Little by little, the deadened lull around her ears lifted. It was like the sense of hearing returning after being around a stun bomb exploding, something she’d unfortunately encountered once in the closed confines of a billionaire arms dealer’s yacht in the Mediterranean. It hadn’t been pleasant, and neither was this sensation today.
As her senses recovered, she could make out that they were moving. A rocking, side by side motion. Like in a car. But why couldn’t she see? Was she in a darkened trunk?
Had those crazy Matrix-like guys captured her? What of Gabe? And Vadim?
Then she felt herself being lifted. Gently, though, with extreme care. Couldn’t be the goons, then. She forced herself to listen … The tread of two large men, joined by a third, as well as the shuffled footsteps of someone with creaky joints. Wait, the Methuselah butler from the Museum had had that walk. And yes, that was Max’s voice. And Djibril’s.
Whoever had been carrying her deposited her on a plush chesterfield—she knew the feel, having one of those at her place in New York.
But why couldn’t she see, damn it? Why couldn’t she even open her eyes?
“Is this better?” a deep male voice asked.
Then suddenly, everything in front of her grew clear. She was standing … and watching her prone body lying there on the couch, the three men gathered around her and Djibril on his knees by her face, urging her to wake up.
Fuck … what again?
She blinked, and something shimmered before her eyes. Like a sort of energy field making up a veil—it looked like it had come straight out of a sci-fi movie, the flickering barrier similar to the ones protecting landing docks on those big space ships from the vacuum of outer space.
And as she glanced around, noticing the edges of said screen, something else made her shudder. Fire. She was encased in it, the flames burning strong and steady all around, but strangely enough, not burning her skin or even making up a high temperature.
“That’s because you’re in my mind right now,” the male voice said once more.
She turned on her heel, looking for him, and that’s when her gaze landed on a tall, thin man slumped in a black loveseat a few paces behind her. A shimmering red suit hugged his lanky body, his hair a waterfall of bright red locks falling to his shallow shoulders, the pale face devoid of makeup and the blue-gray eyes not lined with kohl.
This was Vadim … but also not him.
She cocked her head to the side, watching him.
He gave her a wan smile. “I’ve had quite a few names over my long existence. But yes, you’ve known me as Vadim Damian. Well, I apologize for the sad excuse of a man you had to meet. Had I known … well, I didn’t have my power back then, so I didn’t remember my past life.”
She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out.
“What’s going on?” he asked, as if knowing that’s what she was about to say.
She nodded. A quick glance at the shimmering screen showed her Djibril still by her side, the other two men gone now. Across the room, on a chaise longue, lay Vadim’s unconscious body, too.
“It’s simple,” he said. “We’re dying. At least, I am. I have no idea how you are able to hold it off so much.”
“I … I don’t understand. You’re a Phoenix. You can’t die just yet.”
He smiled again. “From natural causes, no, and not with my power strong in me. However, it was triggered too late after I’d been shot. And there’s nothing natural about the poison coursing in our systems, my dear … I don’t even know your name!”
Poison? But social graces chose that moment to make themselves known. “Kiki. My name is Kiki.”
“Oh. Are you French?” he asked, switching to the language.
She shook her head. “Russian. It is French for Kseniya.”
“Then you must come from court in St. Petersburg, then. Who is on the throne now? Who took it after dear Alexander?”
She frowned. “Uhm, which Alexander are you talking about?”
He seemed to think. “Alexander the Third.”
This was getting so convoluted—she must be dreaming.
“Great-great-great-grandson of Catherine The Great?” she asked.
“Indeed, yes. He had a son, I believe. Nikolai.”
The last Russian Tsar. “The Bolsheviks in the revolution of 1918 killed him and his whole family, actually.”
He gasped. “So there is no royal family in mother Russia?”
“Afraid not.”
He seemed crestfallen, and if she weren’t mistaken, a tear even flowed from his eye.
What on Earth was she involved in here? And he’d mentioned something about poison …
With a few steps, she tore herself from her spot to go to him.
“You said poison,” she asked as she towered over him. “What was that about?”
He waved his hand to his side, indicating a high-back chair that suddenly materialized. “My apologies for not getting up. It is very impolite of me to remain seated while a lady hadn’t taken her seat yet. But forgive me, my dearest Kiki, for I just cannot get up in this condition.”
Frowning even more, she flopped down on the chair and turned to face him. “Can you tell me why?”
He gave a small, sad smile. “Can’t you feel it? Why can you not feel it?”
She listened to what her body was telling her—at least, what her ‘form’ in this weird suspension was imparting. That burning feeling again, but her dragon huffed a little and worked at putting out the flames. A different kind of burn took over then, like frostbite.
Kseniya looked over at him. “You mean the burning sensation?”
He acquiesced with a nod. “Brimstone.”
Confusion started swirling inside her. That was something entirely Medieval. They didn’t even study brimstone as an element in dragon school any longer. “What?”
“Brimstone. The bullets that hit me were made of lead and brimstone, which is another word for Sulphur. Any hint of fire activates it.”
Thoughts started to race in her head. “What do you mean by I should feel it, too?”
He regarded her with utmost patience, then sighed. “My dear, don’t you recall? You brought the dormant Phoenix in me to life, with the spell you wove into me using your own soul. We are connected that way, and it is how you are able to be here, on this plane with me.”
It struck her then. The Kindling had done more than bring out his latent side. It had also bound them. Why hadn’t Adri told her about that?
But then again, this was a scroll which had never been used—no one would’ve known how it would play out for those involved in channeling it.
“But there’s more,” he continued. “You smell of it, too. Not just your soul, but your body. You have brimstone in your system, as well.” Then, he tilted his head to the side. “I am surprised how it hasn’t consumed you yet.”
Come on, Kiki, think. He was telling her so much, and though her first instinct was to say that he had no clue what he was talking about, she just knew there was valuable intel in there somewhere.
Brimstone. Sulphur. Activated by fire.
But she was an Ice Dragon, though—she didn’t have any fire in her.
Unless …
Digging deep in her knowledge about her kind made her put two and two together. Sulphur was used in medieval times to kill dragons. The element made their fire burn harder, literally making them combust from the inside as their lungs collapsed and stopped taking air and their every cell dehydrated out from said combustion.
Vadim being made of fire, it would have the same effect on him, slowly killing him from the inside.
And if she were to think about it … she’d been feeling parched ever since that bullet had hit her—the effect of Sulphur in her system. But it was controlled by her ice nature, and the sudden burst of fire from when she had activated Vadim’s fire side had triggered it inside her. Hence why she had gone into shock just after waking his Phoenix up.
Startled
from this revelation, she looked up into his face. “I’m an Ice Dragon.”
“Ah. That is why it is not hurting you more.” A grimace of pain crossed his face, and he seemed to buckle onto himself.
This was what the poison was doing to him. She reached out to touch his shoulder, pulling her hand at the last second in case the touch might hurt him. Unbidden, her gaze went to the shimmering screen, landing on Djibril who still knelt by her side, his face now buried in her neck.
If he’d taken that bullet … He’d be dead right now. They wouldn’t have known. And come to think of it, that first assailant in her house had aimed his gun at him, not at her.
The bullet she’d taken had been meant for him!
Goodness, she had to tell him that, protect him, let him know what dire danger they all faced.
“You shall be able to,” Vadim said next to her. “Soon.”
“What do you mean?”
“I understand now. I had never met an Ice Dragon in all my long existence, thought your kind was myth, to be honest. Brimstone will not kill you. Weaken you, yes, but if left alone, will take time to get out of your system. It will get out.” He nodded at the scene in the darkened room. “You will soon be able to go to him.”
A lump clogged her throat at his words. She would make it, but he wouldn’t …
“You love him,” Vadim said.
Not a question. Just a mere fact. And reluctantly, she had to agree, so she nodded. Her dragon roared inside her. Because this was more than love. She acknowledged it for what it was now—they had mated when they’d come together.
“Oh, shit,” she mumbled.
“Trouble?”
She glanced up at him. “It’s … nothing.”
He tsk-ed at her. “Come on, dear Kiki. Humor a dying old man here.”
She bit her lip at his request. What did she tell him? How did she even start?
Then she took a deep breath. “As if my feelings will do me any good. He is actually the Crown Prince of our dragon kind. A Fire Dragon, to be more precise, and I am an Ice Dragon. My family are aristocrats, but they’re also his family’s enemy.”
“Hmm.” He paused. “You speak of families, but not of you two. You are not enemies, are you?”
Djibril’s hushed words after the first time they had made love flashed insider her head. That’s exactly what he’d said.
But then, there was the not so tiny matter of her job—the clandestine one. And with it came all those secrets and lies. She shook her head. There was no way out of this predicament for them. When this mission was over, they’d both go their separate ways.
And speaking of the mission … She jerked up and rushed to the screen, peering at the lying body of Vadim over there.
“You’re not dead yet, are you?” she uttered as she turned back to him in this fire-encased room.
“No. But I’m getting there.”
She blinked. “So there’s still hope. For your daughter.”
At the mention of this, he sat up straighter.
“My … daughter?” His face blanked out, then he blinked a few times before turning awe-filled eyes onto her. “She … she’s alive?” He gasped. “She made it?”
Something didn’t add up here. She didn’t know what he was referring to. But she could tell him what she did know.
“Séraphine. That’s her name. She’s alive, yes.”
He gasped. “The angel was right, then. He did save her.”
Kseniya stared at him agog. The angel? A Heavenly creature had already saved Sera Dionysios’ life in the past? More and more, she was coming to see how the young woman was involved in this whole plot, but damn if she could make out the sense or logic in it all.
“She’s at death’s door, though,” she said. “That’s why we were looking for you, so you could convey your Phoenix powers to her so she can be reborn in case she doesn’t make it.”
He frowned as he stared at her. “What are you telling me here?”
Returning to the seat, she sat down and took his hands in hers before proceeding to tell him all she knew—which wasn’t much—about how Sera had ended up in this position today.
“And she is pregnant?” His face appeared swathed in wonder. “Our daughter wasn’t born an aberration?”
Kseniya pursed her lips upon hearing that word. It was the definition given to the unlikely offspring resulting from the coupling of two very unique supernatural races or with a human in the mix. “So her mother wasn’t a Phoenix?”
He shook his head, a wistful smile taking over his too-sharp face. “Let me show you.”
As he pressed his hands tighter around hers, images burst inside her head.
A very dapper-looking Vadim in full regalia at the court of Alexander III of Russia, looking himself over in a mirror. A travelling troupe of circus people coming to St Petersburg, putting on a performance for the Tsar. Vadim roaming the field where the troupe had set its trailers, bumping into a young woman. The most beautiful woman he has ever seen, with her dark eyes, long, curly black hair, and golden skin that glows in the moonlight. Love at first sight. Danira is her name. She has been a long while with the circus, their divining medium, no one knowing she’s in fact a Mystical Gypsy with the power of Second Sight.
The two get involved, then Danira falls pregnant. A miracle for the lovebirds. They travel back to Arles, in France, where her family and their tribe is based. A simple life goes swimmingly for both of them.
Then Danira, heavily pregnant, awakens in the dead of night in cold sweat. Second Sight has showed her bloodthirsty creatures coming for them, and more precisely, the baby. She contacts benevolent White Witches through her crystal ball.
“We can protect her,” the white-haired women say. “But we are not there. Who will take her to safety?”
“I will,” says a tall, blond man who’s suddenly materialized in the trailer. To show them he means them no harm, he turns his eyes white with light. An angel, indeed.
Screams rent the air outside. White magic spells woven by the witches make Danira go into labor, horrendous contractions wracking her body already to eject this precious baby from her womb. Vadim stands at the door, holding off the fanged attackers.
“We’ll be too late,” Danira says.
“Are you ready to die for her?” the angel asks.
“Yes!”
The angel wastes no time, plunging his glowing white hands into Danira’s body to pull out the baby, tearing the determined mother apart in the process. After one last glance exchanged with Vadim through which they connect their power, he disappears into thin air, the sound of the witches’ spells fading in crescendo as a dead Danira lay in bed.
Vadim screams, and vicious teeth rip into his neck from behind. With a mighty roar, he ignites his Phoenix form and burns away, his imprint merging into the wood of the trailer as he combusts and takes all the vampyres in the vicinity with him …
Kseniya came back into the moment with a jolt and a shock. Her heart raced, tears coursing down her face.
Vadim gave her a sad smile. “The love of my life, she was.”
She gulped in a deep breath. “Your daughter … she looks like her mother.”
“She does?”
“Can you look into me? I have an image of her in my mind.”
Vadim tenderly reached out and touched her cheek. A lance of fire shot through her at the contact as he probed, igniting the burn inside her body from the latent brimstone still in her system. Still, she gritted her teeth and let him peruse her mind. When he found her memory of Sera asleep in her bed, he paused, his thumb leisurely caressing her cheekbone as he stared at that image for what seemed to her like ages.
“She has your hair, eyes, and coloring,” she told Vadim.
“But her mother’s features, yes. And those rebellious curls,” he added with a small laugh. “She is with child.”
“Yes. Her mate’s name is Rafe Harcourt. He is the Supreme Leader of the Vampyre Nation.”
He t
ore his hand away, shock on his face.
Belatedly, she realized what she had told him. Vampyres had killed her whole family—how could she be letting this happen?
But then it dawned on her, why all this was so important, why they had to save Sera and her unborn child. The factions of Evil in the world that had wanted her death were probably the same ones who had released the Originals from the portal. Vampyres … and Sera was the bridge between them. Peace would come through her child, born part vampyre, too. Without them, consensus wouldn’t exist to bring about peace.
“Vadim, we have to save her,” she started. “Don’t you see? She is the key to solving this conflict that is about to degenerate into another Great War.”
She thought he would fight her at first, but then he dropped his stance and slumped in the seat.
“I am dying, Kiki. How do you suppose I will do that?”
Hope burst inside her heart. “I have a way. It’s a spell, Le Pouvoir du Sang. You can will me your Phoenix power, and my blood will carry it to her.”
He sighed. “You are an Ice Dragon, my dear. You will not be able to tolerate my fire power for long.”
Drat. They were out of options. Unless …
“Gabe … Djibril … he’s a Fire Dragon. He will be able to hold your energy, won’t he?”
Vadim nodded. “I suppose so, yes.”
She jumped to her feet. “If only I could just tell him to get on with it. You can’t die, Vadim. Not until we’ve made this exchange.”
Another sad smile from him. “I am doing my best to hang on.” He nodded toward the screen. “I expect you shall be waking up soon back there.”
She stopped to consider his words. As she pondered them, she reckoned the image was a bit blurrier across the shimmer, though her hearing had grown sharper, and she could even pick out the faint smell of Djibril’s scent. That hint of incense, yes.
Turning back to Vadim, she rushed to him, dropping to a heap at his feet to clasp his hands. “Hold on. Please hold on.”
He nodded, and they sat like this in silence. Her hearing grew better, and when the sound of her mobile phone ringing rent the air, they both turned to the screen. Across it, in the other room, Djibril was picking up.
“Elena, right?” he said.
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