Breath of Fire (36 page)

There was a man who’d carried many of the weaker out and returned for more. He was too thin, his ribs prominent and his skin slack, but he held an inner strength that gave him a purpose and a reason for living.

“Who do you follow?” I asked him as I opened the door of the last cage.

“Julian is my Archos,” he replied. “But I am less than nothing to him now that my powers are gone.”

“Julian will not think so,” I assured the man. “He is here fighting for all of you now. Tell me, have you seen Archos Alasdair?”

He curled his lip in revulsion.

“Tell me what has been done with him. Julian is my lifemate. And Alasdair is my father. I must know if he still lives.”

He looked like he wanted to ignore my pleas. “If it is as you say and Julian is truly your lifemate, then I can do nothing but fulfill your request. Your father has been held in solitary,” he said pointing to the far corner of the room. “He was quite the troublemaker.”

The man turned to walk away with the other prisoners, but he turned back before he reached the long white hallway. “Your father never turned his back on his clan. He tried to take the brunt of the punishment for his people before the madman broke him. There is honor in what he did. You can be proud of that.” The man limped away and didn’t look back again.

I hadn’t noticed the thick metal door in my hurry to release the other prisoners. This was not a cage but a closet. Part of me was afraid to open it and see what waited on the other side.

I placed both hands against the cold steel, but I couldn’t feel him—couldn’t feel anyone. I held the padlock in my hand and drew my fire until all that was left was molten metal. The hot metal burned against my skin and it would leave a scar if I didn’t remove every trace of it. The door swung open, and the man who hung from the shackles didn’t resemble my father at all. This man was old. His hair was solid silver and his face was deeply lined with age.

“Alasdair?”

He struggled to lift his head, but when he finally did it was my father’s silver streaked eyes that stared back at me. My eyes. They no longer had a diamond-shaped pupil. They were human eyes. Erik had succeeded in stealing all of my father’s powers for his own.

“Rena.” Alasdair’s chapped lips cracked and bled with the movement. “You are too late. I am less than nothing now. And it is a good thing I no longer have my strength, for I would kill you if I could. Erik told me you have given my father’s clan away to the son of his most hated enemy. I despise the ground you walk on.”

“You have the nerve to despise me when your own son is the Destroyer and killing all of our people? You’re completely fucked in the head.” I stood back and wondered what I should do. “Should I leave you to rot? Is that what you want from me? It would serve you right if I did after what you’ve done to me.”

“I…don’t…want anything from you.” His every breath was harder than the next. “I should have killed you when I had the chance.”

“It’s a shame you didn’t. Because now I’m here to make sure you live and suffer for the rest of your pitiful life.” I unfastened his manacles, and he fell to his knees.

“Even now your pity makes you weak,” he said as I helped him to stand. “Just like your mother.”

“What?”

I didn’t get the opportunity to ask any more questions. Something powerful rammed against us and knocked us across the room into the hard stone wall. I heard the crack as the wall gave from the force of my body. My head took the brunt of the fall, and I was dazed for a moment. I looked over at my father and saw his eyes open and empty, staring straight ahead.

His death had been quick after all. The skin around his heart was singed. His body hadn’t turned to ash because he was human.

I rubbed at the back of my head, and my hand came away smeared with blood. My rage poured from my skin, and my power sent the metal cages hanging from the ceiling into an eerie dance. I looked around for the person responsible. Erik leaned casually against the far wall, hidden in shadow. I got to my feet, ready to face him once and for all.

Erik walked toward me. He was covered in blood. It was matted in his hair, and it dripped down his chin and the tips of his fingers with every step he took. I couldn’t see any open wounds so I knew the blood must be someone else’s.

“Are you wondering whose blood decorates my body, Rena?” he asked. “I think the color of Julian’s blood looks good against my skin. Don’t you agree?”

I shook my head in denial. I couldn’t believe it. Wouldn’t believe it. I’d know if Julian had been killed, though panic filled my soul at how completely he’d cut himself off from me. Would I have even felt it if he’d fallen? Would I die the same instant he took his last breath?

“I don’t believe you,” I said.

“I haven’t killed him yet. I thought I’d save him for last. He was a very worthy opponent, but as you can see—” He shrugged, and more blood spattered from his hands into the air.

My power stirred within me. My dragon coiled tightly. She wanted justice. She wanted to fight. Erik smiled, the blood on his teeth and lips a harsh reminder of what I was fighting for. He was as still as a snake ready to strike. His own power stretched just under the surface. He was waiting for me to make the first move.

There was a blur of movement in front of Erik. It happened so quickly I wasn’t sure if I’d actually seen anything at all. But then I saw a tiny hand holding a heart. A beating heart. Erik’s heart.

Erik was still on his feet. He hadn’t registered what had just happened to him. He looked around in confusion, his eyes already going cloudy with unconsciousness. Eunice stepped around from the back of his body where his large frame had been hiding her. She held his heart out and he finally looked at it.

He raised his head sluggishly and opened his mouth to speak. The words wouldn’t come. Eunice looked him in the eyes and blew him a kiss of fire. She laughed as he turned to ash.

My mouth hung open in shock. Eunice had just killed the Destroyer. And it had been way too easy.

“Get real, Rena. Did you honestly think this idiot was the Destroyer?” she asked. She kicked at his smoldering ashes. “Someone so careless and foolhardy that he had to take the powers of others just to make himself stronger? The true Destroyer needs no one’s powers but her own.”

“How can Erik not be the Destroyer? He told me the story of my father and the woman who pretended to be Claudia so she could give birth to him. Erik fulfilled the Prophecy.”

“I was that woman, Rena. Erik was my son. And I knew from his conception that he’d be necessary for my plan to work. My deception was not easy. I’ve been patient for thousands of years, planned everything to the last detail. I knew from the beginning that Alasdair would get me with child. And I knew I would deliver him a son. Just as I know it is yours and Julian’s son who will become the Promised Child. It is why you must both die. But I had to wait for the two of you to join before I could put my plan into action. If the possibility of the Promised Child did not exist between the two of you, then I’d have to wait for another pair of lifemates to come along and put the Prophecy in motion.”

I had a vision of a boy with dark hair and pale blue eyes, the same little boy I’d seen in the vision I had after Julian and I first met. I knew she spoke the truth.
Our son.
I screamed out in protest as the vision faded away and the image of Julian’s torn and bloody body replaced it.

“How can you be the Destroyer?” I asked. “You are not the descendant of two Drakán. You are Fae.”

“I told you that Prophecies were vague. It never says specifically that the Destroyer needs to be a descendant of two Drakán—the race of the descendants isn’t mentioned at all.”

“Gods,” I breathed out. She’d set herself up in the perfect position and waited patiently for thousands of years.
A great pretender.
It was the last coherent thought I had.

An invisible vise gripped around my body and brought me to my knees. My organs were being crushed. No oxygen could get to my lungs, and my mouth opened and closed, gasping for air.

The power Eunice possessed overwhelmed me. I couldn’t beat her. I was nothing compared to what she was. Erik’s power paled in comparison to hers. She released her hold slightly so I could take a breath. But while the vise around my body loosened, I began to feel other things. She began to slowly peel the skin away from my body. Tears mingled with my blood. I couldn’t pray for death to come fast enough. She held me immobile with her powers, but I was still able to scream. I screamed until my voice went hoarse.

The look on her face became one of excitement and I braced myself for worse pain. My muscles separated from my bones with wet pops. Injuries involving muscles were always the hardest to heal, even for dragons. I didn’t want to end my life this way. I wanted the possibility of that child to still exist.

I gathered what was left of my power and tried to heal myself.

“Tsk, tsk,” Eunice scolded. “Don’t waste your energy. You won’t last nearly so long if you do. And what fun would that be?”

I ignored her and embraced my power. I kept it wrapped snugly around me. Eunice’s hold lessened slightly. She was playing with me, but the relief the slight respite gave me was welcome. I drew from everything I had, but when Eunice laughed at my attempts I realized that she knew my powers better than I did. My dragon stirred restlessly, wanting to fight, but I didn’t call to her. I called to the other power. The power that was nameless but grew stronger inside me every day.

“Oh, so you’ve found it,” she said. “I was wondering how long it would take for you to notice. The bond with Julian made it easier, no doubt.”

“What are you talking about? What do you know?”

“It’s a shame Alasdair couldn’t have told you who your mother was before he died.”

“Who was she?”

“Your blood is unique. Much like mine. Do you know the stories of how the Realm of the Drakán came to fall?” she asked.

My throat was raw, and I was to the point of pain where only numbness existed. “Yes,” I rasped out.

“Tell me,” she demanded.

I swallowed the bile that rose in my throat and tried to regulate my breathing before I answered.

“The Drakán stopped growing intellectually because of their selfish natures. They became greedier for things. Not for knowledge. They only relied on their brute strength in battle. And when the Atlanteans accused us of killing their queen’s infant son and declared war on us, the Drakán ultimately couldn’t defeat the Atlantean inventions or the strength of their magic. Their rage and determination was too great, and the Realm of the Drakán fell into nothingness.”

“That’s right. And who is every Drakán’s sworn enemy?”

“The Atlanteans,” I answered automatically.

The Realm of the Drakán had been a barren land, filled with volcanoes and black porous rock—a land that suited its inhabitants in every way. It was the volcanoes that had surrounded our Realm and the lava that flowed within them that we drew our magic from. It was an impenetrable Realm that no enemy could ever breach because the dragons’ psychic powers could sense when the Realm was going to be invaded, and the Drakán would have their armies ready and waiting to fight.

But it was one woman who’d had the power to destroy us.

I knew the tales of how the Atlantean queen had sacrificed herself and destroyed our race to avenge the death of her child. She hadn’t listened to reason when my ancestors claimed their innocence. All that mattered was her vengeance. The queen had figured out a way to block herself from the dragons’ psychic powers, and she’d flown through the portal to the Drakán Realm undetected. She’d fought the fire of our volcanoes with ice.

My mind finally got a grasp on what Eunice had been hinting at. I shook my head in denial, then immediately wished I hadn’t because the pain was so great.

“It’s impossible,” I said. “The gods completely destroyed Atlantis as punishment for the queen’s actions. I’ve never heard about there being any survivors.”

“The Drakán Realm was completely destroyed, too, but here we are. Why is it so hard for you to believe the Drakán are not the only creatures hiding in the Earthly Realm?”

I’d heard something similar to that before. Noah. He’d known all along what I was. And now I knew what he was.

“Your mother was Atlantean royalty, Rena. It was her mother who sacrificed herself and destroyed our Realm. Our forefathers’ brute strength was no match for her invention of ice combined with her control over the elements. She destroyed the entire Realm with ice and fire. The five warriors were very lucky to escape with their lives. No one else did. Julian recognized the symbol on the torq you gave him. He also knows who you are.”

At the mention of my lost heritage, the unknown power I’d been wielding surged around me. It pulsed in time with my heart and fed my blood. I gasped as I felt the hatred inside me. It recognized the Drakán as its enemy and wanted to kill it. It recognized the dragon inside me and wanted to kill her too. No wonder I’d always felt so many conflicting emotions over who I was.

I soothed my power and let her know that the dragon inside me was a friend, and she calmed, though she didn’t like it. My dragon nudged against me, not wanting to be forgotten, and I felt the thread of Julian’s power. It pulsed with his life force. He was alive. I pulled his magic to me, absorbing his powers.