Chapter 18
Damien was the dragon. The one who had saved me from the Lake of the Sirens, the one whose presence had made me feel safe. The same man I had danced with at the Midsummer Masquerade Ball. The same one whose touch had haunted me ever since, even when I didn’t know his name.
That’s why his presence felt so familiar to me. I had met him before. I just hadn’t realized who he was. That it was Damien beneath the shell of the sea dragon who saved me.
“Now tell her,” Xavier said suddenly, snapping me back to the present.
I turned to him. “Tell… tell me what? What should Damien tell me, Xavier?” I couldn’t hide the confusion in my tone.
My gaze shifted back to Damien, studying every angle of his face. There was something in his eyes that made my breath catch. The way his scar curved along the eye, shimmering a silver-blue, just like the color of his dragon…
My heart raced. Why was I starting to feel this way?
I stepped back, just slightly, guilt prickling under my skin.
How could I feel like this, when Xavier and I had just been intimate?
Damien didn’t move closer. He just stood there, his hands clenched at his sides, as if he was keeping himself from reaching out to me. And Xavier seemed to know as well…
What were they hiding from me?
“You feel it too,” Damien said quietly. “Don’t you?”
I wanted to deny it, wanted to bury this strange electricity between us. I looked down, shame clawing at me. I didn’t know how I felt.
“Gwendolyn…” Xavier said my name, the sound of his voice bringing me back to focus.
I loved Xavier. Every beat of my heart belonged to him. So why was there a part of me that now beat to something… else?
His fingertips brushed against my back in tender circles, making me relax.
I listened to Damien exhale through his nose. He seemed to be just as nervous as me, until he said, more to himself than to me, “I didn’t ask for this either.”
I swallowed, my gaze drifting back to him. “What didn’t you ask for?”
“That you’re my mate, Gwendolyn,” he said, his voice tight. “And… I believe you’re my brother’s as well.”
Silence fell like a blade between us.
I froze, the meaning of his words striking me like a crack of thunder in my chest.
Mate. Not just a pull. Not a crush or passing temptation. A bond.
Xavier had explained to me they were bonding through physical connection… and that they were exclusive. So, how could I have two mates? Possibly… three.
My breath hitched, and I took another step back, my mind spinning. No. No, this isn’t happening.
Damien didn’t speak. He just looked at me like he already knew the chaos inside me.
And I wasn’t sure if I was terrified… or if some reckless part of me wanted to hear more.
“Look, Gwendolyn. You don’t have any obligations to me, I would never force something on you, force me on you,” Damien explained hurriedly.
“My brother and I lost contact years ago... but due to our powers we’re said to be bound to the same person and that person is you…”
I stayed silent for a while until I found my voice again, looking at both of them.
“Who is your brother?”
Damien seemed to hesitate. His jaw tightened, and something flickered in his eyes, something between caution and hesitation. Then he looked at me, really looked at me, and said quietly, “You’d know him if you met him. You’d feel him. Just like you feel us.”
“And… you sensed him already, right?” Xavier stated.
Who was he talking about?
Xavier seemed to sense my unsureness, his fingers brushing along my face.
You told me in the library, his voice echoed inside my mind—something that was possible only because we had been intimate with each other.
My breath hitched.
He was talking about my angel.
“How do you know…” I stuttered, barely able to form any logical words.
Xavier’s gaze softened, his thumb brushing my lower lip. “Because you’re mine, baby. I know you better than you know yourself. And I’ve heard the way you speak in your sleep. You weren’t dreaming. He was with you.”
“I thought he was just… made up. A childish illusion. I was always alone. I needed a friend, so I created one in my mind.” My voice stuttered in disbelief.
“That’s what your selfish mother told you. But deep down, Gwendolyn, you know that’s not the truth.” The way he said it, like he knew everything I felt deep down inside of me. Xavier’s fingertips grazed down my chin, as his lips pressed themselves there softly.
“Some children can sense spirits,” Damien said, pulling my focus back to him.
“Through smell, touch… even voices from other realms. When did it start?”
“I think I was five, maybe six,” I whispered.
“I used to smell sage and musk whenever I was sad or angry, paired with something floral. It was… comforting and calming.” And then days later, I came across a flower, she was almost too plain to be plucked at the field, but yet she had the sweetest smell.
And then I found out it was the same floral scent I’d perceived when he was there.
The neighbor had explained to me that these flowers were called moonflowers and were associated with dreams in the night.
And I was angry a lot back then. My mother never played with me. I spent most of my time alone.
I didn’t notice I’d spoken the words out loud, before Xavier took my hands in his, brushing over my knuckles.
“I’m so sorry you went through that,” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper.
I could see the guilt shadowing his beautiful green eyes.
Like he should’ve found me sooner, preventing me from feeling like this.
But I knew the loneliness. The quiet grief.
The things I didn’t yet have words for, they now finally started to get a meaning.
“Was it one voice, or different ones you’ve listened to?” Damien asked.
I nodded. “Yes. Always the same. I thought it was a man’s voice. It only came when my mind was in chaos, so mostly at night.”
“And when did it stop?” Damien asked.
“It didn’t,” I said softly. “The last time I heard it… I was drinking. I’d finished the whole bottle of wine.
The voice told me to stop. Told me to breathe.
I thought it was just me trying to ground myself.
And then when I crashed through the hedge of roses and fell through a cave.
The voice was there too and I felt feathers on my arms. But I’m not sure if this is true or it was all my imagination… ”
Xavier and Damien exchanged a look, a silent conversation passing between them.
“It wasn’t your imagination,” Damien said quietly. “He’s real.”
The words sank into me slowly, like light filtering through water. It wasn’t my imagination. It was real. My angel was real.
“I would like to try something,” Damien said carefully. “To see if my assumptions are correct.”
“You think… it was your brother?” I asked, my voice catching in my throat.
“I do. And I think you can sense him more deeply than you know. If you’ll let me, I want to touch your forehead. It’s part of my gift… I mean the part of my dragon… he’s able to read connections, trace emotional threads and influence emotions. Would you let me?”
I hesitated… then nodded. “Yes. If it means we can find him. He… he helped me through so much. I think I owe him that.” And maybe some selfish part of me hoped he was indeed the guardian I had felt in my sleep. I had so many questions.
Damien crouched down, one hand cupping the back of my head, the other resting gently on my forehead.
“Remember to try to think of the situations you saw him, you felt him or smelled his scent. Nothing else. I’ll try to guide you, if necessary,” Damien explained. I nodded, feeling Xavier’s fingers stroking my back for comfort.
It was hard for me to think about someone I had never actually seen before. But I wanted to help Damien, so I closed my eyes and tried to block out everything else around me.
I could hear footsteps.
Where was I?
“Gwendolyn,” she shouted across the room. I giggled, not knowing what to expect next. I turned around, finding myself in a children’s bedroom. Looking around at the paintings and dolls, I realized it was mine.
Little Gwendolyn continued to giggle, hiding under her bed.
“Gwendolyn, you are five years old. Too old to play hide and seek,” my mother shouted down the hallway, the anger evident in her voice.
“Come out now,” my mother shouted again.
I just kept giggling until my mother dragged me from under the bed and out into the garden. My back started to hurt just like hers did. My hair was disheveled. My mother treated me that evening as if I were not her own flesh and blood.
“You are staying in the garden tonight,” she said. “If you don’t obey, you also don’t deserve to sleep on your bed.” And with that she closed the door, locking me outside.
Little Gwendolyn turned around, starting to cry.
The tears flowing down her cheeks. Tears I had almost forgotten and still I knew they weren’t tears of sadness, but of shame and anger.
Feelings a little child should never be feeling.
How often have people in my neighborhood wondered why I used to throw myself to the floor and cry?
What they had thought to be a reaction of defiance, was actually my body’s reaction to defend itself.
But as a child, I wasn’t able to understand it.
I spent the night outside in the garden alone, all by myself in the darkness.
My mouth felt dry and I was sooo thirsty.
I was already half asleep when I felt soft feathers brushing against my arms. So delicate and soft, as if I had only imagined them.
Maybe it had been a child’s attempt to calm itself down.
But then the scent of sage, moonflower, and musk surrounded me.
The thirst and fear slowly went away, helping me fall asleep.
I felt fingers grazing over me, whispering soft praises in my ear. Was this real?
My eyes opened. I was back in the present in Xavier’s bedroom.
Damien was watching me, concern flashing across his face. “Are you okay?”
I nodded slowly. “It was a memory I almost forgot. It’s like my body tried to erase it.”
“You’re stronger than anyone I’ve ever met,” Xavier murmured, pulling me gently onto his lap and pressing a kiss to my forehead.
He did it often, but something about this one had been different…
it felt like he was trying to erase these memories from my mind with the touch of his lips against my skin.
“If I ever see your mother,” he added darkly, “I’ll kill her.”
“Xavier…”
“He’s right,” Damien said softly, still holding my hands.
“But I’m also relieved. Because that night…
that pain… It was how Malakai found you.
Your pain called to him. And he’s never stopped searching since.
No matter where he is now, he won’t give up hope, simply because he knows that you’re alive. ”
Malakai. That was his name. It felt so surreal. I still had so many questions, but at least now I had a name.
“What my mother had explained to be the wild illusions of a child was actually my angel mate trying to connect with me?” I asked.
Damien nodded.
How could that even be possible?
“But… he doesn’t know me.”
“He knows your soul, and that’s enough for him to find you. Angels have incredibly high sensors for their bonds.”
Xavier’s hand trailed up my spine in soothing strokes. “Do you feel where he is now?”
Damien’s face grew more serious. “He’s not in Aetrum. I smelled ashes.”
“Ashes?” I asked, anxiety tightening my chest. “Is that… bad?” Because it sounded bad, very bad. My hands immediately found Xavier’s chest, like I needed to feel his heartbeat to make sure I was safe.
“He could be in the Demon Court in Marabour…”
“That’s what I thought, but I also smelled rain,” Damien added.
“Oh.”
“The Demon Court is made of fire and ruin. It hasn’t rained there in centuries.”
“Then it must be somewhere else in Marabour,” Xavier murmured. “Someplace hidden… cloaked.”
“I’ll speak with Sparrow.”
“My brother? Why?”
He didn’t answer right away. His silence stretched, like something heavy was about to break.
When he finally spoke, his voice was taut. “Because he may know more than he’s telling.”
A long silence hung between us before the man that had found me in the Lakes of the Sirens left.