CHAPTER 11 #2
I peek around Koen, through his broad arms that pull on the reins for Zeei to walk backwards. The horse shifts, his muscles flexing with every move. I notice Florian’s horse begins to trot around us, moving as far away as he can.
Then I see… him.
Florian’s fingers claw at the ground as his back hunches upward, his high-pitched screech rattling my bones.
He moans in agony as his clothes on his back begin to rip, and I catch his bones rippling underneath him.
Each movement is followed by the unsettling sound of bones cracking and reshaping beneath his skin.
His body convulses, muscles rippling as massive, leathery, ash-colored wings began to bulge and spread from his back.
A guttural scream rips from his throat, echoing with raw agony as he shouts to the sky above.
His skin stretches and ripples unnaturally, straining to accommodate the emerging form that is clawing beneath.
What the actual hell is happening to him.
“Forgive me, Gods,” Florian pleads out to the sky.
I slide off the horse, my boots splashing in the mud as I begin to run towards him.
But fingers dig into my skin, yanking me back with one forceful tug. Koen hovers over me with rage etched into every detail of his face. “Do you have a death wish!” he growls.
With all the effort I have, I try to yank free from his grip, but there is no use.
“What is wrong with him!” I tear my gaze from Koen’s dark eyes and watch Florian’s body rip apart.
“His curse.” Koen drags me away as I continue to fight to break free. “He must do this for us to enter.”
“I don’t want to enter then!” I plead out, my hair swaying in my face as I fight Koen’s vise. “This is insanity! How is this even possible? He will die!”
“Not to the people inside those walls.” He yanks me against his body, slamming into his solid chest. “You should fear this. You should be trying to flee from our presence, yet you stay. You fight me to help him… why?” His eyes glance around my face, searching for any fear that might be present.
But there isn't. I don’t fear Florian. I don’t fear Florian as he transforms into… a dragon. I fear him. Koen. I don’t understand why, but in his eyes, I feel as if I have known them all my life. As if he was the monster hiding in my closet at night.
His hot breath tickles against my face as he pulls me closer. “Who and what are you, really? You should fear that beast that my brother is turning into!”
“I guess you’ll never know if you have yet to believe anything I have said to the two of you!” I stand on my tiptoes, my boots digging into the mud as I glare into his emerald eyes. “Your brother is in pain and all you still want to know is who I am… why?”
“I fear you might be something we cannot control. And the palace thrives on control. They will have your head.”
I take a deep breath, my voice drops to a deep growl as my chin tilts high. “And I fear, Koen, you might be right.”
Let the damn Queen take my head. But I’ll survive long enough to find Tilly.
My body rips away from him, but my eyes never leave his intense glare that melts into me. They burn, almost like the fire in the eyes of Florian the first night we met, but Koen’s spark with a hue of scarlet-red, almost scaring him with a darkness that is deep inside him.
But as I get lost into his gaze, a tail whips in the air inches away from us, pearly-white spikes along the scales beam brightly and the sun bounces off his iridescent scales that were once a dark gray but now have lightened like the snow back in the Ice Nation.
Fire ripples throughout the air, heating up the sky around us as ash falls down over us.
I glance over, tentatively, fear etching into every single muscle inside of me as I watch him turn.
Prince Florian… a dragon.
My eyes widen as my lips part. His wings send out waves of air, pushing us backwards as our heels dig into the mud to prevent us from falling.
His pearly-white scales reflect the sun, making it almost impossible to fully see him and as he towers over us all, a deep growl bellowing from the pit of his massive stomach.
Koen and I crouch, hands cupping our ears as we both squeeze our eyes shut.
Clouds of smoke fill the sky, ash falling around us like a blizzard evening in Alaska, a torturing reminder of the possibility of never returning to help Alice escape the mountain.
Fire ripples through the air, singeing at my skin as I duck to the ground.
Koen throws his body over me, shielding me from the flames.
My cheek soaks in the mud and I gurgle against it as the sounds of his cries become blocked by dirt seeping into my eardrums. Koen’s broad arm hovers over my face as his other arm wraps around my head, pulling me into his body without a second thought.
Besides the smell of a dirty aroma, my nose lifts towards his neck, nestling into his protection and his scent relaxes me.
My body relaxes as I melt into his familiar scent of charred fire mixed with a floral aroma.
Reminding me of the field of ash. I remember this scent.
But his scent, the way his body smells, soothes me. Eases me.
But it shouldn’t.
And through his arms, I manage to see Florian breathe the deepest shade of red I have ever seen, fire bellowing out over the water to the castle and molding a bridge as if melted lava was forming over water.
The ruby-red bridge glistens like glass as it arches a pathway and raven-black markings form scales along the side with swirls of dragon bodies along the sides of the bridge.
Reminding me of the sand dragons back in the Desert of Death.
And up above, the symbols I saw back in the village and the same one on Florian’s chest, begin to take formation, the five rings with dragon wings.
My eyes narrow as my brows arch in. “What… what is happening?” My voice trembles. But Koen hears me.
He pulls me closer, the heat of his breath tickles against my mud-freckled cheek. “Only a dragon can breathe the bridge to life.”