Chapter 32
Thirty-Two
Anna
“You’ve changed.”
“That’s a strange conversation starter, even for you, El,” I said, nudging her shoulder a little but not hard enough to knock her off the rock we were sitting on.
“Is it?” She lifted a foot off the rock and extended it, dipping a toe into the sparkling water of the little lake behind the chalet.
Ripples rolled out in a perfect circle, and we sat quietly watching them slowly fade. Once they were gone, she repeated the motion again.
“Yes?” I frowned. “Maybe, maybe not. It’s only been a few weeks. I know we haven’t gone that long without seeing each other in what … ten years? Since that business …”
“With Milly’s Uncle Leo, yes,” Ella said, giggling over the memory of the portly man and his failed chicken egg empire. “But you’d changed before we were separated.”
She meant my dragon. I nodded. It wasn’t something I wanted to talk about, but if Ella had chosen to bring up this topic, it was important to her. And if it aided in her recovery, all the better.
The silence that lingered this time was easier. More relaxed. She was still my friend, and would be no matter what.
“Does it bother you?” I asked. She’d been tense before saying that I was different and relaxed when I hadn’t shut her down. So maybe that was it?
“No.” She chewed on her lip. “I wanted to make sure it wasn’t bothering you either.”
“Bothering me how?”
“Like, you weren’t repressing anything.”
“I don’t think I repress much,” I said, shrugging it off.
Ella turned to stare at me like I’d grown a second head. I patted my shoulders just to make sure. Nothing.
“What’s that look for?” I sat up straighter, thoroughly lost.
“Anna,” she said, shaking her head. “I love you like a sister. But you have made your memory loss your entire personality.”
I clenched my teeth at the reminder of my lost past. Of a childhood I would never know.
“See? Even now you’re getting worked up about it.
Which is why I never bring it up anymore.
Nobody cares about it, except you, you know.
You think of yourself as flawed, like you somehow haven’t contributed a thing to our group all these years.
Like we take pity on you, and that’s why Milly and I keep you around or something. ”
I licked my lips. “Um. Wow. Been holding that one back for a while. Have you? That came out awful fast.”
Ella stared at me for a second and then laughed. The sound was soft and tender but full-bodied nonetheless. Her shoulders shook, and she leaned against me, one arm wrapping under my shoulder to hold on.
“See, this is what I mean by you’ve changed,” she said as I snuggled in to her as well, grateful for her presence. “Anna pre-dragon would have been super uptight, maybe offended, definitely wallowing in self-pity more. But now you just make a joke about it.”
“I guess.” I frowned. Had I really changed that much? “What does it mean?”
“I don’t know. I’m not the one who has a dragon in their head all of a sudden. You tell me. What does it feel like? Having a dragon?” Ella looked right at me. “What’s it like having a mate?”
“Terrifying,” I said without hesitation.
“It’s orb-damned terrifying, Ella. And exhilarating.
Soul-filling. I smile so much more, and I have nightmares every night that it isn’t real, that at any moment he’s going to reveal it’s all a giant prank, that he doesn’t care, or that he still despises me because I’m a wing-clipped, unfit for the ice tyrant to mate with. ”
Ella nodded, hanging on every word.
“But I don’t want to go back,” I admitted. “I thought I did at first. He left me in the cage. I was pissed. But he made me a promise that night. That he would always be there, that no matter how difficult it gets, he would show up.”
“And you believe him?” It wasn’t a judgment. She wanted to know the answer.
“Yes.” I laughed once. “Yes, I suppose I do. He’s proven he’s willing to do anything for me.
He’s fought his own family to protect me.
He’s done horrible things. That shouldn’t make me want him more, but, Ella, I can’t keep my hands to myself.
Every time I see him, or smell him, I lose my orb-damned mind. ”
“Smell him?” Ella’s brown eyes scrunched up tight. “He doesn’t stink, I don’t think?”
“No. His scent, his smell.” I half-closed my eyes, inhaling slowly through my nose. “Fresh woodsmoke mixed with citrus. Sweet and tangy all at once. Ugh, it’s the best. When I’m next to him, and I can just lean in and drink it in, El? Amazing.”
“Weird.” Ella shook her head. “I’ve never smelled anything like that from him.”
“Wait. Really?” I’d thought everyone could smell it on him.
“No. He just smells like … dragon to me.”
My dragon growled her displeasure at the idea that another woman would be smelling him. My mate.
Calm down. This is Ella. Besides, she doesn’t smell what we do. It must just be for us because we’re special to him.
Mate, the dragon echoed with a happily possessive growl.
“So that’s just for me then.” I smiled dreamily. “Even better.”
“You smile a lot more too,” Ella added.
“Do I?”
She nodded slowly, playing with some strands of her hair that had fallen in front of her face. “Yes.”
“Here,” I said. I moved behind her and grabbed her long hair, beginning to do my best to separate it without a brush.
“Thanks.”
“Mmm hmm,” I said, thinking more on her last comment as my fingers worked on their own, spinning her hair into a braid that would keep it out of the way. “I guess I’m happier.”
“Because of Caz.”
“Yes.”
“Even knowing that he’s the ice tyrant?”
“Don’t call him that when he’s around,” I said, explaining to her how he hated it, the negative connotations that came with it and how he was fighting to find and punish an elite to start change.
“It’s still a big deal what he is,” Ella said as I finished with her hair and let her scoot around behind me to do the same.
“I know.” I thought about what he’d told me about his father’s death and then what had happened with Mirko and Andrik as well.
“But he’s trying to change it, Ella. For all of the dragons out there like us.
But he needs my help, my perspective. For all his good, he’s never been one of us.
I have. If I can help people like us out, I owe it to them. ”
“But won’t that be dangerous, living among them? They could hurt you, bad. Even kill you. I don’t want you to die.”
“I know,” I said. It wasn’t the first time I’d thought about the consequences of who my mate was.
“I’m not planning on letting it happen, but I can’t be scared either.
If I let that fear ruin a monumental shift among our people, I’m not worthy of what might come of that change.
Am I? I have to be strong, for all the people out in the wilds who sleep with one eye open. ”
“That’s deep.”
Was it? To me it had just seemed right. The way it should be. “Maybe it’s being mated to Caz. Having seen him as the ruler, and considering that if I let him claim me, I’ll be at his side one day, I can help make those changes.”
“I’ll be right there with you,” Ella said with quiet but unshaken bravery. “For whatever that’s worth.”
“It’s a worth a ton,” I said fiercely, reaching over a shoulder to grab her hand and squeeze it tightly. “Don’t you forget that. You’re my best friend. Having you and Milly with me will be a huge help.”
Ella leaned forward, and we took comfort in one another’s presence.
“Do you think he’ll find her?” she asked quietly.
I understood the hidden fear in her voice. Without the third member of our tripod present, it wasn’t the same. And not just because Milly was the loudest of all. The silence wasn’t peaceful. It was a constant reminder we were incomplete.
“If anyone can, it’s him. He has more resources than anyone else. He swore to me he would do whatever it took to find them.”
“You like him a lot.”
“I …” I stared at the water, seeing the orbs reflection on its softly bobbing surface. This high up, the wind was always somewhat present. “Yeah. I do.”
“I can hear it in your voice. You get all giddy when you talk about him.”
“I do not!”
“You should see your eyes when you say his name. Oh, Caz!” she cried deliriously, throwing a hand to her brow.
“I’ll throw you in,” I threatened through laughter.
“You can try, but if I go, I’m taking you with me!”
We laughed again, harder this time. It was really good to have her back. I couldn’t wait until the three of us were reunited at last.
Behind me, Ella stiffened abruptly, her laughter evaporating.
Lifting a hand, she pointed past my head, far to the south. “Look at that,” she whispered, awestruck.
We watched as two mammoth shapes appeared again from within a wispy cloud, gliding sedately past many miles away.
“Pure dragons,” I said, stunned at the spectacle as the mated pair of behemoths continued their long journey westward. Such a sight was incredibly rare.
They were headed westward, where the Great Abyss signaled the end of the Ice Kingdom.
“They’re leaving Hollow Earth,” Ella murmured.
Pure dragons were what happened to a true dragon after centuries of life. The human half of us could only live for so long. When it faded, the dragon took over fully. A pure dragon never stopped growing. Every year for a thousand years or more, they would grow a little bit more.
Until one day it was time. Nobody knew what signaled it. Pure dragons lived in the massive mountains along the southern edges of Hollow Earth, and none went there if they wanted to return.
All that was known was that eventually their time came, and together the mated pair of dragons would head west, crossing over into the Great Abyss and disappearing into the distance and whatever lay beyond.
The journey was too great for any other type of being to make.
In the past, I understood that journeys had been planned and all manner of creature had set out.
Very few had returned at all, and only then to tell of endless nothingness. Whatever the pure dragons sought, it was beyond the reach of any. All the great and epic love stories talked about that journey about eternity and one last voyage with the other half of your soul.
“That could be you one day,” Ella whispered as we watched. “You and Casimir. Making the great journey together.”
I swallowed a lump. She was right. That was the future I was headed toward, if I let it happen. If I let him claim me.
I ran a finger over my teeth. They were smooth for now, but my fangs were in there somewhere, apparently. Maybe I could claim him too, and we could live out our lives together. Like one the great love stories.
“Breathe,” Ella urged. “Breathe, girl. It’s okay. Don’t hyperventilate on me, please.”
Sucking in air, I patted her hand. “I’m good. Just … rearranging the preconceptions of a lifetime. It’s a bit of a shock.”
“I can imagine.”
We watched the dragons disappear into the distance, their giant wings beating slowly in perfect synchronization.
“Hey, you know something,” I said to Ella once they were gone.
“What?”
“If I can have a mate, maybe you can too. Maybe things are changing. Think about that while you’re teasing me.”
Ella was silent.