by Terry Spear
She saw a black-haired guy dressed in a uniform decorated over the shoulders with royal gold cords, revealing he had some official capacity in the queen’s household, moving toward her in an aggressive way. She was certain this wasn’t a social call.
“Why don’t you come with me?” he said, not in a way that was asking.
She heard heavy footsteps approaching behind her and whipped around to see four guards coming for her. Alton had told on her. The traitor!
Why? So he didn’t have to give up her gold? She would never ever save his life again, if the need ever arose again.
She transported beyond the guards, dashed out the door, and transported right out of there, swearing she’d get even. And get her blasted locket back too!
5
Alton was in such a fog after the queen’s physician had given him so many drugs for the pain where the bolt had been removed that he couldn’t think straight.
“Where is she?” Alton asked Halloran, Ena’s brother and Alton’s best friend. Halloran was now Dragon at Arms, the highest position any dragon shifter could have. Though the queen had offered the position to Brett for his saving her life, despite having been wounded at the time. But he had asked that Ena’s brother have the honor instead. Which had both shocked Halloran and pleased him.
Why had Brett done that? So he could stay close to Ena.
Would Alton have done the same for her? He doubted it. That was the most coveted position any dragon shifter could ever want and hadn’t been filled for years under the old king’s rule.
It had been three days since Alton had returned to their kingdom, and he was still forced to be on bedrest—per the queen’s orders.
“My sister is fine. She and Brett had to take refuge in an abandoned warehouse for a time. Fae seers had surrounded the building, and Ena and Brett couldn’t leave until reinforcements arrived. But we got them out before dawn the next day.”
Halloran had said Ena would be Alton’s mate, and Alton had planned on it, even though several dragons had been vying for the honor. That was until Brett showed up in her life. But Alton wasn’t talking about Ena. The queen’s physician had told Alton that Ena and Brett were safely back home. Alton wanted to know about the golden fae, though he’d been extra careful not to call her that. To everyone, she was a dragon fae, and he wanted to keep it that way.
“What about Kayla? The girl who brought me back? The physician said she returned Muriel safely also. Where is she?” Alton had worried—once he was able to really concentrate on anything much when he wasn’t taking so many pain medications—that someone would wonder just where she’d come from. Even so, he’d expected her to be visiting him repeatedly, hounding him to get out of bed and return her locket to her. And her friend’s also! Maybe even returning all the jewelry she’d left behind when she’d endangered her own life for him.
“The golden fae?” Halloran’s brows furrowed.
Alton frowned just as much, his skin growing cold all at once. Had her aura slipped and suddenly she’d exposed herself for what she truly was to the dragon fae? Or had she mistakenly thought that since she’d helped both him and Muriel, she could reveal what she was and the dragon fae would make an exception in her case?
He didn’t think she could be that naïve.
“She transported out of here as fast as she could. She knew what would happen to her once she was found out,” Halloran said.
“She brought me back here.” Alton wanted to punch whoever had made her leave. “Muriel too.” As if Halloran hadn’t known that. “She must have thought that would count for something.” Even in his book it did.
“You’re the one who told us what she was.”
Alton wouldn’t have! Not after what she’d done for him.
“You told Ryker she intended to steal Ena and Brett’s gold. At the high school, you told Ena she was a golden fae. Though my sister hadn’t believed it at first, not when Kayla helped save your neck and Muriel’s. Good thing you told us. We wouldn’t have had a clue otherwise.”
“I told you?” Alton felt sick to his stomach. He couldn’t believe it. Did she know he was the one who told on her? She’d hate him forever when he had no intention of doing anything of the sort.
“You kept talking about her. Over and over again. Didn’t make much sense half the time, but we pieced it all together. When I went to question her, she took off right away. It’s unbelievable what one of their kind will pull just to get in our good graces, then wham, the next thing you know, the little thief has robbed you blind.” Halloran leaned against the wall and pulled out a pad of paper and a pen. “I came to talk to you about the games. I need to know if you want me to pull your name off the list, or you think you can still take part in them.”
Alton felt absolutely awful about Kayla. He’d wanted to thank her for saving his life. Oh, sure, he knew she was helping him so he’d give back her locket, but in no way had he ever intended to tell anyone what she truly was after what she had done for him. He still wanted to know why the locket was so important to her. Family heirloom? He suspected that was it.
“Alton?”
“What?”
“The game?”
“I’ll be there. In the games.”
“It will be worth it just to see if your scales turn different colors again.” Halloran grinned at him. “You’re looking better. Doc said he’d let you go this afternoon.”
“How’s Muriel?”
“Furious with you.”
“Why now?”
“Because of the golden fae. She said you ought to be ashamed of yourself after all Kayla had done for the both of you. You owed her your life. But Muriel isn’t a dragon shifter, so she has no understanding of the troubles we’ve had between our kinds.”
“Where’s Ena?” Alton tried to sit up in bed, but his side still hurt.
Halloran helped him and readjusted his pillows. “She’s angry with you. Same reason Muriel is, I suspect, though she wouldn’t say for sure.”
Alton didn’t have to ask what Brett’s viewpoint was on the matter. People mattered more to him than gold. Alton figured it was because he hadn’t been born a dragon shifter. Or, at least hadn’t known he was until a few months ago. That could put a different perspective on it. So Alton knew he would side with Ena on the issue.
“Don’t worry. You did the right thing.” Halloran started to leave, but paused at the doorway. “Muriel said Kayla had been bathing when you grabbed her gold. You’re more of a dragon than I could ever be. I wouldn’t have given the gold any thought.”
Bathing? No way had Kayla been bathing when he found her jewelry. She’d been running away.
“Wait, what about that fae seer? Hannah? What is to become of her?” Alton asked.
“Ena has petitioned the queen to allow her to keep the girl at her castle, like she did Brett, Mark, and Bryan Jessup. If Ena continues to take in fae seers, she’s going to be overrun by humans.” Halloran shook his head.
“Does Ena think the girl might be a fae?”
“Like Brett? Maybe. Mark and the other haven’t come into fae abilities, so who knows. All I know is that it’s causing a bit of dissension. Their kind have killed our kind, and—“
“Our kind have killed theirs.”
“Don’t tell me you want her to stay too.”
Alton scowled at him as he got out of the bed to dress. “Be serious. How do you think I lost Ena to one?”
“Well, I didn’t think so, but just checking. You don’t have some feelings for this fae, do you? The golden one?”
“Hey, she saved my life. I at least owed her a thank you. She didn’t have to risk her neck to go with me.”
“Unless she wants something from you in return.” Halloran lifted a brow. “Are you sure you didn’t see her bathing?”
“What are you going to do?” Tanya asked Kayla as she marched into the woods to Sigrid’s cottage.
“I’ve got to ask Sigrid if there’s something else I can do to disguise myself
, and learn how I can take down a dragon shifter.”
Tanya’s eyes rounded. “You’re kidding, of course. You don’t seriously mean it.”
“Yes, I mean it. I saved his life! And what does he do? Turns me over to the Dragon at Arms. I mean, who would do something like that to someone who saved his life? Have me thrown in the dungeon?”
“A dragon shifter fae who’s afraid you’re going to try and steal his gold.”
“I can’t steal it. I don’t have a clue where it is.”
“Then he’s afraid you’re going to ask him to give you the two lockets back, and he doesn’t want to part with his gold.”
“Now that’s more like it.”
Kayla couldn’t believe how angry she was about it. The ring around her eyes had been glowing gold for three whole days. She was just glad her mom had left a note saying she’d gone on a trip to see her sister and hadn’t waited for Kayla to get back. Then again, she hadn’t waited to tell her mother either. Her mother must have figured Kayla wouldn’t be home anyway. Which was a really good thing because how would she explain why her eyes were glowing otherwise?
“I still can’t believe you went to rescue a fae and ended up rescuing an injured dragon who had taken your locket. I’ve never been in a mausoleum.” Tanya shivered. “That must have been morbid.”
“It was. Buried under the earth.” Goosebumps rose all over Kayla’s arms. “I want to go to the games.”
“The dragon games? You’ve got to be kidding. Why? They didn’t catch you and throw you in the dungeon, so you want to go back to see if they’ll catch you this time?”
“No. Of course not. I want to see Alton.”
“Why? He will only try to have you imprisoned again.”
“That’s why I need some kind of magic. I’m not going to just talk with him. He’ll probably just take me to the dungeon himself. I need something that will—“
“Paralyze him?” Sigrid asked.
They looked behind them and saw her using her beautiful wings to float to the forest floor.
“Well, not paralyze him. Of course if I did that, he couldn’t lock me up or call the guards to have them do it. But I need the lockets. So I’ll need to do something to him that will force him to give the lockets to me. I thought of a truth serum, but even if I asked him where his treasure is, it might be well-guarded. I need to…bind him to my will. Like a vampire would do.”
“A vampire?” both Sigrid and Tanya asked at the same time.
“Don’t you guys know anything about the human’s vampire lore? They mesmerize humans and make them do things for them.”
Tanya smiled. “Wow, if I could have that power over Shane, I’d do it in a heartbeat.”
Sigrid laughed. “See? What did I tell you? Everyone wants something.”
“What if someone else told on me and it wasn’t Alton after all?” Kayla couldn’t help but grasp at straws, trying to make sense of why Alton would do something like that to her.
“Who else knew?” Tanya asked, sounding skeptical.
No one. That was the problem. Kayla slumped her shoulders in defeat. She’d really hoped to come up with another reason for his betrayal. A reasonable explanation. One that let him off the hook. “No one. Just Alton. It’s just that I can’t believe he’d tell on me like that. Not after I saved him.”
“To keep his gold safe? A dragon shifter would do anything.” Tanya cast her a worried look. “Listen, it was a rotten thing to do. We’ve just got to figure a way around this. Assume, like we did in the first place, there’s no helping their kind. You’ve just got to steal the gold back.”
“Well…he was injured.” Kayla remembered a time when she was zapping the weeds in her lavender fields and a bee landed on her hand. She’d shaken her hand to get him off, pulled the trigger on the wacker accidentally, and hit her foot. It burned right through her boot and scorched the top of her foot. Her mom had said Kayla had made some pretty weird remarks while she had been under the healer’s care, all doped up.
“So?” Tanya and Sigrid said at the same time.
“Well, what if he was out of it because he was on pain medication? That can make you say some pretty strange things. Remember the time you broke your arm, Tanya? Sure, we heal faster than humans, but we still take some time to heal, and you were on some pretty heavy duty pain medication. You said you were going ice skating, or something weird like that. It was the middle of summer. And you’ve never gone ice skating, ever.”
“Telling the Dragon at Arms that you were a golden fae wasn’t weird. It was the truth. Face it. The dragon turned on you as soon as you had transported Muriel safely back. Right?” Tanya said.
“Yeah, but he was probably under while they took out the bolt and repaired the damage to his muscles and stuff. By the time I returned, he might have been waking from the anesthesia and told them about me. Maybe he’d been asking to see me, and he mentioned the golden fae, letting it slip, but not meaning to.” Kayla could see how that could happen and then he would have been perfectly innocent of ratting her out.
“Okay,” Tanya said as they entered Sigrid’s cottage. “Let’s say for the sake of argument that in a drug-induced state, the dragon made the mistake of calling you what you really are. What do you propose to do at the dragon games? If Halloran, Ryker, Ena, Brett, Muriel, or any other of the dragon fae saw you at the games, you’ll be hauled off and manacled in the dungeon. If you think Alton won’t turn you in, how will you be able to get hold of him to speak with him alone? If that’s what you’re thinking of doing. At the games, he will more than likely be in a special place for dragon contestants, don’t you agree? Ena, Brett, and Halloran will surely be with him to participate in the games.”
Sigrid poured water into the tea kettle. “What about a love potion?”
“What?” both Tanya and Kayla said at the same time and looked at her like she was crazy.
“That would be a way to bind him to you. Hey, you were the one who brought it up. Vampire wills him to do your bidding.”
“How in the world would she get it to him? Here, have a nice glass of water to quench your thirst after all that dragon gaming stuff. And oh, by the way, you don’t know me as Kayla, the golden fae,” Tanya said. “But you love me.” She put her hands over her heart and sat down at the table as Sigrid made the tea. “And more than anything else in the world, in fact, you feel you will just die if you don’t give me the two lockets I’ve asked for. I’ll even help you look for them. And then, you’ll remember nothing of this conversation or anything that you will do.”
“He’d remember all of it,” Sigrid warned, pouring the tea into floral cups. “Once he snapped out of it and was no longer under the influence, he’d remember everything he did and said.”
“That would serve him right.” Tanya took a sip of her tea. “Lavender. It’s my favorite too.”
“But how would I give it to him?” Kayla asked, getting interested.
“You could blow magical dust in his face. If the wind is blowing the wrong way or shifts, you could be the one doing anything he asks of you instead, though. You could give him the potion to drink. But would he trust you? That would be the other problem. Why would you be nice to him after what he did to you? You could shoot a dart at him, but you would have to hope no one caught you at it, or you could be incarcerated in the dungeon. Well, for any of the situations if you got caught.”
“But then he’d come to get me out because he would be under my influence,” Kayla said, thinking this had real possibilities.
“Only if you had eye contact with him once he was under the influence. Otherwise, he could be under someone else’s influence until it wore off.” Sigrid sat down with them at the table.
Great. That wasn’t what Kayla wanted to hear.
“She still has the problem with others seeing her and recognizing her,” Tanya said.
“I can disguise her. She could be an old hag or a beautiful dragon fae. I can even turn her into a dragon shifter. Beware,
if I do this, they might think you’re there for the games, and you won’t know anything about flying or breathing fire. It’s something you’d have to practice. And fast.”
“Sounds too dangerous to me,” Tanya said.
“It sounds absolutely perfect to me.” It was the best plan ever. At least Kayla thought it could be. And she loved the idea of flying. “Can we do it now? So I can start practicing right away?”
“We can.”
“What about when she’s in her fae form? What will she look like then?” Tanya asked. “She can’t look like herself or wear her dragon scales all the time while she’s there.”
“If I make her too old, they won’t believe she can be in the games, most likely. Too young, same thing. But if I make her the right age, and too beautiful, she may have all kinds of suitors. Dragon suitors.”
“Wouldn’t that be a laugh on them?” Kayla didn’t believe she would have all kinds of dragons interested in her for a minute, but she got a kick out of the idea just the same.
“We can dye your hair a different color. You can wear human colored contact lenses. The kind that are just for looks, not to clear up vision problems. We can work on your makeup too. We can change what you wear to something that is completely different to give you a whole new appearance. The pretend you.”
“You mean like wearing Goth clothes and makeup like Ena because I never wear anything like that.”
“Exactly,” Sigrid said. “I don’t think I’ve had this much fun since I gave Morten the hiccups after he called me a witch. After two days, he finally apologized and begged me to stop it.”
Both Tanya and Kayla stared at her in disbelief. What was she truly capable of?
“Don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done something to him if you had the power to do so,” Sigrid said, sounding annoyed with them.
“Maybe worse,” Kayla agreed, knowing Morten bullied everyone, given the chance.
“Hey, what if Sigrid turned you into a boy?” Tanya sounded thrilled with the notion she had come up with as if it was the best idea ever. “Not for real. Just in outward appearance,” she quickly added when no one responded.