33. Chapter 33
The tremble in Izzy’s voice carried a current of worry that spoke to the rational side of Daxton’s brain.
Her words pierced through the darkness and awakened him.
She was something he wanted, and when he denied himself, it caused a rift between him and the dragon.
Though he couldn’t say how he felt about her now, he agreed with his dragon—she had hurt him.
And he could accept the role his dragon’s dominance had played in his life.
The dragon’s heat slipped away from his mind. In its place, a calming sensation swept over him.
The dragon relinquished control, and the man breathed in for the first time. Daxton pushed through the suffocating darkness and clawed his way to consciousness.
Izzy’s stance struck him as intimidating and domineering yet also comforting. His heart thundered.
But just like she said, she wasn’t the only one with him. Other dragons surrounded him, locked behind a yellow, cracking light. His clan. Guilt over what he’d done sat heavy in his chest, but he was in control now.
He shifted.
Fire raced over his body. The pain wrenched his insides.
He stretched and shrank all at the same time until he became human.
Chest heaving from exhaustion, he took a moment to ground himself in his crouching human form.
A breeze swept over his sweat-slicked bare skin.
He’d been unable to keep his clothing in the harsh shifts. Cuts and bruises across his body stung.
Murmurs and gasps filled the air.
“It’s a miracle.” Someone said as his clanmates touched him.
They welcomed him as they lifted him to his feet, pushing Izzy away from the circle.
As she was lost to the sea of joyous faces, the gap in his mind called out for her.
But Daxton couldn’t give in when people who loved him surrounded him, especially when he’d hurt them.
His clanmates handed him a towel to wrap around his waist. As each person clasped his arm, patted his back, or touched him, the sting of his wounds pressed against theirs.
They shared that pain together because what happened was a miracle.
Daxton tried to remember the fight and took stock that his clanmates had worked together to bring him down and make sure he hadn’t critically injured anyone.
“Jamal,” he croaked. “Where is Jamal?”
“Here,” Jamal’s voice boomed behind him.
The throng of people split as someone helped Jamal toward him. The sight of his lifted, injured leg wrenched Daxton’s stomach.
He clasped Jamal’s fingers in one hand and pressed his fist into Jamal’s shoulder. At a loss for words, he bowed his head to the other man in submission, pleading for forgiveness.
“You can pay me back later,” Jamal said, squeezing his fingers. “We’re just glad we didn’t lose you.”
“I didn’t say you could leave, Jamal,” Sarah said, rushing toward them. “And you—” She slapped Daxton across the face. “That’s for making me worry.”
The sting sizzled with Healer energy. The pain and swelling in his face lessened until he could open his left eye.
Sarah smacked her fists onto her hips. “Someone get this man some real clothes.”
Never had Daxton felt happier to be human and in the presence of his clanmates.
Even exhausted, Daxton couldn’t sleep. He got out of his bed with a splitting headache.
His ribs twinged as he headed downstairs from his loft.
Sarah had only healed his more serious injuries, while time was the only remedy for the rest. Get-well baskets filled his small living room table.
His heart still ached. He didn’t deserve his clan’s kindness but understood their wonder.
He was the first dragon who’d come back after becoming Lost.
A knock thudded on his door. If it’s another basket…
Izzy stood on the other side. Her presence impacted him as if she were wearing a crown instead of a simple T-shirt and jeans. Still, the gaping hole in his mind was hard to look past.
“What are you still doing here?” he asked. “According to Silas, you just needed dragon fire for your weapon. Though, good luck when Tattered Ones move faster than bullets.”
“Yes. About that. I—I…” She rocked back on her heels and almost appeared as if she’d run away. Stamping her feet down, she sighed. “I will stop him one way or another. I came to ask if I can visit the dragons afterward.”
The nerve. As if he meant nothing to her. He slammed the door in her face and strode to the kitchenette. She’d blazed with such emotion for him when she saved him, but she was back to zero.
His door opened. Izzy’s tangy scent filled his cramped quarters. Izzy stood with her back toward him as she closed the door. Heat bristled up his spine.
“What I meant to say is…I’m sorry.” She turned from the door.
“I shouldn’t have stopped you from attacking Fotios.
I feared what he’d do to you, and part of me couldn’t let you kill him even though he’s not the same person.
When I saw Serephina, it was too much. I stupidly thought emotions led us to failure, and I ran away.
But your clan showed me true strength when they continued to fight for you. Shutting you out isn’t the answer.”
“I’m glad you came to that conclusion. Just wish it had happened before you cut yourself from the link.”
Her face fell. “I want to fix this.”
“That’s hard to believe. Don’t you think the link broke for a reason? We obviously aren’t meant to work.”
“Yes, we are.” The heat in her voice demanded his attention.
“I may think highly of my intelligence, but in this—” she waved her hands between them “—I’ve been a clueless fool.
If I must fight for you, I will because being close to you makes everything new for me.
Despite the danger Fotios poses, you make me feel strong enough to embrace my emotions.
And the idea of being away from you if I had to reincarnate again…
it makes me sick.” Her voice grew thicker.
“The truth is—I’m the one lost without you. ”
His heart skipped against his chest. There was no way she believed that.
He crossed the room with fast strides and angled her head up with a finger under her chin until the sincerity in her eyes crushed him.
He may have fought his dragon about how he felt about her, but the truth was—he still wanted her, and he always would.
But he didn’t know if he could take another ride on her rollercoaster, especially if the link was already gone between them.
Spirit energy hummed in his mind as if knocking against his thoughts.
The energy that carried Izzy’s signature had always been there, but the link lay buried.
When she saved him, he’d felt its presence.
And the answer to fixing it lay in the guardedness reflected in the way she stood stock still.
He’d have to push through that wall if they were to make it.
And after the spark of passion she set between them, Daxton had to try.
“I’m not the answer to your feeling lost,” he said.
She stepped back from him. “What do you mean?”
“You’re not letting go.”
“Go of what?”
“It’s whom you need to let go of.”
Her face paled before flashing red. “You think I haven’t grieved Fotios? That’s preposterous. I laid that man to rest.”
“Have you, Izzy? You said you cried for him, but he showed up on your doorstep. He’s been with you every step of the way. Is that really letting him go?”
Recognition crossed her face, as if he wasn’t the first one to tell her so.
“Oh, please do tell me how I’m supposed to grieve him properly, Daxton.” She threw her hands up and paced away from him. “Especially now that he’s a walking corpse.”
“Tell me how seeing him again has made you feel.”
She stopped pacing. After one heated glance in his direction, she headed for the exit. Daxton slapped a hand on the door just as she opened it.
“Please,” he murmured into her ear, knowing her anger was the right step toward grieving.
Heat radiated from her skin as she breathed deeply. After a few tense seconds, her shoulders drooped. She walked away from him again. Daxton pressed his back against the door.
“Fotios always believed emotions clouded an analytical mind, but he was once so compassionate. The Fotios in Boston isn’t the same man I spent years with.
We would talk through our problems. He would say that even if he held a Remnant of my energy, he cherished our time together.
I tried to remember when he changed, and I think it was after I healed him in a camp of soldiers during the Persian wars.
They held me captive and tortured me because of my abilities. ”
The sad tale was a reminder of how long ago her history went.
“After Fotios rescued me, I think that’s when the dark changes started in him.
His beliefs took on a new meaning. We were so distant from each other, distracted.
He became obsessed with his work and turned into something dark.
He lied to me when he said he’d quit his research.
And now, he’s festered into this being I don’t recognize.
I should have talked to him. What if I had helped him earlier? Would he have become an Archfiend?”
A tear escaped her lashes, squeezing his heart. He walked to her side and cradled her face to wipe the wetness from her cheek.
“You can’t change the past. But we can help free him from the evil he has become.”
She nodded, and a sob shook her body. Daxton wrapped her in his arms, and she fell into him.
A static charge waved between them. The link pushed free of the darkness until it bolstered into a strong energy band once more. Her anguish became his, ravaging his spirit, and he held onto her as she wept.
When he found his voice, he soothed her with words of reassurance and kisses to her forehead, temples, and wet eyelashes. After a while, her sobs subsided, and she slumped, her curves relaxing into him.
“How did you know?” she asked hoarsely.
“I didn’t, but I could feel that the link was buried. That you were holding yourself back from me.”