Chapter 10 Sister
SISTER
Strom and Laerke’s history comes back to me as I watch him take her hand now, comforting her.
He’s not in love with Laerke anymore; I can feel it through our bond.
That ship has long past sailed for him, thanks to Alfhild Fey doing such a number on him and ending their relationship.
Strom’s sadness echoes Mikkel’s, however, as Mikkel clasps Laerke close now, kissing her brow and pressing their cheeks together.
I know the twins and Strom were a threesome in the past, but that past is long dead, over a hundred years gone. I sense how Laerke feels alone now, though, since both Strom and Mikkel have found a place in my Bloodbond.
And she hasn’t.
I feel her deep sadness that everything has turned out this way, but I can also feel through my bond to Mikkel that Laerke no longer pines for what they once had. She knows Strom is good for me and this bond. Just as she felt for Mikkel, she’s happy we all found each other.
But it can’t help her heartbreak—that she’s the one left out in the cold.
“You wish you could find good love again, like me and my drakes.” I understand her now, with the deepest intuition of my Bloodwalker magic. Aesa’s Truthstone no longer hums on my chest, but I know I’m right as my power directs the way to Laerke’s deepest truth.
Plain as day, written all over her face.
I know Laerke wouldn’t grovel to be in my Bloodbond; and my bond does not reach out to her, not like it did with my drakes, for her to be included in it.
But something else is happening between us, as I take up both Laerke’s hands and hold them in mine, staring her down. She doesn’t flinch, or remove them, and her eyes don’t shy away.
Only a terrible sadness envelopes her—which I can feel now, lancing deep inside her heart.
“It’s fine, Rikyava. Don’t worry about it. You can continue with your drakes, as you need to, to raise your energies and get ready for a Bloodwalking. I’ll remove myself.” Bitterness fills Laerke as a cold, solitary fire of purple darkness devours her eyes.
She moves to go, though I hold her hands, not letting her get away. Pausing, she lifts an eyebrow at me; though the look is severe, it’s also questioning, as I hold her now in this intimate space.
Something is happening between our magics; even I’m not sure what it is, as both my inner black drake and my bright drakaina roil through my veins. Wildfire scorches over my skin as I stare into Laerke’s bitter gaze; as she inhales, her eyes widen, and I see her vivid lavender eyes blaze.
Bright spring green with flecks of gold, they’re like nothing I’ve ever seen from her before. Mikkel inhales beside us as his dragon comes to high alert inside him. He moves in close beside us, touching his twin’s shoulder.
“Sister, what…?” Mikkel says as he watches that strange phenomenon sear through Laerke’s eyes.
But even as he speaks, I feel my inner dragons twist hard now into my united Bloodwalker magic. As auric wildfire bursts between Laerke and me, flashing hard from my magic, I feel how my power resonates with Laerke’s.
Laerke gasps as that power sparks between us. With that ring of springtime flaring so bright in her eyes now, Laerke stares at me with her mouth open in astonishment, even though neither of us quite knows what is happening here.
But it’s as if my power recognizes hers somehow—and wants to do something about her deep inner sadness.
Something inside my Bloodwalker magic howls now, not to leave her out in the cold like she has been, distant and alone.
Laerke’s not a mate, not someone destined to be in my Bloodbond.
This power is something else, as I feel some kind of connection yearning between our two powers, roaring to be made.
I’m not thinking now, only feeling, as my magic burns like crazy now inside my skin. My united Bloodwalker power hurtles into Laerke in one masterful wave as I release one hand, putting a palm to her chest.
As my hand touches her heart, a burst of wildfire thunders between us; something rockets through me as Laerke and I are hauled close, with my drakes also pulled in tight now around us.
Memories flood into me from Laerke. I feel them sear through Mikkel’s Bloodbond to me. Laerke is masterful in her mind-magics; she would never let me see into her past voluntarily, but her horrible history comes crashing in now as she cries out and Mikkel grunts.
I gasp as my palm is hauled in tight to her chest by whatever my magic is doing to us.
As memories pour into me of Laerke’s bad use by a tirade of vicious drakes in her teens, then a long string of coldly distant one-night stands after she started her and Mikkel’s clubs, I feel how she’s never let anyone get close to her.
She’s let no one other than Mikkel see the real drakaina she is—beautiful, radiant, and intensely loving. No one except Strom, long ago.
And me now, as we stand in this space together, heart to heart.
As Laerke’s terrible past is cracked wide open by my magic, I feel how something deep inside her aches. My heart clenches so hard that I gasp, like a sob; I feel the vast ache that suffuses her, gripping in my chest like an iron band and constricting deep around my heart.
I understand it’s her broken heart I feel, as everything inside me floods into a deep, infinitely compassionate place. A place I’ve never been to in my Bloodwalker power before, it’s not a hot fire of lust that fills me now—but a deep, resonant love.
Compassion, togetherness, fealty, respect; all these things fill me now as I find Laerke’s broken heart and let it suffuse me, deep. As a massive heave of my power rushes all through me now, resonating like crazy with Laerke’s Bone Magic, I feel how deeply they understand each other.
Because I’ve had my share of heartbreak, too, of a different kind. The harmony our mutual understanding creates is unlike anything I’ve ever felt inside my magic before.
Laerke’s eyes spark hard with that luminous spring green color now, roaring.
“Sister. Your magic…!” Mikkel breathes as he waves a hand through the air.
Because Laerke’s power is sparking in runnels of auric fire now just like ours, only a beautiful, scintillating opal-green as it lifts in the air around us.
That power spreads in a tremendous wave through me via Mikkel, as Laerke and I stand strong in this insane synergy of understanding shared between us.
Laerke is a tidal wave of power with her Bone Magic.
It’s incredible, as I feel that gargantuan magic open to me now, though not in a Bloodbond way.
It’s a wave of sisterhood we’re sharing now, rather than of mates; of battle-drakainas in the trenches, of Matriarchs ready to take their place in the world.
Of furious powers, resplendent, despite all our woes.
Soul sisters—found.
“We’re sisters, you and I. Soul sisters,” I say as I understand it. “Sisters in wrath and sisters in war… we’re sisters in peace and love, too. Family—real family. No matter what situation we were born into.”
As I finally get why Laerke and I have been resonating with each other these past days, the truth sings all through my heart. Ever since she gave her all to protect us as we made the Soulstone, I’ve understood Laerke is with us to the end, despite not being bonded to us.
She’s a righteous bitch of a drakaina, a force to be reckoned with—just like me. We’re two peas in a pod, and we trust each other, now that she knows how much I love and care about Mikkel. She knows I am no threat to their empire, and I know she would do anything for our Bloodbond, even die for us.
Real family—a true sister to the end.
“I have a sister…!” Laerke says now, as tears shed from her blazing green-white eyes. As her eyes fill with an incredible light, her magic suddenly combusts all around us—and mine does, as well.
My entire magic trumpets with glory then, as something sings from my deepest heart. It sings from Laerke’s heart, too, as that massive wave fills us both up with a sensation of family found, right through our core.
It careens all through me, bursting inside my bones and sinews in a beautiful wave of light, as we understand what we are to each other. Like me, Laerke’s been yearning for a sister all these years. She loves her brother, but there are some things only a sister can share.
A sister who is strong enough, true enough, and a badass bitch enough to hold her where she is broken, in her deepest heart of hearts. As Laerke bursts into tears now, her entire body shaking with the force of her tremendous sobs, I wrap my arms around her.
I hold her as she breaks, letting her know she’s safe. She loses it, roaring as she screams with the highest screeches and deepest bass notes of her dragon in her voice.
Cinching close to her side, Mikkel pets her sweetly, and Strom wraps himself around her back, protective. Bjorn and Baldur form a solid container around us with their encircling arms and power.
But I hold Laerke as she screams out all of her endless woes, giving her my all in this powerful space. My power dives deep inside her, through our bodies and chests pressed close.
As our shared auric fire bursts into the air all around us now, I feel my Bloodwalker power dive into Laerke’s deepest heart, digesting her misery, where she roars for release. I feel it thrust right down into all the places she hides, the darkest places she never wants to show anybody.
The massive compassion and sisterhood inside me cracks wide open to Laerke’s misery. As my heart goes pouring into her body now, deep inside that endless hell she lives in, luminous white sigils blaze all through me.
As I understand Laerke—heart, body, and soul—compassion floods me in a tirade. I am lost in a universal bliss as my power pours right into the stains that ruin her heart.