The rainbow scattered on the blue marble surface reminded Dakota of the story of the warrior and the rainbow god. On one hand, she knew there were things worth dying for, like the warrior had. Things that drove a person toward their destiny, or at least their dreams.
On the other hand, what if a person chose the wrong dream?
Dakota had fixed her hopes on being a shifter for so long, anything else felt like failure. She’d convinced herself that shifting was the only way to right the wrongs she’d witnessed, the tragedies that had eaten away at her, made her feel helpless.
But what if giving up the dream of being a shifter was the only way to realize her destiny? What if the shifter she had always thought lived inside her had to die, just like the warrior, so her true spirit could be freed?
She muttered to the empty room, “Holy cats, Dakota, you are a mess.”
Dakota winced. She couldn’t say that anymore, could she? Holy cats? Dakota was not a cat. She wasn’t any kind of shifter.
She was a switch, whether she liked it or not.
Dakota knew she was driving herself crazy, but she couldn’t help it. Something had better start clicking for her soon, or Dakota was going to come out of her skin altogether. She couldn’t go on in this limbo.
A quiet knock sounded on her door. Dakota called for whoever it was to come in.
Aven. Her heart ached at the sight of him. “How’d it go?” she asked, as he closed the door behind him.
He didn’t answer, just came close and sat in the chair beside Dakota’s. He held a box that was about a foot long and half as wide. He set the box on his lap and looked at her, his eyes deep and serious. “That’s not why I’m here.”
Dakota uncurled her legs and put her feet on the floor, leaning forward. She couldn’t imagine what was going on, but she assumed it had to do with whatever was in the box.
“You feeling any better about being a switch?” he asked her.
Dakota’s mental shoulders slumped. “I’m feeling less like a shifter. Does that count?”
“Sure,” he said softly, and like he wasn’t sure what would make her feel better, but really wanted to know.
Dakota slouched in her chair and pulled her legs up close, curled herself into a protective ball. As if that could keep reality away. “I hate it. I don’t want to let go of shifting. That means admitting… lots of things”
She broke off, not wanting to say it out loud, but also knowing she needed to. The shame was so thick, it brought tears to Dakota’s eyes. A shape moved in her blurred vision. Aven’s hand, rubbing her foot. “Admitting what?” he prompted, softly, gently.
A tear spilled. Damnit. She wiped it away and spilled a story that had colored her life, but she’d never shared before. “I had pretty much given up on shifting as I got older. I got along fine as a cop without it. One night during monsoon season two years ago, we had these flash floods. I was on patrol by myself. I saw a car in a ditch, about to be washed away.”
The memories and sensations were so real it could have been yesterday. “I got out and ran down the embankment. It was raining so hard. I was drenched in seconds. I got to the car and there was an old man inside, unconscious.” Dakota took a shuddering breath. “His car was barely hanging on, one tire stuck on a tree that had washed out.”
She could still feel the urgency tightening her muscles. “I didn’t have time to go back to my car for my kit. I got the door open, but he was buckled in. I couldn’t get him out.” Her reach wasn’t long enough to unfasten the belt, and she couldn’t yank him out without sending the whole car into raging floodwaters.
“It was so dark, only the blue lights from my patrol car flashing. I had a knife, but the rain made it so slippery I dropped it. I had always wanted to shift, but before that moment, I had never been desperate to shift, do you know what I mean? I thought my desperation would make it happen. I believed it would, actually. I tried to shift again and again, even just one finger, turn it into a claw so I could slice him out.”
She dropped her head. “He could have been my own grandfather.” Aven took her hand. She didn’t stop. “Then I heard a crash behind me.” Dakota remembered the ice-cold feeling of terror that had drenched her body like rushing water. “Another tree. Bigger, washing down the ditch straight toward us. I had about ten seconds to get him out or die trying. Or let him go.”
“I let him go. I landed on my ass and the tree hit the front fender, took the whole car with it. They found him the next day.”
Aven’s hand was still on her foot, keeping the connection between them. He moved to the floor in front of her, bringing his face into her line of sight. “You can’t save everyone, no one can.”
She nodded. She knew it. She wanted to believe it.
Aven reached behind him without a word, bringing the box around and placing it in Dakota’s hands. It was heavier than she expected. Not unwieldy, but solid. The weight in the box shifted slightly as she tilted it to get a better hold. “Would a gift make you feel better?”
“Always,” she breathed, taking hold of it. The lid slid off easily. A layer of cottony fluff stood between her and whatever was in the box. Dakota lifted the cotton and gasped. It was a weapon. Dakota wasn’t sure exactly what to call it. A short spear, was what it looked like. The handle was a black metal tube, a bit thicker than a roll of quarters and twice that long, with a textured surface like a gun’s grip. The handle tapered at each end in quick, neat stacks, four or five times. One end had a blade attached.
The blade… Dakota stared at it, transfixed. Had she ever seen anything so beautiful?
It was clear quartz, but with a shock of blue lightning running through it, like a chunk had fallen off Lightning Rock. It was shaped like the flat V of a spearhead. It had a wickedly sharp point and jagged, almost serrated edges that came to points of their own behind where the blade met the handle.
There, a hole was drilled in the crystal, not quite touching the blue shock of color. The handle’s thin tip was inserted and held in place with some kind of epoxy, then lashed with metal wire around the joint. The wire was soldered in place.
Dakota swallowed past the lump in her throat. “You got this for me?”
Aven’s voice was gruff with emotion. “I made that for you.”
Another tear. Damnit. Dakota reached out, then hesitated. Something told her that once she touched the blade Aven had crafted for her, there would be no going back. But did she even want to anymore? Would she be a shifter, if it meant giving him up? Her heart flexed painfully with the answer. Hell, no.
She picked up the weapon.
It felt more like home than any firearm she’d ever held. She lifted the short spear from its cottony cradle and wrapped her hand fully around it. The diamond pattern felt familiar, like a pistol grip, but the weapon itself contained a power she’d never experienced. Dakota felt its energy move up her arm, filling her with magic.
She could climb a mountain, or bring it crumbling to the ground if she had to.
Aven sounded awed. “Holy shit. I’ve never seen you glow like that.”
Dakota blinked her gaze to her hand and saw that he was right. It was faint for her, but she could see a glow for the first time.
“Turquoise,” she murmured. Like the stones they used to pull out of the mine in Bisbee. That was the color of her magical switch powers. Dakota had her own color, her own unique power. Just like the Breath switches said they did.
And Aven had given her the way to find it. Dakota swallowed the emotion clogging her throat. He deserved to hear her say it. “Thank you, Aven.”
He grinned and moved back a few feet. “Give it a twist but be ready,” he said, mimicking a motion with his wrist like revving the throttle on a motorcycle.
Dakota followed his direction, flipping her wrist out and back. There was a metallic clunk under her palm and both ends of the handle shot out. The spearhead jabbed forward eighteen inches, while the tail extended even further to balance it.
“Nice,
” she breathed. This thing was deadly.
Aven grinned, his pleasure at her joy written all over his handsome face. “Now you can throw it.”
“Or surprise a fucker,” Dakota said softly. She flipped her wrist and felt the spear’s layers snap back into place, short once more, the balance never faltering. Dakota turned ninety degrees, flipped her wrist again, then speared a throw pillow on a chair with one vicious swipe of her hand.
As if the violence tripped something in Aven, he got serious, coming in close to her, blocking her view of her new weapon jutting out of the upholstery. He took her jaw in his hands, and looked deep into her soul. “I’ve got a promise for you, Dakota.”
Aven bent his head to hers and kissed her. The kiss touched every part of Dakota, not only her lips, but also her heart, her mind, her soul, her very essence. A shock of turquoise forced Dakota’s eyes open, even while she gave in to the kiss.
The color was all around them, engulfing them, almost… being them. Dakota surrendered everything. She wrapped her arms around his neck, her Aven, her new home.
It lasted long minutes, neither one of them pulling back until the powerful magic faded. “What the hell was that?” Dakota breathed into Aven’s mouth.
Aven’s mouth moved to her neck, to the soft skin beside her ear, and replied. “Heartbound kiss.”
Dakota melted with his words and the kisses on her throat. She felt as languid as if she’d had a dozen orgasms. “Mmmm, what’s that?”
Aven’s hand gripped her ass, pulling her closer, grinding her against him. “Means I’m yours. Doesn’t matter if another switch begs me to have sex with her, I won’t do it. I don’t want anyone but you, Dakota.”
Dakota pulled back. Her stomach felt heavy, shivery. “Are we… fated?”
Aven’s jaw bulged and his eyes went a little hard. “You’re not mine, but I’m yours.”
Dakota went stiff. She hadn’t even thought about that part of it. She’d seen all those males who wanted in, all of them ready to fight and eager to serve.
She wanted this male in front of her. She wanted him and only him.
Could she really have him now?
Chapter 39 - The Caged Cat Sings
The next afternoon, Aven stood at the switches’ training ground behind the BBOC, beside Dallas and the Breath shifters. The shifters were watching Dakota and the three Breath switches as they worked their magic. Or in Dakota’s case, tried to.
Whereas the Breath switches could make balls of green magicks with their own breath, or by snatching the wind out of the air, Dakota didn’t have any such assistance. She’d mastered her Resonant as both a short and long spear, piercing the leather training dummy so many times it was ragged. But not one spark of magicks had shown while she’d done it, nothing but her turquoise glow.
Gemma tilted her head to one side, looking at Dakota in that way she had, like to her, a person was a breathing puzzle. “What if you held some rocks? Or threw them?” Gemma had used nuggets of gold to channel her metal-loving Breath magicks at the mine, so that made sense, Aven thought.
But the idea was a non-starter. Dakota dutifully gathered a pile of rocks and used them every which way that anyone suggested: as projectiles, as talismans, as inspiration. She worked so hard that sweat dripped down her forehead. Her cheeks flamed with failure. Aven caught her eye, feeling the frustration and hopelessness pouring off her, wishing he could ease her.
Dakota walked right toward him, a half-dozen pebbles still clutched in her fist. She stomped her foot right before she buried her face in his chest, an infuriated moan rising up from her throat. “I can’t do it!”
The other shifters didn’t stare, but Aven felt Riot and Flint’s surprise. They hadn’t known about him and Dakota. Aven wrapped his arms around her. Now they did.
Dakota didn’t react. Aven had never seen her so unsure of herself before. He didn’t know what to do.
His Instinct spoke up, startling Aven. Instinct was handy, but as a raptor who listened to his extra senses, Aven had less use for it than most shifters. But this voice was loud and clear. (believe in her, for her.)
Of course. Breath switches weren’t magical because of the air, they were magical because of their breath, the power that lived inside them. Dakota was a Belief switch. She wouldn’t be powerful because she held some rocks, she would be powerful when she believed in her power. But how could Aven convince her?
Easiest thing in the world, he realized. Tell her the truth.
Aven gripped Dakota’s shoulders, holding her a little back from him so he could look her in her eyes. “You are a switch, Dakota. You have magic. I promise you do.” Aven slid one hand down to her handful of rocks. “Do you believe me?”
She didn’t nod. She almost shook her head.
“You trust me, Dakota,” he interrupted before she could. “I know you trust me, just try to believe it, for me?” Her eyes slid away, but then they came back. She nodded.
“Throw the rocks.”
Dakota turned, she whipped the handful of pebbles across the sky. They blasted into mini, blue lightning strikes that scorched the grass in tiny black circles.
A cheer went up around them, all the Breath switches and shifters, but Aven only had eyes for Dakota.
She ran to him.
She kissed him once, hard on the mouth, and that got a bit of a cheer again. She pulled away. Blue lightning flashed as she went back to work. Aven followed the lightning into the sky, smiling, savoring the feel of the still-fading pressure of Dakota’s lips on his.
Was he heartbound? Sure. Whatever...
But was he in love? Absolutely.
* * *
Dakota got good, and she got good fast.
Cora relaxed in a chair with a built in umbrella. Jameson had even brought her lemonade. “Too bad Thorn’s not one. I’d set you loose on him,” she told Dakota.
Gemma spoke to Goldie. “Wait. You said you were kind of intrigued by Lance when you met him, right?”
Goldie nodded. Gemma went on. “And that was before you were switched-on?” Another nod.
Gemma moved on to Cora. “Same with you, right? You thought Thorn was fascinating before you were switched-on, but now you hate him?” Cora nodded, too.
Gemma turned to Aven. “And you say that Thorn and the stalker scent exactly the same, right? So they’re probably the same kind of shifter.” Aven nodded. Dakota wondered what kind of case Gemma was building.
Then Gemma turned to her. “You’re the control group.”
Dakota pulled her head back. “I’m what?”
Gemma explained, ticking points off on her fingers. “We know that Goldie and Cora both had the same reaction to different guys, depending on their switch status. What we don’t know is why. But we’ve got you.” She pinned Dakota with narrowed eyes. “You were the same kind of fascinated with two guys, one of whom is Thorn-” She gestured at Cora. “And the other one who might be Lance.” She pointed at Goldie.
Cora spoke up, one eyebrow quirked. “Or some other gross guy with a ponytail. There’s plenty.”
“My point is,” Gemma said, “if Dakota has the same reaction to Thorn now that she’s switched-on, we’ll know that has something to do with it. That there’s something about both those guys we need to watch out for. They may not know about vampires or The Cause or any of it, but they’re somehow involved with us.”
Dakota turned to Aven and nodded. She wanted to do it. He didn’t question, just whipped his phone out of his pocket and started typing. “Ryder and Shiloh are on him right now. I’ll find out where he is.”
Shiloh? Dakota hadn’t thought of the female shifter for days. Wonder if she’s mad we never got to fight? If she were Shiloh, she’d be pissed as hell. She’d better not show that shifter her back for a while. Dakota knew that shifters were sworn to protect switches, but most coventwined shifters were male. The rules might be different between females.
Dallas spoke up beside her. “I’m going with you.”
&nb
sp; Dakota hesitated. She didn’t want to embarrass Dallas, but just like he’d been worried for her when she couldn’t shift, she worried for him if he did. “What about your leg? If you need to shift-” She broke off when she saw the look in Dallas' eyes. He knew he wasn’t one hundred percent, but he couldn’t let her go without him.
Goldie stepped up beside them, smiling her gentle smile. She touched Dallas' arm and pointed at the BBOC, walking that way and chatting as he fell in beside her. “Let’s get you everwefted. I’ve only done clothes so far, but I’m the strongest at magic. I bet I can get you through one day…” Her voice drifted off as she and Dallas walked away.
Aven’s phone chimed. He swiped the screen. “Thorn just got back to his apartment in Shady Pines. We can be there in ten.”
Chapter 40 - Alley Cat
Dakota followed Aven’s directions to Shady Pines, him in the passenger seat and Dallas in the back. The sun was setting, casting long shadows of tree trunks across the road, blinding Dakota one second and then disappearing behind a spike of mountain. She parallel-parked Luxe down the street from Thorn’s apartment building.
The three of them exited the car, standing on the sidewalk. From the corner of the block by the main drag, Ryder approached. Shiloh appeared a few seconds later, striding in from the opposite direction. Both went straight to Aven. Dakota heard him say, under his breath, “Pull back. Grab some coffee or something. We won’t be long.”
Ryder winked at her. Dakota smiled back. She liked that cat. Definitely more than she liked Shiloh, who had her muscled arms crossed and was sneering in Dakota’s direction. She looked at Aven and said, “3B,” then tapped Ryder’s arm. The two shifters walked away.
Dakota followed Aven and Dallas down the block. They stepped into the apartment building’s lobby and she looked around, impressed by how swanky the furnishings were.
The marble foyer led to a staircase with carved wooden railings. Brushed bronze light fixtures lined the walls. Not quite coven-level, but still. These people paid rent. Probably more every month than Dakota had made as a highway patrol officer.
Raptor's Peak: Switch of Fate 4 Page 20