Chapter 13
Thirteen
Nolan
Something was different about Zamir when he came back from the bathroom. He seemed lighter, and I had no idea why.
I shot him a questioning look, but he merely smiled at me as he joined me on the couch.
While he'd freshened up, I'd brought the pizza and our drinks—beer with a dash of my fire—over to the coffee table so we could eat comfortably. Muffin and Clip were already stationed on the rug between the couch and coffee table, ready to catch any scraps that fell their way.
Zamir chuckled as he stepped over Clip to sit beside me, and I smiled.
In the span of a few hours, he'd lit up.
His cheeks—what I could see of them over his beard—had more color to them, his aura was bright and beautiful, and our bond seemed stronger than it'd been when he'd first arrived.
Offering him my life force had been the best decision.
"Do you feel okay? I took a lot from you," Zamir asked, and I realized that while I'd taken him in, he'd done the same to me.
Smiling, I brushed the backs of my fingers against his cheek, and he leaned into the touch as his eyes fluttered shut.
If I didn't know he was a shtriga, I'd have thought he was a cat shifter with the way he acted sometimes.
Or maybe he was someone who loved being touched but didn't have enough of it in his life. Well, that ended now.
"I'm fine, Zamir. I promise. You can sense it, I'm sure. You didn't take too much, and I'll regenerate fast. We always do."
Zamir placed his palm on my chest, his fingers firm as they pressed into my skin. "Yeah, I can feel it, but still. I'd hate myself if I'd caused you any pain."
The only way Zamir could ever hurt me was if he left. Or died. But I didn't say that. Even if that ever happened, I would never blame him for it.
"Well, you didn't."
He nodded, then blew out a breath. "All right, let's eat."
And that was what we did. We ate pizza, guarding the slices and the very loose toppings from the hungry gators at our feet.
"Aw, shit!" Zamir exclaimed when a pepperoni slice fell off his slice of pizza. Clip snapped her jaw around it before it could hit the floor, and I shook my head.
"You two act like I never feed you," I told them, and Clip gave me a wide doggy grin as she chewed her treat, making me laugh.
After we'd finished our meal, we kept talking, and I didn't realize how much time had passed until I realized all my fur children had left the room. I glanced up at the clock, and my brows shot up. Zamir followed my gaze, and let out a low whistle.
"Damn, it's late. I should get going."
"Or you could spend the night," I offered, and his lips curved in a small smile, but he shook his head.
"Nah. Maybe some other time?" he asked hopefully, and I nodded.
"Anytime."
He smiled, and we made plans to go out again as we made our way to the front door. Zamir wanted to do something 'human' for our next date, out in the human world, and I promised him I'd figure something out. It'd been a while since I'd dated, but I could figure it out, right?
Zamir pressed a kiss on my lips, then tugged at one of my piercings with his teeth as he pulled away. Of course, that made me pull him into another kiss, and for a while, we stood outside on my small porch, making out like the newly mated pair we were.
He pulled away with a laugh, rested his forehead against mine, and gazed into my eyes. "You're making it hard to leave."
"Then don't."
He sighed, and kissed me again. "I have chores to do tomorrow morning, and I can't ask Keoni to cover for me again. It won't be fair to him."
"I understand. You know, when you're ready, I'd love to meet Keoni, and the rest of your friends. I'd like to see the Sanctuary from the inside."
Zamir grinned. "Yeah? I'd enjoy that too. You've met a few of them already, of course."
I nodded, searching my memory for their names. "Haruto and Liam, right?"
"Yeah. My friends are eager to meet you too. Most of them have never met a dragon."
Being one of seven dragons in the entire world meant I'd met a lot of supes who'd never seen a dragon before, and their reactions ranged from awe to fascination to indifference to downright terror.
"Okay, I'm going to go now. For real," he declared, and I nodded, and drew my hands away from his waist so I wouldn't be tempted to kiss him again.
He smiled, then nodded to himself and climbed down the stairs.
He turned back to wave at me, and I was tempted to walk him home, but I bit back the offer. He didn't need my protection, not for this, and I didn't want him to think I doubted his ability to defend himself, especially now that he was at full strength.
Still, I stood watch until he rounded the corner and disappeared from view before going back inside.
I cleaned up the mess from our dinner, then went into the pet bedroom to check in.
I locked the bunnies' hutch—they spent most of their time in there when Zamir was around, but I hoped they'd get familiar with him soon—made sure all the chickens were in their coop, smiled at Pebble curled up between Clip and Muffin, and left the room, leaving the door slightly ajar.
After turning off all the lights, I retreated to my room and slid under the covers. A soft exhale escaped my lips as I closed my eyes.
While Zamir had napped, I'd spent the hours watching him, admiring the way the sunlight cascaded over his face through the open window, the way his eyelashes gleamed gold.
I'd watched pieces of my life force settle inside him like they were home, watched his own life force strengthen and recover from the near-starved condition it'd been in for thirteen years.
I hadn't slept a wink with him, so sleep came easy to me now, and for once, my dreams were full of visions of the future, instead of the past.
Zamir
I padded into the Forest, my shoes clutched in one hand as I slowly shut the door with my other. Sneaking into a place filled with supes with hypersensitive hearing wasn't easy, and I doubted I'd be able to get home without waking at least one of them. I hoped it wouldn't be...
"There you are."
I jumped, the shoes dropped from my grip, and I pressed myself against the door I'd just shut, catching my breath as I turned to glare at Keoni.
"I hate you," I growled, and he chuckled.
"Hey, I'm not the one sneaking in like a teenager trying to avoid being caught by his parents."
I rolled my eyes at the comparison, then gave him a look. "Why are you up this late?"
He shrugged, giving me a look that was Keoni-speak for 'I don't want to talk about it right this minute, but will you please stick around until I'm ready?'
My nap earlier meant I probably wouldn't sleep for a while, so I nodded, and we walked arm in arm to our favorite spot, a small clearing off the path that was surrounded by trees.
"You wanna?" I nodded up at the sky, and Keoni grinned.
I unstrapped his cart from his back half, and he slowly lowered himself onto the ground.
He turned on his back, and I leaned his back legs—which were still wrapped together with a soft cloth to keep them in place—against the side of his cart so the weight of his horse-half wouldn't topple him.
We'd done this a lot, so it didn't take me long to get him situated and spread myself out beside him.
The canopy of the trees circled our view of the sky, leaving us a three-square-feet window. The headmaster's magic made it so the sky in here mirrored the sky of whatever city or town we were anchored in.
"What do you see?" I asked as I turned my head to look at Keoni.
Centaurs were known for their ability to predict the future with the study of stars, and while Keoni had never officially learned the skill, he'd read every book on the topic available in the Sanctuary library, and every book the headmaster could find for him.
He pursed his lips, brows furrowed, his eyes flicked around, his lips moving silently as he worked his magic.
His brows shot up, and he turned to look at me, his blue eyes bright with curiosity. "Something big happened to you today. Care to share?"
I chuckled, then reached over to ruffle his hair. "As if you couldn't already tell that with one look at me."
He smirked. "You got me. You're practically glowing, and not just the happy kind. You feel... stronger. That's the best way I can think of to explain it."
I told him everything, the kiss, the feeding, the warm glow of Nolan's lifeforce inside me, the mixed feelings I still hadn't quite figured out.
The only thing I didn't tell him was my mom's connection to Nolan.
I was still struggling to digest that one, and I couldn't bring myself to say the words.
"I can't believe you've been starving yourself," Keoni exclaimed, and I winced.
"Shh, you'll wake the others," I hissed, and he rolled his eyes. He knew as well as I did that most of the houses had silencing wards around them to keep inside sounds in, and outside sounds out.
"Zamir."
"I wasn't starving myself. I... I have a lot of mixed feelings when it comes to feeding, Keoni.
Nolan told me about shtrigas who are different, who aren't like my father, but growing up, feeding never resulted in anything good.
I watched my father kill a human he fed on, and he told me it was okay because that's what shtrigas did. He made me believe I was a monster."
I kept my eyes on the stars and swallowed the lump in my throat.
My conversation with Nolan had brought up memories I'd buried at the back of my mind, and I couldn't help wondering what my father was up to now.
Was he still killing humans whenever he got hungry?
Had he looked for me when I ran away? He'd told me he wouldn't lose me, so what'd happened after I'd run away? Had he kept going? Or had he given up?
Was it wrong that I hoped he was still alive, when that would mean the deaths of dozens of humans? Despite everything he'd done, he was still my father.
"I get it," Keoni said, his voice soft as he reached for my hand. He squeezed it gently, and I turned to smile at him.
He returned my smile, but then his face sobered, and he blew out a breath. "I'm worried about Zephyr."
He was one of the few people who called the headmaster by his name. I didn't know why we called him the headmaster, but it was a name that'd stuck, and now it felt weird to call him anything else.
"I think we all are," I said, and he nodded, though something in his eyes told me his concern ran deeper than mine.
There had been moments over the years that'd made me think there might be something going on there, at least on Keoni's side, but I'd never asked him, and he'd never told me.
I understood wanting to keep things to yourself, so I'd never pushed him, but I wanted to now.
"I asked Nolan about it, about the issues we're having."
"Yeah? What did he say?" Keoni asked, eyes full of hope.
"He said the pocket dimension is unbalanced, that we have a lot of new human members who can't contribute any magic, and that makes everything unstable. The headmaster is trying to make up for it all by himself, but his magic isn't enough."
Keoni's brows furrowed. "Can we give more magic from ourselves?"
"I'm not sure. I think if that was possible, the headmaster would've mentioned it. Maybe he's taken all he could from us?"
"Okay, this is weird to ask. I know you and Nolan have just started dating, but he's a dragon, right? He must be very powerful."
I thought about his life force, how it hadn't felt any weaker when I left his place, even though I'd fed on him until I was full.
"Yeah, he is," I murmured, and my lips curved up without a conscious thought from me.
"If he lived here, could he help? Make up for the imbalance?"
I blinked, my brain stuttering to a halt. "You want me to ask Nolan to move in with me?"
Keoni blew out a breath. "Sorry, that's way too much to ask. Forget I said anything, okay? I'm... I'm just worried."
The 'about Zephyr' didn't need to be said, because I could hear it regardless.
"Not now, but maybe soon?" I said, not wanting him to get sad. Keoni was like a younger brother to me, and I hated seeing him down.
"Thanks, Zee," he murmured, then turned his gaze back to the sky.
We lay there for quite a while, and Dots strolled up a while later, curling up on my chest like he belonged.
I ran my fingers through his fur, and the warmth of his body and the twinkling night sky slowed down my buzzing thoughts, the cool breeze made me feel sleepy again, and before I knew it, I was asleep.