

  But wasn’t that just part of the nightmare?

  Except—

  Her throat tightened and she fought back a sob. She needed a safe place to get her bearings, but the shock and fury from the monster’s thoughts still raged through her. It wasn’t possible. None of this was possible. But she no longer knew what was possible and what wasn’t. And what about Glenn and the others? What about Werner? Were they creations of the nightmare, or were they real? Stanbury? The facility?

  No, they had to be figments. It couldn’t be real. But the devil’s master had said it was. And he was sorry. They’d ripped into her soul, tore at her essence, determined to ignite the impossible hiding dormant within her, for hours, days… years?

  She stumbled, shooting pain through her chest and shoulder from her broken bones, before the drug-induced weight from the Versed swelled, dimming the agony and weakening her muscles enough that the convulsions didn’t overwhelm her.

  It couldn’t have been years. It wasn’t years, because it wasn’t real.

  She should have frostbite on her bare feet by now. Surely that meant it was a dream. She couldn’t remember when she’d last eaten. She should be starving… she was starving. But did that mean—?

  God, she couldn’t think straight… no, that had been the devil’s master. He’d been worried about not thinking straight. Except—

  God damn it.

  Someone said something, too softly to make out the words, and her heart skipped a beat. She wrenched her gaze up then down the street. It was help? Danger?

  No one was there. Which meant it had to be the devil’s master waking—

  Except the essence inside her was different. She couldn’t explain it, only knew on an instinctual level that it hadn’t been him.

  Most likely her imagination and just another figment from the nightmare… if this was a nightmare… which it had to be? How would she even be able to tell?

  No. Shelter and clothes first. Determine reality second. And not even think about how hot the devil’s master had been in person. Jeez, why did this have to be a nightmare? He was as attractive as his presence had felt. Except that was just part of the horror, another torture to add to all the others.

  God, if he’d heard that— But thank goodness, his thoughts were still quiet. They’d gone quiet the moment she’d hit him and reached the door. She prayed that meant he was unconscious, and when he woke, he wouldn’t renew the connection — because any kind of connection with him was a bad idea.

  Escape and regroup. That was what she needed to focus on. Werner had established an emergency meeting place almost two weeks ago, when their first hideout had been raided by the devil. If Werner had escaped Stanbury’s men, he’d be there. And it had looked, with that parting glimpse she’d gotten before the devil’s master had jerked her away, that Werner had escaped. That’s where she needed to go. Werner knew more of the others who’d been prisoners in the cave than she did. They’d create an assault force and get Glenn and anyone else back.

  And she wasn’t going to acknowledge how those thoughts fit in with the nightmare versus reality. Right now, the thoughts steadied her, gave her a purpose, and that was the only thing holding her together.

  Before Stanbury had dragged her off the street, she’d had a ten dollar bill stuffed in the toe of her boot for emergency transportation and food. What she wouldn’t give for those boots now, with or without the money. What she wouldn’t give for summer weather. It’d be too much to ask for a clothesline filled with clothes hanging nearby, but she wouldn’t turn down an open window, either. That at least would indicate if any of these buildings had occupants, which in turn would mean clothes and shoes.

  She reached an alley that ended forty feet down with a brick wall that was too high for her to climb with her cracked collarbone, but she slipped into the shadows anyway and pressed her back against the wall. A moment to catch her breath and think. That was all she needed. She strained to hear sounds of pursuit from the devil’s master.

  Someone said something again… no, a few someones, whispering, but she couldn’t tell if they were having a conversation or how many there were.

  Her pulse beat faster, and she glanced down the street again. Still no one following her and no sign of the devil’s master. It had to be the Versed. It made her dizzy, dragging at her senses, and everything was getting muddled. Even with the adrenaline from the fight helping to burn through the drug’s effects, she couldn’t shake it. There wasn’t anyone around. It was her imagination or the nightmare. She just had to keep in mind her priorities: clothes and shelter, and thank God, across from her in a large, clean storefront win
dow stood a mannequin wearing a beaded embroidered full-skirted wedding gown.

  Finally, something was going her way. She wasn’t going to hold her breath the gown store had anything practical to wear or even pantsuits in impractically thin fabric, but hey, it might have shoes — and she’d take unpractical footwear over no footwear any day.

  The cold seeped through the thin hospital gown, making her teeth chatter. At least she was dressed in something that wrapped around her body and attached at the hip and shoulder, and she wasn’t running around with her ass hanging out. It surprised her the nightmare hadn’t stuck her with that, and soon, if her luck stuck, she’d be in something warmer.

  She groaned—

  No… wait…

  Her pulse stuttered. This wasn’t possible, this—

  Aw, shit. She hadn’t groaned. He had. The devil’s master was waking and she could still hear him.

  “God, just get out of my head.”

  That’s what I’ve been trying to do— When he’d gone after her at Stanbury’s facility and then again in the abandoned building she’d just escaped from.

  Yeah, right. He’d only rescued her from Stanbury’s men because she could tell Stanbury his every order to the devil and the others. If Stanbury’s men had been trying to kill her, he would have sat back and watched.

  That’s not tru—

  Don’t even try. I’m not an idiot.

  A flash of pain cut through the Versed, more voices whispered at the edge of her hearing, and the muscles in her chest tightened. Shit. She had to get him out or she was going to collapse, and then he’d find her.

  How about a truce. We meet and work this out. He almost sounded sincere. If he hadn’t just tried to stab her, she might have believed him.

  You’re a monster. Like the others. Oh, God. What if the voices were the monsters still in her? But that didn’t seem right. They were… she couldn’t explain it and didn’t have the time to figure it out. All she knew was the devil’s master was different. He wasn’t inside her like the others had been and neither were the voices. Those monsters—