by D T Dyllin
My eyes popped open in alarm and I looked up into Cliff’s face, who still had a Rider staring back at me from inside of him. It was time for me to be confused myself. I saw the Rider leave his body. I saw it disappear. What did it mean that it was back? Why was I shown the vision if it didn’t mean anything? “I have low blood sugar. I’m fine. You can put me down,” I said managing to sound much more stable.
“You’re not fine. You passed out cold back there. I’m taking you to the nurse. She might need to call—”
“I said to put me down!” I demanded shrilly at the same time that I attempted to extradite myself from his arms. And for my effort I ended up back on the ground, on my ass. Lovely. My breath left me with a soft oof before I scrambled to my feet. I narrowed my eyes and glared at my would-be savior, and host to the Rider, Cliff, who was staring at me with surprise.
“How did you do that? You’re stronger than you look.”
Shit. Not good. “Adrenaline?” I said unsurely. “Yeah, adrenaline.” I repeated with more confidence. “I don’t like to be carried around like that, okay?” My mind skittered through the many times that both Bryn and Khol had both carried me in such a manner over the last year. A wave of homesickness washed over me as I longed for nothing more than to be back with them . . . where I belonged. And then a wave of nausea crashed over me and stole away any sentimental feelings I had been carrying as I proceeded to throw up right on Cliff’s shoes. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and met his blue eyes with horror. “I’m so sorry I—” I what? Apparently my morning sickness was back with a vengeance now that Khol wasn’t nearby to do his magic mojo to help me out. Any hope I had at blending in lay splattered all over Cliff’s ruined kicks. But surely my birth mother would have seen this and taken it into consideration. I mean . . . she’d been ready for everything else. Right?
“There you are.” A vaguely familiar female voice said with saccharine sweetness. Long feminine pale fingers, and yet strangely strong in their grip, wrapped around the bicep of my left arm and tugged me to a full upright position. I whirled my head around as fast as I could and met the dark eyes of probably the last person in the world I expected to see coming to my rescue . . . Nala. My lips opened and closed like a guppy . . . and a very surprised guppy at that. Nala and I had effectively been avoiding each other since . . . well, since we first met. She wanted Bryn, and Bryn was mine. At least he used to be. And wanting the same guy didn’t exactly produce warm and fuzzy friendship feelings between two people. What the hell?
“What are you doing here?” I said while trying to cover both my surprise and animosity toward her.
She gave me what best could be described as a patronizing older sister look. Loving, but with a touch of exasperation. “Your mom sent me over because she realized you forgot your medication. She was worried something like—well, exactly like—this would happen.”
I turned my head away from Cliff, who was now shaking his feet in attempt to dislodge my less than thoughtful gift from him. “Medication?” I mouthed.
Nala gave me a sharp look that was obviously telling me to go along with her story. Normally, just because of our mutual dislike for each other in our past, I wouldn’t have trusted her, but I had a sneaking suspicion because of her choice of words that my birth mother had been meddling from beyond the grave again. “Oh, right, I forgot.”
“What kind of medication?” Cliff asked with concern. “I mean—”
“Oh, she’ll be fine,” Nala interjected. “She just has an ear infection that causes her to get dizzy and if she’s not careful, well . . .” She then motioned at the second viewing of my lunch.
Ear infection. Now why hadn’t I thought of that? “I’m sorry.” I mumbled in Cliff’s general direction not wanting to see his face, or rather the Rider that was hiding behind his face. “And I didn’t mean to snap at you either.”
“It’s alright,” Cliff reassured me. “It just means you’re going to have to make it up to me.”
Not a chance in hell, buddy. “Oh, um . . . sure.”
“Great,” he said with cheer, as if he didn’t have my puke all over his shoes. “I’ll be seeing you then.”
“Not if I can help it,” I mumbled.
“What?” he said with a hitch in his voice.
“Oh, nothing,” I said louder. “I just said thanks for helping.”
The brightness in his voice returned. “No problem. I hope you feel better soon, Paige.” And with that the hot boy known as Cliff exited stage left with the alien that had rode in on him.
I exhaled a huge sigh of relief and refocused my attention on Nala. Her long black hair was pulled back in a loose French braid and her blue eyes met mine as a smirk began to tilt the corners of his full lips up. I really hated how pretty she was. “So, care to share with me the real reason why you’re here?” A sudden excited thought made fresh adrenaline course through my system. “Bryn and Khol—”
“Aren’t here.”
“Oh,” I said, trying not to sound too crestfallen. I just hate feeling so alone and vulnerable, I told myself. It was not because I needed either one of them to make me feel safe. I was an adult woman, and I could stand on my own two feet completely on my own. Right.
“I’ll explain everything, but not here.” Her bright blue eyes scanned the empty hallway as if she thought someone might jump out of a locker at any moment. And I thought I could be paranoid.
“Yeah, okay.” I was pretty eager to get the hell out of this place and end my first day as a pretend student, even if it meant leaving with Nala.
Once we were safely back at my humble abode . . . a.k.a. the huge old creepy house that my birth mother had instructed me to take up residence in. Apparently staying in a place where it looked like probably multiple murders had taken place in was a lot safer than say . . . a cozy apartment or something. I hadn’t slept well since I’d been staying here. I was half convinced the ghost of some victim past would attack me in my sleep. I hated to admit it but I was kind of glad to have company, even if that company was Nala. “Alright . . . we’re safe from prying ears now. Care to explain why you’re here?” I huffed, wondering if we were indeed safe from all varieties of prying ears. Well, at least any spirits that might be hanging around didn’t frequent any gossip circles that might report pack to the Riders. I hoped.
“I brought you some tea, it’s made up of some herbs that will help with your morning sickness,” Nala said as if I hadn’t said anything.
“How do I know you’re not trying to poison me?”
She heaved a huge sigh and met my eyes with what reminded me a little bit of Khol’s exasperated face that he reserved especially for me. “So use your powers to see where I got it from.” She then lifted her arm up in an invitation for me to touch her.
I worried my bottom lip between my teeth. So far I hadn’t received a vision on purpose . . . ever. Sure, I’d asked questions and gotten the answers in the form of a vision, but even then, I hadn’t done anything but muse about the subject of interest. Like when I had wanted to know why Khol hadn’t used Jenna to try and forget me when I had been mated to Bryn. But what would it hurt to try? Besides my fragile ego, that is. “I will then,” I retorted with false bravado as I reached out and grasped her wrist. I closed my eyes tightly and silently pleaded with my powers. Show me where Nala got these herbs for my tea from . . . please. I felt myself sliding into a vision much more smoothly than I’d ever experienced before. It was actually working! I mentally did a happy little jig.
“You know where she went.” Khol’s beautifully sculpted face was twisted with a mix of anger and desperation. “Tell me,” he growled low in his throat as he reached out and grabbed Nala by her shoulders. “I’ll burn you to a crisp where you stand if you don’t!”
Her eyes widened slightly with fear. “I was instructed not to tell anyone—you specifically. I was told that you would know why you can’t know this information, that you wouldn’t be happy but would understand.”
&nb
sp; Khol abruptly released his tight grip on her shoulders and turned away from her, his dragon green eyes glowing brighter. “Yes, I was . . . informed.” His voice was low and inhuman. “And no, I’m not happy.”
“So—” Nala started but Khol didn’t let her finish.
“Drake,” he bellowed. Barely a second passed before Drake appeared in a low crouch before Khol. He didn’t speak and appeared to be waiting for whatever Khol would say next. “These herbs will help her?” I’m not sure if anyone else was picking up on the slight tremble in his voice, but it made me want to go to him and to take him in my arms.
“Yes, they will help her, I swear it,” Drake rumbled low without lifting his face to meet Khol’s penetrating gaze.
The muscles in Khol’s jaw contracted as he studied the top of Drake’s head for a moment before responding. “Fine then. Go, before I change my mind.”
I snapped back into my body and the present where I was still gripping Nala’s wrist. I felt a single tear slide down my cheek and I let go of her so I could wipe at it with the back of my hand. Just seeing Khol, even if it was in a vision, made my homesickness that much more acute. And what about Bryn? How was he handling the news of my disappearance? Another vision ripped me suddenly from my body.
Bryn lay on his back, the dark sheets that covered his bed twisted around his legs. His pale muscled chest glistened with sweat and his chest heaved in and out as he slept restlessly. “Peej—” My name slipped from his sleep-encrusted lips. He looked bad. Or what I mean is not well somehow. Even with his eyes shut, I could almost see the torment that lurked in his unseen gaze. Dark circles marred his otherwise perfect face, and his skin wasn’t just pale but almost sickly looking. “Peej—” He repeated my name again as his face furrowed with worry, and then he sat up suddenly and gasped for air. He ran his hand through his sweaty black hair and blinked in confusion as he looked down at the empty spot beside him where I wasn’t. I saw a moment of regret play across his face before it turned into cold hard determination. He reached over for a glass that had been resting on the table beside his bed and drank the contents before sliding back down in between his sheets. “I’ll make sure you’re safe Peej, no matter the cost.”
“Something’s wrong with Bryn!” I exclaimed as I slammed back into the present for the second time within minutes. Maybe whatever was wrong with him was making him act the way that he was toward me. What if there was more than meets the eye with him and me feeling bitter that he’d turned away from me was completely unfair. I loved both Bryn and Khol, I’d come to terms with that truth, but no matter how much I tried to deny it there was nothing Bryn could truly do to turn me away from him. He was my first love, my best friend . . . my home. What if—
“Here,” Nala said interrupting my inner turmoil over Bryn and Khol. “Drink it while it’s still hot so it doesn’t taste as bad.”
I crinkled my nose at the pungent smell that was wafting at me from the mug that Nala was pushing in my direction. “No way that stuff is going to make me stop throwing up.”
“Just drink it already. It’ll fix things.”
“I’m not going to drink it if I don’t want to,” I groused. I knew I sounded like a petulant child but I still wasn’t a Nala fan, even if she seemed to be trying to help me.
Nala heaved a huge sigh. “Look, I know you don’t like me, or trust me, and I can’t really blame you. But let me lay it out for you. You’re the queen of us all now . . . do you really think I want to make you my enemy?”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Too late.” She wanted Bryn, and had tried to take him from me. That point fast tracked her to the top of my enemy list as far as I was concerned.
“I didn’t know you. And it’s the way of the dragon. Besides, if Bryn could have been swayed that easily, I would have been doing you a favor.”
“Are you kidding? I mean . . . are you serious right now?” I could feel my dragon magic pushing up from inside of me. If Nala weren’t careful, I’d end up burning her to crisp where she stood without a second thought.
She raised her hands up defensively as if she sensed the danger she was in. “Look, he doesn’t want me. He’s made that crystal clear.”
“But you still want him.” My voice came out as a low inhuman growl and I would have put money down that my eyes were glowing too.
“Yes, but it doesn’t matter. I have pride, you know. I’m not going to chase after Bryn when he’s clearly made his choice.”
My anger suddenly left me as quickly as it had come, and I felt my face crumple up involuntarily. “Yeah, he has. He thinks I should mate with Khol.” Much to my chagrin, huge fat tears began to roll down my cheeks. Damn pregnancy hormones!
Nala rolled her eyes. “Young male dragons are the worst. They haven’t fully come into their powers yet but they’ve already got the alpha male ego thing down pat.” She shook her head and frowned. “He doesn’t really want you to mate with Khol. He just has this idea that he should be able to protect you completely, unfortunately he doesn’t have the power yet—”
“And Khol does?” I interjected.
“Precisely.” She then smiled at me. “Although fully matured male dragons are no better. I think you’ve learned that from Khol.”
Laughter bubbled up and escaped from my chest. “Between the two of them I’m lucky I still have my sanity.” I paused and looked down at my hands that glistened from the tears I’d just wiped from my face. “At least I think I do.”
“I almost feel sorry for you,” Nala snorted. “Almost. If not for the fact that you have two powerful, handsome male dragons fighting over you.” She snorted again. “Never mind, I actually don’t feel sorry for you at all.”
“Bryn isn’t fighting for me at all. He’s given up.”
Her face grew serious and she met my eyes. “He’s fighting for your safety, and sacrificing himself in the process. It’s not the fight you want, but it does prove how much he loves you.”
I wasn’t quite sure what to say. I knew on some level that she was right, and I hated it. Bryn was only trying to protect me, and seeing in my vision how much he was suffering made me feel like someone had reached inside of my chest and put my heart in a death grip. But I loved Khol now too. I inevitably would end up crushing one of them when I mated with the other. It was easier on some level to be angry with Bryn when I was with Khol. Because otherwise I’d have to admit to myself that maybe on some level I’d betrayed Bryn just as much as he’d betrayed me. I reached up and rested my hand on my abdomen. “It doesn’t matter,” I murmured more to myself than Nala. And it didn’t. Whoever the father of my child was, he will be my mate. I’d made up my mind to let fate decide, because no matter which way I looked at it . . . fate was going to play its hand anyways.
“So you’re really going to mate with whoever the father of your child is?” Nala asked.
I gave her a sad smile. “Yes.” She simply grunted as her response and pushed the mug that contained the fowl smelling concoction closer to me. I stared at it for a moment, before deciding to just drink it despite the fact that Nala was the one giving it to me. I’d clearly seen she wasn’t trying to poison me and cutting my nose off to spite my face would only result in more humiliation by way of puke. I picked up the mug and chugged it down as fast as I could. It burned my throat, nose and eyes and I coughed demonstratively when I’d managed to get all of it into my stomach. “Blak!” I exclaimed. “That was just as bad as I thought it would be!” A sudden wave of tiredness swept over me. “What the hell?” I slurred as I fought to keep my eyes open.
“Oh, didn’t I mention that you should only take this before bed because it’s supposed to really knock you out?” Nala paused and winked at me. “No? Oh my bad. Nighty night, little Queenie.”
Panic rose up in me for a second before I had the chance to think about it. Nala wouldn’t risk hurting me because she knew it would result in her own death, but that didn’t stop her from being a bitch to me. A title that I thought she deserved to hear
out loud. “Bitch,” I grated just before I felt myself slump down onto the kitchen table.
I knew it was a dream right away, or a memory really.
I stood alone with Khol in his old room.
“Please,” I whispered, my whole body beginning to tremble. “Don’t do this to me.”
“I’m sorry I don’t have a choice anymore.”
“It’ll be rape. Are you telling me you have no choice but to rape me? I don’t believe that.” My words came out shaky as I tried to withhold the onslaught of tears that were pooling in my eyes.
He came to stand mere inches away from me, his voice barely a whisper. “You’ll enjoy it, I promise. I know your body craves mine. That isn’t rape, coercion maybe, but not rape.”
He leaned forward to kiss me and I ducked down so he missed and got the side of my face. “But my heart and soul still crave Bryn. You’ll deny me that for the rest of my life? Because once you claim me for your mate, I won’t want him anymore, will I? At least not physically?”
“No, you won’t. And it’s better that way.” He grabbed my wrists and pushed them up over my head, causing my heart to triple in time.
“I’ll never forgive you for this,” I hissed.
A sad smile turned Khol’s lips up ever so slightly at the corners. “But you will because only I will be able to give you what you crave when I’m your mate. And dragon’s are quite insatiable, especially the females; you haven’t even begun to experience the full scope of your dragon side.”
Bryn’s image flooded my mind, and just like that time in the woods when I was almost raped, all I wished for was for him to come to my rescue. “Bryn!” I mentally screamed. “Please, somehow don’t let this happen to me—to us!” I struggled in Khol’s grasp, but he was much too strong for me. He managed to keep me pinned with just one hand holding both my wrists as he tore at my clothes. I screamed with fury. I couldn’t—wouldn’t let him do this. When he dipped his head to kiss me, I bit his lip, causing him to growl low in his chest, his eyes glowing brighter. I tasted the tangy copper flavor of his blood as he persisted, delving his tongue into my mouth.