The onyx-colored fog spread out in front of her. The screams came loudly. Her body threatened to explode. She collapsed to the ground and coughed. She was using too much black magic at once, and the ruthlessness of the art was straining beneath her skin, eating away at her.
“I can’t leave her like this!” Rayse said from above.
“You have to go,” she pleaded. She felt as if her heart would disintegrate if she had to stay any longer with him. Looking at him was a constant reminder of what she couldn’t have.
Greta was trying to justify something to him. Their argument lingered in the background. Constance closed her eyes. Consciousness slipped away from her like water on glass. Easy breaths, she told herself. Don’t be crushed. Stay strong.
More chaos exploded in the background. It was noise, noise, noise.
Then nothing.
She inhaled sharply. The pain lifted from her like a wisp of air. Grogginess took its place. It always surprised her how abruptly the effects of casting a spell could come and go.
“They’re gone?” she asked, a croak in her throat.
“Gone,” Jaerhel replied.
The pain of being close to Rayse disappeared as well, leaving behind a gaping hole.
Jaerhel lifted her up by her elbows. He was like a sturdy tree, always there for her to lean on. She should have chased him away long ago. He understood he could only be like a brother to her. Why stay? Why torture himself the way Rayse did to her?
“That portal. It was awfully small, wasn’t it?” he asked.
She cocked her head. “What?” She reached at her pouch of beads. She was missing a few. It had made the spell weaker. “I’ve lost some souls. I never lose them.” They were her treasures—essences far too costly to be frivolous with. Her brows rose as understanding slipped over her. “Rayse took them.” He’d distracted her with the kiss and stolen from her.
11
Rayse tried to find excitement in his heart.
His wish was going to be fulfilled soon. He’d see Constance, his mate, and then all would be well. He’d told himself repeatedly that finding her would make everything perfect, and he wouldn’t want for nothing else in life once he accomplished that.
That was a load of horseshit.
He wanted Catrina.
He shouldn’t, but he did. It was wrong, dirty, almost incomprehensible. His feelings were tainted by his lust for Catrina. It soiled this reunion, and made him question his love for Constance.
He let his eyes rove over Catrina, trying to remember each curve of her face before he left her forever. He dug in his mind for reasons to not go, excuses to be with her. There were so many of them that it overwhelmed him. But he needed to return to his mate.
Catrina cast her spell and inhaled deeply. She closed her eyes and summoned the magic from her fingertips. Immediately, she crumpled to the ground and began shrieking.
He jolted to her side. “Catrina? What’s happening?” He didn’t know what to do. “Greta, how do we help her?”
Catrina held fists over her head. She was breathing so hard that Rayse wasn’t sure if her lungs could take it. “You need to leave,” Catrina pleaded.
“I can’t leave you, not when you’re like this.”
He felt arms trying to drag him up, but they couldn’t move his weight.
Then Kien threw a punch to his face. “Fucking leave!” Rayse fell backward. His shoulder crashed into the ground. He spread out his wings and lengthened his talons, ready to rip Kien apart.
“She’s hurting because the portal is painful to keep open,” Greta said. “We have to hurry.”
He didn’t want to part like this. His dragon was thrashing in him, demanding he protect this woman. Greta tugged him into a standing position. Reluctantly, he let her.
“Be quick!” Greta said.
He took one last glance at Catrina, feeling his heart constrict. Kien looked at Rayse as if he were the devil himself.
Shen glared at the portal as if it might bite his head off. “Here goes,” Shen said. He thrust himself into the magic, allowing it to swallow him whole.
Greta tightened the shawl around her shoulders and went in after Shen. She didn’t seem fazed that the portal could kill her.
Rayse gathered all his mental strength and tossed himself into the swirling blackness.
Screams resounded in the portal, clawing at his thoughts. Hands reached out from the endless sea of darkness and anguish. He shoved them aside. He didn’t want to deal with this, not after just seeing what he had made Catrina go through.
He worried for his friends. How would Greta survive this? She was an old woman, not in prime condition.
He felt himself getting sucked forward. Then fresh air slammed into him with its coolness. He was out of the suffocating atmosphere of the gateway, and away from the arid staleness of the outlands. The smell of swampy green hit his nostrils, and the sensation of damp mud prickled his skin. He was back in Gaia.
“About time you got here,” Greta said.
His vision cleared. How that woman remained so sturdy, despite all the years wearing her down, he couldn’t figure out. He hoped Shen would escape fine. Just as he was thinking, the gateway flung Shen from it. It wasn’t the best way to leave a mythical gateway, but Shen settled, and looked unharmed for the most part. Rayse let out a breath of relief.
Catrina… was she all right?
He reined his mind back in. He had to focus on Constance.
Part of him didn’t want to see Constance again. How would she react? Plus… he had feelings for another woman. He thought his emotions were clear, but Catrina had turned his world upside down, making him question what he had known for sure.
The three of them were sitting on the ground, panting and trying to catch their breaths.
After she had enough rest, Greta got to her feet. “You’re not running to Constance.”
Rayse’s chest was so tight, it made him dizzy. “And?”
“I assumed you would.”
“Where is she?”
“Waiting with Aryana and Diovan, possibly,” Greta said. “I’ve been gone for a week. Can’t say for sure. What, do I look like the Dragon Mother to you? I can’t know everything.” The old woman readjusted her unnecessary set of glasses.
“How is she?”
“Constance?”
Rayse nodded.
“She’s acting strangely. I think she might have knocked her head too hard on something.”
He snarled. “Is she injured?”
“No, not in the literal sense. Calm your dragon teats. I mean, she’s a little bit”—Greta made a swirling motion next to her temple—“you know.”
“I guess I’ll just have to see her to find out.”
He was waiting for the thrill he’d expected. Where was the love he’d felt for Constance just a month back?
All he could think about was Catrina. She stood front and center in his mind. He wanted to feel those lips on his again. The sensation of her being pressed on top of him, however brief and wrong it was, had felt glorious.
And then memories of Constance came back. Her laughter when she sat on his wings, the glimmer of her eyes when she made a new discovery. The way she gave him somewhere to call home. He loved the sound of her melodic voice when she read books to him—regardless of how dry they were. Her excitement always rubbed off on him. The moments he had kept suppressed came rushing back to Rayse. The last years of solitude had made them too painful to recall.
His heart still belonged to Constance, despite the distraction of Catrina.
Why had he kissed Catrina? He’d convinced himself that he ought to get the souls from her, lest he need to return. But perhaps the answer was simpler.
He had locked his lips with hers because he had simply wanted to. Because he was a dragon twat who couldn’t stay true to his mate.
“Let’s go see her,” he said, and stood up.
“I gave her a temporary cottage to stay in while she waited. Are you sure you
don’t want to share some alone time with her first?” Aryana said. “I can’t help but feel like we’re intruding.”
Rayse shook his head. Greta and he padded up to Constance’s lodgings, with Aryana leading the way. “No, that’s fine. I’m sure Greta wants to talk to her, too.”
“I spoke to her before I went to fetch you,” Greta said.
He grunted. “Well, then speak to her again.”
“I didn’t miss her that much.”
Rayse shot her a quizzical look.
Greta feigned innocence. “It’s possible to see too much of one person.”
They reached Constance’s home. Physically, it wasn’t larger than the other houses of the Grimfire clan, but to Rayse, it loomed like a large tower. He reached out and pushed. The door creaked open. The room was dimly lit. A cool, light breeze swirled around the place. He searched for the papers and spells, which Constance usually had next to her, then realized he was being silly. This wouldn’t be like their home in Dragon Keep.
Aryana and Greta followed behind him.
“Do you want me to leave?” Aryana asked. “Last chance.”
“No, it’s all right. You can come,” he said. Part of him didn’t want to face her by himself. He felt like he’d betrayed her by having those feelings for Catrina, and he couldn’t face her alone with that truth. How would he react if she came up to him the same way she used to all those years ago? What if he couldn’t return his love because of these new, traitorous feelings?
Aryana let out a weary breath. “If you say so.”
“Constance?” he called. His dragon eyes made out most of the darkness, but he still couldn’t see her.
Footsteps on the floorboards made his ears twitch.
He tensed. For sixty years, he had imagined hugging and kissing her, showering with all the love he’d owed her. He had almost killed her. How could he make up for that?
“Hello,” came a familiar voice.
When he saw her, his heart nearly stopped.
She looked exactly as she had sixty years ago, with the same beautiful chestnut locks cascading down her face as if she were an angel sent from above. Her frock was almost the same. His love for her crashed into him like a storm, pushing Catrina from his mind.
She was his true mate. They were meant to be together.
The fear from moments ago seeped from him. Now that he’d seen her, he felt silly for being so wary.
He ran to her, joy and heartache beating in him in an arrhythmic tempo.
“I… I…” He couldn’t find the words to describe what he felt in that moment. He hugged her, relief coursing through him.
But she pushed him away.
He frowned, wondering why she wasn’t getting the same rush as he was. “Is there something wrong?”
“No.” She shook her head and forced a sheepish smile. “I think I ate something strange. Feeling a little unwell, that’s all.”
“Unwell?” He checked her for injuries. Goddess be damned if someone had harmed her. If someone had hurt her like he did… He brushed his sin from his thoughts. “Have you slept enough? Are you all right?”
“I have and I am,” she said, nodding to Aryana. “The Grimfires have given me more than I deserve in my stay here.”
He grabbed her by her shoulders, drawing his head back to take a better look. “Then what’s wrong?”
“Shock? Perhaps?”
Her mannerisms were different. She even smiled differently. Constance had always looked at him directly when they talked. She had carried herself in a way that shone. This Constance wasn’t alike. She was looking at the ground.
But then, this person standing in front of her couldn’t be the very same Constance he’d spent time with. Sixty years could change a person like water over a stream.
Where were they going to start? How much had he missed in her life these past years? It seemed like their lives had crumbled apart, and their strings had untied. Now they had to wrap everything back together again.
“Your mark,” he asked. “Is it gone?”
“Mark?”
He pointed to her shoulder, where it should have been.
She looked confused. “Uh, yes…”
He pursed his lips and stepped toward Aryana. Lowering his voice, he said, “Did you check her?”
“We did,” Aryana responded. “For weapons, spells, and the like.”
“And? Did you find anything?”
Aryana shook her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“She’s acting strangely.”
“How so?”
Aryana had never met Constance, so she wasn’t the right person to judge his mate’s reactions. He turned to Greta, who didn’t show any signs of suspicion.
His initial reaction to her was beginning to fade, slowly being replaced by disappointment. He’d imagined her to be… better.
Things will warm up, he told himself.
“So, where have you been?” he asked, trying to make small talk to calm the awkwardness she was projecting.
She rubbed the back of her neck. “There’s a lot to say.”
“The goddess? Last I saw you, she took you away.”
She looked down and ran her fingers around her wrist. “I don’t want to talk about that.” She tugged the sides of her mouth up in a half grimace, half grin.
“How did you escape?” Greta asked.
Constance shot him a pleading look.
He attended to her plea. If talking about what happened made her uncomfortable, then he shouldn’t press her. His protectiveness flared, if only just a little. His mate shouldn’t feel uncomfortable.
“Little fi—” Using that nickname now felt wrong, somehow. He caught himself, then said, “Constance, are you hungry?”
“Famished.”
“Let’s get something to eat.”
She leapt at the opportunity to dodge the conversation like she was starving, and shuffled away quicker than two dragons racing. “I’ll prepare something. The three of you can wait here.”
“I can help,” he said.
“No, wait here.”
She sped off, leaving him confused.
Constance… wasn’t Constance.
He took a glimpse into the kitchen as she prepared dinner, and every aspect of her felt off.
She walked differently, fidgeted differently, and even her voice came out too low-pitched. Where was the woman he’d missed all these years? His memory couldn’t have failed that badly. For the Mother’s sake, even his dragon couldn’t recognize her instinctively. He waited for the lust to come, but his cock was still sleeping like some hibernating mammal.
He strode up to the kitchen.
“You know, I’ve never actually seen you cook,” he said. “Nanili always did all the cooking.” He wanted to compliment her and tell her how angelic she looked while doing it, but that would seem like a lie.
She startled, and a pan slipped from her fingers, clanking against a metal bucket. “Fuckin’ dragon teats. Rayse, you should warn about your entrance next time.”
Why was she being so jittery?
“I thought I should check up on you,” he said.
Her lips pulled up in a way that was uncharacteristic. “I’m fine, thank you.” She inched further away.
He couldn’t understand the hostility. Constance was afraid of him? No, that wasn’t it. She had been afraid of him the first time they’d met. This was different. She exuded disgust. She probably didn’t notice it, but her actions made it obvious that she was trying to repel him.
“We need to talk about what happened,” he said.
“Not at the moment.” She placed the pan on the stovetop and went looking for food. She didn’t even know how to go about this kitchen. He puzzled over why she was attempting to do everything by himself.
He crossed his arms. “Soon. We need to discuss what happened soon.”
An uncertain pause hung between them. “Maybe.”
Her shoulders were as s
tiff as a branch. He knew he wouldn’t be able to pry anything from her then, so he sighed and stalked away.
He went back to the living room.
“Why is she behaving so strangely?” Rayse asked Greta and Aryana. They sat at a table as they waited. They already had a pack of Oweeja cards out and were gambling to pass the time.
Greta shrugged. “It’s been sixty years. Lots of things could have happened. Give her time. She looks like Constance.”
“Looks like her.” A creeping suspicion had started up his chest. Catrina had felt—
No, enough with Catrina. He belonged to Constance now. That kiss was an excuse and a mistake. He couldn’t think of that witch anymore. She’d been using black magic, for dragons’ sakes.
“Like Greta said,” Aryana added, “she’s been through a lot and can’t simply snap back into her old self. Be patient.”
“Yeah…” Rayse glanced into the kitchen. His paranoia scratched the back of his mind. Where had his dragon gone? It should be flaring and rabid in its mating throes. “She’s not giving us any answers, however.”
“She might have gone through something traumatic,” Greta said as she flipped a card. “Be more understanding.”
He sat next to the two women.
“Do you want to play?” Aryana asked.
“I’m not really in the mood.”
“Suit yourself. I’ve got one game over Greta—maybe she needs a change in the winds to lift her luck up.”
Greta scowled. “It’s only been one game. Don’t get cocky.”
He ran a hand over his hair and rested his elbow on the table. “Do you think she’ll tell us about what happened with the Dragon Mother eventually?”
“She just got back,” Greta said. “And you’re already trying to play detective. Stop being a cock in a dragon’s ass and just be patient.” A devious smile split Greta’s face. “Aha! Five in a row. Pay up, you dirty little witch.” She held her palm out.
Aryana rolled her eyes and slapped Greta’s hand away. “We pay when all the games are over, shriveled pumpkin.”
Greta’s eyes were fixated on the soul beads on the table. She was looking at them like a hungry dog. “I’ll have my prize soon enough. Oh, just you wait.”
Fractured Souls (Soul of a Dragon Book 3) Page 10