Elena ate her fried rice alone, put away the leftovers alone, washed the dishes alone. She kept waiting for the creak of the front door or the squeak of the back one, her ears tuned to the slightest sound. She sat on the patio to watch the stars alone, but the night wind was colder than she'd dressed for, and the darkness felt deeper and harder than it ever had before. She went back inside. She walked through the house once more to check for Anabel and then locked all the doors.
Late that night, a sound woke Elena—the back door, squeaking as it swung open and closed, followed by the slow groans of footsteps that someone is trying to keep silent. The footsteps passed her room and continued down the hall towards Anabel's room. Elena turned over, too tired to wonder at the hour, and slept.
The rising sun did not wake Elena as it had the day before. Instead, the sound of rain on the roof pulled her out of her dreams, and she smiled. Finally, the rain had come. There would be space to breathe for a few more days, space to laugh and plant and cook without worry.
She had made it all the way through her morning routine and halfway through breakfast before she began to wonder at Anabel's absence. She crept down the hall and pressed her ear to the door of the bedroom. Light snoring came from the other side. Elena sighed in relief. At least she was safe.
Despite the morning's soaking rain, she worked in the garden as best she could without guidance. Late that afternoon, she was struggling to glue together a broken ceramic pitcher that had been sitting on the kitchen counter when Anabel came into the room.
“Hey there,” said Elena tentatively.
“Good … not-morning.” Anabel's eyes looked weary, but her face was clean and she'd pulled her hair back. “Don't worry about the pitcher, it's been broken for weeks.”
“It's okay, I can fix it.”
“Well, thank you.” Silence fell again as Anabel looked around the kitchen. “You managed all right?”
Elena nodded.
“Good.” She yawned. “When you're done, can you go pick some vegetables for the soup?”
There wasn't another word about her mysterious absence all evening, nor the next day, nor the next. As Elena packed her bag to return home for the weekend, she wondered if Anabel would even be around when she came back on Monday. She hoped so. It was much nicer to work with her than to struggle in the garden alone. And after all, she was still new. She needed the help.
* * *
It would be a full week before anything happened again. Elena waited, wondering if there would ever be an appropriate moment to ask Anabel about her disappearance. None occurred. Even when the timing might have been right, she found herself lost in their conversations, paying more attention to making Anabel laugh or listening to her stories than confronting her. When midweek rolled around and she had nearly forgotten all about it, the witch vanished again, in much the same way.
This time, Elena was not surprised. She went about her evening as usual, performing only a cursory search of the house and garden. Once more, she found herself wishing she could speak with the dragon, although it was no more likely to give her information than Anabel was. As soon as she'd eaten, she lay down on the couch, crossing her legs at the ankles and closing her eyes.
She slept fitfully, accustomed as she was to a proper mattress, but when the door opened in the dark pre-dawn hours, her eyes snapped open. Elena sat up.
“Oh!” Anabel jumped at the sight. “What are you doing up?”
“Waiting for you,” Elena said. “I was worried.”
“Oh,” Anabel said again. She shoved a hand through her hair.
“Come on, I'll make you tea.” Wiping the sleep from her eyes, Elena stood and made her way to the kitchen table.
Once seated, Anabel put her face in her hands. Elena averted her eyes, focusing on filling the kettle, but when quiet sobs broke the silence, she set down the mugs and pulled a chair right beside Anabel.
“Hey, now,” she said, “it's okay.” She put a hand on Anabel's back, but she jerked away.
“Sorry,” Anabel muttered.
“Are you okay?” The shaking subsided, and Elena could tell she was trying to gain control of herself.
Anabel nodded, then shook her head. “No. I'm not.”
“You look exhausted.” Elena brought over the kettle and poured two mugs. “Where have you been? Talk to me.”
In the silence that followed, Elena looked carefully at Anabel. Tears had run trails through the desert dust on her face, and her hands trembled even as they rested on the table. She wanted to place her hands on top of Anabel's, calm them and warm them, but she had flinched at even a touch to her back. Questions flooded Elena's brain and threatened to spill out her mouth, but still she waited.
“I'm so tired,” Anabel said, her voice cracking. When Elena opened her mouth to speak, Anabel held up a hand. “Wait, or I'll never say this.”
“Okay.”
Anabel closed her eyes. When she opened them, her gaze was fixed on the table before her.
“I'm the dragon.”
Oh. Of course. Elena bit her lip, forcing herself not to speak.
“I'm a witch, yes. But my main power is transformation. That's why you haven't seen the dragon while you're here, except perhaps when I'm gone. I assume you saw me tonight?” Anabel sighed at the nod. “Yes, I suppose you saw me last week, too.”
When Anabel didn't say anything further, Elena ventured a question. “Why do you go out as the dragon?”
Anabel groaned.
“I'm sorry, you don't have to answer that,” Elena reassured her.
“No, it's okay. This is going to sound ridiculous, but, well.” She looked up, meeting Elena's eyes for the first time since she'd walked in the door. “I bring the rain.”
“You what?” She'd known Anabel wasn't causing the drought, but this was beyond unexpected.
“I bring the rain.”
“How?”
“It's complicated. I have to fly out to the ocean, coax the water into vapor, bring the clouds back. It takes forever.” Anabel leaned over, head on her forearms.
“That's why you slept all day last time,” Elena said, nodding. Her heart ached at the thought of Anabel's exhaustion. “I was so worried. You didn't say anything.”
“I couldn't tell you. You think I'm the reason for the drought, how could you believe I'm the only one trying to stop it?”
“Oh, no.” Elena winced. “I'm so sorry. I don't believe that, you know. I know you're not causing the drought. Even before tonight.”
Anabel looked up. “You do?”
“Yes,” she said emphatically. “From the first day I came here.”
“Wow.” She reached for her tea, taking a tentative sip. “I didn't know.”
“So you're the reason we have rain at all these days?” Elena asked. She could hardly believe Anabel would give up so much of her time for a town she barely knew.
“Most of the time. I don't know why the drought is so fierce here. Maybe there's bad magic left over, I couldn't tell. But that's why I picked this town. I wanted to help.”
“Which everyone saw as a catalyst for the drought.” Elena sighed. “Even though you showed up a full month after it started. Of course.”
“It's why nobody knows.” Anabel shrugged. “They wouldn't believe me. And somehow, nobody's noticed that dragon sightings precede the rain. I go out at night, I try not to let anybody see. Sometimes I fly around on weekends for practice. But I don't know how much longer I can keep this up.”
Elena reached out a hand, but Anabel pulled her own back before they made contact. “Let me help.”
Blinking, Anabel turned to her. “What?”
“Let me help. Teach me. Teach me to become a dragon.” Even as the words came out of her mouth, Elena knew she sounded ridiculous. She didn't even know if magic could be taught, let alone shapeshifting. And Anabel hardly knew her. Why would she let her help?
“Are you serious?”
“Dead serious.” She kept her voice calm, tho
ugh her heart was fluttering with excitement.
Anabel nodded. “Okay.”
“Really?” It was Elena's turn to lose her composure slightly.
“You've seen me.” Anabel gestured at her face, then at her house. “I can barely keep it together as it is. And I think you could help. I couldn't have asked, but since you offered, I might be able to teach you. We'll start tomorrow night. But right now,” she said, trembling as she stood, “I need to sleep.”
Elena watched as she made her way down the hallway. It would have been natural to offer a hand for stability, but Anabel clearly didn't want to touch her. She sighed. At least tomorrow she'd start to learn magic.
* * *
“So how does this work?” Elena adjusted her position. She and Anabel sat across from one another on the bed, legs crossed, like mirror images. The window was open. The smell of the day's rain swept in on a gentle breeze.
“The main thing is that we have to be in physical contact,” Anabel said. She reached out a hand. Tentatively, Elena took it. Her skin was soft and warm. The touch made Elena's heart beat a little faster.
“How come?”
“It's just how the magic transfers. It's why I didn't want you touching me yesterday,” she explained. She took Elena's other hand.
“You don't need a reason,” Elena said.
“I know. But it's important.”
It took several deep breaths for Elena to keep herself from grinning in relief. It was nice to know it wasn't her fault Anabel had pulled away.
“What else do I have to do?”
“Not much, honestly.” Anabel smiled. “You've already expressed interest, and I know you want to do this. That openness makes the transfer a lot faster. We can just chat, since we have to wait.”
“Can I ask a prying question?” Elena asked.
“Go ahead. I might not answer.”
“How did you get your magic?”
“Ooh,” Anabel said, “right to the serious stuff.” She raised an eyebrow teasingly. “Well, I suppose now is as good a time as any to tell you. I used to date a witch, three or four years back. When I was your age, I suppose.”
Elena's hidden grin threatened to burst out again. “And she taught you?”
“Sort of. It was kind of an accident, actually.” Her cheeks flushed. “I knew she had magic, but she didn't intentionally transfer it to me. We realized after a few months of … intimacy,” she said, stumbling over the word, “that I'd begun to show signs of magic. She knew it was the result of contact, but she said she didn't think it could happen on accident.”
“Wow. That must have been a surprise.”
“It was.” Anabel laughed. “But she taught me how to control it, and it was nice to be able to join her. It doesn't transfer perfectly. The recipient has some say over how their powers manifest. But that comes later, and I'll show you what to do.”
“Thanks for that. I'm still a little surprised this is so easy to pass on.”
“Well, I don't think magic ever really had any boundaries. It just doesn't pass between as many people because fewer people are magic than there used to be. And somehow it's a lot easier for women to both give and receive than anybody else.”
“Thus your accidental magic.”
“Precisely.” Anabel sighed. “But then we split up, and I couldn't really stay there anymore.”
Elena squeezed her hands. “I'm sorry.”
“It's okay, it's been a few years. Long years. And it was a relatively amicable split to begin with. No,” she amended. “That's a lie. But it has been a long time, and working my magic here has been healing.”
They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes. Elena never knew what to say about heartbreak. Silence seemed the best choice, like a shared moment of grief before conversation continued. Anabel squeezed her hands, an acknowledgement of her sympathy.
A chill ran up Elena's spine. Probably the magic, she told herself, ignoring the equally tell-tale signs across her body: the quickened heartbeat, the flushed face, the strangely comfortable nervous knot in her stomach.
When she glanced up, Anabel was looking directly at her. They both averted their gazes.
“So you know most of my story now,” Anabel said, breaking the silence. “Tell me about you.”
Elena didn't feel particularly interesting, but as she detailed her upbringing in the next town over, her move to be her aunt's apprentice, and her three years in metalwork, she could sense Anabel's enthusiasm.
“I can't believe it,” Anabel said, laughing at one of Elena's many escapades with Cal and Lara. “The three of you sound like quite the bunch.”
“Oh, we are. I don't know what I'd do without them. They're like siblings to me.” She wasn't sure of the veracity of that statement, as she'd never had siblings and didn't quite know what it was like, but she saw Anabel's smile widen. Not just the magic.
They sat together until the sun came up.
“We can probably let go now,” Anabel said. “It's been long enough.”
“Oh, yeah. Good point.” Elena made no move to pull away. Nor did Anabel. They both inched closer until their knees were touching.
“It's late,” Anabel whispered. “Or early. We should probably get some sleep.”
“Yeah, or …” Elena took a deep breath, pulling her courage to her like dry leaves at autumn's end. “Can I kiss you?”
Anabel's face broke into a smile, the lightest hint of bashfulness coloring her cheeks. She leaned forward in response, covering most of the distance between them before Elena even knew what was happening. Their lips met gently, soft against soft. Elena kept one hand in Anabel's and slid her other up her arm and into her hair, pulling her closer.
At the pressure, Anabel lost her balance, breaking the kiss to catch herself from falling onto Elena.
“Oops,” she said, her cheeks still red.
Elena's only response was to laugh and kiss her again.
* * *
As it turned out, shapeshifting came naturally. They practiced in the deep desert, a good half hour's walk from the house, always at night. Elena could only shift while holding Anabel's hand at first, the contact reviving her nascent magical powers. It wasn't so painful to change, but her bones ached like muscles after a long run. Weary, but strong.
On Friday, Elena ran all the way home just to tell her aunt she'd be staying at the farm across the weekend.
“Are you sure?” Gabriela asked.
“Oh, yes. A lot of the plants are ready to harvest, and she wants me around to help,” Elena lied. It wasn't as though she could tell the truth, not yet.
Thanks to the extra days of practice, Elena could shift and fly on her own by midweek. Her new form was smaller than Anabel's, her scales a matte turquoise.
“You look lovely,” Anabel had said, still in human form, running her hand over Elena's back. “What gorgeous color.”
At that moment, Elena discovered that dragons did not blush, but her cheeks still felt hot with human memory.
Their first trip to the seashore was under cover of darkness. Both women landed on the beach and shifted back into humans so Anabel could provide better instruction. They could speak as dragons, but Elena struggled to form words without accompanying fire.
“Like I told you before, you've got to be gentle. Use a little flame, but make sure it doesn't come out too hot. Whether you're in dragon or human form, everything about you carries magic now,” she said, gesturing widely at Elena. “Not just the fire you breathe, but your breath itself. You'll get the hang of it.”
With a nod, they shifted. Elena's transformation was still slow, her bones creaking and skin stretching, but the dragon form was already starting to feel like home. She tried to follow Anabel's lead, flying over the ocean and breathing gentle fire along the surface of the water, but all that came out was smoke. A fireball. Smoke again. Sometimes nothing at all.
She might have given up but for Anabel's encouraging presence at her side, calling out suggestions
for throat control, head placement. Finally, after three long hours of failure, a cloud began to form. Elena nearly fell out of the sky in surprise.
“Careful,” Anabel called out, her voice resonant across the waves. “Don't lose it.”
With Anabel's expert aid, Elena coaxed her cloud into something stronger. When the cloud had stretched to Anabel's wingspan, she beat her wings against her own fresh rainclouds and began to fly back to shore. Elena followed, using her wings to propel the clouds. Her head spun with dizziness after all the focus on her breath. She kept her eyes on Anabel and flew. It took all her energy to stay in the sky.
When they arrived at town early that morning, both dragons gave their clouds a final push and landed sharply behind the house. Elena collapsed into human form as she hit the ground, her vision still spinning.
“Careful, careful,” Anabel said, her voice hoarse. She sat down beside Elena. “It's hard the first time. But we need to get you inside so you can sleep.”
Leaning on one another, they stumbled inside and fell onto their respective beds. Elena slept hard and dreamless, waking only to Anabel's knock on her door late that evening. They dined together, leaving the dishes for the next morning. Anabel led Elena back to her room, where she paused before entering.
“I'm exhausted,” Elena said. “But that was amazing.” She leaned forward and kissed Anabel gently on the lips. “Good night.”
Anabel put her fingers to her lips, covering a soft smile. “Good night.”
* * *
Elena left with reluctance on Friday evening, kissing Anabel goodbye as she swung her bag over her shoulder. Upon her return, her aunt ushered her into the kitchen where Cal and Lara sat waiting.
“Oh! Hi, what are you doing here?”
“It's nice to see you too,” Cal said, laughing.
Elena rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean. What's up?”
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