Chapter 40
Forty
VAUGHN
Ihave the phone glued to my ear when a power sphere crosses the sky and hits the Elder dragon in the chest. I’ve seen that type of magic before. I look in the direction the sphere came from and see Sophie on the top of a hill just as she collapses to her knees.
“Sophie!” I run toward her, forgetting everyone else. I don’t care about what’s going on up in the sky with the Elder dragon and Larsson. I have tunnel vision, locked in on reaching Sophie.
A sudden roar makes the ground shake. I lose my balance and stagger forward, falling on my hands and knees. Heat comes from above, but I don’t look; I spring back onto my feet and keep going. When I reach the top, Sophie is down and passed out in Igor’s arms.
“Sophie, no…” I drop to my knees next to her. “What happened?”
“She drained herself casting that spell,” Igor replies.
I touch her face, finding it cold. Her pulse is also weak. “Soph, wake up, please.” I pull her into my arms.
“I think she might have gone into premature hibernation,” Tish states, and I notice the sadness in her voice.
“No! She can’t have gone back to sleep. I just found her.” Tears gather in my eyes. “Please, Soph, don’t leave me.”
“Uh-oh. We got company,” Tish says, but I couldn’t care less.
Igor jumps to his feet, body now coiled tight like a spring.
“What the hell! What are you doing here, Igor?” Lucca yells.
“Saving your ass, apparently,” Igor snaps back.
“Saving us?” Lucca laughs. “Who do you take me for? Jacques sent you after us, didn’t he?”
“Jacques didn’t send us, jackass. We did just help you,” Tish retorts.
“What the fuck are you?”
“Everybody shut up!” I shout.
“Vaughn, what’s going on?” Vivi asks.
I shake my head, then cut my wrist and press it against Sophie’s lips. “Wake up, babe. Wake up.”
“What’s wrong with her?” Vivi drops to her knees.
“She’s gone into hibernation. She put every ounce of energy she had into that blast that hit the Elder dragon,” Tish replies.
“It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have told her I was coming here,” I say.
“Maybe you can help her, Vivienne,” Solomon suggests. “You have your powers back.”
I whip my face to hers. “That’s right. I totally forgot about that.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Your blood might work,” Larsson says, appearing in his human form out of nowhere. His hair and suit are pristine, as if he just walked out of a GQ photo shoot.
I tense for a second, then realize there’s nothing he could do to me that would hurt me more than Sophie not opening her eyes.
Vivi nods. “Okay. I’ll try.”
“Hold on a second,” Lucca interrupts. “You don’t even know who she is. If she came with that one over there, she must be the ene—”
“Sophie is not the enemy,” I grit out. “She’s the woman I love.”
Vivi and Lucca both stare at me with wide eyes. I haven’t had a chance to share with them what happened while they were in Ellnesari. This isn’t how I wanted to tell them about Sophie, but I don’t care about their opinion as long as Vivi brings her back.
“I’ll help her, Vaughn, or try at least.”
I glare at Lucca, daring him to open his piehole again. He doesn’t offer any more objections, but he keeps staring at Igor through a narrowed gaze. I can feel the hatred pouring from them in waves.
“I don’t have a knife to cut my wrist,” she says after a moment.
“I’ll do it for you, love.” Lucca drops into a crouch next to her and gently bites her wrist.
Blood drips from the puncture wounds when Vivi applies pressure. She quickly brings her wrist to Sophie’s lips, and I open her mouth to help.
“Come on, Soph. Come back to me.”
Some of Vivi’s blood gets inside Sophie’s mouth, but she’s not swallowing it, so it probably won’t help at all. Nothing happens for a minute, and I begin to lose hope that Vivi will be able to bring Sophie back from hibernation.
“That’s enough blood donation.” Lucca pulls Vivi’s hand away and licks the wound to seal it shut.
She looks at me with her heart in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Vaughn.”
I pull Sophie against my chest, fighting the tightness in my throat. “Thank you for trying.”
Sophie gasps suddenly, her body becoming tense. Her eyes fly open, and they’re crimson instead of lavender. Lucca pulls Vivi to her feet and away from us.
“Hold on to her, boy,” Solomon pipes up. “She might be in bloodlust.”
“Sophie. It’s me. Vaughn.”
She blinks fast, focusing on my face. Relief washes over me when her eyes return to normal and the tension between her brows softens. “What happened?”
“You did too much and went into hibernation,” Igor replies.
Tish rubs her back against Sophie’s arm. “Don’t scare us like that, Soph. I can’t go another hundred years without you around.”
“She hibernated for over a hundred years? Isn’t that too long?” Vivi asks.
“Yes. It’s thanks to Boone,” Tish blurts out. “I owe you my thanks for getting rid of that asshole, Lucca.”
“Glad to do it.”
“What did Boone have to do with Miss Soph—” Igor stops suddenly, his eyes widening. I know he just connected the dots. “No… he did not.”
“Please, I don’t want to talk about him or what he did.”
“Yeah, drop it, Igor,” Tish adds.
“You brought it up,” he argues.
Larsson clears his throat. “Can someone explain to me why I had to kill the Elder dragon?”
“You killed her?” I ask, belatedly remembering that I shouldn’t draw his attention to me considering he probably wants to flay me alive.
He narrows his eyes. “Yes. You’re lucky Ryker failed to mention you were here. I wouldn’t have come otherwise.”
Lucca’s brows arch. “Whoa. What did Vaughn do to you?”
Sophie sits up, pressing her hand against her forehead. “What happened to your precious figurines was an accident.”
He crosses his arms. “They were irreplaceable.”
“Like my mother’s necklace was irreplaceable, and yet I gave it up,” Lucca retorts.
Upon the mention of the necklace Vivi was tasked to steal for Larsson, the dragon shifter relaxes his stance a fraction.
“It’s been real, and it’s been fun, but I can’t say it’s been real fun. Let’s get out of here,” Solomon chimes in.
“How are we getting home? Sophie can’t cast another transportation spell,” Tish says.
“And I can’t walk the wind with everyone,” Vivi adds.
“Well, there’s someone here who can take all of us.” Solomon turns to Larsson.
The look of horror on the dragon shifter’s face is almost comical. “Hell to the fucking no.”
“I don’t want to ride him,” I say.
“I do,” Tish replies, and I don’t think anyone missed the innuendo.
“I helped you defeat the Elder dragon,” Sophie reminds him. “And opened the lerix box for you.”
“You also trashed my office,” he argues.
“That was my fault,” I say. “Besides, if those figurines were that valuable to you, they should have been locked in a safe, not on display on easily breakable shelves.”
Larsson’s eyes flash like embers, reminding me that he can easily kill me.
“Sunrise is coming. You either help us, or we need to find cover now,” Lucca butts in.
Larsson grunts. “Fine, but this stays between us.”
“Excellent.” Solomon claps his hands, strangely excited. “I’ve always wanted to ride a dragon.”
“Everyone needs to stop saying that,” Igor pipes up.
“Why?” Tish asks.
“Because it’s pissing the dragon off, and it’s weird as fuck.”
“Finally, someone with brain cells in this group.” Larsson turns around and breaks into a run down the hill. I crane my neck to see where he’s going, but a moment later, he soars in his dragon form.
Shit. He’s bigger than I thought, and now we have to ride on the back of that beast.
God help us all.