by Tesha Geddes
“Mother says my baby killed herself,” Mordecai continued to sob, “but I think she’s lying. I think Mother did it. They found Mother’s handgun on top of a cliff… it had been fired.”
So that’s how she escaped. She faked her own death and high-tailed it out of there. Tusk allowed himself a small smile while his back was to the captain. If they thought she was dead, they wouldn’t come looking. He didn’t know what she’d been through, or what she’d had to do to gain her freedom, but he wasn’t going to be the one to jeopardize it. He grabbed a box of tissues from the shelf and handed them to the captain before shuffling off in search of a clean towel.
“I’m sorry for your loss. I’m sure she’s in a better place now,” he said, wincing at the trite words.
He didn’t know anything about the afterlife, so those words were usually meaningless to him, but this time, he knew with absolute certainty the truth of what he said. He couldn’t imagine the pain the captain was feeling, but his daughter was finally somewhere safe and with people who cared about her, and she was getting the help she needed. It wasn’t his place to reveal her secret. If she wanted her father to know, she could tell him herself –– Tusk just needed to find a way to talk to her first.
Mordecai continued to sob and eventually passed out on the couch. Meanwhile, the storm outside continued to rage. Tusk dropped a spare blanket over the drunk and shuffled back to his room. If he was lucky, he’d be able to grab a few hours of sleep; however, the tangle of thoughts in his head said he wouldn’t be. He sighed. When his thoughts were like this, there was only one thing that helped them settle enough for sleep. He pulled a thin russet-red book out of his rickety nightstand drawer and began writing.
❀
Tusk shuffled into the kitchen with the rising sun. A glance into the living room showed the captain still passed out cold on the couch. Ivory was already in the kitchen, brewing a fresh pot of coffee. She threw a worried glance at the couch but pursed her lips and said nothing as she poured two cups of coffee.
“He’s real,” Tusk said as he sipped his coffee.
Ivory let out a shaky breath and said, “Honestly, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Who is he?”
“My captain,” Tusk grumbled. “He’s going through some things right now and showed up drunk on our doorstep last night.”
“Oh,” Ivory said.
“Lost his daughter,” Tusk said.
“Poor thing,” Ivory said, throwing a pitying glance at the sleeping dragon shifter. “I’m sure he’ll be hungry when he wakes up.”
Tusk snorted his coffee, biting back a curse as the hot liquid burned the inside of his nostrils –– Ivory and her bleeding heart.
“I don’t recommend doing that,” Ivory said as she handed her grimacing brother a paper towel.
“Don’t make anything too heavy,” Tusk warned her. “He’s going to be pretty hungover.”
Ivory nodded. “Fluffy pancakes, coming up.”
Tusk’s mouth watered –– maybe it was a good thing Mordecai had shown up on his doorstep. Ivory hadn’t made pancakes in ages.
“You must be feeling good this morning,” Tusk commented.
“A little bit better every day,” Ivory replied with a smile.
Chapter 23
Kaida woke to a thunderous boom and tumbled off her bed in fright. It wasn’t… it couldn’t be. She’d recognize that magic anywhere. How had he found her? She flapped her wings and screeched in alarm. Her mind went blank with terror. She zoomed around her room but couldn’t find the exit.
❀
Erica awoke with a start. There was a storm outside, but that wasn’t what had woken her. Something was happening in Kaida’s room. Erica burst out her door at the same time as her roommates.
“What’s happening?” Sophie asked, looking as alarmed as Erica felt.
“I don’t know,” Erica said, trying the door, but it was locked. “Sophie, can you unlock her door?”
Sophie nodded and cast a quick lock-picking spell. The three roommates burst into Kaida’s room to find a small purple dragon zooming around the room, clearly terrified out of her mind. They tried to approach her, but she just hissed and flew out the door.
“Whatever happens, don’t let her leave the apartment!” Erica shouted, worried about what would happen to Kaida if she made it outside in that state.
“The window!” Tanya shouted. “Someone close it!”
Erica saw the open living room window before Kaida did, but Kaida was faster. Erica’s fingers just brushed the tail of the tiny dragon as it darted out the window and into the storm. Erica cursed in every language she knew, and in a few she didn’t. There was no way they’d be able to catch a terror-blind pocket dragon in this storm, but they had to try. The three roommates dashed outside to look for their friend, but it was futile –– they couldn’t see more than three feet in front of their faces.
❀
Sen’s phone rang, pulling him from a dreamless sleep. Outside, a storm raged. He blinked blearily at the phone. Who could be calling at this hour? He sat up in alarm as the name registered in his sleep-fogged brain. Erica, Kaida’s roommate. She wouldn’t be calling at this hour with good news.
“Hello?” he said, desperately hoping that the phone call had been an accident.
“Sen! She’s gone!” Erica shouted into the phone. From the sound of it, she was standing outside in the middle of the storm. “Kaida’s gone!”
So much for the call being an accident.
“Do you know where she went?” Sen asked, fumbling for a light switch.
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t have called you,” Erica snapped.
Fair point, Sen mentally conceded. “What happened?” he asked.
“We don’t know,” Erica said. “We woke up to Kaida freaking out in her room, flying around in a frenzy. She wouldn’t respond to any of us. Then she got out of her room and flew out the window. We can’t see anything –– we don’t even know which way she went.”
This was bad –– if Kaida wasn’t thinking rationally, there was no telling where she would go.
“We’ll help you look,” Sen said as he shook Rio awake.
It didn’t take long to wake everyone else in the house, and soon, nearly twenty people were crowding the front entryway, getting their shoes on to head out the door. Sen opened the door, truck keys in hand when something small, hard, and wet barreled into him. Tiny claws dug into his shirt, pricking his skin. Sen looked down at the tiny, quivering dragon and wordlessly shut the door.
“Never mind,” he said to the pack as he turned around. “I found her.”
“What happened to her?” Amyra asked, reaching out hesitantly as if to touch Kaida.
The small dragon flinched back and hissed, her eyes wide with fear, and wordless terror rebounding from her mind-voice. Sen stroked her wings and back gently, hoping to calm her down.
“Celicia,” he said. “Call Gramps, he might know what to do. Linus, call the girls, let them know Kaida’s safe with us.”
Celicia nodded and pulled out her phone. Sen walked Kaida over to the couch, accepting the towel thrust into his hands on the way. He sat on the couch and gently patted the tiny dragon dry.
“What did Gramps say?” Sen asked when Celicia hung up.
“Basically, just keep doing what you’re doing. Although”––she paused and carefully looked around at the people standing in the room––“everyone else should probably go back to bed. He did say that too many people would likely overwhelm her.”
With concerned glances, everyone else shuffled out of the room. Amyra, on the other hand, walked in with a steaming mug of hot chocolate and a warm, soft blanket. Sen wrapped the blanket around Kaida as best as he could, though since she never let go of him, he ended up wrapping himself in the blanket as well. He made to grab the hot chocolate, but Amyra slapped his hand away, telling him that it was for Kaida when she was ready.
Sen sat back on the couch and was trying
to get comfortable when the ground shook as something massive landed in their backyard.
“I am here for the dragon,” a thunderous, angry voice boomed in his head.
Everyone who had just left streamed back into the room, most in their shifted forms, snarling teeth bared. Celicia stalked to the window and peeked out the blinds.
“Can’t see a thing in this storm,” she cursed.
“You can’t have her!” an angry bear growled. “She is pack!”
This declaration was met with a fierce chorus of agreement from the rest of the pack.
“If she is pack, then why is she frightened of you?” the large, angry voice demanded.
Sen let out a shaky breath –– he was fairly certain he knew who the angry voice belonged to. He waded through a sea of bristling wolves to get to the back door. When he realized what Sen was about to do, Linus tried to block him, but Sen deftly slipped around him, whispering, “Trust me.”
Sen opened the door and stepped outside. A massive being stood on the lawn, and a fierce, glowing, golden eye glared down at him.
“We didn’t frighten her,” he said as he unwrapped the blanket to show the still-shaking dragon. “Something else did, and she came to us for protection.”
The golden eye lowered and the massive head of a thunderbird materialized out of the gloom. He peered at the tiny dragon clutching Sen’s shirt and said, “This storm reeks of dragon. Come, we must take the daughter of the aerie out of this place.”
Before Sen could react, a large beak had snatched him up by his shirt, and suddenly he was airborne. He might have been frightened to see the ground drop away so suddenly, but the gloom of the storm prevented him from seeing anything beyond his own feet. Within moments, he was soaked to the skin. He wasn’t sure how it was possible, but Kaida was shaking even harder now. He wrapped his arms around the tiny dragon and prayed his shirt wouldn’t tear. As if hearing his silent prayer, strong talons wrapped around his middle, holding him gently as the beak released him.
They flew through the storm for what felt like an eternity before they broke out into clear starry skies. Sen shivered and hugged Kaida tighter. They were out of the storm, but they weren’t out of danger yet. The weather had turned cold, and that rain was only a few degrees above freezing –– if they didn’t get somewhere warm and dry soon, they’d both be in danger of catching hypothermia. He would have shifted into his wolf form, but he didn’t want to risk dropping Kaida.
Thankfully, it was only a few minutes before they began descending. Sen quietly rued the fact that his first (and likely only) aerial approach to a thunderbird aerie was on a moonless night. He couldn’t make out any details, but he imagined it was magnificent.
“Brace yourself,” Storm said, and that was all the warning he gave Sen before he dropped him.
Sen landed on the ground with an oof and rolled several feet before he was able to stop himself. He took a moment to make sure nothing was broken before climbing to his feet. He checked Kaida as best as he could, but it was difficult without being able to see anything. He carefully extracted Kaida from his shirt and shimmied out of his clothing and shifted into his wolf. He sighed in relief as the warm fur swept over him. He quietly padded over to Kaida, who was looking around in confusion. That alert, present look in her eyes was far more relieving than his fur had been. She was back. He gently nuzzled her, and she hesitantly returned the affection before climbing up to perch on his back.
“What happened?” she asked. “Where are we?”
“You showed up at the pack house in the middle of a storm, terrified out of your mind,” Sen replied. “Then a thunderbird showed up and said the storm smelled like a dragon and we needed to get you out of there. Since you wouldn’t let go of me, he just picked us both up and carried us to his aerie.”
“The storm,” Kaida said with a shudder. “It was him, Sen. My… my father made that storm –– I’d recognize his magic anywhere.”
No wonder she’d panicked.
“Do you think he found me?” Kaida asked, her tiny talons gripping Sen’s fur tighter.
“It is difficult to say,” Storm said, walking up to them. “But I can have someone make some discreet inquiries.”
“Thank you, Storm,” Kaida said, dipping her head in the thunderbird’s direction. “How did you find me?”
“That feather I gave you,” Storm said. “I felt your terror through the bond and followed it to you.”
“Thank you for coming for me,” Kaida said to the thunderbird, then turned to Sen. “And thank you for being there for me. I’m sorry for any trouble I caused.”
“You’re worth every bit of trouble,” Sen said teasingly. “But we do need to get somewhere warm and dry soon.”
“There are a few small caves inside that our human guests use when they visit,” Storm said. “You may use those tonight, and for as long as you need. Get some sleep now, if you can. You can meet the rest of the aerie in the morning.”
Sen yawned –– sleep sounded great, but morning couldn’t be more than a few hours off. He snatched his sodden pajamas up in his mouth and quietly padded after the thunderbird. Kaida seemed content to stay perched on his back. Once they entered the cavernous aerie, it was easy to tell which caves were designated for humans –– they were on the ground level, had the smallest openings, and even more telling, they had curtains strung up at the entrance for privacy. Storm motioned to an empty cave and Sen gratefully ducked under the curtain.
The cave was nothing spectacular. It had a small bed tucked in the corner, a small dresser, and a rickety table. A battery-powered lamp stood on the table, though it was currently turned off.
He dropped his wet clothes on the floor and nosed his phone out of one of the pockets and frowned at it –– it was far too wet to use. Hopefully, it would be dry by morning; he needed to call his pack and let them know they were okay, but that would have to wait until he had a working phone.
He padded over to the bed and nosed the covers back, pleased to see that the sheets were as clean as could be expected for being in a cave. He jumped onto the bed and curled up. Kaida slid off his back and curled up next to him, tucking her head under her wings. She was asleep instantly. He tugged the blankets up over them –– ordinarily he would bother with blankets when he was in his wolf form, but they’d gotten very wet, and very cold, so the added warmth of the blankets was welcome.
❀
Kaida woke up slowly, burrowing deeper into the warm, furry blanket around her. She blinked in confusion. Furry blanket? She looked at the shaggy wolf curled around her, and the events of the previous night came flooding back. If dragons could blush, she’d be lobster red. Losing her mind when she sensed another dragon was definitely not the smart thing to do. At least it ended well… this time. She whimpered quietly –– if her father was looking for her in Whispering Pines, would she ever be able to return? She felt a warm, wet nose nudge her gently and she looked up into Sen’s worried, golden eyes.
“I’m fine,” she said, “just tired and worried. Tired of always looking over my shoulder, and worried that I might not be able to go back to the life I built.”
Sen nuzzled her and said, “No matter what happens, you’ll always have the pack, and you’ll always have me.”
His words warmed the very depths of her soul –– she wasn’t alone anymore, but that was all the more reason to make sure her father didn’t find out about her new life, or anyone she cared about.
“How did you find me?” Kaida asked.
“I didn’t,” Sen replied, grinning. “You found me. I opened the front door to go out and help look for you and got a tiny purple dragon straight to the chest.”
Kaida winced. That must have hurt.
“If you two are awake,” Storm interrupted, “the aerie would like to meet you.”
Kaida gulped.
Chapter 24
Kaida followed Sen out to the main cavern to find it filled with thunderbirds on every available surface. Hundred
s of pairs of eyes looked down at her. A murmur of disbelief swept through the aerie as eyes widened in shock. The shock was quickly replaced with another look that Kaida couldn’t quite name.
“Oh. My. Feathers,” a very young female thunderbird said as she took a tentative step forward. A cleft in her beak made it look like someone had taken a chunk out of it. She bent down to get a better look at Kaida. “You are so cute!” she squealed. “Mama, can we keep her?”
“Rani,” her mother chided, “we don’t keep people. But you can ask if you can be friends.”
Rani, the young thunderbird, turned back to Kaida and eagerly asked if they could be friends. Kaida quietly agreed, feeling as though her world had just been turned upside-down.