by Ophelia Bell
Immortal Dragons
Book Two
Dragon Void
Ophelia Bell
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Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Epilogue
Thank you for reading!
Books by Ophelia Bell
About Ophelia Bell
***
Chapter One
Ked
Brooklyn, New York
Present Day
Love at first sight wasn’t a dragon thing—the turul had the honor of that particular, crippling feature of their romantic lives. Dragons had the honor of choosing their mates, but Ked knew enough about dragon magic to know that some of the same rules applied to them, too. Fate so often chose for them, and she was pulling his strings at this very moment.
He stared at the photo for way too long. Evie North’s brothers had given the faded Polaroid to him moments ago. It was hard enough for him to even process the static image of the turul woman. He’d been away from the human world for so long. He cursed himself for his disorientation. He should have come out more often. Acclimated to the changes every few centuries so he didn’t wind up in this situation where he was staring blankly at a piece of paper with a too-realistic painting on it and getting a headache over how it worked.
The woman in the photo was in danger. And he couldn’t even process her tiny, beautiful countenance on the square piece of paper he’d been handed.
Evie.
His heart hurt looking at the photo, which was impossible. He didn’t have a heart. Contrary to what his siblings believed, he knew his chest had been occupied by a swirling void of nothing for centuries.
Still… something inside him ached to find this woman. The sensation was new and uncomfortable, but it felt right. She was his.
His pulse quickened and he clenched his jaw.
This beautiful woman—the image from his recurring dreams—was his. And she’d been taken from him.
The voices around him grew louder and he jerked to attention. Losing track of a conversation probably wasn’t a good quality in an immortal. Ked forced himself back to the present and said something he hoped was at least coherent, though he wasn’t sure what it was. He kept looking at the image of Evie, unable to tear his eyes away from her, hoping there might be clues in the picture that would help him find her.
She wasn’t alone in the photo. Beside her stood a hulk of a man in a pilot’s uniform, his gaze raptly set on Evie while Evie beamed at the camera.
That man was the enemy. Ultiori to the core, though maybe only a new recruit, from the look of him. He looked so full of love and hope in the photo—with not a hint of the devious hunger the other Ultiori that Ked had encountered possessed.
Marcus, he said to himself. Evie’s brothers had met him, had told Ked everything they knew, which wasn’t much. Marcus had been her seducer. The Ultiori hunter who had stolen her away. The man Ked would kill to get her back.
She was his. Fate said so. Or his dreams did, at least, and they were the only connection he had anymore to what Fate intended.
But the image of Marcus intrigued him as much as Evie did. Partly because of how he looked at her, and partly because his presence in her life back then was a conundrum. If he hadn’t already become a hunter, he must have become one very soon after the image was captured. Iszak and Lukas would have known him for a hunter, as would Evie, if he’d already joined the Ultiori ranks.
“Are you sure he wasn’t turned yet?” Ked asked, looking up from the photo to meet the gazes of the two turul males across the table.
Iszak shook his head. “He was harmless. We’d have never let her keep seeing him, otherwise. She would have known better, anyway.”
Lukas nodded in agreement. “She had this crazy idea that she could find love with someone other than her true mate. Every decade or so, she’d get impatient and find some poor schmuck, blow his mind for a few years, then move on when the mystery wore off. She’s had more marriage proposals than we can count.”
An amused chuckle carried from the other side of the sunlit kitchen they sat in. Ked looked over to the back of the elderly woman who was chopping vegetables and shaking her head. She paused and turned, pointing the knife at Lukas.
“You two used to do the same thing. Ever since you were old enough to notice a pretty girl, you were chasing them, no matter they weren’t your Belah. I could set a clock by your escapades.”
“Oh, do tell me more, Nanyo,” Belah said, smirking at her mates. She stood to join their grandmother at the counter.
“In time, my dear,” the elder North said. “Right now, your brother must focus on my granddaughter. What do you see in the photo, boy?”
Ked raised an eyebrow at the diminutive, but let it go. Sofia North may not have been even half his age, but she still commanded the respect of any matriarch. He’d have loved to have known her in her prime. He glanced back down at the photo of her granddaughter, wondering if the elder had been as beautiful when she was younger. His eyes shifted to Marcus again and he studied the young man.
“There’s something about him. Without seeing his aura, I can’t put my finger on it.” He wished he could have been there—Evie’s beauty shone as bright as any aura, but this man had a bearing that drew Ked’s attention as much as Evie’s did. The man’s fixation on Evie seemed familiar somehow.
Ked swallowed, confused at the conflicting emotions that welled up inside him. His mouth watered as he thought of how Evie’s magic might taste when they made love. But Marcus… the hunter… his sly eyes made Ked itch to know his secrets, to delve into the darkest depths of the man’s soul and understand him completely.
Yet he was her captor, and if Ked were going to carry out the mission ahead of him, he’d have to kill Marcus and any other Ultiori who stood in his way.
“What did you see the day you met him?” he asked, directing the question at Sofia. The woman had a reputation as a powerful seer that was well-known among all the higher races. Ked had no doubt the woman knew much more than she was sharing about her granddaughter�
��s disappearance with this man. He refrained from using his powers on her, however, simply out of respect. If the woman wanted her granddaughter back as much as she seemed to, he had to trust her to share anything she knew that would help.
“I saw a young man in love with an ideal. He believed he was in love with her, but it was only her nature that drew him to her. It is the way of the blessing, of course.”
Ked’s head jerked up and he stared at her. “Blessing? Are you telling me this man was a Blessed human? Did Evie know?”
“To be Blessed during a renunciation is a lonely time,” she said, ignoring his question. “Dragons won’t take mates so late in a cycle, yet his path was laid out for him from before his birth. He followed the only course open to him, as did my granddaughter.” Sofia’s voice never wavered, nor did she avert her piercing gaze from his as she spoke.
Ked’s vision narrowed as he stood and glowered down at the small woman. The room darkened, his shadow blocking out the light so thoroughly that not even the sunlight outside broke through. He ignored the alarmed exclamations of the others, even the warning admonition of his sister.
“Do you understand how grave an offense it is to divert a Blessed human from their journey to find their dragon mate? He belongs to my kind. And now the enemy has him. And if he is a Blessed, that means he isn’t merely a hunter—they have turned him into an Elite.” And whose blood runs through the man’s veins now? Mine or my brothers?
Sofia set her jaw and stared him down. “You would do well not to question Fate. While your kind were busy abandoning your children, my Evie was ensuring your Blessed found his path.”
“Straight into the belly of the beast. I’ll be forced to take his life when I find him now.” Ked didn’t hold back his anger, letting it spill forth, a roiling cloud of black in the already dark room. This meddlesome woman had been instrumental in not only her own granddaughter’s abduction, but the turning of a Blessed human into the enemy. The worst kind of Ultiori, too.
Sofia’s stubbornness was a beacon in the center of the void his powers had rendered, bright and determined to compete with his anger. She held up her kitchen knife to point it at him. The tip caught some errant scrap of light that seared his eyes.
“You are a fool, Immortal. Your own power has blinded you to the possibilities. The world does not operate at the extremes your magic seems to. Find a way between the darkness and the light, Ked. Your race’s Shadows understand this, yet you do not. You are too consumed by the absolutes to see how to balance them.”
A dull howling pricked at his ears, growing louder in the moments the two held each other’s gazes, both too resolute to be the one to look away first. Sofia’s hair suddenly whipped around her head from the gale-force wind that rushed through the room, seemingly from nowhere, buffeting Ked’s body so violently he lost focus. This was no normal wind, either. Within the din he heard the voice of one of the few powers greater than his and his siblings’—the words chilled him at first, before the clarity of them forced him to his senses.
Between light and darkness, between life and death, between power and weakness, lies love and truth.
Ked’s skin prickled. It was an admonition, something he rarely had to endure at his rank. Sometimes he forgot that there were powers greater than the Dragon Council. The North Wind was a power he respected, and even feared. As a dragon, he depended on the winds. If he pissed one of them off, he’d be hurting. Few other higher powers could damage him or his race as much as the winds could.
He withdrew his darkness and sat back down with a sigh.
“We are allies, Sofia, and I intend to remain your friend. I will find your granddaughter. If Marcus can be redeemed, I’ll decide what to do with him after.”
Sofia’s shoulders sagged and she came toward him. She was so small. Most turul women were petite and bird-like. Only a few broke the mold. He’d known her for her entire life and had always admired her tenacity, not to mention her power. She’d have made him a perfect mate in her prime. Her granddaughter was the one fated to be with him, though, and the one in the most danger now.
Sofia came around the table and rested her hands on his shoulders. “The path was never meant to be a straight one for them, nor for you. Yet it was the path they were meant to tread. You are their doorway to the next part of their lives.” She dug into his shoulders with her steely fingertips and leaned closer to his ear. “He is yours as much as she. Never sacrifice your heart for the sake of your soul when you can keep them both.”
Sofia left the room, her shoulders sagging. Belah gave Ked a stern glance before following, sending an admonitory message directly into his mind.
“She’s losing strength, brother. That wasn’t fair of you. Your power is too draining on a woman as old as her.”
He frowned and sent her a wordless apology, then turned his attention back to the other problem in the room.
“You’re my sister’s mates. I cannot, in good conscience, ask you to come, but I have a feeling she’d argue more strongly for me to take you than even you would—because she loves you.”
Lukas glowered at him. “Not even your sister could keep us from joining you if she asked us to stay. Perhaps that’s what you really mean to say? And you know she’s letting us go as much for your sake as for ours.”
Ked hated the admission—not that his sister had found love again after so long, but that she was willing to sacrifice it to see him find love for the first time in his life. He would do anything to avoid taking that away from her.
“But I have a use for you. You will follow my lead, and answer to me at every point.”
“I take it you have a plan?” Iszak asked.
“I’m taking you with me to do aerial reconnaissance of the compound. From there, I’ll access the compound from the air with my brothers’ assistance. They can null the security sensors to allow me to go in silently. Aodh and Gavra can distract the hunters inside, sending their breath through the ventilation ducts from the roof.” And they would have to just pray that there were no Elites on the premises who would be immune to their tactics.
“And we just sit in the woods with our thumbs up our asses?”
Ked scowled and the pair of them cast their eyes to the floor. “You can do whatever the fuck you want, but when she comes out, you remind her who she is. They indoctrinate their captives. She’s been in there for five decades, and she doesn’t know me.”
“What about him?” Lukas asked, pointing at the man in the photo. “We actually liked him, at first. Fuck, I can’t believe we let her leave with him. I’m just happy she isn’t really dead.”
“I won’t know about him until I see him—talk to him—if that’s even possible. If he’s with them, he’s a lost cause. If he remained loyal to her and wasn’t turned, he may already be dead.”
Ked stared down at the photo again, taking in the red-haired man. Another Blessed. They were rare and highly desired. Fated to be a dragon’s mate. And desired just as much by their enemy for the magic they carried.
If they had made another Elite hunter out of Marcus, his Blessing would have merged the power of the three Immortal brothers into one man. He would also be able to sense dragons as well as any of the other higher races the second he was near them or heard their voices. Ked had only met a few Elites over the years, and each time they were stronger than before—harder to kill, and learning to harness more of the power carried in their blood. But for so long, there had only been two Elites.
He’d killed one himself more than three thousand years ago. The Elite he’d faced had been a female, beautiful and fierce. Full of the kind of fiery light that he almost believed could be his redemption, but a shadow clung to her. Her Blessing had made him want her almost too much to end her life, but she was too far under the Ultiori’s spell to be redeemed. The worst part was that he knew without a doubt that the shadowy power and the lust that flickered in her
eyes were a result of his blood in her veins driving her.
The Blessing was all she’d needed to find him. That was all they ever needed. He’d nearly fallen under her spell at the time, until the truth became clear to him. She hadn’t been easy to kill, either. Once he recognized what she truly was, there was only one way to end her life. Only his own black flames could destroy her body, along with that piece of himself that had turned her into what she was.
Chills prickled Ked’s skin at the idea. He was responsible for this, more so than his sister was. He hated the secret he and their brothers had kept from Belah. After he’d killed the female Elite, they’d counted on another Blessed being too hard to find. It was too late now. The enemy may very well have three Elites who, when working together, could sense any dragon when they were near, including Immortals. He and his siblings were all in danger if Marcus had indeed become an Elite.
No one knew the truth, at least. If his sisters knew, they’d forbid him and his brothers from this mission. If Marcus truly carried Ked’s blood, he would be a formidable opponent. If any of the other Elites were in the compound, Ked may very well find himself as trapped as Belah when her old lover had tied her down and bled her dry.
It was a necessary risk. At least Aodh and Gavra couldn’t enter the compound without sounding perimeter alarms. Only Ked could venture inside. Risking his freedom would be a small price to pay if he could make sure Evie North was safe. He would trade his life for hers, if it came down to it.
Chapter Two
Ked
Canadian Rockies
Present Day
The biggest advantage they had was the power of flight—the one thing even an Elite Ultiori hunter was incapable of without modern technology.
Ked, Aodh, and Gavra reached the edge of the remote research facility that served as the Ultiori’s Canadian headquarters. Nestled deep in the northernmost ranges of the Rocky Mountains, built into an evergreen-covered hillside overlooking a raging river, it would be tough to differentiate it from the wilderness around it with an untrained eye. Ked and his brothers made a wide circle around the valley. The slightly smaller winged forms of Evie’s brothers swooped more recklessly, eager to get to work.