by Sariah Skye
I crossed my arms over my chest and narrowed my eyes. "I already told you, I have never done this before in my life okay? Except that one time with that bully dragon long, long ago. I never have. Shit, what does a dragon gotta do to get peoples to believe her?" I grumbled under my breath.
"I know it sounds crazy but I really don’t think she has," Maxxus piped up, coming towards me and offering a comforting hand on my shoulder. I jerked away and continued scowling. "Seriously, though…" he turned to Gabriel, looking stern, his blue eyes staring him down. "You have no idea what it’s like for dragons up there who don’t fit in. I couldn’t do magic, either for a very, very long time."
I blinked, surprised. "What? Really?" I knew he had had a rough time, but I didn't know that's why. I just knew he'd had strife with his family; who were very influential in the Court. I'd always figured it was some deep-rooted argument or something of that nature. Not that he'd struggled with magic. And why didn't I know about that? Seems like something that would have come up in conversation with my grandfather, you'd think. Sure would have made me feel better to know I wasn't the only one who struggled with magic.
He nodded solemnly. "I was an embarrassment to my family. It wasn’t until your Grandfather…" he trailed off, looking sullen, "…well, I finally learned but in the meanwhile, it was hard listening to all the ridicule. It was pure hell; I wouldn’t wish the scrutiny on my worst enemy. So, why in the fuck would Leo be faking that she couldn’t do magic, when if she could—it probably would have made her life a whole lot easier? Huh?" Maxxus’ mouth was in a straight line, glaring sternly at Gabriel.
Gabriel puffed up his chest and squared his shoulders, glaring right back. He opened his mouth to speak, but stopped, softened his gaze and looked at me. "Leo—I didn’t mean that. I just didn’t think it was possible for anyone—anyone—to be that powerful right off the bat."
"She always has been, she just didn’t know it," Maxxus said, sounding a little...boastful? He was still continuing his stare down, his fists clutched at his sides.
"I believe I may have some insight on that." A vaguely familiar voice chimed in from behind us. I swiveled around; it was Evie, the vampire, clutching a manila folder by her chest. She waved it in the air, indicating that she received some sort of test results from my blood. "Can we?" she nodded towards the door to our room, and I nodded as she waited for Gabriel to wave his hand over the doorknob unlocking the magic lock and pulled the door open for all of us to walk in.
"Sit down," I said, offering her a spot on the couch. I attempted to sit down next to her, but couldn’t quite maneuver past the wings. I groaned, trying to push them off to the side. "Please tell me you have a solution?"
The others—Gabriel, Daniel and Maxxus—all sat around the room, in chairs or on the floor (Daniel was cross-legged on the floor, looking like a little kid on the "magic rug" awaiting story time). I noticed as Maxxus took a seat on the nearby velveteen chair, Gabriel made a big production of picking up the stool and moving it across the room—nearly out the door—as far as he could get. I shot him a dirty look briefly before turning to Evie, hopeful.
Evie sighed. "Well, I can’t say that I do. But…let me just ask, have you ever gone and had your blood drawn anywhere? Like at a human doctor or…something?"
"What? No, of course not." I furrowed my expression. "Gods only know what they’d see; one weird cell and it’s off to the laboratory to be a dragon guinea pig."
Evie laughed shortly. She pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to me.
I looked it over. It was a bunch of numbers and letters, with some kind of diagram. I handed it back to her with a shrug. "No idea what this is."
"Just a second." She produced another sheet of paper from the folder, and handed that to me. I glanced at it; whatever it was looked extremely similar to the first. "Well…what am I looking at? Seriously, whatever they are, they look the same." I thrust them back at her in frustration.
"That’s precisely the point: you cannot tell the difference between them." She produced a third sheet of paper from the folder and handed it to me. I cocked a brow at the random letters and numbers—twice as many as the other two pages. "Okay, this is different."
She nodded. "Now, pick out which one you think is your blood results."
I snorted. "Um, obvious. This one." I waved the third piece of paper in the air.
She swiped it from me. "Wrong."
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Maxxus shift forward in his seat a little more, as if suddenly intrigued.
"Wait, what? I’m confused."
"One of these papers contains your test results. The other a human's," she explained; her mouth was partially open, her tongue running along the bottom of one of her sharp fangs. I heard Daniel gasp ever so quietly. Evie glanced at him momentarily, who just smiled sweetly.
"Yes, I am what you think I am," she told him dryly. She turned back to me, her pale eyes playful as I scanned over both sheets of paper, looking for some sort of difference.
"I am not sure what this means?" I said, rhetorically.
"It means, Leorah, that your DNA is virtually indistinguishable from a human’s. Meaning, you could go to a human doctor, have your blood taken and no one would be the wiser that you’re anything but human," Evie said. "It’s…fascinating really. I’ve never seen anything like it."
My mouth fell open. "But…how is this possible?"
"Does that mean she’s actually part human?" Gabriel mused from the opposite side of the room. "That doesn’t explain the magic part…"
Evie had to crane her head over her shoulder to peer at him. "Well…that we’re not sure about. It’s a possibility. But…there’s more."
"More?" I swallowed the lump welling in my throat. "I’m some sort of like, demon?"
Evie snorted. "No, not a demon. At least I don’t think."
I let out a little squeal, and she chuckled.
She pulled out another page and handed it to me. It was a picture…a bunch of red circles.
"What’s this?" I questioned.
"That is a close up of some of your blood cells and platelets. As you can see—very human in appearance," she said. "But when you view them under here," she stood up momentarily to produce a thick magnifying glass from her pocket and handed it to me. "There. Look through that."
I held the glass in my hand—which was deceptively light—and positioned it over the picture. There, appearing next to the red cells were very, very faint circles and shapes of different colors, almost misty in appearance. "What the—?"
"The glass is spelled to detect magic. What you’re seeing is the actual magic in your blood."
"What?" Gabriel was on his feet in a split second, and grabbed the glass and picture away from me and looking for himself. Daniel jumped up and was peering over his shoulder.
"What does that mean?" I asked, my voice small and somewhat appalled.
"I’m not sure, exactly," she replied. "It’s nothing anyone has ever seen before. Somewhere along the line, I cannot tell if it was in you specifically, or just your genetic line, someone infused your DNA with some extra, super powerful magic." She yanked out yet another page from her folder and handed it to me. She grabbed the glass away from Gabriel with a scowl and handed it to me.
I looked through it at the picture, similar to the one I already looked at: red cells, platelets, but it looked the same under the glass as without.
"And this." Another page. This one had at least triple the red cells, along with some other ones I could not recognize but again, the glass revealed nothing special.
"One of these is human—a sorceress, actually—and the other is dragon. Even though they are magical, there is no actual magic in the blood," she explained. "So, what you have is…something quite extraordinary indeed."
I let out a groan, covering my face with my palms and cussing. "Oh great…I'm even more of a freak than before!"
"But who could do this kind of thing? Or what?" Gabriel asked.
&nb
sp; "I am not sure. It would be a tremendous undertaking indeed. Probably a whole group of someones, I would guess." We all handed her the pages back, along with the glass and she set them down on in front of her. "All I know is whatever it is…it’s insanely powerful. I have no idea how you were able to not know it for so long, how powerful you are. I would imagine that there was a spell to make it lie dormant too until something triggered it. But what—I have no idea."
Daniel let out a noise, and gestured towards his brother. "It has to be."
Evie bit her lip with one of her pointy fangs. "When did you two meet?"
"A couple weeks ago," Gabriel replied.
"When did your magic start?"
"A couple—" I began, and Evie nodded knowingly. "Hey…whoa."
"Can’t be a coincidence," she said.
I frowned. "Great. Well great. But that still doesn’t answer the wing problem."
She shrugged. "I’m sorry, but that’s all I know. Finnian said that he guesses the problem will fix itself. Just…go about everything as normal. Eat. Sleep if you can…maybe try shifting again. Replenish your energy; it should fix itself. We think. But clearly you are meant to be just as powerful in your human form as your dragon." She turned to Maxxus. "Your magic is less in human form generally, right?"
Maxxus smirked. "Well, mine isn’t that great anyway but yes, in human form it’s a bit less. Other dragons though have more control over it."
I gazed at him apologetically. He just gave a small smile and shrugged as if to say "no big deal."
"And as we just saw, Leo yours is just as powerful in human form as your other form," Gabriel said. Evie looked at him expectantly, and he explained briefly what had just transpired. She let out a low whistle when he was finished.
"I’d wondered what had happened as I was walking here." Evie tucked all her papers back into the folder and shoved the glass in the front pocket of the white lab coat. She turned to Gabriel. "Would you mind if I tested your blood too?"
"Me?" he asked, a surprised hand over his heart.
She nodded. "I’m just curious if there is anything similar to yours, maybe something there that would act as a trigger."
He shrugged. "I guess, sure."
"Right now, if you don't mind." He nodded.
I just stared, dumbfounded at the floor as he followed Evie out the door and to the lab.
Maxxus coughed loudly, getting to his feet. "Well…I suppose I’ll go let you rest."
I peered at him momentarily. "What are you going to do?"
He shrugged. "Well, I didn’t sleep much last night so…perhaps get to bed early. Maybe eat some more," he said with a chuckle.
"Well, why don’t you come eat here? We’ll all have…something. Whatever is around here, anyway," I insisted.
"No, no," he said, waving my suggestion off with a motion of his hand. "You need to get some rest yourself. I’ll find some way to entertain myself." He gave a quick laugh. "Let me know when you get that—" he nodded towards my wings, which I hadn’t noticed but were flapping ever so gently and slowly, almost like a nervous habit like twitching one’s leg rapidly, "—figured out."
I stood and attempted to walk him to the door that led to the hallway, adjoining all our rooms but he was on a mission to get out the door. I stopped in my tracks in the middle of the kitchen area. He was about to shut the door behind him, when he stepped back in.
"Thank you, Leorah…for saving me." He said, with a warm smile.
I snorted. "Oh, it was only a small cut. Hardly life-threatening to a big ol’ dragon."
He raised a brow. "It was a little more than that, and you know it. It hurt pretty badly."
I shrugged. "No biggie," I said, looking down at my feet instead of at him, suddenly uncomfortable with the praise.
"It was a big deal." He took a couple steps closer to me and paused in his tracks again. I looked up, his bright eyes were clearly fogged with conflict; his expression troubled.
"Is…everything okay?" I asked uncertainly.
He looked as if he wanted to say something but did not. He just smiled instead. "It’ll be fine, Milady Leorah," he said, a lilt of regality in his tone that made me chuckle. He reached out for my palm and bent at the waist slightly, pressing his lips on my knuckles softly, and ever so briefly.
I knew I blushed under the gesture, but I tried to keep my expression neutral; knowing fully well for whatever reason Gabriel had a problem with him (which was just stupid) and his brother was still sitting in the living area, probably watching the entire thing.
He shot one more smile at me and disappeared out the door.
I stood for a moment, not quite sure how to react when Daniel piped up, "Well…that was interesting!" he said shooting me a suspicious grin.
Maxxus opened the door to the room across the hall, disappearing behind the door and leaning back against it, with a frustrated sigh…the wood felt cool and smooth against his skin.
He untied the robes around his neck and let them slide down his back to the floor, walking to the bathroom—a room that was nearly identical to the one he’d just been in—a room that Leorah was sharing with Gabriel, while he shared with no one.
He didn’t have many clothes as he hadn’t planned on actually escaping with Leorah—just making sure she was all right as she made her escape but, when things transpired how they did, he knew he couldn’t leave her. He reached into the bag he’d had on the shelf and pulled out a pair boxer shorts that Daniel had helped him find at a goods store in town, and pulled them up over his legs.
As he stood up, he caught a glimpse of his bare-chested self in the mirror. He frowned…he had a body most human males would kill for: defined pectorals, flat stomach with a hint of muscle, broad shoulders and long muscular legs. Not a bad face, either; although…it did him no good. She didn't seem to notice. Still, he wasn’t human, he was really dragon and although dragons should be equally as comfortable in their human forms as their dragon selves, Maxxus had still preferred his dragon. Probably because of his hard time with magic; it was easier in dragon form. But, while being here he was beginning to be more comfortable with it; especially because she was endlessly more comfortable in hers.
He frowned at his reflection. He should be happy that he was blessed with an attractive human form, he could probably attain many beautiful human females to distract him away from the pull on his heartstrings that he’d felt every day for years. Recently that pull strengthened into a full-on heartache that welled into his throat and caused him to gasp nearly every time he was near her. So many times he almost told her; but he just couldn’t. He could distract himself but…it would do no good. Nothing would take his mind off of how much he loved her, how much he’d loved her in secret for years. Years. She barely even knew who he was, yet he thought about her every single day since…well since long ago.
He noticed the shiny, pink flesh that now marred the side of his abdomen. He laughed shortly, noticing it almost resembled a perfect heart shape, except the left side was a little jagged. The fingers of his left hand gingerly traced the outline of the scar, the wound that she had healed. He remembered clearly the look of absolute panic and terror on her face upon seeing his mortal injury, caused by a tree limb that had been barreling towards her as she was performing her magic: she hadn’t seen it, she was too busy saving the town. He knew—he always knew she was meant for greatness; he just didn’t know how great until today. He knew, long before anyone else—besides maybe her grandfather. That’s why he didn’t even hesitate: it took him only a split second to shift and throw himself in front of the sharp, spear-like limb that would have been a devastating injury to her in her human form; knowing no one else but maybe Gabriel would be fast enough to stop it.
And she conjured the magic—the magic a short while ago she didn’t even know she had—and she passed out afterward from the sheer exertion of it, he didn’t speak of his wound, even though it hurt (but less than it would if he was in human form) because all that mattered was
her. He would heal, although it might take a while. He didn’t want to take away from her accomplishment, from her recovery. It was stupid, of course but…when it came to her he often didn’t think clearly.
The corners of his mouth upturned a little. She had healed him. She had been worried, scared even. Perhaps guilty, he didn’t know. What little he knew of spirit magic, he knew that the user had to draw strongly on intent, and pure will…and especially since she didn’t even know she could…it is remarkable indeed.
She had felt badly that she hadn’t been able to heal the scar, even though she had healed the little boys; clearly more practice was needed but he really didn’t mind. It was her, she did it. It would always be a reminder of the caring magic she performed on him and she didn’t have to. She could have called for a witch or healer, but she took it upon herself to do it, somehow instinctively knowing she could. If the scar was all he had of her for now…he was okay with it. And he’d wear it proudly until the day he died. He smoothed his fingers over the shiny skin again and sighed.
This was all he could have, for now. Maybe ever.
For now, it’d have to be enough.
Chapter 19
I stood in the kitchen for a moment, motionless, in a moment of bewilderment before Daniel piped up behind me.
"So…what now?"
I shook myself out of a daze and swiveled around, the weight of the wings I was unaccustomed to nearly knocking me off balance. Daniel was up in a flash to catch me before I stumbled over. I shot him a pathetic half smile. "Thanks."
He placed his strong hands on either side of my shoulders, helping me regain my footing.
"You’re gonna have to get used to those, darlin’. Even if you can shift out of them…well there’s no telling when you’re going to need them again."
I blew out an annoyed raspberry at no one in particular; just fate, really for this particular turn of events. I dragged my feet back into the living room and tried to toss myself on the couch, my wings of course getting in the way.