Ava shrugged. “They were fine enough to fly off. Don’t know where they went.”
He looked around the empty space, thinking. “Is this…are we in Manuel’s room?”
“I think so.”
“Why do I keep waking up in other people’s beds?” He paused, his thoughts sifting through his brain for icy memories.
Ava knew he was going to ask what happened. What could he have done to make his own herd hate him so much? But he stopped himself. Ava was glad he didn’t ask. She didn’t want him to go on. He and Victor, they didn’t get along. That was understandable, since Victor was a pompous alpha idiot. But the other dragons…they were his friends. His family.
“It’s my fault,” Ava said.
Cale wanted to sit up, confront her, correct her. But she wasn’t asking for pity or validation. Ava never needed any of that.
“I’m going to figure out how to fix it, Cale.” She should have been panicked, but her amber and green eyes were so steady.
“I don’t want it fixed.” He studied the smooth bend of her skin, the sharp contrast of her collarbone as it peeked from beneath her t-shirt.
“Yes, you do.”
He reached out and touched her arm, pulled her closer to him. “Ava, listen to me….”
“No. I know you don’t think you want it fixed.” She shook her head. “But they were right. Your family…your dad…I’m screwing everything in your life up. And my life? It doesn’t have anything in it to wreck.”
“Ava….”
“Let me fix it for you.”
His palms touched the skin of her neck as he held her, looked into her eyes. “Listen.”
But she could hardly hear him over the sound of her heart thundering in her ears. His voice was calm, warm, like it always was. He kept his hands where they were, gentle, holding her still.
“I want things, Ava. I do. I want to fly with you—right now. All the time. I want to fall asleep beside you. To laugh and fight and play. Ava…I just want you.”
“But—”
“You. Just you.” He moved over in bed, wincing as he made room for her. “Get in.”
She glanced down at her torn clothes She had forgotten to will herself a knew outfit in ownworld. “I’m filthy.”
Cale stared at her as if she said the dumbest thing in the world. Then she slipped into bed with him, pulling the sheets over her and lining her body up with his. Face to face. Chest to chest. She was relieved that the need to be free wasn’t throbbing, wasn’t trying to force itself between her and Cale. Just give me a few minutes with him. Just give me one night.
“Are we safe here?” she asked. “What if Manuel wants his room back?”
“Don’t care.”
Ava didn’t have that option. She had to care. She couldn’t let him get hurt another time. What if the hate takes over again? What if—
“You’re thinking so hard,” he said, smiling at her from over the pillow.
“I was just wondering…if you were hungry.”
He chuckled, his face so close to hers that she could peer right into his eyes. She couldn’t figure out what she saw, but she knew it was good. Everything about Cale was good.
“I ate,” he said.
“Are you thirsty?”
“I drank.”
She almost didn’t notice the way his thumb played against the wisps of curls on her temple, the way he traced circles along her cheek. She didn’t notice, because it was supposed to happen, just like that. Whether or not they’d bent the balance to make it real, they were supposed to be together.
She whispered, because she could barely say it out loud. “Does...does it still hurt?”
And instead of answering, without another thought, his lips met hers, and her mouth found his. It was easy, like the sun slipping over the horizon, like the stars opening their eyes at dusk.
They stared at each other from across the bed. The dark was cool, the sheets warm. Cale’s hand still rested on her cheek. Their breathing was simple and even as the moments crept by.
They waited. Ava wasn’t sure for what. To see if the world would keep turning. To see if the cosmos would unravel. To see if either of them would laugh, as if it was a silly mistake, simply the product of tired minds and exhausted bodies.
She couldn’t tell if Cale was thinking, too. She knew all that could fit in her mind was whether he was or not. Maybe he’ll never say anything. Maybe nothing ever has to be said.
And as sweetly as it came and went, there it was again. Somehow their lips met—smooth, effortless. Like a long walk. Like closing a good book for the night and knowing in the morning there would be more.
This time, Ava felt the air leave her, as if his lips were pulling it from her. And she was glad it was going. She didn’t need air. Didn’t need anything else besides right then. Her will vibrated to life inside her. Stay with him, she told herself. Stay with him always.
She wanted to ask him, to make sure he knew the mistake he was making…but she didn’t ask. And neither did he.
They remained like that—so close they could feel each other breathe, until they fell asleep without realizing it. Because Ava knew her truth. The only truth greater than the binding reality of being a phoenix. No matter how much it would hurt, no matter how much she needed space, or needed ownworld, or needed to be reborn…Cale was her home.
And she decided to belong to him, just as much as he belonged to her.
Ten
Finally
Cale opened his eyes and couldn’t fight the smile that overtook him. The rest had done him well, and having his rider close enough to touch was healing. He understood why red dragons didn’t need to sleep in firebeds. A rider was enough.
Ava’s eyes were brighter than usual, her skin a shadowy gold. Already awake, she chuckled. “You don’t have to look so smug.”
“Yeah. I do.”
“It was only because you were dying. I felt bad.”
He laughed a little, moved a strong arm to her back, and pulled her closer to him so there was nothing between them. When he spoke, his lips just barely grazed hers. “I could say the same thing to you.”
Ava fought to keep the guilt from showing on her face. But Cale felt it anyway. It made him cringe, but he resisted pulling away.
“This seems like such a terrible idea, Cale. There are too many problems for us to fix,” Ava said. “Maybe we shouldn’t add any more.”
“Maybe it’s too late for maybes.”
Ava chewed on her lip. “Is this even allowed?”
“Probably not.”
“So…you don’t care that we might have broken the rules?”
Cale sighed, moved away, and sat up in bed. “I think the rules are shot to hell right about now, Ava. Up is down, good is bad. What’s going to happen from one kiss? Shiloh going to come sit on us again?”
One kiss? Ava let that sink in. She felt stupid for assuming it had been anything more than one kiss. “So, we move on, then.” She cleared her throat, ashamed with herself for how nauseous she suddenly felt. “So, how do we fix the world?”
Cale was quiet for a minute before he turned to her again. “I don’t understand what you’re feeling.”
“What?”
“You’re unhappy, and I can’t figure out how. You’ve never felt this
way before.”
Ava tried her hardest not to blush. It didn’t help that he was invading
her privacy, and doing it without wearing a shirt. His tan skin was spread over hills of muscle, a few spidery siren scars reaching across his body. Since when do I care what Cale looks like? And since when did he become so…?
“How about we leave my feelings out of this?” she said, chewing on her lips to distract herself.
“I said something wrong, didn’t I?”
“No.” Lie.
“I take it back. Whatever I said, I take it back.”
“Cale, it’s nothing.”
“So we’re not going to talk about last night?�
��
“We’re going to talk about fixing the world. We need to focus.”
But Cale only stared at her, trying to read her face. It was hard for anyone—even Cale—to break down her walls when she had them up. He sighed, finally leaning back against the headboard. “Start at the top. Tell me about Sirce.”
Oh god. Ava had almost forgotten. Her heartbeat began to race just thinking about it, and Cale put a hand on her arm to steady her. Even that drove her a little crazy. Why? Why does he always have to know?
She closed her eyes to gather her thoughts. “I don’t understand all of it. Just that Sirce wanted me to help him find his treasure. The pearl. He said it would help him restore the balance for good. But what he really meant was it would help him put more bad things into the world. That’s what they pour out of their windows. Pain, sorrow, revenge, fear, war, death, and hatred.”
“The judge said that? They only send bad out into the world?”
Ava nodded, glad for once that Cale wasn’t moving his hand away. It made her feel warmer, safer. Talking about the judges made her skin prickle. “Sirce kills honorable people, gifted people. He’s supposed to be making the world better, but all he cares about is hate.”
“But that can’t be right. Killing the good to make room for more bad?”
“It’s all in the grey book. That’s why he wanted to kill you. Because you were so good. But I was a better bargain, He let you go so he could have me on his side. He thinks I can help him get to the pearl.
“Apparently, a phoenix like me doesn’t need to live by the grey book anyway. And since I am above the balance, I can help him restore it once and for all. With the pearl.”
“Ava…how do we fix this? How do we stop a judge? He has the power of the no-ir at his disposal. He could kill me just by lifting his scepter. Who do we even tell? And what do we even say?”
“I was thinking…if Sirce is right, and phoenixes operate outside of the law and above the balance…if I could potentially help him, maybe I can potentially hurt him too.”
Cale nodded. “You can do something like that?”
She pulled her knees up and hugged them to her. “I really don’t know what I can do.”
He paused. “I don’t believe that, Ava.”
She stared at him, her jade and amber eyes wide. “You don’t?”
“You come back from that…place…different every time. I think you know more about yourself than you want to admit.”
She squirmed a little. He knew. He knew how her nature wanted her to be alone, to be free of him and their pact. He knew they weren’t supposed to be together. “You think I’m different?”
He nudged her knee with his elbows, sensing her unsettling. It helped. “You come back stronger and calmer. Like you understand yourself better. But not just that…you come back…more.”
“Like…bigger?”
He rolled his eyes in the dim light. “Not bigger. It’s like you’ve always been a flame. And every time you come back, someone’s added more wood. You burn brighter.”
A pang in her chest made her miss it. The quiet. The perfection. She took a deep breath. “I’m not going back. I’m going to figure out how to make it so I never go back again. And you and I can fix this world.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I’m not going back,” she snapped.
And Cale’s mouth clamped shut.
Ava looked around the sparse room, hoping she could change the subject. “Don’t you think it’s weird that Manuel hasn’t come back for his stuff?”
A tap on the door post. Karma opened the door and paused before she entered and spoke. “They are quite apologetic, actually.”
“Karma…what are you talking about?” Ava asked.
The blue dragon walked over without being invited, checking Cale’s vitals, taking his temperature. “Your herd. Their actions were not their own. They were influenced. I could not understand why such a thing would happen so suddenly, especially within the same herd. An anomaly is the only plausible explanation. An outside force warping their actions.”
“Maybe they were just angry we showed up,” Cale said it too slowly, as if he was choosing his words without having to remember what they were referencing, as if he needed to divorce the facts from the feelings that came with them.
“That wasn’t just anger, Cale,” Ava said. “It wasn’t some grudge. That was…the most scared I’ve ever been. That was pure hate.”
He looked up at her, a bit surprised. “Last night was the most scared? What about the airplane? What about the sky dungeon?”
Ava stood up while Karma continued to check her son for broken bones. “Doesn’t compare.”
“Really? Why not?”
“Because I was stupid then. I didn’t know that everything happening was my fault. And I didn’t know what I could lose. Now I know.” She picked up the rest of their stuff. “It’s up to me to change everything. Stop the blue dragon. Stop Sirce. Stop this…pearl.”
Cale got out of his bed, his muscles so stiff they were like planks of bloated wood. He winced as he forced his body forward. It would take a while for the healed bones to move freely again. “First, we take showers. Then, we eat breakfast. After that, we go kill some bad guys.”
Ava grinned, surprised she still had the ability to smile. It always got her when Cale made her do that. “It’s that simple, huh?”
“No.” He opened the door to the hallway. “But I really feel like killing someone right now.”
Cale walked out of the room and right into Myra. She shrieked, almost losing her balance in her black combat boots. Her face was swollen and damp. Her mascara left shadows of black around her brown eyes.
“He’s dead.”
“What?”
“Cameron…he’s dead.”
Cale put his hands on her shoulders. She felt smaller than usual, frail, like she was falling apart. “Myra, Cam’s not dead. He’s been quiet, and I bet he has a good reason for it. If he was dead, I’d know. I’d feel it. He’s my brother, for God’s sake.”
She shook her head and took a folded piece of paper from her pocket with trembling hands. “The blue monks sent this.”
Cale took the letter from her and turned it over. It was crinkled, creased as if Myra had opened and closed it too many times. It explained something about how the monastery had done away with Cameron’s remains in the most practical manner, and that parts of him would be donated to other blue dragon monks who were pursuing knowledge and in need of cadavers for experimentation.
Cale read it again. Again.
“This isn’t right.”
“It looks official, Cale,” Myra said through her stuffed nose.
“But it’s not right.”
Myra snatched the letter back, her cheeks flaming red. “They sent a letter, Cale. An official letter. They mailed it all the way from Ireland. All the way from wherever that stupid monastery is hidden. It has to be real.”
“Stop,” Cale said. “Stop and listen to me. Put your hand on your chest.”
She put her hand on her chest and took a shaky breath.
“What do you feel?”
“There’s a letter. I knew something was wrong and now there’s a letter.”
“What do you feel, Myra?”
Her eyes clouded with tears. “I feel afraid.”
“Exactly. If Cameron was gone, you’d feel all sorts of things. Despair. Anger. But fear means you know he’s not dead. Or else what would there be left to be afraid of?”
She groaned, running a hand through her unkempt blonde tresses.
Ava pointed at her. “She’s hiding something.”
Myra’s stare darted over to Ava. “No.”
“Yeah, she is. Just look at her, Cale.”
Myra turned as if she was trying to leave. But Ava grabbed her, shoved her back. “What are you not telling us?”
“I….” she started pacing, biting her nails. “I can’t say anything.”
“Why
not?” Cale asked.
“I promised Cam.”
“So?” Ava said with a shrug.
“So that means something. We don’t tell each other’s secrets.”
“Well if he’s dead he won’t care…”
Cale frowned at his rider. “Ava, you’re just as bad as Karma.”
She threw up her arms. “Why is it so bad for me to say that? It’s not like I’m actually killing him. It’s just words.”
“Words can do a lot.”
“Now, I’m being grilled instead of the one who won’t tell us what’s got her so wound up? Can we please go back to Myra’s issues?”
Cale sighed. “I’m not going to make you tell me, Myra, because I respect that you’re secret keepers. But I need to know what you want us to do about this.” He held up the piece of paper.
Myra’s brown eyes widened a little. She’d always been in the background, hidden beneath the shadows of her silence and seeming indifference. There was only one person who ever noticed her. And he was gone. “What? You want me to decide what to do?”
Cale waved the paper in his hands. “Someone sent us this and I don’t believe it’s true. Neither do you. So you tell me what you want us to do about it, and Ava and I will do it. No argument.”
Myra couldn’t hide her surprise. “You and Ava are supposed to go off and meet important people and be heroes. No one’s ever asked me what I wanted before. Except for Cam….”
“You know him better than any of us, My. We’re listening.”
She would have smiled if she wasn’t so worried about Cameron. She couldn’t believe someone was listening. “We go get him.”
Ava sighed. “We? By we, you mean Cale and I will go and bring him back for you, right?”
Myra folded her arms, looking like her sister for a split second. “By we, I mean I’m coming.”
Ava rubbed her temple. “Of course you are. Let’s all climb into ‘minivan Cale’ and go for a road trip. We’ve already saved one dragon we weren’t planning to. Let’s save another. Maybe by then we’’ll rack up a third. And instead of fixing the world, we’ll just spend all our days saving people one by one.”
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