A Shade of Dragon (13 page)

I
used
the firelight at my back to guide myself out of the cave again, waiting patiently on Theon. I exited into a blast of bitter midnight wind, wondering why he’d be willing to come out here naked. In a matter of seconds, Theon arrived to join me, skipping onto the bridge-like formation where I had sat on the first night we met. I gaped. He had transformed into a dragon again. In public! On the beach where my dad lived!

Theon leaned down to scoop me up with his massive, triangular skull, depositing me onto the bridge-shaped rock with him.

“Is this where you wanted to take me?” I asked, joking.

“Yes,” Theon said, his voice deep and husky. “It’s not far from here that we will find a portal.”

“A p-portal?”

“Do you see that island, just beneath the moon?” Theon asked.

I squinted and peered over the waves. There were no islands off the coast of Beggar’s Hole, I knew that, and yet, in the distance, I did see some dark speckles. It looked like nothing more than another formation of rocks, much like the one on which we stood. “Yes, I see it.”

“Let’s go there. You will hold my clothing for me, so that I may dress when we arrive. We will find the gate on that island, and you will finally be able to see the country about which you have so often wondered: The Hearthlands.”

My heartbeat raced. We were going to see his home country. I imagined verdant fields, and gigantic dragons arcing to and fro in the sky.

“How will we get there?” I wondered aloud.

It was probably the stupidest thing I’d ever said. Theon nudged me again with his large head, and I slid onto the back of his neck, which was as thick as a horse’s back at the junction of its base and his shoulder blades.

His black wings began to beat, showing their golden undersides, and a tiny yelp escaped my lips before I wound my arms around his neck and buried my face into his soft scales. Theon lifted into the air, taking me with him, and then we were moving over the dark ocean, ribbed with waves and hemmed in with a light mist.

I forced myself to accept the surreality of this situation.
You are on your dragon boyfriend’s back… and he’s taking you over the ocean, to some island, to a portal… which will lead into another dimension… where you can see his home country. Yes. All of that is true.

I gulped and pinned my face against his neck, squeezing my eyes shut and trying to ignore the buffeting of the icy winds.

Theon settled with a jolt and I brought my face away from his neck, where it had remained pressed with my eyes tightly shut. I slid from off his back and gazed around. We were on one large rock, surrounded by other large rocks. All around us stretched black sea—and above us, black sky—so that it was as if we’d been marooned on some vast, empty, oceanic planet. Even the distant shoreline was almost invisible from here, save the dark strip at the very horizon.

The only hint of civilization was a metallic bolt which appeared to be drilled, or hammered, into the rock.

“You said the gate was here,” I reminded Theon, stooping to examine the bolt. It was then that I stood up and fell back a step.

The thing I was seeing between these rocks, which I had thought was the swirling, dark ocean, was not.

Attached to that metallic bolt was a strange, smoky canvas whose depth and substance could not be discerned. It wasn’t water which connected this circle of jagged rocks. It was a star-choked abyss, which shifted and faded, influenced by something to which I was not privy.

“Oh, my God,” I whispered.

“Yes,” Theon agreed. “This portal was only recently discovered by me, but I remember my first encounter with a different one. It is breathtaking. Not only is it beautiful… but an entire universe of worlds is only one touch away.”

“One touch?” I whispered.

Theon nodded gravely. “You only need to go through,” he assured me. “The portal will do all the rest.”

“I… But, Theon…” I turned from the portal to face him. “I can’t just jump into another world like that.” I laughed nervously, a hint of my old self coming back to me—the girl who would never dare to dream for herself, the girl who faltered when asked to let her imagination run wild. “I don’t know what’s on the other side.”

Theon smiled warmly and braced my elbows with his palms. “It’s paradise,” he said. “You’ll never see a more beautiful country in all of your planet. The hills are grassy and emerald, choked in vibrant flora. Clouds are rare and distant, almost yellowed by the purity of the sunlight. Our wildlife is prolific. The sense of growth and succulence is overwhelming, particularly to visitors from less-fortunate worlds.”

“So I guess you won’t be needing your jacket.”

“We will return here in a matter of minutes, I promise you.” Theon guided me toward the portal. Theon took his jacket from me, draped it over his arm, and took my hand. “You will step with me into the portal.” He took one step closer to the ledge of the rock, where the bolt signaled the border of the gate. I hesitated, but he glimpsed back and smiled. “Trust me, you’ll be safe in The Hearthlands. They’ve not seen unrest since the decapitation of Emperor Bram.” I blinked and stared at Theon blankly. “Many, many years ago now,” he explained. He rubbed his thumb down the inside of my palm. “Trust me, Nell.”

I took a deep breath and nodded. We took one more step forward, and then we leapt into open air.

T
he world
around us was briefly crushing and colorless, like falling down an inky tunnel; it wasn’t painful as much as it was uncomfortable. Then we were dumped onto our hands and knees in a foot of snow. I reeled backwards, surprised by its intense coldness, and climbed to my feet. This world looked nothing like the world that Theon had described.

The sky was low and huddled in metallic clouds. They spat chunks of snow and ice in a hail around us, and my arms came up to surround myself. Even though Theon wasn’t wearing any jacket, he took the woolen coat from off his arm and laid it across my shoulders, swallowing me in its layers.

We were surrounded by rolling hills, that much was true, and in the distance—hardly visible in this snowstorm—appeared to be mountains.

“This isn’t right,” Theon breathed, his face carved with a worry I had never seen before. “I must get closer, but I cannot uphold my promise that this is a safe place for you to be. My castle is just a little beyond here. You can stay at this gate and await my return. If you notice anyone who is not me, jump back through the gate immediately. Count to three hundred. If I have not returned by then, you must leave without me and I will come back to you when I’m able.”

“Theon, I can’t. I can’t leave without you. The gate on Earth is out at sea, and what if the water level rises? If anything happens to you here… I’ll drown back on Earth.”

Theon winced. “Of course,” he said. “Then I must secure you first, and then return.”

In the distance overhead, several shadows migrated toward us. In the blowing snow, they looked like blue blimps, but they moved with the same grace and speed as Theon had moved in the cave. But the snow had also hindered visibility. They weren’t that far away from us.

“What is that?” I dared ask.

“A pack,” he answered, “coming to inspect the activity at the gate. We must flee before we’re seen. Take my hand. Don’t let go.”

But he didn’t only take my hand. He took my hand, and he also took my other arm in his other hand, just in case the tension between our hands broke. Then he leapt, pulling me into the air with him, no hesitation, back into the black, crushing void.

T
heon and I
, both coated in snow, sprawled across the wet, jagged rock island off the coast of Maine. I breathed hard and struggled to catch my bearings, but I couldn’t imagine how it must’ve felt to be Theon. What must it feel like to transport your significant other to your homeland, only to find that everything had changed and it’d been transformed into some bitter, wintry wasteland?

Theon was already standing, pacing on the rock. “I have to go back,” he said, his jaw tense. “I’ll take you home first. Keep the pendant. Never lose it. If I can return, I will use its power to find you.” He stooped and gazed into my eyes. “I know you must understand why I have to do this.”

I swallowed. Did he think that he might die? How dangerous were The Hearthlands now? “What’s going on over there, Theon?” I asked him. “Do you have any idea? I’m—scared—”

The words had only just left my lips when an azure-blue dragon head erupted through the portal, followed by a spill of talons, wings, and a long, whipping tail. The beast was much smaller than Theon in his dragon form, but it was still much bigger than Theon in his human form. The dragon was low and long, slinky, with an angular, strangely haughty face. Its electric-blue eyes shimmered and I collapsed back onto the rocks, screaming.

A woman emerged through the portal next, riding the back of this dragon, and she was familiar. Her body was thin and pale, her hair was straight, long, and black, and her mouth was dripping in dark red lipstick. She wore a long black skirt, a black sweater, and a neck full of gaudy brass pendants. Latex boots with thick platforms.

Then it hit me. She was the woman who’d owned the apartment. The “interested third party”…

Theon transformed rapidly in front of me, keeping his body between mine and theirs, just as he had done with the harpies. He lunged for the blue dragon and it darted back, blowing a stream of ice shards at his plated chest. The thickness of Theon’s hide didn’t allow for the offense to break through. Theon only roared in defense, even though he was significantly bigger than the blue dragon; he could have killed it, I surmised.

The black-haired woman threw her hands toward Theon. A sickly yellow haze was flung from her body like a shower of pollen, and it seared into Theon’s eyes, causing him to falter, his head to swivel and sway. He roared again, and his face convulsed. He threw his head back in a rage and a swath of white-hot flame such as I had never seen filled the sky.

Theon staggered to the left and lost his footing, scrabbling on the rocks and causing many of them to collapse into the sea. He stumbled into the water itself and slid into the battering waves. “Theon!” I screamed, forgetting how very small and weak I was. I thought only of him needing my help, him wounded, him falling into the ocean.

I darted forward and grabbed his thick neck, tugging him back onto the rocks… or trying to. Of course, he was much heavier than I. As he fell further into the water and cried out in pain and confusion, my own hands locked around his neck pulled me with him, toward the violent sea beyond. “No!” I cried, pulling harder and only losing more ground. “Theon!”

His dragon form slid completely into the water and, still clutching him, I too was pulled in. We both went underwater and I was reminded vividly of the night we’d met. Burning pins of ice sank into my every pore and I gasped involuntarily, sucking the frigid saltwater into my lungs.

I pulled toward the surface to breathe, coughing while underwater and only sucking in more of the ocean, but Theon was also thrashing in the waves and his tail and wings struck me, driving me underwater again until the tide pulled us apart. I threw my arms into the air wildly and snatched a grip on the side of this rock island, first vomiting, then coughing, then gratefully dragging the cold air into my lungs, relieved to merely no longer be drowning.

I couldn’t see Theon or the blue dragon anymore—

Warm hands secured my shoulders and dragged me backwards, into the air and out of the water. At first I thought it was Theon, even as I was dragged and draped across a narrow, scaly hide. But I realized who it must have been. My eyes bulged open. These scales were a bright, vibrant azure, and I shrieked.

The blue dragon lifted into the sky and wove in circles, lazy and smug in his victory. The black-haired woman pinned me to his back, even as I thrashed and cried out. I struck at her wiry frame, but she was surprisingly strong. “Let me go!”

Up close, she was older than she had appeared from a distance. Wrinkles encroached on her eyes, where there was a hardness one seldom found in the eyes of an adolescent.

I wrenched from her hands to gaze down to the black ocean below. Theon… He had transformed back into a human, and was crawling back onto the rock island from the water. He was completely nude, his clothing ripped off in the unexpected transformation, and his eyes were squeezed shut.

I screamed down to him. “Theon!”

Theon’s head lifted so that I could see his face. His wet hair whipped in the wind. “Nell!”

The blue dragon completed one more pattern and then darted down into the portal. In a flash, Theon was gone, and I was pinned to the back of an unknown blue dragon, accompanied by some kind of witch, sucked through the narrow, inky tunnel between Earth and The Hearthlands… and Theon was back at that rock island. Alone. Naked. And blind.

“
N
ell
!” I bellowed into the winds—but no sound answered me back; even her screams had been dampened into silence. A cold despair swallowed me whole.
No! No!

I could only imagine the horrors being enacted in my home country, the condition of my father and mother—and now Nell. Why would they have taken her? She was nothing to them, a young Earth girl who had never even heard of The Hearthlands… until she’d met me.

Would they treat her with kindness or cruelty? What had the ice dragons done? How had they altered the very island itself?

I groped for the bolt which would signal to me one of the far corners of the portal; I could jump. I could follow them. But where would I find someone to heal my eyes? Would it really be wisest to leap, blinded, into unfriendly territory?

It didn’t matter anyway. I couldn’t find any of the three bolts securing the triangular gate. I only felt rough rock beneath my palms.

I couldn’t see anything. That witch—Thalissa, she’d called herself—had hexed the only vulnerable part of my dragon form: the eyes. Now, without the aid of another magical person, I feared I would be too useless to even cross over for Nell, much less find her and rescue her without getting us both killed. I needed to think logically… I couldn’t let my role in this fill me with such grief that I began making haphazard decisions.

Let’s think,
I instructed myself dizzily.
Let’s think. You’re the only hope Penelope has, and you might be the only hope of the entirety of The Hearthlands… so you have to think. Number one—don’t get killed. Do not let yourself die until Nell has been safely returned to her family. If you do not rescue her, it’s unlikely she’ll ever return home again… and she must live, with or without me, a long and happy life. She must.

I would need to transform and fly from the portal. Resting so near to it was dangerous; the exchange with the blue dragon had proven so. What if he returned, and me still in this condition?

But how could I find my way back to the beach while blind?

Transforming into my dragon self, I took to the sky and moved in the direction of the clanking buoys between the rock island and the sandy shore. After that, it wouldn’t be far until I reached the beach, and even if I was off-track, it wouldn’t be by much. It was a dark, cold holiday night, and I’d be on a private beach which had seemed deserted when last I’d been there. Perhaps I would be unobserved until I could find my way back into the cave by touch, smell, and sound, then set myself a comforting fire in the pit, and then, finally, come up with some kind of a plan. How many seconds had it been? Had it already been minutes that she’d been gone?

“What are they doing to them?
”
I demanded of the sky gods. No answer came down to me.

Think.

The foremost issue was my blindness. In order to cure that, I would need to find a magical person willing to help me… But how? Where?

The clanking of the buoys alerted me that I was near to the shore now.

The ice dragon had abducted Nell intentionally, I was sure, and for what cause? Was it related to the abduction she had suffered at the talons of the harpies?
“Your battle is already lost,”
the harpy had said. Had she known of The Hearthlands’ condition? When had the ice kingdom risen? How had they known that I was here? Why had the ice dragon taken Penelope when he could have just as easily killed me?

I lowered until my belly skimmed the cold water, then crashed into the damp sand of the shore, rolling and caking my armor with dirt. I transformed rapidly back into a man. Being a nude man on Earth would still be preferable by a hundred times to being a large, blind dragon. I crept across the beach, bearing south until the sand became sharp with pebbles and I knew that the outcroppings were near. The waves fumed and roared against the rocks.

I climbed over the formations and felt my way into the cave itself, where I could think in peace without fear of observation. It was what had drawn me to this cave in the first place, when I had arrived after flying all the way from the Pacific Islands.

I had heard a voice on the winds, calling me, coaxing me onward, and it had risen in volume and clarity as I’d approached this beach. It was the cave itself where the voice seemed to be the clearest and the loudest. I’d gone inside and rested after a flight across an entire ocean and this broad countryside to the next ocean, with nothing but a thick leather satchel strung around my neck, filled with my most prized possessions: the heirloom mirror, and a few pieces of clothing. I’d prepared myself a fire, set my mirror and clothing to the side, and coiled in the large, cathedral-style cavern, where I had entered a deep meditation in search for the source of the voice. I knew it would lead me further onward.

What had awoken me had been Nell’s screams. By the time she’d drawn me from my trance state, she’d already fallen unconscious, and I’d had to pull her cold, limp body from the water.

As soon as I’d laid eyes on her, I’d felt a deep, hot swell move through me and almost burst, as if I was seeing a beloved friend or family member who had been separated from me for our entire lives. Gazing down at her perfect face, I’d wondered if it might have been her voice which had been calling me on the winds, calling me here, and knew that I had no choice but to save her.

I’d stayed in the cave for only the next day or two when yet another strange Earth woman had entered.

Her name was Thalissa, she’d said. She was a pagan witch, and she worshipped dragons. She had sensed me in the ether and come to find me and offer me her home. She would give me anything I wanted. She was a loyal servant to my people.

And I had trusted her, because I was simple-hearted. She’d taken me into her home, and I hadn’t questioned her charity; to me, charity seemed natural, not suspicious. Even as I’d gazed around at the horrific artwork which littered her domicile, I did not question her motives.

In spite of this turn in events—the kindly witch who had purported to worship me, the offering of a dwelling in the center of the village—I still couldn’t become distracted from Nell. I’d become increasingly certain that she had been the voice calling me onward, my destined soulmate. I hadn’t meditated in days, not since I’d met her. But now the elements called to me, beckoned me by my ear…

What could I do? Blind? With the only witch I knew being a traitor, and the very one to have blinded me? Nothing… Nothing but lay myself out before the universe and request aid with all the sincerity of my soul.

I crawled up onto the stone shelf and in the direction I knew the pit and cathedral ceilings to be. I blew a lick of flame across the loose kindling therein and heard, smelled, and felt the fire, even if I couldn’t see it. It comforted me to simply know that it was there.

And so, with my heart pounding in my chest, with the world weighing on my shoulders, I crossed my legs, closed my eyes, and began to hum in a low, hoarse rhythm, calling whatever spirits might answer back to me.

The response was immediate, as though an entity was lurking in the ether just above me.

I cannot see what others may,
the familiar, raspy voice cooed inside my mind. It was the same voice I had heard speaking on the wind from across the world, and now it boomed in my skull as if it—she?—was right here. Her voice was soft and light as a child’s, low and husky.
Yet I see what others never shall. What you seek, dragon prince, was already found some time ago.

“You are what I seek,” I answered the entity aloud. “I appeal to you, spirit. I am in need, desperate need, of a witch.”

Found you not other kin?
the voice rasped to me.
The black-haired, red-mouthed slave? Did she not satisfy your quest?

“That woman was a traitor, and is not my friend. She who offered me refuge was the same who took my eyes.”

Will your heart open for the words, dragon prince? You do not know the way. I thought to help you, but found myself abandoned. Alone always, much like you. We could be friends.

“Have I met you yet, spirit?”

This cave is mine. I am at its heart.

“Can I come to find you?” I asked, throwing my voice loudly into the cavern.

The path is clear. No one ever comes. Good luck, dragon prince. You are distracted. Never a good listener. Never to me.

I stood, scouring the cavern with my hands alone for its exit into deeper rooms. The being with whom I spoke must have been close… but there was no way I’d be able to travel far in my condition. Not without killing myself.

I groped through a low corridor, banging my head only twice, and then sloshed into bitter, ice-cold water. A heady fragrance filled the air as something within the room hissed. Next, I heard a series of splashes, as if something was rushing toward me across the surface of the water, and I recoiled at the sensation of clammy fingers moving along my bare skin, testing every part of my body.

She did blind you,
the sickly voice confirmed. I relaxed only slightly.
A kiss, then. A kiss for the prince. One should never be so lucky. Did you know that my mother could have killed you with a kiss?

A cold, wet sensation passed over one eyelid and then the other before I was able to open my eyes and blink. Blurry colors shifted into focus around me, and I realized that this section of the cavern was lit by bioluminescent algae and other life forms. Even its water was a vibrant, fluctuating teal.

And in the delicate greenish light I could finally see the face of the being who had been calling me this great distance to her side.

She would have been pretty, if she’d had any eyes at all. Instead of eyes, smooth, fleshy pits existed above her cheeks. She had a small, shriveled mouth and her skin was so pale, it shone in this light as almost translucent. Her body was papered in black marks—unreadable symbols—which migrated along her skin of their own volition, like shadows at play. The woman was tiny and nude, though her body had to be the least sensual humanoid I’d witnessed yet. The buds of her breasts had no nipples, and where reproductive organs should have been, there was nothing but more puckered flesh. It made me wonder if she was deformed or asexually reproductive. But she’d said her
mother
could have killed me with a kiss…

Now you see, dragon prince,
the creature hissed.
But will you believe my prophecies?

“What… are… you?” I breathed. She was clearly not a spirit. She was very much flesh and bone, even if her psychic abilities were beyond any I had yet seen.

I am an oracle,
the response came.

“I can bring you tribute, fair Oracle,” I told her, collapsing immediately to my knees. I could think of no better creature to encounter in this moment than one who knew the future. “I will give you anything if you can answer a single question for me.”

Ahhh.
The oracle inhaled deeply of the aromatic fumes surrounding us. Like the water, they too glowed with an unearthly light whenever they encountered motion.
I need nothing but an ear for an eye, dragon prince.

“You have my ears,” I promised her. “Can you see how I may rescue Penelope, my human mate, from the ice dragons of The Hearthlands?”

You may not,
the oracle answered.
She is not meant to be, fool prince. Abandon your quest. Seek love elsewhere.