Stroke of Fire

by Kira Nyte

  Her mother grabbed her by the shoulders. Her gaze hardened. “Yes, you do. You’re Briella Everett. You’re the strongest young woman I know, and I could not be more proud of you. You go after what you want and fight for what is right. You have the power to make a difference.”

  A small smile began to crest her mother’s lips. A peculiar twinkle lit her eyes. “You are a blessing as much as you have been blessed. Every hope and dream your father and I secretly held are unfolding.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’m about to tell you the truth, Briella. The whole truth. It is as fantastic as it is real.” Her smile widened. “It’s been a little over thirty years since we came to this world from another. The dragon realm, The Hollow, was attacked by an enemy so bent on destruction they cared not what or who they destroyed to get the power of the dragons. You see, Syn is a Firestorm dragon. They were already a rare breed before the attack. Only a couple dozen existed. After the attack… I don’t know. Your father and I escaped the carnage on the back of another dragon. Syn ensured our safe escape and stayed behind to protect others. We had no idea if he survived. This is the first time we’ve seen him or heard from him since that day.”

  Briella blinked. Was she seriously hearing this tale from her grounded, logical mother? Okay, so her gift of visions came from Saralyn Everett, but her mother kept her head about her more than most parents Briella encountered.

  There wasn’t much to discount her mother’s claims, however. She’d seen for herself what Syn was. Or, at least, an impression of what he was.

  “Your father and I didn’t mean to brush you aside, sweetheart. We were both in utter disbelief that he was here. Here, Briella. With you. My heart can rest easy knowing that you are in his care because he won’t let anything happen to you. You see, we are not entirely human. Your father is what the Firestorm dragons call a Keeper. Specifically, he is Syn’s Keeper.”

  Briella stiffened. “A what?” Sweet little Keeper. The sorcerer’s voice mocked her. Her mother’s face faded as the attack replayed in her head. “Oh my God. That’s what that person called me.”

  Saralyn’s shoulders squared. “What person? Are you talking about the attack you mentioned downstairs?”

  Briella nodded. “Yeah. At my apartment. I had thought it was one of my friends stopping by, but Syn… I don’t know. He freaked when I opened the door. I had no time to think before he took me down to the floor and shielded me from the attack. The guy looked pretty human, except for the fact he was carrying around what seemed like a sparking ball of blue lightning. He had the strangest eyes. Black with silver specks.”

  In all her life, Briella had never seen such fear drain her mother’s face of color and steal the strength and life from her eyes. She watched her life-loving mother melt into a terrified shell of a person in the space of a few breaths.

  “They found you? How did they find you so quickly?” Saralyn’s fingers curled into the blanket, bunching the white fabric in similarly whitened knuckles. Briella dropped a hand to her mother’s, surprised by how cold her skin felt. “My worst fear, Briella, is losing you. I haven’t had any visions about danger coming close to you. None.”

  A distressed moan fled her mother’s lips.

  “Ma, I’m fine. But who was that person?”

  Saralyn shook her head before she lifted a hand to her forehead. “Our enemies. The Baroqueth slayers. At one point, centuries ago, they were allies. Friends and protectors. The leader of the Baroqueth sorcerers—they didn’t adopt the slayer name until after their betrayal—was Keeper for the leader of the Firestorm dragons. Greed made the Baroqueth turn on his own dragon. He killed the dragon for his power and unleashed an evil within our sanctuary. It was defeated, but as all evil does, it came back again and again until it almost wiped us out. We all understood that if we ever had to leave The Hollow because of the Baroqueth, we were to blend into the human world and not attract attention until the dragons contacted us. They never came. Information about the dragons, the number of survivors or casualties, was never discussed. We were told to keep the dragonstone safe, not to open it—”

  “Wait.” Briella waved a hand, cutting her mother off. “A what? Dragonstone? What is that?”

  “The dragonstone?” Saralyn’s fists loosened their grip on the blanket and she aimlessly traced the stitching. “It’s a priceless jewel unique to each and every dragon. No two are the same. It’s magic, created from a dragon’s first shedding of his scales as a youngling. It’s used to bond the Keeper and the dragon throughout the Keeper’s lifetime. Each generation of Keeper bleeds into the jewel. It opens the bond between Keeper and dragon.”

  “You know how ridiculous this all sounds, right?”

  Saralyn let out a small laugh. “To you, I can imagine. To your father and I, it’s normal. We were born and raised in a world of magic alongside dragons. My love of gardening comes from my longing for our home. The Hollow is unlike any place you will ever see. The flowers, the fields, the mountains, the waterfalls. Briella, you will fall in love with it.”

  Briella had always envied her mother’s green thumb. The gardens in Briella’s childhood home far surpassed magnificent and could easily put many botanical gardens to shame. Her mother spent more time in the gardens than she did inside the house, when the weather permitted.

  But her mother’s insistence that she will love this other world, not would, struck her stubborn self as wrong.

  “I’m not leaving here. My art. It finally has a chance to be recognized.” Briella tugged her braid in agitation. She sighed, gazing across the room to the boxes of paintings she hadn’t unpacked because the drive to finish the dark and sinister portrait of a dragon under a man’s skin demanded every molecule of her concentration. “I won’t give it up. Not now.”

  “Sweetheart, things are changing. If the Baroqueth have found you here it New Orleans, it’s only a matter of time before they find you again. The dragons have very little power in this world aside from their shifting abilities and the natural protection of their scales.”

  “And that’s fine. Syn and that other guy downstairs can go back. I’m staying here to pursue my dreams. I’ll figure out a way to protect myself.” She shrugged. “I’ll befriend a few witches and voodoo priestesses. Maybe barter with a demon or two I’ve seen lurking in the cemeteries.”

  Saralyn stiffened, her lips drawing taut. “Briella Isabelle Everett! That isn’t funny.”

  Briella arched her brows. “And neither is your insistence that I’ll be leaving the only world I’ve ever known to go back to the world you miss. I’m an adult, Ma. I have the right to make that decision for myself.”

  “The Baroqueth will kill you!”

  “Why?” Briella snapped back, her voice rising. “Why are they after me? If they want the dragons and their power, why me?”

  Saralyn’s eyes gauged Briella for a long moment. The older woman’s gaze seemed to pick at the outer layers of her mind, the probing a dull zing that resonated throughout her body. The corner of her mouth twitched.

  Silently, she pushed to her feet and crossed the room with leisurely steps until she stopped in front of Briella’s painting of Syn. She folded her hands behind her back.

  Briella watched her mother, waiting for her response.

  “You tried to paint a monster,” Saralyn said softly. There was no accusatory hint in her voice, just simple observation. “You tried to create a beast, but your subconscious softened what your conscious mind desperately tried to hold on to. What it wanted the world to see.”

  Briella scooted to the edge of the bed and hesitated. She played her mother’s words over in her mind, dissecting what she heard for the true meaning beneath the surface of obvious statements. That was Saralyn.

  Slowly, Briella moved to stand by her mother’s side. The hint of rose and wildflowers caressed her senses, calming her roiling emotions. Saralyn brought with her the delightful scents of her garden, and it stirred a bout of homesickness inside Briella.


  Her mother pointed to the swirling grays that outlined a sodden hoodie and the broad expanse of night-drenched shoulders. “I see the sharp strokes you initially used, but then you went over them with gentle curls.”

  She lifted her finger to the shadowy face, a face Briella recalled as menacing the night Syn stood between her and the safety of her apartment.

  Briella tipped her head, eyes narrowing on her work. She noticed it before her mother even spoke.

  “Here. Again. I see the underlying jagged edges of his face, the gruff, dangerous angles, but you went back and softened them, too. Rather than possessing that threatening component you wanted, something inside you created an intriguing vision. More mysterious than menacing.”

  Briella felt the curiosity of her mother’s gaze before she peeled her focus away from the painting and looked at the older woman. Her blue eyes contained layers upon layers of wisdom and knowledge. Her pretty face, seemingly untouched by time, possessed an angelic component Briella always found soothing. Her blond hair could easily have been a glowing halo.

  And right now, all of that soothing, angelic essence poured over Briella, dissolving her resistance.

  “Why, sweetheart?” Saralyn asked.

  Because…

  She turned her gaze back to the painting. To the fiery eyes she had seen more than once. Heat, both deadly and wicked, throbbed in the details of the eyes she had painted. They touched her soul, wrapped her in an unseen strength.

  But she had seen those eyes after a kiss. A kiss that claimed her in more ways than she wanted to admit. A kiss she wanted to experience again and again until she drowned in a passion she had never experienced before.

  “You know the answer,” Briella said quietly.

  “I do.”

  “Then share it with me, because I’m so confused.”

  “You said he claimed you belonged with him.” Saralyn’s hands rested on her shoulders and eased her around to face her. The gentle expression on her beloved face further banished Briella’s fight. She trusted her mother and father. Trusted them to the death. Right now, she clung to that trust, hoping it would keep her feet steady beneath her as her world imploded.

  “Keepers, Briella, protect their dragons as much as the dragons protect their Keepers. You have your gift for hearing thoughts. It’s a survival mechanism. A way of filtering your surroundings to locate a threat before that threat has a chance to attack. Keepers and dragons can engage in mind-speak, or telepathy. The dragon can feel what you feel, as well as the reverse, once the bond is made with the dragonstone. However, there is one case when the bonding isn’t necessary and it happens naturally.”

  Briella’s heart began to thump. Blood rushed past her ears, muffling her mother’s words. A wave of weakness washed over her, starting at her toes until it reached her head and made her vision spin.

  Lifemate. Lifemate. Lifemate.

  She heard the term in Syn’s mind. Heard it as clearly as she felt her mother’s hands.

  “You are our daughter, and next in line to become Syn’s Keeper. One day, you will take your father’s place. When that time comes, you will be the last Keeper for Syn.”

  Briella shook her head, trying to dispel the gray fog that threatened to overtake her mind. Never had she passed out. Never, until earlier today. She sure as hell wasn’t making a habit out of it, no matter how much her world cracked, crumbled, exploded. She was stronger than this. She’d adapt.

  “Why? Why the last?”

  As the word left her lips, a flood of turbo-fast visions sped through her mind, none of which made much sense. Syn was the only constant in each scene, from them sitting at a dining table, standing beneath a lavender and silver tree, a strange rock, flying through the sky, a baby, two babies, her and Syn late in life…

  All of this news about dragons and Keepers and dragonstones was taking its toll on her, but there was enough of herself left that she had an inkling of what her mother meant.

  The visions supported her assumption.

  “In the history of the Firestorm dragons and Keepers, females are seldom born into the Keeper lineage. They are more rare than the dragons themselves. The last time a surge of daughters was born was after the first war between the Baroqueth and Firestorm, when the population was culled to the brink of extinction. Females are born to help preserve the Firestorm bloodlines. Nature’s way of saving a race.”

  “I think I know where this is going.” Briella rubbed her eyes with the heels of her palms. “What’s a lifemate?”

  Saralyn’s mouth melted into a smile that set off the sparkle in her eyes. “A soul mate to a dragon, but more. You’re Syn’s lifemate, Briella. If he survived the attack on The Hollow, as we now know he did, it was only a matter of time before he found you. The pull is irresistible, from my understanding. It is overwhelming. The dragon, who is already supremely protective of his Keeper, will be more so toward his lifemate because you, my darling daughter, are priceless to him.”

  “Because I’ll give him kids and the dragon lives on.” Like she saw in that dizzying vision. She wasn’t going to be a baby factory. That wasn’t in her plans.

  “No. Well, yes, but more importantly because you own his heart. And owning a dragon’s heart?” Saralyn shook her head, a dreamy glaze crossing her eyes. “Briella, you have no idea how lucky you are. None. If there is ever a man to exist that I feel is deserving of you, Syn is that man. The only man. He will treat you like a priceless treasure. He will forever respect you, protect you, and love you. You, like all Keepers to their dragons, are his equal, not his possession. And you can rest assured that whatever he says and does comes from his heart.”

  “So when you and Dad realized you were having a daughter, you also realized there was a chance that I would be a dragon’s lifemate.”

  Briella wasn’t sure how she felt about this. Okay, so there was definitely nothing appalling about Syn and having the security of knowing they were meant for each other was certainly tempting. However, she lived in a modern world with modern thought processes. Pre-ordained marriages before birth did not exist in her world.

  “Yes, but we also knew the significance of being blessed with a daughter beyond the possibility of her being a lifemate because, remember, daughters are rare.” Saralyn cupped the side of Briella’s face, lifting her gaze. Briella hadn’t realized she’d looked away. “Sweetheart, you will find your path on your own, but you need to understand who and what we are. You need to understand the dangers that will hunt us, hunt you, because if the Baroqueth got their hands on you, there is nothing Syn won’t do to save you. He will give his life for yours, whether you have accepted him or not. The significance of what you and Syn have will be irrelevant because it is you, and only you, that will matter to him in the end.”

  “What about Dad? I thought dragons protect their Keepers.”

  “They do, but their lifemate comes first, and your father knows that. He is pleased by it.” Saralyn leaned over and pressed an airy kiss to Briella’s forehead. “It is a lot to take in, I understand. Know that Syn is not your enemy. Whatever Firestorm dragons survived the attack, none are your enemy.” She stepped back and nodded once. “I’ll leave you be. You’ll learn more in time, but for now, you should relax. You’re safe. As safe as any person could hope to be.”

  Briella listened to her mother’s light steps recede from the room, followed by the soft click of the door opening, then closing, leaving her alone.

  She looked at her painting. Five hours of work led to this finished product. A masterpiece because her inspiration was a living, breathing, walking masterpiece. The longer she retraced every stroke and detail, the more discrepancies she discovered that fell in line with her mother’s observations. She’d tried to create a monster. The monster that attacked her and terrified her.

  The end product?

  Not a monster, but a mysterious depiction of a man who created as much turmoil within herself as she created on the canvas.

  Turmoil. A
churning entity alive and well, fighting to make sense of a life she thought she controlled until she learned fate had other plans.

  Chapter Ten

  Syn slowed down by his second beer, and his first hour into catching up with his Keeper, taking small sips rather than trying to drown the tumultuous emotions that battered his spirit. The dragon grew more and more restless, the desire to see Briella, to explain to her and beg for forgiveness growing unbearable.

  Giovani was his rock in these restless moments, since the alcohol had no effect on Syn physiologically. The drink kept his hand and his mind busy, that was all. And his throat moist against the hot smoke that roiled deep in his chest.

  “Who else survived besides Cade and Taryn?” Giovani asked. He had settled back in a chair, taking in the serenity of the courtyard. After two beers, he looked relaxed and a faint flush painted his cheeks, evidence that alcohol certainly had more of an effect on him than it did on Syn.

  “Eight of us total. Zareh, Alazar, Emery, Gabriel, and Tajan came out of it, too. Emery and Gabe will be here by morning. Zareh’s Keeper was killed a year ago by Baroqueth. It was the first attack since Cade had dragons and Keepers split up to divert attention.”

  Giovani’s eyes widened. “Talius didn’t make it?” Then he shook his head and took a sip of beer. “I learned a lot from Talius before the attacks on The Hollow. I find it hard to believe the Baroqueth were able to kill him. Wow.”

  “His death prompted Cade to search for the remaining Keepers, especially after he learned Talius had a daughter none of us knew about. Zareh’s lifemate. Shortly after that, Alazar learned his Keeper had a niece, and she’s his lifemate.”

  “So the surge of female Keepers is true.”

  Syn shrugged a shoulder and turned his head up to the cloudless sky. Streaks of dark navy swallowed up the brilliant cuts of magenta and gold. The moon made its presence known before nightfall took over, a pockmarked chalky white orb waiting for its time to shine.