by Beverly Rae
“We find her and the scepter.” I grinned at him, happy to see his movements growing easier. I wasn’t so sure, however, that I wanted to find Sabrina. Especially not when she still had the Scepter of Fire to use as a weapon.
Does Anyone Speak Zeiwacian?
“There she is!” Thad shouted and swung his arm out, striking me across my neck.
Choke. “Damn it, Thad.” Cough. “Watch it.”
Kaine growled from the back seat next to Jenn.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to—” But Thad’s apology got lost in the frantic scramble of everyone jumping out of the car almost before I’d managed to slam on the brake. Kaine moved with lightning speed with Jenn taking a close second. Thad and I brought up the rear, hurrying to catch up with them at the top of a small rise. I caught up with the two leaders and almost slammed into Kaine’s back. However, he didn’t appear to notice. Instead, he stared down at the scene below us.
“Tuo’s with her.” Kaine nodded his head at the two figures standing on the dock. “Be careful.”
Tuo Chow had Sabrina cornered at the end of the dock, and from the way he was waving his arms about, I knew the argument had gotten heated. I could hear his words, but couldn’t understand what he said. Sabrina, her face a mask of fury, shouted at him in a strange language. “Is she speaking alien?”
A small smile broke the concentration on Kaine’s features. “Yes. Zeiwacian is one of over a few billion different alien dialects.”
A few billion? Would I ever get used to this new parallel world and its strange inhabitants? “Wow.”
Jenn bounced on her feet, raring to go after them. “Kaine, let’s go. If we’re lucky, they’ll stay involved in their argument and won’t notice us. Let’s not lose the element of surprise.”
“Agreed.” I took a step forward, ready to charge into battle, but Kaine grabbed my arm and tugged me back. “No, Chrissy-doll, you and Thad should stay here.”
“No problem.”
I scowled at Thad, wanting to berate him for his cowardice. “If you hadn’t borrowed—” I made quotes around the word, “—the scepter in the first place, Kaine’s people could’ve found it before all this happened. You are not sitting this one out.”
“Thad and you can help by staying out of the way.” Kaine nodded at Jenn. “Leave this to the professionals.”
“The professionals?” I spit out the word professional as though it gave me a bad taste. “I understand Jenn is a professional, but how the heck are you a professional?”
Gold filled Kaine’s green eyes. “I’ve done this kind of thing before. I can handle myself.”
“Yeah, well, I’m a professional, too, ya know. I’ve been dealing with unpredictable and dangerous situations for a long time now. Without any help.”
“Chrissy-doll, I don’t mean to offend you, but telling an old lady that the crumbs left on the kitchen counter were made by a rodent and not her dearly departed husband raiding the cookie jar doesn’t make you ready to handle the likes of Sabrina and Tuo.” His face softened. “Besides, if anything happened to you… Don’t you know how much I love you?”
I had a tear in my eye and my heart grew full of happy emotion. I couldn’t speak when a flash of light, blindingly intense, blared outward from the edge of the dock. Feeling like I should’ve ducked, I turned to see Tuo lying on his back. His body was covered in the same black smoke I’d seen coming from Kaine’s leg. But the blast he’d taken must’ve had more power behind it because his body had been thrown backward, all the way to the edge of the lawn.
Kaine shook me, returning my attention to him. “Do you see now why you have to stay here?” He kissed me then, hard, driving the breath out of me. Too bad for him, however, that it couldn’t drive away my stubbornness. Turning on his heel, he jerked his head toward where Sabrina stood staring at Tuo, telling Jenn to follow. The golden dragon on the end of the scepter glowed brightly.
Kaine was halfway down the hill before I took my first step, dragging Thad along with me. “Damn chauvinistic men. Especially chauvinistic dragon men.”
The element of surprise we’d counted on didn’t last long. Sabrina looked up, saw Kaine and said something that sounded like a mix of French and a garbage disposal grinding up bones. With an evil laugh, she pointed the Scepter of Fire at Kaine.
I screamed, not only as a warning, but in surprise at what Jenn did next. She threw herself sideways into the air, like a gymnast catapulting over the pummel horse, placing her body in front of Kaine. A ball of fire erupted from the staff and sped toward them, blazing like a sun ready to explode into a thousand smaller stars. Kaine tried to pull her out of harm’s way, but wasn’t fast enough. The fireball struck her shoulder, flipping her backward, spinning her over Kaine to land in a crumpled pile at my feet.
“Jenn!” I knelt next to her, saw the whiteness in her face, the dark smoke rising from her shoulder, and sent a prayer skyward. “Please, don’t let her be dead. Please don’t let her be dead.” But Jenn wasn’t the only one I had to worry about. Thinking I could do nothing more for my friend, I tore my gaze away from her to see Kaine changing, transforming as he ran toward Sabrina.
The thought of losing my husband sliced through me. “No!” I flew (okay, not literally, but you know what I mean) down the hill, my heart in my throat and a stitch in my side. “Kaine!”
Sabrina spun the scepter in her hand, reminding me of a gunslinger spinning his pistol in a show of ability. “The Scepter of Fire is mine. Mine to take and sell to the highest bidder.” She glanced at the still-smoking body of Tuo. “Too bad for Tuo he didn’t want to pay my price.” She giggled, mean and nasty. “And yet, he ended up paying an even greater price and getting nothing.”
Kaine roared his anger, his transformation nearly complete. His clothes tore away, exposing scales running the length of his body. His head, no longer recognizable as human, grew, stretching the bones and narrowing the eyes. Claws shook shoes off and curled, ready to take prey in their grip. His tongue lashed out, licking his lips in anticipation. A tail slashed the air. At last, with the metamorphosis almost complete, wings sprouted on his back. I kept running and watched my husband the dragon take flight.
No longer looking confident, Sabrina screeched a high-pitched piercing sound that echoed in the trees surrounding us. I stumbled and kept going, getting closer to Kaine, who now hovered in the air above her. She pointed the Scepter of Fire, striking Kaine in the chest.
He shrieked, his tongue whipping out. Fire burst from his mouth, spinning in a whirl of white-hot fury toward Sabrina. She thrust out the Scepter of Fire again, blocking the flame rushing her way and turning it back on Kaine. His own fire hit him in his left wing. With a snarl of pain and anger, he dipped to the side, furiously flapping the other wing, struggling to stay in the air.
“Leave him alone, you skank!” I didn’t care if she used the scepter’s power on me. Anything was better than seeing Kaine hurt.
But I was a mere pest, unworthy of her attention. With a twirl, Sabrina changed.
The beautiful redhead was gone. In her place stood an ugly creature with two heads. Bulging eyes covered each of those heads, all of them moving in different directions. Limb after limb burst from the black-green body, ripping her clothes to tatters to expose a black-red puss oozing from open gashes in her skin. Her legs disappeared, either under her body or gone for good. I couldn’t tell which.
I skidded to a stop directly under Kaine and watched, horrified and too entranced to tear my gaze away from her. She doubled in size, stretching until she was as wide as she was tall. Three tongues wiggled from each of the lipless mouths and flicked spittle at me.
“Oh, gross!” I’d had babies spit up on me, dogs barf on my feet, and maggots fall on top of me. This black-red gook, however, was the worst. “Keep your phlegm in your own mouth, you bitch.”
Kaine cheered me and I have to admit I was as surprised as he was at my bravado. I guess getting spit up on was the last straw for me.
Sabrina garbled what I assumed was her native language, but I understood the threat clearly enough to duck. A fireball zipped perilously close to my head. She screeched her displeasure at her miss, and with another even higher-pitched shriek, turned her massive body around to face the lake. Pulling a round device from somewhere on her body—and I so didn’t want to know from where—she pointed it at the lake and pushed a blinking red button. The button’s color slowly changed from red to green. Water in the middle of the lake boiled, making waves that rolled toward the shore.
What the hell? Is she summoning a lake monster? Does Lake Lanier have its very own Loch Ness Monster? I watched, too intrigued to do anything else.
Instead of a sea monster, a spaceship broke through the surface of the water. Sabrina pushed the remote device again and the ship wavered, turning what I assumed was the front toward her. A luminous glow extended from the ship and across the water, stopping when it struck the dock in front of her. With a gleeful cry, she stepped onto the light path and shuffled toward the ship.
“Chrrriisssy-daawlll.”
I guess a tongue like Kaine’s dragon tongue must wreak havoc on pronunciation. I swung away from Sabrina and found it hard to stand. Kaine had changed again, not in appearance this time, but in size. Like the dragons of ancient lore, he grew, enlarging his body once, then twice, then a third time. The enormous dragon flapped his wings, pushing great gusts of air at me. I staggered, trying to stay on my feet.
Jerking his head, he indicated his back. He lowered to the ground, not actually landing, but only inches from touching down. “Gwet ooonn.”
Is he serious? He really expects me to ride on his back like one of those heroes in a fairy tale? I took a step closer and stopped. “I don’t think I can. What if I fall off?”
“I’wll catchsh youw.”
“Not exactly reassuring, ya know. How about ‘Don’t worry, Chrissy-doll, you can’t fall off. I promise.’”
“Chrrrisssy-dddoll, dwon’t worrsy. Youw cwan’t falls offt. I pwromize.”
I scoffed at him. “Too small, too late, dude.”
“Thwat’s not hwow vthe swaying gwoes.”
I gaped at him. “Seriously? Are you seriously flapping your wings, not to mention your gums, and telling me I’ve got the expression wrong? Who the fwuck cares?” I’d purposely imitated his current speech impediment, needing some way to needle him.
Yet instead of throwing back a nifty retort, he simply glared at me, then pointed one claw at the escaping Sabrina. She was halfway to the ship, walking on the beam above the water. He shifted, lowering his injured wing for me to use as a ladder.
“Aw, hell.” I called to Thad to take care of Jenn, gritted my teeth and ignored the warning bells clanging in my head. Trying to hurry while taking care, I climbed on top of my husband—and not on top in the good way either. “You’d better not let me fall off, you big lug.”
“I wonwt.”
“Argh!”
Kaine lifted in flight and I grabbed the small tuff of hair at the bottom of his neck. Pressing my legs against his body as I’d been taught to ride a horse bareback, I lay closely against him and prayed the air whipping by me wouldn’t drag me off.
“Twry to grab the scepter.”
Is it my imagination or is his speech getting better? Maybe it takes a little time to adjust to the tongue’s new size. Wait a sec. What did he say? “Did you just tell me to try and grab the scepter?”
“Yes. Swabrina is cwoncentrating on walking the light pwath. This is our best chance to snatch wit away.”
Pff. My best chance, if you could call it a best anything. Yet I knew he was right. We couldn’t let her get to the ship with the scepter. “Okay, dive bomb her and I’ll pretend I’m grabbing for the brass, er, gold ring.”
He pointed his head down, flapped his wings with extra gusto and dived downward. I held on and swallowed back a yelp of fear.
“Chrissy-doll.”
“Yeah?”
“You should open your eyes.”
I hadn’t realized that I’d closed them. “Uh, yeah. That would probably be wise. Oh shit!”
Suddenly Kaine stopped flapping his wings and curled them to his side. Dipping one side lower, he turned, speeding toward the shuffling Sabrina, who had her two heads looking toward the ship. I dug my nails into the rough scales on his neck and shifted my weight the other way.
Please don’t let me fall off. Please don’t let me fall off. Closer we flew, faster with the wind blowing my hair straight back from my head. I squinted against the wind battering my eyes and watched Sabrina’s grotesque figure growing closer, bigger, until at last I reached out to grab the staff.
As though she’d waited for just the right moment, Sabrina whirled around and pointed the Scepter of Fire at us. A huge fireball burst from the golden dragon’s mouth and spun our direction. Knowing I could do nothing to stop the fireball, I closed my eyes and waited for hot burning torture to envelope me.
Kaine’s body rocked underneath me, loosening my grip and sending me sliding down his back toward his tail. I opened my eyes and screamed. Kaine, his head twisted around to see me, lifted his tail. My butt rammed against it, stopping my slide and my impending freefall off his back.
Black smoke filled my eyes. The fireball had missed me, but had struck home elsewhere. Kaine! Wiping my eyes and peering through the sooty fog, I gaped at the hole in his right wing. “Kaine. Both wings.” As if he didn’t already know.
He didn’t answer. He couldn’t. His eyes were closed and short pants of flame puffed from his mouth. With a growl that filled my heart with an overwhelming ache, he tucked his head, sending us into a downward spiral.
“Kaine! Please pull up. Kaine, can you hear me?”
We plummeted toward the lake. I fought the dizziness brought about from his spin and got ready for the impact, watching the water grow closer. I knew the end was near for one or both of us and I couldn’t let that happen without saying what I had to say one last time. “Kaine, I love you.”
At that moment, he lifted his head and I saw love even within the glowing gold. “I love you, too, Chrissy-doll.” Seconds before hitting the water, he curled his body upward with a groan, slowing the descent until he abruptly stopped only a few feet above the water.
“Omigod, you saved us.”
“Swim, Chrissy-doll, swim.” With a great shake, he threw me off his back and into the water.
The shock of plunging into the water wasn’t as great as the shock that Kaine had thrown me off. I sank several feet before finally getting my bearing and breast-stroking to the surface. “Why the hell did you do that, Kaine?”
He hovered above me, tilting his head toward the lake’s edge where Thad had commandeered a small row boat and was pushing it into the water. “Thad will help you.”
“But why did you drop me? We have to stop Sabrina.” My heart squeezed tightly in my chest. “Kaine, you’re still smoking.” Real fear, colder than I’d even known held me in its grip. I could barely whisper his name in question. “Kaine?”
He flapped his wings twice, putting himself several yards from me. Casting me a pain-filled look, he closed his eyes and fell into the water.
The waves from his impact carried me away from him. “Kaine! No!” I struck out, battling a second wave and swimming as hard as I could. I had to get to him. Sabrina’s victorious laughter spurred me on, but my arms ached from my ride. I couldn’t move forward.
Exhaustion overtook me, almost a relief against the heartache tearing my heart open. Tears streamed down my face and I gazed at the spot where he’d gone under. I stopped treading water and drifted under the waves, ready to join him in death.
I kept my eyes open under the water, hoping to get one last glimpse of the man, the dragon I loved, but the water was too murky. I cried out, losing air to give one last plea to bring him back to me. How can I have finally found the man of my dreams only to lose him so soon? A pain, greater than I’d ever experienced, sliced into me, cutting thr
ough me like a dagger to my soul. Kaine, where are you? Please, don’t leave me. Take me with you. I sighed, releasing more of my air, and prepared to die. I closed my eyes, letting the emptiness enveloping me take over.
I wonder if dragons and humans end up in the same afterlife? I hope so. Kaine and I had so little time together. Our children will never have their chance to live. Goodbye, Kaine. Goodbye, my love.
Something grabbed my hair, yanking on me, and I yelled, making me expel the little air I had left in my body. I tried grabbing whatever was dragging me toward the surface, but I simply didn’t have the energy to fight. Darkness closed in on me and I let it come.
A hand struck my cheek, jolting my eyes open. I jerked up, sputtering, coughing and spraying water everywhere. I blinked in the bright sunlight.
“Sheesh, Chrissy, don’t get me all wet. I hate getting wet.”
I gawked at Thad, then glanced around the rowboat. “Where’s Kaine? Did you find him, too?”
“Well, he ain’t in this dingy, sister.” He noticed the anguish in my face and softened. “I’m sorry. I haven’t seen him since he…” He tipped his head toward the place in the lake where Kaine had fallen.
“He’s gone. Dead and gone.” An evil cackle sickened me.
A terrified expression on Thad’s face turned me in the direction of the voice, the witch of the lake, my husband’s murderer, Sabrina. She’d made it to her ship and stood outside, holding the Scepter of Fire like a queen surveying her kingdom. “Only a strong person wielding the Scepter of Fire can kill a dragon, especially an enormously powerful dragon like Delcaluca.” She lifted the scepter, then brought it down on the ramp of her ship with a thud. Thrusting out her chin, she shouted, “I, Sabrina Stellina, Zeiwacian citizen, killed the dragon, Kaine Delcaluca, leader of the Dragon Dynasty. Now I will control all the dragons of the universe.”
Fury hotter than I’d ever felt broke free in me. I wanted nothing more than to take that alien bitch down. I stood up, balancing in the small boat and pointed at her. “I’m coming after you, you color-changing whore. No matter how far you go, no matter how long it takes, I will kill you.”