by Rachel Red
I moved my head in the slightest of nods, my hold on my ribs loosening.
Victor's deep gray eyes twinkled.
"Good. Now, I'm sure Miles will soon be aware of your absence, if he hasn't already, so we need to move. We're only about a mile from his encampment, so this will all happen very quickly. But don't worry about a thing; you'll be protected every second."
"You mean...you mean, I get to come to the battle with you?"
"Yes, you, Julia, Elizabeth, and the two other women. It would take us too long to take you all back to Stonebrook, and who knows what Miles would be up to by then. And I don't want him coming to the city."
"Well...I don't mean to be funny, but this seems kind if strange and unlike you to let me get near the danger. To bring me near the danger yourself."
Victor's eyes twinkled again.
"Let the magic commence."
He took a step back and dipped his head, closing his eyes briefly. And suddenly, a sheer, shimmery golden mist enveloped my entire body, from head to toe.
I examined it, stunned. "What...what is it?"
He smiled. "It's a protection shield. I developed a way to protect non-shifter humans from any and all magic. It will be impenetrable to Miles and his men, and that I swear to you on my soul. You will be completely safe. It will last up to three hours, which will be more than long enough. And I'll give them to the other women as well. However, I'm still going to have the five of you very, very far back from the fight and surrounded by all my men. You'll be shielded from any and all magical spells, but not from the heat of my own dragon fire."
Victor soon applied the golden protection shield to the other women and then gave a few instructions to the two-dozen or so Keepers. Shortly after, everyone began marching towards the encampment.
But we didn't march long.
Victor saw the tiny black dots in the sky first and shouted that the Oppressors were coming and for the five of us women to be taken up on a nearby very tall, broad hill. Sam shifted into dragon form immediately, and we all, all five of us, hopped on his scaly, jewel-green back. He flew us to the hill, all the other shifters flying in dragon form behind us.
For the first minute or so on the hill, I was aware that things were going on around me; I was aware that the dragons were shifting back into human form so they could talk; I was aware of a low hum of conversation; I was aware of Julia examining her golden protection shield and saying things next to me. But I didn't really see or hear any of it. My gaze was focused on Victor, who stood un-shifted in the middle of the great open field we'd all just been marching down. His own gaze was locked on the sky and the dozen or so tiny figures that were quickly descending from it, getting bigger and bigger.
Soon he roared Miles' name, and all conversation on the hill came to a sudden, grinding, halt. Even a few birds circling a tall tree on one side of the giant hill stopped chirping. The figures in the sky became easily identifiable, Miles at the front. Victor roared his name again, the rage in his voice so palpable that the hairs on the back of my neck stood up, even though he was my own loving husband. But Miles and his men didn't seem to slow down.
Victor roared one final time. "Miles!"
If anything, Miles accelerated. But his men fell back a little.
Victor stood growling, not budging an inch. "Miles, meet death!"
A burning in my lungs reminded me to breathe.
Miles came to within maybe four hundred feet of Victor, and then three hundred, flying so fast he became a blur. Victor didn't shift into dragon form until Miles was less than two hundred feet away. But then, he launched himself into the air, dark wings unfurling, massive. His and Miles' mid-air collision sounded like a thunderclap.
He pinned Miles' beneath him and slammed him into the ground on his back. Miles whipped up a hand and shot a beam of bright green light that hit Victor right between the eyes, making him rise up on his back legs, roaring, obviously in pain. I gasped, horrified, and Elizabeth put an arm around my shoulders.
But Miles' punishment of Victor didn't last long. Victor took a deep breath and breathed a jet of bright blue fire on Miles. Keepers normally only breathed red fire. Miles writhed on the ground, literally screaming, and the sound of it as high as a woman's. After several moments, Victor stopped the jet of fire shooting from his mouth and turned his attention to Miles' men, who had just entered the airspace directly above him. They each seemed to try different spells on him while Miles remained on his back, flailing. Some shot bolts of green light at Victor; some shot bolts of silvery light; and some shot bolts of light somewhere between silver and black, like gunmetal. But Victor deflected each bolt with one dark gray scaly arm extended, a golden light surrounding his knife-like claws seeming to bounce the bolts of light right back at the Oppressors.
Just as Victor seemed to have everything well under control, Miles rose to his feet and exhaled some sort of fluorescent orange mist that encircled Victor's long, thick-scaled neck, appearing to tighten and choke him like a pair of hands. He staggered while the Oppressors flying above him renewed their efforts, hitting him square in the chest with several beams of light. I heard someone whimpering, only realizing after several moments that the noise was coming from me.
Elizabeth gave me a squeeze. "Stay strong. He's about to take the upper hand."
Elizabeth wasn't known to be psychic, and I knew she'd said what she'd said just to be encouraging. But at that moment, Victor did take the upper hand. And he kept it. He shot a thin stream of red fire from his mouth at Miles, and the fluorescent orange mist around his neck disappeared. He roared blue fire on the dozen Oppressors above him, making every single one of them drop to the ground like flies before they even had a chance to fly away. He immediately got to work stabbing them in the eye with one of his long claws, killing several of them within seconds.
Meanwhile, to the astonishment of everyone on the hill, myself included, Miles had opened his mouth and directly from it was shooting a thin stream of what seemed to be orange fire from it. Just like he was a dragon. The stream was at least twenty feet long and got Victor right in the side, but Victor didn't seem harmed by it or even phased in the least. He paused in his Oppressor killing, threw his mighty dragon head back, and made some sort of deep, rhythmic noise in the back of his throat. He seemed to be actually laughing.
He soon returned fire on Miles, except his stream was more powerful. It was more like a bomb of blue fire exploding from his open mouth. Miles shook on his feet as if being electrocuted before falling backward, hitting the ground still jerking and shaking. Gray smoke billowed from his light brown hair. A few Oppressors were just starting to come around from being stunned in the sky, and Victor got each of them with a blast of blue fire before stabbing several more in the eyes, killing them. While he did this, Miles attempted to sit up, failed and fell back down. He extended a hand in Victor's general direction and shot a silvery beam of light so weak that it didn't even connect with Victor, who stood less than ten feet away. If he even noticed, Victor ignored him and continued on with the task at hand, until all the Oppressors but Miles were dead.
Elizabeth breathed a sigh, surely of relief. Julia, who stood on my other side, bit back a noise that sounded like a little squeal of delight.
Victor slowly turned from the Oppressor carcasses and stomped over to Miles, the scales on his enormous dark body glimmering in the sun. Miles, who had ceased all efforts to shoot any beams of light from his fingers or breathe any fire from his mouth, rolled from his back to his stomach and began trying to crawl away. Before he got more than a few feet, Victor stopped him with a foot to the back, and then flipped him back onto his back using the same foot. Now, the whimpering I heard wasn't my own. Miles was making pitiful noises loud enough to be heard all the way across the enormous field. But they soon stopped because Victor lifted one of his thick arms and cracked Miles across the face with the back of his claws.
Elizabeth spoke in a low voice near my ear. "I think you might want to look away.
I just feel like...something crazy is about to happen. And I know you have a weak stomach when it comes to blood."
She was right. But, surprising myself, I found that I was willing to risk a fainting spell or an episode of getting sick. I didn't want to look away. I wanted to see Miles lose his life. And not because of what he'd done to me, but for how he'd abused Rose and Brook, too, I was sure. And for how he'd killed many of the women in Cold Creek just in the past couple of weeks.
I shook my head. "No. I'm watching."
Elizabeth said all right, and then extended the invitation to look away to Julia, Rose, and Brook. None of them took her up on it, either.
Victor slapped Miles again, seeming to crack his nose, sending a spray of blood shooting into the air. Although immediately nauseous, I still didn't look away. I continued to focus my gaze directly at Victor and Miles, even when Victor with a single claw tore open Miles' chest, plucked his heart out, and flung it aside in one continuous movement. I didn't even look away for a fraction of a second. Though I did start swaying on my feet just a bit. With a sensation of heat, immediately followed by icy coldness, washing over me. I blacked out just a split-second after Victor hit Miles with a blast of blue flame and then stabbed him through the eye, killing him.
*
When I came to, I was in Victor’s and mine bed, with him on his side next to me. An electric lamp on one of the bedside tables revealed his expression of concern.
He began smoothing my hair. "How are you feeling?"
I thought for a few seconds. Usually when I fainted, I came to feeling as if I'd just woken up from a very long and restful nap, this time was no exception.
I managed a little smile. "I actually feel fine. Like I just woke up from a nap."
He planted a kiss on my forehead, smiling a little himself. "Good. And I think you did actually have a little nap. You came to briefly after I flew you back here on my back, but you seemed really sleepy, and curled up and fell asleep in my arms after I shifted."
I grinned. "Well, levitating five people into the clouds is really tiring work."
He chuckled and brushed my lips with a kiss. "I can imagine."
He continued smoothing my hair, and I briefly thought over the events of the day, suddenly remembering what had set those events in motion. Me and the idea to peek out of the crack in the mountain wall near the hot springs. And a badly injured rabbit that was really a sorcerer.
I sighed, wondering how Victor could be acting so loving to me when I'd behaved so stupidly. "I don't know if you've heard how everything started today, but –"
"Julia and Elizabeth filled me in on all the details of what happened before the woman at the hot springs saw that scum Miles abduct you."
I sighed again. "Okay. I guess all that's left for me is to tell you how sorry I am about how everything got set in motion, and I really, really am. I'm so sorry that I looked through that crack near the hot springs, which made me see the hurt rabbit, or what I thought was a hurt rabbit, and fell for Miles' trick. I'm so sorry that I messed everything up and put my life in danger, and Julia's and Elizabeth's, too. Can you ever forgive me for being so dumb?"
"You weren't dumb in the least, and there's absolutely nothing to forgive. I'm the one who should be asking for your forgiveness. I didn't protect you as well as I should have. I should have had guards with you every second of every day leading up to the fight with Miles. And if a situation similar to this one ever happens again, I most certainly will."
I didn't answer right away, thinking. "Or...if a situation similar to this one ever happens again, you could just trust me to not make the same dumb mistake again. You could just trust me to have learned from this."
Now it was Victor's turn to not answer right away.
He paused in smoothing my hair. "I do believe you've learned from this and I do trust you to help me keep you safe. But ultimately, as your husband, I do feel as if the biggest share of the responsibility for your safety should rest on my shoulders. But...." He resumed smoothing my hair again. "Maybe this is a conversation for another day. One when you haven't been through so much."
"And you, too. You're the one who killed twelve Oppressors and their leader!"
Victor smiled. "I guess the word is it's some sort of a record."
Not once in post-Event history had any Keeper ever killed thirteen Oppressors in one day. Not even close. Most Keepers had never even killed one in the hundred years since The Event. Sam and Michael each killed one maybe every several years or so. Victor usually killed a couple each major battle but never had he killed thirteen, in one day.
I wrapped an arm around his shoulders. "I'm so proud of you. I'm so proud that you're my husband."
He smiled again, revealing his straight white teeth. "Not half as proud as I am that you're my wife."
He dipped his head and kissed me, his mouth warm and tender. But I realized the kiss had been too brief for me. I wanted to kiss him for a bit longer, a lot longer. I also realized at that moment that my mouth definitely wasn't minty fresh how I liked it before we started a marathon kissing session. I realized, too, that I hadn't used the bathroom since early that morning, and I had to go, very badly.
I excused myself, used the restroom, brushed my teeth, and washed my face, the cool water soothing the light bruise on my cheek where Miles had slapped me.
When I returned to bed, I had a sudden thought. "Oh! Rose and Brook. Can they stay here in Stonebrook?"
Victor pulled me into his arms. "Of course."
"Good. They're both so sweet, and I know they've been through absolute hell. But I think they might be able to find some sort of healing here. I hope so, anyway."
"I do as well. And sometime in the very near future, I think we're going to launch an attack on Cold Creek in order to free all the slaves. All those they haven't murdered yet, anyway. And now that both Alexander and Miles are dead, I think we'll launch our attack in the very, very near future, before they get the chance to pick a new leader and regroup. So, very soon, we'll probably have many more new arrivals to our community."
We talked about that possibility a little more before both falling silent briefly. Victor remarked that I hadn't had anything to eat since breakfast and asked if I wanted him to get me something. I told him I was a little hungry, but a run to the kitchen could wait.
"I want to kiss you first. For a little longer this time than the one a few minutes ago."
A slow grin spread across his face. "Well, what if that kiss turns into something more?"
"I'm kind of hoping it will."
"Not as much as I am." Still smiling, he pulled me closer, and we began kissing on our sides. His clean, woodsy scent, which never failed to completely intoxicate me, filled my nostrils as I ran a hand along the muscular planes of his back. It wasn't long before our kissing intensified, and I hiked a leg up on his hip, pressing myself into his hardness, making him groan. Our clothes soon lay in a heap on the floor.
I mounted his thick shaft facing him, and began riding him, moaning, while touching my most sensitive spot. This sight always had the effect of seeming to drive Victor to levels of excitement even beyond what he normally reached during our lovemaking, and he usually didn't go quite as long before climaxing in this position than he did while in other positions. And I got the impression that the placement of my fingers had quite a lot to do with that. But that was just fine with me because I usually didn't go quite as long, either.
Within just a couple of minutes, I felt an urgent need to increase my pace, and did so, breasts bouncing, while Victor grabbed my soft hips, growling. I soon threw my head back, crying out, the sound blending with a long, low groan from him.
*
The following evening, the entire population of Stonebrook, including Brook and Rose, gathered outside for the long-awaited summer celebration. Speeches and toasts were made; a fireworks display lit the sky; and everyone had their fill of delicious food washed down with champagne.
Around midnight, from a
somewhat secluded spot away from most of the revelers, Victor and I gazed up at a velvety, starry sky. He stood behind me, his arms around my waist, while a tiny white light trailed across the inky darkness for just a few moments before fading.
I looked over my shoulder at him, smiling. "Make a wish."
His expression remained sober. "I don't need to. I already got what I'd wished for. You."
Knowing that my own expression was now sober, I turned to face him, suddenly more lightheaded from his words than I'd even been from three glasses of champagne earlier. "Kiss me."