Jaime Rush - Dragon Awakened

Ribbons of magical lights danced like ghosts and fairies in the night sky. As steam wafted up from the water, she prayed again for the end of her heartache. It wasn’t good to steep herself in such sadness, but she mourned silently now, her tears dropping into the water some believed to be magickal.

A rustle in the bushes drew her attention to the wooden gate that was now opening. Who dared enter—

The Dragon Prince stepped inside. His smile lit the night. “Garnet,” he said on a breath, coming close and kneeling near the edge of the spring.

“’Tis cruel, whoever you are, to come here looking so much like him.”

“I am he, my love.” The endearment had come to mean something during their time together, and she heard meaning in the way he said it now. “You brought me back.” He gestured to the skies filled with ribbons of light, and then to the spring in which she sat. “I could see and watch over you, though I felt so helpless. I saw that you loved me, rather than merely tolerated me as I thought.” He reached for her hand, his fingers closing around hers. “Your love, along with the magick here, brought me back.”

He was real. Alive, flesh and blood. Tears came faster now, free of the pain that usually accompanied them. “I didn’t know I loved you until you were gone.”

He tugged gently on her hand. “Let me see you. Both of you.” He pulled her to her feet, his eyes taking in her face before moving down to the lushness of her pregnant body. “Amazing. Beautiful. A miracle.”

When she looked into his face, he was gazing at her.

Cyn’s cell phone vibrated. “Jay,” he whispered, and they left the viewing area.

“I’m here,” she could hear Jay say as they walked down the path. “Cottage 14B.”

“We’ll be there in a minute.”

Cyn grasped her hand as they took the trail down to civilization. She squeezed, reveling in the feel of it. She’d been daydreaming while watching the lights, giving Garnet and the Dragon Prince their happy ending. Now she wanted one, too. When she’d withheld her forgiveness, all she had was anger and bitterness. By forgiving Cyn, she’d gained so much more. And freed herself in the bargain.

As though he’d picked up on her thoughts, he lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed it.

In turn, she pulled the back of his hand toward her mouth. “I hope you can forgive yourself, too.”

“I took away your parents. That you are the one woman who touches me, who makes me feel something…karma.” She could see his wry smile in the dim lights.

She held their linked hands to her heart. “If I can forgive you, you can sure as hell forgive yourself.” She bumped him with her hip. “Don’t make me hurt you.”

He rubbed his thigh, faux pain on his face. “You have hurt me. Or have you forgotten that beating?”

Her cheeks warmed at the memory of her lost control. “Emotion over logic. That’s going to be a tough lesson. But I’m sorry—”

He swung her around so that she faced him, pressing a finger to her mouth. “Don’t apologize.” He took her hand again and checked the number on the cottage just ahead. “We’re here.”

The door opened, and a big, burly Deuce with mussed dark hair and the beginnings of a beard stepped onto the stoop. For someone who was close to her father’s age, he looked like he was in his twenties.

“Cyntag!” His voice was boomingly loud, which was how she’d heard him so clearly on the phone. “Long time no anything.” He gave Cyn a back-slapping guy hug, then turned to her. “Well, well, what do we have here?” He thrust out his hand. “Jay Caruso. And you are…”

“Ruby Salazaar,” she said as he enveloped her hand in his.

“Nice to meet you.” He waved them inside the warm cottage. “Come in, make yourselves at home.”

The place was cluttered, though not dirty. Papers and whiteboards covered with calculations made her long for her parents. Framed pictures of auroras adorned every wall. Off to the side sat a huge backpack.

“Coffee? Tea?” Jay said from the kitchen, pouring from a pot. “Something to warm you up?” He shivered. “Spending two days in the wilderness is a bit much even for my Alaskan blood.” No wonder he smelled of fresh air and pines.

She rubbed her upper arms. “Coffee sounds great.”

Cyn pulled her against his chest. “Got everything I need right here.”

Jay gave him a speculative look. “I see that.” He handed Ruby the mug and set out milk and sugar. Then he opened a wooden cabinet and poured out two shot glasses of whiskey. “Bet I can tempt you with this.”

Cyn waved the glass under his nose. “You remembered.”

“It was the only way I could regale you with my fascinating studies of the aurora borealis.” Jay cleared off the couch and gestured for them to sit. “You said you’re here because of Brom. So you know he called me about the Deus Vis fracturing in Miami that coincided with a vision he’d been having for years. Where is he? I haven’t heard from him since his initial call to me.”

Cyn and Ruby filled him in on what had happened, her gaze going to an aquarium on the floor that contained a prism instead of fish.

Jay finished off his whiskey, shaking his head. “Will he be all right?”

“Once we kill the one who summoned it,” Cyn said. “We need to know what you found out.”

Jay braced his elbows on his thighs as he sat forward. “When Brom had the first vision, Justin wouldn’t tell us what element he was using to fracture the Deus Vis. He said no one knew but him, and if it was doing something dangerous, he wanted to keep it that way. I don’t think he believed his father’s vision yet. I told them how to make this, something I’d been working on for years.” He tapped the aquarium with his foot. “Brom called and said they could see the fracturing. Justin’s prototype pulled the Deus Vis ribbons so hard they completely fell apart. The solar storm we were experiencing at the time wasn’t particularly strong, but it was enough to weaken the ribbons. That exacerbated the effect of the element Justin was using.”

Jay went to the cabinet, took out the bottle of whiskey, and poured more in their glasses. “Brom called me back a few days later and said that Justin had obviously destroyed his device—and was killed for it. The good news was that the fracturing stopped. Then Brom came here, broken and catatonic. I tried to talk to him several times over the years he’s lived here, but he wouldn’t even see me.” He gave a slow shake of his head. “He saved a lot of lives, but all he could focus on were the two he didn’t. I think it made him crazy.”

Ruby took a long drink of her coffee, hoping it would warm the cold that truth left in her heart. “Brom’s vision of Black Doom came back.”

“Yeah, and he came to me pretty freaked out, especially when he learned about the big upcoming solar storm. Apparently someone re-created your father’s technology. But Brom had new information. He saw you trying to destroy the cause of the fracturing—and the device exploded. Not only did it kill you, but it also totally fractured the Deus Vis . And that narrowed down the element that Justin was using to a few choices. I got my hands on them, which wasn’t easy, and ran some experiments.”

Jay got up and dug through his backpack, extracting a glass tube. He killed the lights, grabbed a black light, and mounted it on clips over the aquarium. The ribbons were visible as they undulated in the water. He lowered the tube into the water, and the ribbons began to pull toward it. “This is a weak example. There are formulations that would need to be figured out to do it properly. But you get the idea.”