“You know what to do, and do so quickly. If I lose this man, there will be serious repercussions.”
“What is happening?” asked my father, still at my side. “Who are those men, and where are they going?”
“Those men work for me. They are none of your concern. All you need to know is that Mikhail’s pain will stop soon. Until then, he will remain here under my guard. The last thing we need is for word of his ailment getting out.”
“What ailment?!” my father shouted.
“Don’t you know? The only way for a bond of true love to be severed is for one of them to die. I am not going to let my best soldier and key to the fae treaty die because of some foolish girl!”
My heart skipped, sending a blinding pain through my body once again. I tried to stand and attack the Director, but it was no use. I couldn’t even speak. He had broken the agreement. He was sending men after my beloved.
“You made a deal, Director,” said my father cautiously.
He nodded his head. “I did make a deal. I promised your son that I wouldn’t kill the woman that he was with, but I said nothing of ordering the kill for another to complete. How can you not agree with this? Don’t you see what she is doing to him? He will die if she is not stopped.”
“No! All we need to do is take him back out of the antechamber, to where their link is still intact. Then he will not suffer. There must be another way!”
“There is not. If she can find him, then there is no telling what a wild and unruled human would do to our home. I will not risk all our kind for one dragon. He will remain here until the wedding. Then he will be bound by law to stay with his new bride and uphold the treaty. Retaliation wouldn’t be possible.”
“This isn’t right,” hissed my father.
The Director glared at him. “I never thought that I would encounter an entire family of traitors. One son is enough, but now the father would defy me also?”
My father shook his head. “No, Director. I would never betray you as my son has done. You are an honest man, and I have put my faith in you. Forgive me, though, if I cannot watch my son suffer. If you are agreeable, I would take my leave.”
The Director nodded his head. “You may go, but do not leave the Federation. I, of course, take you at your word, but I believe that staying here would be for your own safety as well as others. I am sure you can understand, old friend.”
My father bowed low, and our eyes locked. Something in his gaze brought me peace and understanding, but as quickly as it had come, the look was gone as he stood back up in front of the Director. I watched all this transpire without being able to lift a finger or speak. The love that I had for Veronica was crippling me. I was defenseless to help her, and I knew that my suffering would only stop when my love was dead. It was a pain worse than death for me to realize I was helpless against my own beating heart.
“Thank you, Director,” said my father before stepping over my body. “I will not try to flee the building. You have my word of honor.”
The Director smiled. “Your word is all I need. Go in peace. You have a wedding to attend to, if I am not mistaken. It is but a few short days away, and I am sure the bride would like to know that her betrothed has returned from yet another successful mission. If you would be so kind as to relay the message.”
My father once again nodded and backed out of the room, disappearing behind a wall. The Director knelt onto the floor in front of me.
“You see, Mikhail, there is always a loophole. Now I have you, and I will soon complete the mission that you failed to do. You are a disgrace to our kind, but you will still serve a purpose.”
I closed my eyes, fighting against his words and the pain. The last thought I had before the pain consumed me, and I slipped into the darkness was of Veronica. I loved her, and she would never know.
Chapter Eight: Veronica
“What have you done?!” I screamed at Rhett.
The entire house – if you could even call you that – shook violently at my outburst. Rhett had transported me against my will to a little shack somewhere near an ocean. I could smell the sea, but there were no windows in the little building. I was fuming with rage at Rhett and Mikhail both, but for different reasons. My fury that was pointed at Rhett was because he helped Mikhail to take me away. Now, though, I couldn’t sense Mikhail at all, and that struck a fear inside of me that overpowered every other emotion.
“Please, Veronica. We are only trying to protect you, and I promise that if you bring this building down, I will just take you to another one.”
I walked slowly over to him. “If you don’t tell me where Mikhail is right now I will bring this house down with you in it.”
“I can’t do that. I gave him my word that I wouldn’t let you go after him. It would be a death sentence. You don’t know what he gave up to keep you safe. Running back into the fight now would defeat everything that he is trying to do.”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass what you promised him. If you haven’t noticed, I can handle myself rather well. So, you can help me, or I can go by myself. Either way, I am going help Mikhail.”
I stormed to the door and jerked on the handle, but it didn’t budge. I glared back at Rhett, but he looked more amused than anything, which was even more infuriating. I stomped over to him and leveled my gaze at him, but he didn’t waiver. I screamed, and the house shook once again, only more violently this time. It broke Rhett’s concentration, and I made a break for the door. Jerking it open, I continued to run.
I sensed the danger before I even saw it. Skidding to a stop, I quickly looked back at the house to where Rhett was standing with his hands up in the air. A slow vibration was coming from them, pointing in one specific direction. I spun around and saw two men in matching black cloaks facing Rhett. They looked dangerous, but it was more than that. I could see the power emanating from them. One on one, they weren’t stronger than Rhett, but together, he was struggling to keep up the protective barrier guarding me and the small cottage.
He needed my help. He was growing weaker by the minute. I ran to him.
“What can I do?” I begged.
“Nothing! Run!” he hissed at me. “I can’t let them get to you. I need to know that you are safe!”
“I am not going anywhere. So, either you can let me help you and we might make it out of here, or we can die together, because I am not leaving!”
He glared at me. “Fine! Your power emanates from your hands. Focus on them and think about what you are trying to protect and why. Your emotions give you your power.”
I closed my eyes, taking a deep breath and doing as Rhett said. I saw what I was fighting for, which was easy. If I lost, my life would be over and so would Rhett’s. That made it easy, but as the power started to flow, it came out more like a weak, blocked pipe than the amazing rainbow of power I had imagined. The cloaked men’s power pushed back hard, almost crippling Rhett and I.
“What am I doing wrong, damn it?” I screamed.
“You are not trying hard enough. You aren’t thinking about what you want. You need to look down deep inside of you!” he yelled back. “Why are you here? What are you fighting for?”
“My life! Your life!” I yelled back.
“Why are you fighting?” he asked again.
“I told you!” I shouted.
They were growing stronger with each passing second. I closed my eyes for a second time and drowned out all the other noise. The magical wind whipped through my hair. The scent of lilacs and the ocean pierced through my mental barrier, and I was transported back through time, to when I was a young teen. My mother always smelled like lilacs. Her perfume was from a small boutique just down the road from our house. My father would buy it for her every year on their anniversary. When he died, I carried on his tradition.
The scent took me back to having my arms wrapped around her as I cried. She stroked my hair and did her best to soothe me as the rain fell outside. I could recall the feeling of heartbreak. For a young
, sixteen-year-old girl, I thought that my life was coming to an end.
“I thought that he loved me, Mom.” I sobbed into her chest.
“I know, honey. I know. Sometimes, things just don’t always work out the way that we think they should. That doesn’t mean that this is forever. I promise you that this heartbreak will pass.”
Defiantly, I shook my head. “No! I will never love anyone again. Not if this is how it feels.”
“Sixteen is young. There is someone out there for you.”
“Young? But you and Dad got married when you were sixteen. That wasn’t too young for you. Dillion said he would love me forever.”
“Yes, we got married at sixteen, but that wasn’t our choice. Our love was a surprise for both of us.”
I sniffled, gazing up at my best friend and role model. She never talked about her life with my dad after he died in a terrible accident at the deli he ran with my mother. I didn’t ask about him either, seeing the pain that it brought her. After that, we moved away from the city into a small town.
“You didn’t have a choice?” I asked, confused.
She nodded. “You see, where we came from, the moms and dads decided who their children would get married to. Things like love were considered silly. So, your father’s family and mine decided we should get married. It wasn’t until I was pregnant with you that we fell in love and decided to move away from our family so you wouldn’t end up married so young.”
“But I would have married Dillion! I can’t believe he broke up with me!”
“Shh,” she whispered. “You are making it rain!”
I rolled my eyes, “Mom, I don’t make it rain, okay? I’m too old for that crap.”
Pulling me up to look into her eyes, she said, “Then you are old enough to realize that sixteen is too young to find love. There is someone out there for you that will complete you. You won’t feel whole when you are apart. He will be the great love of your life, and you will do anything to protect that. Trust me, honey, okay?”
“Did you and dad love each other like that?”
“He was my one, true love honey,” she said sadly.
I nodded my head and buried myself back into the folds of her soft sweater. By the next week, the errant boyfriend was just a distant memory in a different city. After that night, my mother took a new job far away from the small town.
It wasn’t the memory that struck me as strange, but my mother’s words. True love. I was fighting for true love. It was the only thing that was more powerful than my own self-preservation, or protecting Rhett. Mikhail was my end game. I was fighting so that I could be with him. So that our love could have a chance to flourish and grow like the love between my parents had. I wouldn’t give up!
The rush of power shot through me, my body trembling as it radiated out of my hands. Instantly, the two men attacking Rhett shot backward away from us, tumbling and spilling over the steep hillside. I had no remorse for what I had done as Rhett dropped down to the ground beside me. I felt more powerful than I ever had before. Though I was no longer using it, the magic continued to radiate through my body.
“Rhett! Are you okay?” I asked him.
He nodded. “I see that you’ve found your inner love. You just saved both of our lives.”
I smiled. “I couldn’t have done it without your help.”
“You need to be careful, though, Veronica. You are not a full fae. Using that magnitude of magic can kill you just as easily as it can save you.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Once you have used the magic in your body, there is no more to hold. This is why fae do not wage wars against others or use it without care. Each one of us only has a certain amount in our lifetime. There is no telling how much you may have because you are the first of your kind.”
“Can it help me to find Mikhail? I can’t sense him anymore. I’m worried that something might have happened to him. I thought that dragons couldn’t be killed, though?”
“They can if they’re cut off from their true soulmates. In this case, I believe they have taken him into the antechamber of the Federation’s base. It’s the only place that he could be cut off from you, but we need to act quickly. The longer the bond is severed, the more likely it is that Mikhail won’t survive being pulled back out.”
“Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go,” I muttered.
I was more worried than I let on about Mikhail. I hadn’t felt the pull of his heart in a while, and now I didn’t even know if he was still alive. Rhett sensed the urgency and took my hand. I closed my eyes and knew that we were traveling through a portal once again. I would never get used to the sensation and neither would my stomach. It lurched forward before coming to a crashing halt all at once. His steady hand once again braced me for impact as my feet hit solid ground.
I opened my eyes and looked around. “Where are we?”
“Just outside of Rome. It’s been the Federations headquarters for as long as I can remember, and my memory goes back several centuries.”
“Just how old are you?”
He grinned. “That doesn’t matter. Just remember that I am old beyond the ages.”
“So that’s it?” I asked, nodding toward a small farmhouse.
“Yes. Now as soon as we walk in, I can promise you that we will face trouble. You are going to be looking for a door that would otherwise seem out of place. That will be the antechamber where they are holding Mikhail.”
“What do you mean by ‘out of place?’” I asked.
“Trust me, you will know it when you see it. I will do my best to ward off the others, but I don’t know how long my magic will last. I haven’t had to work this hard in many years. I already feel the draining effect of it.”
I nodded. “Got it, look for a strange door, and go fast. Let’s go.”
I followed Rhett not to the front door but to a smaller one off to the side. It made sense to use a less obvious entrance. As soon as he pushed open the door, I understood what we were up against. The inside of the house was nothing like I expected. It wasn’t small and quaint like the outside, but it rather resembled a massive operation full of cold metal features and no personal touches. A few feet into the large archway, a man in a black uniform approached us.
Rhett nodded his head, and I quickly jogged past the guard. Just as I maneuvered out of his grasp, he started to scream as his feet left the ground. Others ran to his aid, going after Rhett and ignoring me. I was grateful for the distraction, but I knew that it wouldn’t last long. I needed to find Mikhail.
Running past the others that were focused on Rhett, I searched frantically for the door. He hadn’t given me much to go on. A door that looked out of place? They all looked the same as the rest of the building: cold and metallic with no personality. I was about to give up and help Rhett retreat and find another way in when I saw it from the corner of my eye. Far down a hallway was a door that stood out like a sore thumb. The old, cherry wood and ornate knob were as different from the rest of the structure as one could get.
I knew that it was the right door as I ran to it and grabbed the knob. Slowly, I turned it and held my breath as it creaked open.
“What the hell?” I muttered.
There was nothing there but an old closet full of dusty and outdated furniture. Something wasn’t right about it. My gut told me that I was in the right place. Taking a deep breath, I walked into the small space and once again felt the change in the dimension. Before my very eyes, I watched the room shift from the closet to a large office. Like I was walking through a separate, invisible door.
“Veronica?” came Mikhail’s raspy voice.
I ran to him as he lay on the floor, clutching his heart. My body was on edge, my mind sharp as I looked for the danger around us. We seemed to be alone, but I didn’t know how long that would last. Falling onto the ground beside him, my heart fluttered at the realization that he was still alive. I helped him to sit up, the color already returning to his pale cheeks. I
couldn’t stop the tears from falling over my cheeks as I pulled him closer to me.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“You didn’t think I was really going to let you do this, did you?” I asked. “We need to get out of here, though. I don’t know how long Rhett can hold them off.”
“I thought that I was protecting you. The Director broke his word. He sent men after you. I am so sorry. I never meant for you to be in any danger.”
I smiled down at him. “None of that matters now, okay? Let’s just focus on getting out of here. Can you walk?”
He nodded. “I think so. Now that you are here, I don’t feel like my heart is being ripped out. The Director knew that this would happen. He brought me in here to sever the bond with you. I guess he didn’t count on Rhett.”
“How did he know where to find you?”
“I’ve never really trusted the Federation like I trust Rhett. I brought him here long ago, in case he ever needed to find me. I guess that my paranoia paid off, didn’t it?”
“Thank God for that. We need to go, Mikhail,” I said, listening to the approaching footsteps.
“I know, but I need to tell you something before we go. In case we don’t make it out of here together. I love you, Veronica.”
My heart filled with joy, the tears threatening to make a second appearance on my cheeks. I kissed his lips, and wrapped my arms around him for a second time, knowing that I had made the right decision. There was no denying how I felt for him.
“I love you, too, Mikhail. Now, can we get out of this hell hole?”
He laughed and stood up. “Absolutely.”
I took his hand and let him lead the way, knowing that he would be able to navigate the halls better than I would. We reached the end of the hall and peeked around the corner. Rhett was still busy picking up the guards as they charged him and he haphazardly tossed them away with a wave of his hand. His aura was weakened, though. We had gotten to him just in the nick of time.
“Ready?” Mikhail asked.
The Guardian Mikhail Page 7