35. Chapter 35
John dropped his hands. A different idea? What was she talking about?
Sienna walked over to the desk where the bowl sat all alone, the rest of the desktop’s contents strewn across the floor. “We’re going back to the beginning. We’re reversing the curse.”
He couldn’t have heard her correctly. “Sienna. The Templars are almost here. We don’t have time.”
“Listen to me! We’re trying this first. You don’t have any say, since I’m the only one who can touch this damn knife!”
He blinked at her. His fierce, powerful, and beautiful Sienna.
“Uh. Sorry to interrupt,” Tessa said. “I know that Megan flung all the stuff off the desk onto the floor and that was cool and all, but I wonder if maybe we should try this spell outside. We don’t know exactly what will happen.”
“Yeah.” Sienna cleared her throat. “Let’s go out front.”
Megan picked up the bowl as they marched out the door. John didn’t argue since maybe her brothers could convince Sienna to do what needed to be done. They rushed to the front foyer and outside.
Adam and Eric stood with their wings out and their sentry symbols showing. John assumed that they hoped to intimidate the Templars if all else failed. Marcus, Ryan, and several other guards were standing alongside them with their wings out too.
“Why aren’t you in the basement?” Eric barked before Adam could.
“No time to explain,” Megan said. “Grab the side table off the porch and set it in the drive.”
Eric jogged up the porch steps and did as he was told. Megan, Tessa, and Sienna surrounded it.
“Everyone stand back,” Megan ordered as she broke sprigs of lavender and placed them in the bowl. Tessa’s hands shook as she held a paper that looked suspiciously like the scroll.
Sienna tightened her grip on the dagger and nodded to John. “Come here.”
He sucked in a deep breath as he walked over to her, and she held out her hand. He placed the back of his hand on her palm, and she gave him one last nod before slicing his palm right along the silver scar from when he was child.
Sienna turned his hand over the bowl, and he zeroed in on his blood dripping into the bottom, staining the metal and the lavender sprigs.
His vision blurred and he felt like he was a small boy again.
His heart trying to escape his chest. But instead of his grandmother’s voice filled with venom, Tessa’s shaky voice rang out as she read from the scroll in front of her.
A call to nature
Embrace the flying dragons
Fire, air, water, earth
Give back their wings
Give back their fire
Give back their powers
Fill the sky
The bowl shook and smoke swirled up, followed by a black flame. He held his breath along with everyone else, waiting. But nothing else happened.
Sienna grabbed the scroll and held it down inside the bowl and it caught fire, turning the flames from black to yellow. She dropped it. As the scroll curled up and turned to ash, it felt like something hot and sticky peeled away from John’s body.
Light burst from the fire like fingers and shot outward, hitting both Adam and Eric first. They yelled and stumbled back as their wings expanded, their skin turned colors, and they shifted into their full dragons.
The sentry symbol glowed on their wings like a beacon.
Warmth, or possibly hope, filled John’s chest and encircled his heart.
He studied the majestic purple and red dragons in front of him and then closed his eyes and opened them again to make sure he wasn’t imagining things.
They had done it.
The light bounced to Marcus next, and he turned into a black dragon. He launched into the air, as did the other guards who, like dominos, began changing into their dragon forms. They were beauty in motion and everything John had hoped for over his never-ending life.
Tessa and Megan clutched each other and gaped at the dragons around them, tears running down their faces. And Sienna. She stood frozen as if she couldn’t believe what she had done. She still held the knife in one hand and his bloody hand in the other.
A commotion at the gate had them all turning in that direction.
Sienna yelled for Tessa and Megan to go inside, and they ran toward the house without argument.
Of course Sienna jogged toward the road when all John wanted to do was push her behind him.
The dragons surrounded her as they converged at the gate.
Several trucks and 4x4s sat on the other side.
Men scrambled out of the vehicles, but they didn’t know what to do, pointing their weapons in different directions as the dragons flew overhead.
“The curse is broken. You’ve failed,” Sienna called out in a steady voice. “Leave now.”
A man stepped forward, sneering at her. “We’ll stop you again.
” He gestured, and a woman threw her arms into the air.
Red light shot from her hands and headed for Sienna.
John’s heart stopped as he lunged and pulled Sienna behind him, bracing for the spell, but nothing happened.
He looked up to see that a golden light pulsed from Adam’s wings, and it was wrapped around all of them like a shield.
The witch’s spell bounced back, hitting her and three Templars, killing them before they hit the ground.
Eric launched himself into the air and smacked his wings together. A pulse of energy forced the other men who started shooting to stumble backward. Dragon guards swooped down and grabbed the Templars’ guns with their razor-sharp talons as bursts of flames left their mouths.
Several of the men dropped their weapons and tried to escape, but dragon guards landed on top of their vehicles, stopping them.
Adam, Eric, and a handful of the guards returned to their human forms, and since dragon magic had been restored, their clothes reappeared as well.
It didn’t take long for them to round up the men.
The mercenaries were grouped together, and the six men that had to be Templars sat on the ground, glaring at anyone who approached them.
Everyone tensed when a car drove up until Mia climbed out.
She had streaks of dirt on her face and clothes, and her sleeve was torn off and tied around her bloody arm in a makeshift bandage.
But none of that stopped the look of pure bliss on her face when she saw the orange dragon sitting on top of one of the mercenaries’ SUVs.
“It worked!” But then she jerked to a stop when she caught sight of John.
Sienna smiled. “We didn’t break the curse. We reversed it.” She gestured to Mia. “Are you okay?”
Mia looked down at herself and shrugged.
“The bullet wound is a through and through. And I got a little too close to the Templar super-secret lair after I set it on fire.” She pointed at the larger group of men.
“These guys are hired guns. Keep their weapons and send them on their way with a little dragon haze thrown in for good measure.”
John should have suggested that, but his thoughts were a bit muddied.
“What’s dragon haze?” Sienna asked.
“It’s part of your full dragon’s powers. A dragon can give a suggestion to a human that makes them forget what they’ve seen. It leaves behind a feeling of dread so that they don’t try to think too hard about the memory.”
Eric and Adam nodded. “Our dragons know what to do.”
Within minutes the mercenaries were tearing down the road in their SUVs minus their weapons. Now they turned to the six men sitting on the ground.
John tried to concentrate on what was going on around him, but he felt like he was on the outside watching a movie.
Mia walked over and looked at the bodies that had been moved and covered with sheets. “A witch and three Templars.”
“And with the six Templars here that means we’re missing one, right?” Sienna asked.
Mia shook her head. “One died chasing me.”
“So what should we do with the rest of them?” Sienna asked as she and Mia walked over to the men on their knees.
“They know too much about the dragons, a dragon haze would probably not work on them.” Mia turned to the group.
“Besides. I want you to remember every bit of what I am going to say to you. The Templar facility has been destroyed. And I’m thinking that the fire department will be reporting the illegal weapons they find in the debris to authorities.
ATF, FBI, so many choices. I believe the building was registered under your shell corporation, Matthew.
It won’t take long for them to come knocking on all your doors. ”
Mia was growing on John. He was glad she ended up on their side.
Mia took a step closer to the men, pain and hatred filling her face.
“Since I found out you had Paul killed, I have wanted to end your horrid lives, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that was too easy for you. Instead I want you to live with the fact that you failed. That your Templar ancestors are spinning in their graves and cursing your names. Because let’s face it.
This wasn’t about ridding the world of purported evil.
This was about your fragile egos. You couldn’t handle the idea that someone was stronger than you.
But magic won and there are beings more powerful than you could ever wish to be. ”
She crossed her arms. “However, I’m not the only one you have wronged. Maybe these dragons who you’ve tried to destroy for over a thousand years might want to turn you into charcoal briquettes. I wouldn’t blame them one bit.”
John’s stomach dropped as Matthew attempted to surge to his feet. Sienna punched him in the face. And then Mia kicked him and Matthew fell on his ass in the dirt.
Before John could take a step toward them, his own legs wobbled and his vision blurred. He dropped to his knees and someone screamed. His chest grumbled like his dragon was trying to tell him something.
Why did it feel like goodbye?