Chapter Sixteen
Ronan
All thoughts of curtains, linens, and adorable throw rugs in the shape of butterflies and dragonflies flew out the window when I saw that picture. I waddled to the stairs, only to be swept off my feet and carefully carried down them and all the way to my favorite easy chair.
“I-I was going to wait by the door,” I said, starting to get out of it.
“It’s going to be a while,” Odem explained. “They still have to be processed before being driven out here.”
“Oh, okay, I didn’t think about that,” I muttered, feeling a bit foolish.
Of course it would take time to get here, too long for me to stay on my feet, pacing by the door while I waited for my brother to arrive.
“Do you think they’ll be hungry?” I asked. “Maybe we should have refreshments waiting. I do hope Ionus gives us a few minutes before he starts firing questions Upalo’s way.”
“If I know my brother, the inquisition has already begun.”
“He’d better not scare him off,” I yelped, trying to come out of the chair again.
My devious mate cranked the lever and reclined it instead, effectively trapping me in the chair.
“Oh you, I’m going to get you for this,” I said as he backed away, snickering while I kicked my feet.
“You’ll thank me for it when you’re feet aren’t more swollen than they already are,” he said.
“What!”
Screeching, I tried lifting both legs, but that was utterly futile, so I lifted one and peered down at my toes.
“Oh. My. God!” I yelped. “No wonder they won’t fit into anything but bedroom slippers.”
“And some rather adorable pairs,” he pointed out. “No one will mind if you show up wearing them.”
“Now I’m glad I ordered a few sets to match my dresses and joggers.”
“Want me to go upstairs and get you a pair?” he asked.
One more glance at my feet and the answer was easy. “Yes, please. They’re in the front of the carousel.”
“I’ll be right back,” he said, eyes raking over me before I left.
I’d have done a better job of preening if I hadn’t been trapped in the chair.
Next time he was going to be the one trapped in it, when I fell asleep in his lap.
That would be a suitable punishment for his transgression.
When he returned, I realized the real reason he’d stared at me before leaving the room.
The slippers he brought back coordinated beautifully with the dress I had on.
“You already know me so well, mate,” I praised as he slipped them on my feet. “These are the ones I’d have chosen too.”
“Now you just sit there and relax, and I’ll go whip up some sandwiches and drinks.”
“Thank you,” I said, the girls’ eggs poking around in my belly like they were repositioning themselves. “Oh, do you have time to make deviled eggs?”
“I’m sure I can manage,” he called back before disappearing into the kitchen.
Click. Click. Click. I abused the hell out of the button on the remote, scrolling through the steaming service guide, nothing catching, let alone holding, my attention.
I was too anxious about seeing Upalo and getting to ask all the questions I’d had since he left.
Like why he never came back for me and if he’d ever found our mom.
Every few sections I squirmed and it wasn’t the girls’ fault either.
The eggs had settled into a comfortable spot the way they always did when I was in the chair, but I was a restless mess, glaring at the guide screen because oh my Goddess I just wanted something to serve as a distraction.
When I spied The Devil Wears Prada I clicked on it and tried to settle in.
The movie, which had never failed to entertain me in the past, could barely hold my attention.
I was drumming my nails on the arm of the chair when I heard the door open and Ionus’ voice as he stepped into the house.
“Get me out of this chair!” I bellowed, which took way more effort than ever before.
It got the eggs rolling too and I pressed a hand to my belly to help settle them when I heard Upalo holler back.
“Ronan! Are you okay!”
He came thundering into the room a half step behind my mate, who scooped me out of the chair and placed me on my feet, barely having the time to steady me before Upalo engulfed me in a hug, being careful of my belly.
“I’m fine,” I said as I hugged him back as best I could. “Better than fine now that you’re here. Where were you! Why did you stay gone for so long? Why didn’t you come back for me! Did you find our mother? Where did you go when you left?”
“Whoa, whoa, slow down little brother, I’m not going anywhere again,” he replied. “I’ll answer all your questions, and your brothers-in-law’s too. He wasn’t happy about bringing me here before I’d tell him anything, but you deserve to hear the answers before anyone else.”
“I missed you!” I wailed, clinging to him, fat tears, no doubt hormone fueled, rolling down my cheeks.
So much for holding the questions until I had time with him. There were more threatening to tumble out but I wanted the answers to those first.
“Why don’t we all go into the kitchen where we can snack while we eat,” Odem suggested.
“Fine, but I hope you made enough deviled eggs or I may not share,” I threatened as I waddled there between my brother and mate.
Ionus, Baird, and Larkin were already seated at the table when we came in, but Odem must have warned them about the eggs, because none looked to be missing from the platter my mate had made.
He’d made plenty, smart dragon.
“Did I make enough?” Odem asked, chuckling as I sat down in my usual spot.
“Yes, I am willing to share them now,” I declared, before snagging one and popping it in my mouth.
“Pregnancy suits you, brother,” Upalo said. “You look radiant.”
“And you are going to get a lot of practice being an uncle,” I told him. “We’re having twin girls.”
Upalo’s eyes teared up as he stared across the table at me. “Mama would love spoiling them. She always hoped for a girl. I only wish I could have located her.”
“Oh…” My shoulders slumped as he crushed that hope right out of me.
“I’m certain she’s still alive,” Upalo said. “I’ve felt flickers of her presence, but always too far away for me to hone in on. I believe she went back to her people, but I lack the ability to dive deep enough to seek them out.”
“Wait,” I demanded, “back up a moment, please, when you say dive…I need you to be very specific.”
“Our mother’s people are ocean dwellers,” Upalo said. “Unfortunately, you and I take more after our father’s people.”
“I hate him with every fiber of my being,” I snarled, biting into a sandwich and ripping a chunk out of it that was way too large to properly fit my mouth.
It was only when I studied the remaining half left in my hands that I realized that there were fang marks in it, instead of teeth impressions. Giggles bubbled up as I chewed, because I knew it was my dragon’s handwork.
“The man you hate isn’t our father,” Upalo told me. “He’s just the man who took our mother captive and us along with her.”
“Wait,” I said, sputtering as I choked down the bite. “How do you know that and why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Because you already defied him enough and you were way more brazen about it than I was,” Upalo explained. “If you’d known the truth you would have fought him harder and he would have destroyed you before I had the chance to get you out of there.”
“But you were gone so long,” I said. “I had no choice but to leave without you.”
“I’m sorry for that, I truly am. It was never my intention to stay away so long,” Upalo said.
“First I hunted for mother, learning the pieces of our dragon heritage along the way. So much knowledge was denied to us, so we wouldn’t be able to revolt against the elders.
When I learned that true mates did not live long once the other had perished, I knew our real father had to be alive somewhere, so I tried hunting for him, but I barely remembered him, and had only the name our mother called him to go by.
Unfortunately, I’ve come up empty time and time again. ”
While we spoke, his friends, whose names I still couldn’t remember, were steadily pigging out on the thick sandwiches my mate had made, but I could tell that they were listening, and every now and again, I caught one of them studying me.
“We’ve been all over the world,” Upalo said. “Met dragons hidden in intricate caverns and others who were reluctant to even admit that dragons existed out of fear that they’d be discovered.”
“They didn’t always take too kindly to us poking around,” his midnight haired companion said. “We’ve been imprisoned a handful of times and threatened so often I lost count. Some eventually shared information with us, while others banished us from their lands under penalty of death.”
“Communities are scared,” Upalo announced.
“Not all who come hunting for individuals have done so because they hoped for a joyful reunion. Dragons have gone missing. Others are deep in hiding. While some effort has been made to locate the missing, many times it’s only led to more missing.
We were in a seaside town in Japan when we heard rumblings about the protectors and Dragon City.
Some folks believed it was nothing more than folklore, while others were hopeful that a change was in the air.
We came to see for ourselves if it was real and if there were any answers to be found here.
Finding you is a blessing from the Goddess. ”
“I could have helped,” I protested.
“Now, yes, but when I left you were still a child, and I knew he would never allow me to leave with you without a fight I could not win,” Upalo admitted. “I have never been strong enough to defeat him.”
“Because of the leeches,” I blurted.
“In part,” he said. “And because my dragon was damaged in a fight with him not long after he dragged us to live with him. I did my best to keep him from doing the same to you. I’m sorry that meant having to keep secrets from you.”
“No,” I said as I listened to his explanation and allowed it to sink in. “You were right to do it. I didn’t need any more reason to hate him than the ones he gave me. Knowing he’s not truly our father is a relief.”
“Many of us who were raised there did not belong to the dragons who had us,” his midnight haired companion said.
“Wait, what?” I said, startled into dropping the deviled egg I’d snagged. “And please, can you tell me your names, I’m sorry, but I’ve forgotten them. I’ve forgotten a lot of things, though my dragon is slowly sharing the memories with me again.”
“I’m sorry, I should have asked if you remembered who they were,” Upalo said, gesturing to the midnight haired one first, and then the one with hair as white as snow. “This is Canyon and Kestrel.”
“Kes is just fine,” Kestrel said. “That’s all you could ever say of it anyway.”
I stared hard at him now because his voice was familiar, even if his face wasn’t, but then, I think I’d have remembered a man in an eyepatch like the one he was wearing now. His snow-white hair fell loose over his shoulders and hung to the middle of his chest in beautiful, shimmering waves.
“Kes,” I muttered, testing how the name felt on my tongue. “I remember your hair.”
He chuckled at that. “You liked to braid it. Said that it reminded you of icicles.”
Nodding, I smiled, because I remembered now that the strands had always been cold, like ice, too.
Because he is an ice dragon, my dragon reminded me.
Smiling, I nodded across the table at him. “And you always let me. Thank you for being so kind. I was probably an annoying kid pestering you guys all the time.”
“The opposite,” Kes said. “Well, not about the pestering part, you always wanted us to take you on adventures, but you were never annoying. You were always running around giggling and leaping into leaf piles, insisting that they were your own special places to nap. I can’t tell you how many times we had to pick you up out of one to carry you home. ”
“I hated being in the house after mom left,” I muttered, somberness hitting again as I remembered what our home was like after she was gone.
Wee!
Leaves everywhere.
Mama and me leaping into the piles together.
She loved to play silly games with me. The memory was sent straight from my dragon and I would cherish it forever. Someday, when Ruby and Opal were as big as the other dragonets, we’d rake a big pile of leaves in the yard and leap into them together the way my mother and I had done.
“She didn’t leave us of her choosing,” Upalo said.
“That man who ordered us to call him father, Foley, drove her out of the mountains with talons and fangs. He felt that her presence was undermining his ability to run the household and that the ideas she was putting into our heads would make us too tenderhearted to be of any use to him. I don’t know what sent him into a rage that night, but he was determined to make her go. ”
“Are you sure she survived?” I asked, stomach twisting at the viciousness she must have endured.
“I am,” he replied. “I’ve spoken to elders who aided her and helped her heal. The presence I felt was her, but no matter how long I circled above the waves, she never emerged, and I could not dive deep enough to follow.”
“Why would she stay hidden?” I asked. “Couldn’t she sense you too?”
“I wish I could answer that,” he replied. “I’ve wondered the same thing.”
“Why did this happen to us?” I asked. “Why would Foley want to raise sons who weren’t his own? Why keep us from our mother?”
“The answer to why is one of many we’ve sought over the years,” Kes said.
“The dragons who raised me were not my birth parents either, but they are the only ones I remember clearly. Sometimes it feels like the ones I had before are just a wistful dream, but I know they existed, if only because my abilities never lined up with anyone else’s in the village. ”
“Mine didn’t either,” I mumbled, remembering that now.
“No, our lava was unique among them,” Upalo said.
“It was the same with my ability to harness the wind,” Canyon admitted. “That I can forge it into the edged weapon of my choosing was of particular interest to them.”
“They are collecting,” Ionus barked, banging his fist on the table.
One of my precious deviled eggs flopped on its side, half of it’s beautiful filling spilling out, and I shot him a scathing look as I scooped the filling back into the egg and ate it.
“My apologies,” Ionus said, looking sufficiently chastised, though I doubted it was my glare that did it.
The look on my mate’s face threatened violence if Ionus forgot to keep his voice at a dull roar again. That bellow was completely unnecessary.
“The delivery might have been a bit unnecessary,” Larkin declared. “But there’s no denying that is what they are doing.”
“Which tells me that at some point, they’ll return in greater number to try to retrieve the errant pieces,” Ionus said.
Goddess help us all when they did.