Chapter 27
Elana
They’d shoved us into a van straight out of every stranger-danger PSA I’d ever seen. White and windowless, it was further proof that these wizards didn’t have an original bone in their bodies. Worse than the textbook molester van were the asshats waiting inside.
I’d expected Leroy. But I hadn’t expected Samuel.
My ex-husband had grinned like the cat who ate the canary.
“Elana,” he’d said, like we were meeting for coffee and he hadn’t just kidnapped me, a dragon baby, and a goblin girl in broad daylight in front of the entire town. “Ah, my darling. You look well. Radiant even. Look at all that magic you’ve saved up for me.”
“Fuck you,” I said, hoping to shock him with the crass word. “I’m not your anything, and especially not your darling.”
His smile didn’t reach his eyes. “But you are. You’re mine forever. Till death do us part, remember?”
I’d refused to say another word the entire ride.
The cave they dragged us into was all too familiar. Same jagged rock formations. Same damp, stale air. Except there was no cage, so this must be a different one from where I’d busted Melly and Dizzi out. I wondered how many of these hideouts they had around the mountain.
Luella and another woman—her mother?—were already there, slumped against the wall.
Both looked exhausted, their skin too pale, their eyes sunken.
I recognized that look. I’d seen it in the mirror many times before.
They were exhausted, drained of their magic.
The wizards had been using them as power sources.
That was what they were to these bastards: living batteries.
My ex-husband stood there like he owned the place, his expensive shoes completely wrong for a cave floor.
Leroy was slumped in a chair, still wearing the stupid-looking wizard robe, except it looked worse for wear, having been dragged through mud and leaves and who knew what else.
A third wizard stood nearby, watching us with cold eyes.
He looked vaguely familiar, like someone I might have passed on the street.
Leroy stepped forward, his dirty robes swishing around his legs.
“I’ve got to thank you, Elana. Because of you, we now know this dragon welp has a human side.
She’s not so useless after all. I don’t know how that blasted dragon found out about the demon, but you’re going to help us fix it. I want those ifrits you control.”
Did this idiot still think I control the ifrits?
I bared my teeth. “I’m going to fix things by helping bury all of you.”
Leroy chuckled. “However did you manage, Samuel? I thought the WEC prided themselves on obedient, well-trained women. Your wife is the most willful woman I’ve ever—”
A low rumble shook the cave walls, interrupting him mid-sentence. I covered my mouth and nose as dust rained from the ceiling.
“That blasted dragon,” Leroy snapped. “How the hell did he find us? I told you we should’ve hidden that car better.”
“And that demon you lost control of is here too,” the third wizard added, voice tight. “He’s trying to break through our wards with his friends.”
Samuel turned to Leroy, eyebrow raised. “Why are you acting so worried? We’re wizards. We can handle them.” His gaze slid back to me. “Especially now that I have my dear wife back.”
He reached for me, and the moment his hand touched my skin, I felt the familiar sinking feeling of my magic being siphoned away. I wanted to hurl. It was like the old days, when he’d drain me dry to fuel his spells.
My body instinctively made itself small, like it always had. But that only lasted half a second as I reminded myself that I wasn’t the same woman as before. This version of me didn’t cower. This version of me fought back and got angry.
I let the rage surge through me, white-hot and furious. Rage for the years he’d stolen. It mingled with my magic, growing until it was too big to contain. I focused everything I had into my fingertips and hurled it at him with a yell.
Samuel flew back, crashing into the cave wall, his eyes wide with shock. Some of the magic missed, slamming into the rock beside him. The surface shimmered, revealing glowing wards woven into the stone. Then I watched as the shimmer slowly cracked.
“Impossible,” Samuel breathed. “You can’t use magic. You never learned.”
I laughed, a full-on cackle, reminding me of how I’d laughed at Emmett that day at the gala. “I’m not the same woman you left behind.” But my eyes were still on the lowly crack in the spell on the cave walls, and an idea started to form. “You made a mistake bringing me here.”
Samuel’s smirk faltered.
I turned my focus to the cave walls and the shimmering threads of magic woven into the stone.
I didn’t need a spell to bring it down. That was one thing I’d learned about magic.
Casting a spell was like erecting a building; you had to do it right or else the structure would fall.
But destroying a spell? That was like demolishing a building; if you didn’t care about the fallout, brute force would do.
And my magic, when wielded without finesse, was brute force indeed.
I reached out with my magic, poking and prodding. The wards resisted at first, but I kept trying, looking for a weak spot. When I finally got my magic to sink in, just a little, I tugged, and the wards shuddered.
Dizzi’s eyes widened as she realized what I was doing. She joined in. Her magic was weaker, but I’d already started a hole, and every little bit helped. Together, we pried at the edges, loosening the wards bit by bit. And we did it all without even moving from our spot.
Samuel’s face twisted in rage. “What the hell are you doing? You bitch!” He lunged for me, his fingers closing around my throat.
Then Melly was there, with the tiniest ferocious growl.
A thin but determined jet of smoke puffed from the dragonlet’s nostrils as she let out a stream of fire.
It scorched Samuel’s arm, and he yelped, letting me go.
Melly took another deep breath, her small chest expanding, but Samuel was ready this time.
He made a motion as if smothering the flames, and the jet spewing from Melly’s mouth dissolved into a sad little wisp that smelled faintly of burnt marshmallows.
Samuel shoved the baby dragon away hard. Melly faceplanted in the dirt. She whimpered, and the sound had me furious. But Melly had scrambled to her feet again and was latching onto his arm with her tiny teeth.
I suddenly remembered the premade spells in the tool belt pockets.
I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten about them, but being plunged into a cold lake, then immediately kidnapped by the one man I’d been hiding from for the past twenty-odd years could do that to a woman.
I grabbed one, even as my eyes scanned the rest of the cave.
Leroy was concentrating on keeping the wards from falling, and the other wizard had a portal up and was transporting crates out from the cave to wherever it went.
If I didn’t act now, we’d all be forced through the portal, and Emmett would arrive to an empty cave. I had to do something. I looked down at the foiled spell in my hands. The word “freeze” was scrawled in Tansy’s handwriting.
What did that mean? I didn’t have time to figure it out, so I pointed it at Samuel. And when he shook Melly loose, I ripped the foil open.
Magic swirled out, combining with mine and pulling from my well. It flew toward Samuel and hit him in the chest. He froze like a statue, his limbs were unmoving, just as the spell said. I ran over and scooped Melly up into my arms.
By now, Leroy had noticed. He stomped over. I tried to grab another spell, but he knocked it from my hand and grabbed me by my hair.
“You’re going to pay for this!”
I shoved my hands into another pocket, but this time instead of a foiled spell my fingers found the scale Emmett had given me all those months ago.
I wasn’t sure what calling him would do now that he was already actively breaking down a mountain to get to me, but I rubbed it anyway, thinking of him.
There was a ground-shuddering crash, and the walls at the far side of the cavern crumbled in.
I saw Emmett before the dust even settled, standing in the wreckage in his dragon form.
He’d literally torn apart the mountains to get to us.
His form blocked out the light from the sun as he took in the scene: me holding Melly, Leroy grabbing me by the hair.
Leroy never stood a chance. The flames came rushing at us, bathing us in blazing light. The heat was overwhelming, and I looked down and away as the scent of charred flesh filled my nostrils. I focused on the green and bronze scaled dragonlet in my arms instead as I waited for the pain.
But the pain didn’t come, and for a moment I wondered if I’d died already, skipping the painful burning part altogether. But my clothes were burning. My hands, however, were still whole. I was covered in fire, but unblemished, much like the dragon child in my arms. It was hot, but not painfully so.
I squeezed my fingers, and the fire in my hands formed into a ball.
Remembering Dizzi and Tansy’s lessons, I tried snuffing the flames out.
It worked, but was quickly replaced by more.
This wasn’t my magic; it wasn’t my fire.
It was Emmett’s. And I was standing in it.
And I was alive. Not just alive, I felt… amazing.
The implication hit me at once. I was Emmett’s mate!
Holy crap! I was his mate!
Suddenly, everything made sense. The connection with Melly, with the castle, with him. Even the fact that I appeared younger in the mirror. Dragons shared their long lives with their mates. I wasn’t any younger, but I was his mate.
I looked from Melly up to Emmett, who stood in his dragon form. Four legs, low slung, and beautifully clad in bronze scales. He was magnificent. Our eyes met, and he started to shift.
But his fire hadn’t caught everyone. Samuel, who had been frozen just out of reach of Emmett’s flames, moved, using my distraction to break free. He ran to Luella, whose eyes were wide in horror and shock, and slapped a hand on her. The glowing shield around him grew and intensified.
“A monster? You chose a monster over me? A rutting beast?” Samuel sneered, then shook his head. “I was wrong about you, Elana. You are not salvageable. But if I can’t have you, no one can.” He flung his arm forward, and I watched in slow motion as an arc of electricity raced toward me.
Emmett moved, reaching for me, and my eyes went wide as he put himself between me and the deadly arc. But I hadn’t come all this way to lose. I hadn’t come all this way to find out I was a dragon’s mate only to lose him because of my good-for-nothing, asshole ex.
Rage burned through me, and I felt the tingling sensation in my fingers just like I had when I torched that goblin.
“Oh no, you don’t!” I threw everything I had at the bolt of electricity. It came so close that I felt my hair rise on end, but it didn’t touch us because I was already flinging it away, redirecting it back the way it came.
I saw the shock in Samuel’s eyes, even as he dodged out of the way. He had not expected me to fight back. He probably hadn’t even realized I could.
The ball was in my court now, and I was angry.
I was angry for the years he’d taken from me.
Furious. I stalked after him, my arms raised.
The first two fireballs missed and flew out of the giant hole Emmett had made when crashing into the cave.
I was preparing a third one when the two ifrits suddenly showed up on either side of Samuel.
“Sorry it took us so long. Had to hold off some goblins. Need a hand?” Blaze asked.
Then the two ifrits each grabbed one of Samuel’s arms, holding him in place.
“Let ‘er rip!” yelled Flame.
“Goodbye, Samuel.” I launched my final fireball directed at the has-been who’d plagued my life.
Flame’s loudly proclaimed, “Yee-haw!” only made the scene more surreal.
I was panting when I looked back at Emmett. He was in his half-shifted form now, the form I liked best on him: human body, a mix of hair waving in the wind and shining dragon scales, a tail, and horns and wings. But it was what he held in his arms that had me gasping out loud.
A human baby, a little singed but no worse for wear, with the most gorgeous green eyes.
“Melly!” I stepped toward them, but found that I’d used up all the adrenaline in my body. I stumbled, but Emmett was moving already, and very soon he had both of us in his arms.
“I was right,” Emmett said in a tone of awe. “She wouldn’t shift because she didn’t feel safe. It was Leroy.”
“Leroy?”
“He made plans in her playroom, thinking she wouldn’t understand.
A normal child wouldn’t, not at her age, but she’s a dragon.
A part of her understood. Cassian and the ifrits warned me, and I installed cameras in the playroom.
I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I should have.
I would never have given you to him. Never! You have to believe me.”
He was holding onto me now like he was afraid I would leave.
“Because I’m your mate.” It wasn’t a question but a statement.
“Yes. Because you are my mate. I have no doubts about it now. Please forgive me for not telling you sooner.” He cupped my cheek with one hand while cradling Melly with the other.
“There’s nothing to forgive.”
There was a clearing of a throat, and Cassian appeared right next to us.
“Hate to break up all this sappy shit, but we have to go. Two fire ifrits, dragon fire, and magical fireballs… the forest is burning. The town is sending in their fire crew now to hold it at bay until the fire rangers can get in. They’re going to sell it as a natural forest fire.
It’s the right time of year. We need to be gone by then. ”
“What about the third guy?” I asked. “And Luella and her mother?”
They were gone. And in their place, a slight shimmering from a closed portal spell.
“Shit. But two out of three ain’t bad,” Cassian mused. “Still, we need to go.”
Emmett grunted in agreement. We couldn’t be here if we wanted the excuse to stick. He handed Melly—who was much smaller and lighter as a human—over to me, and then scooped us both up into his arms.
And then with a leap, we were in the air and flying toward the castle.