Page 5

5

NEED

S trom and I are left alone in our rooms as Mikkel and L?rke leave. We’re not alone, but we might as well be; in the big bed, Bjorn is out cold, snoring to beat the band. He’s not waking for anything right now; as Strom comes to me, corralling me in his arms, Bjorn doesn’t move a muscle. In the relative quiet of it being just us now, Strom and I take a moment to kiss, slow and deep. It finally relaxes me. As he at last pulls away, I heave a deep sigh.

He holds me to his chest, letting me plunk my chin on his shoulder as he strokes my hair.

“Crazy day, huh?” Strom murmurs. As our dragons move through each other from our touch, it sways us in a slow dance, which calms me further.

“You can say that again, Mr. Garrison.” I quote South Park, and Strom chuckles, but then we get serious again.

“It may not be life or death just yet, but it’s still a lot.” Strom pulls back now. Cupping my cheek in his hand, he gazes deep into my eyes, his grass-green ones vibrant. “Are you okay? ”

“No.” I answer truthfully, because for some reason, Strom is the one person I’m always truthful with in our group. But then, he’s always been a friend; I feel him step into that role easily now, as both friend and lover, as he holds me and lets me process.

“I feel crazy inside right now. Having Mikkel bonded to us…” I shake my head, even as Aesa’s stone hums on my chest, reminding me that Mikkel needs to be with us. “It’s a lot.”

“Beyond a lot.” Strom nods, still watching me as he cradles me close. “I’m not immune to Mikkel’s energy either, you know. I feel him like a thousand megawatts jolting through my Bone Magic at all hours. It’s way more than just being a friendly acquaintance. I’m not sure I would have encouraged you bonding him if I had known what was coming…”

“How are we ever going to find a Blood Mage strong enough to counter Mikkel’s power in our bond?” I glance at the out-cold Bjorn. “If we can’t find someone soon, Bjorn’s going to pay the price…”

“He’s okay for now.” Turning my chin back, Strom gently kisses my lips. “Bjorn is made of stronger stuff than any of us know. He beat his own father, Jarl Oggi Magnussen, in a duel when he was only eighteen. Bjorn’s got some piss and vinegar in him yet. I feel it.”

“I know.” I sigh hard now, even though I know Strom’s right. Still, I can’t help but worry about Bjorn, seeing him this way.

Strom’s right, though. Bjorn’s far from an invalid, and he’s not even lost a whit of muscle mass yet. Unbalanced metaphysics have a way of draining the body and the energy, making a person waste away like they have a cancer. Bjorn is still far from that, yet.

But it’s only a matter of time before he does. And it’s time we don’t have, as wretchedness grips my heart. I don’t know what I’ll do if I lose my First Drake. I don’t even know if I’d survive it, as I bury my face in Strom’s chest and growl to shove back tears.

It works, barely. Strom strokes my unbound hair as I hitch deep breaths until I can manage everything again. He holds me, kissing my temple .

Until a soft chime from a lightning-stone sphere on the table startles us.

I glance over, watching the flickering lightning within the milky agate stone whirl and lance. It’s an alarm the Storm Healers gave me to tell me when they have another healing session ready for me.

The healings they’ve done have been fucking painful, involving more than a few jolts of pure lightning blasted right into my system. Along with all the horrible beverages they’ve had me consume, and strange chants I’ve repeated for hours, it really hasn’t done me any good. I watch the alarm and set my jaw.

Strom watches me, stroking my hair.

“Not going to tonight’s healing session?” he asks as I fume.

“No.” I decide then, though I had already decided. “They’re not working. Nothing they’ve tried has helped, and I don’t think it’s going to. It’s probably because I’m a Blood Dragon, not a Storm Dragon. They’ve never tried their healings on someone full-blooded of our kind. Rhennic may be half Blood Dragon, but his magic is Storm Dragon through and through. It’s different.”

“It is.” Strom kisses my brow before glancing at a long, white oak table at the far wall. It’s where we’ve been pouring over the now-deciphered scrolls from Unhaemmerten all week. Fortunately, Alfhild Fey overlooked taking our lockbox of scrolls from The Chartreuse when she captured us, thanks to everything in it being magically dead and generally useless. We’d picked them up on our way down here from Copenhagen.

As if feeling as dejected about the scrolls as I do my healing sessions, Strom shakes his head. “I feel as stumped as you right now, Rikyava. I’ve been poring over those scrolls all week, and most of it is just as much gobbledygook to me as it was to Mikkel and L?rke. Arcane formulas, detailed descriptions of reagents, tools used, and star charts; it’s like the Black Dragon of All Souls was created by some insane genius. Whatever else your ancestor was, she was certifiably brilliant. Magic like I’ve never seen, used in ways I’ve never even heard of. Unfortunately, it means that Mikkel, L?rke, and I have gotten nowhere with them.”

Breaking from each other, though we still hold hands, we move over to the scroll-table now, with its plethora of burned-out magical items. Nothing here is valuable; a laptop sits open upon the table and Strom fires it up, our translated documents already magically un-bioencrypted so we could work on them this past week.

Even though I left that to Strom, as Bjorn rested, and I went through treatment after treatment, what little I’ve peeked at from the translations has left me with nothing, as well. Staring down at them and feeling at a complete dead end, I glance at Strom, who is bending over now to squint at the computer screen. “Is there nothing here that could help us?”

“Not nothing,” he says now as he straightens, tapping one document open on the screen. “Strangely, the most useful thing here so far has been the genealogy scroll, the one that mentions all our families and how someone from each of them was part of the core five who created the Black Dragon. Between you, me, Bjorn, and Mikkel, we represent four of them. But there is still one family we have no connection to: a Blood Dragon family called the Sigurddians.”

“Siggurdians?” I frown. “That’s not a Blood Dragon surname. Not one I know, at least.”

“It’s not. Not anymore.” Strom nods, though intrigue glitters in his green eyes. “I did some digging into a few ancient palace annals King Huttr gave me access to, and I found out the Siggurdian family is extinct. The last of their clan were killed in a vicious clan-battle about two thousand years ago—no one survived.”

“So it’s a dead end. And there is no fourth drake we could find who would come from the last original family.” My hope drops through my feet as I feel a deep keen inside my soul for Bjorn.

Who won’t make it if I can’t find a fourth drake to bond.

“Not technically, but this is where it gets interesting,” Strom says. Leaning against the table, he crosses his arms as he lifts an eyebrow. “The Siggurdian family were from Iceland, so I called my great-grandfather to see which modern Icelandic Blood Dragon families the True Knights have been watching, which could be connected to the ancient Siggurdians. I thought it was a dead end, as my great-grandfather sighed on the phone and told me that the bloodlines are too convoluted to know with certainty.”

“Why is that?” I ask, frowning.

“Among Icelandic Blood Dragons, it’s common practice to mate with whomever you like, be they a life-mate or no, so their family branches are insanely complicated,” Strom says. “The True Knights just end up watching all of Iceland, really. Since their clan is so small, however, they need all the younglings they can get, in any combination of genetics that will produce a healthy baby. I did some deeper research in the King’s annals for our most likely prospects and found that there was one bastard youngling of the Siggurdian’s highest clan-shaman who survived when the family all went to war, a drake of twelve named Hans. He was a powerful shaman like his Siggurdian mother, but because he wasn’t a pure-blood, he couldn’t take the surname Siggurdian. You’ll never guess what surname he did take, though.”

“Enlighten me.” I purse my lips at Strom, though it comes with the slightest smile, because his Sherlock-like sleuthing and how proud he is of it, is just too adorable.

“Sigures son .” Strom’s lips twitch into a smile as his green eyes sparkle. “A family which came into being at that time and had two members, siblings, still alive until about sixty years ago. One was lost and presumed dead at the Battle of Riksfold, though her body was never recovered, a drakaina by the name of Hekla Siguresson?—”

“And one who still lives. A drake by the name of Baldur Siguresson.” I blink as astonishment floods me. “The artist. The one you and I saw at The Vault in Sweden. At Mikkel and L?rke’s club. ”

“How are you so aware of that?” Strom cocks his head at me, his gaze intense. “I can feel how far your memories have slipped again, Rikyava, since our sex early this morning. You shouldn’t be able to recall Sweden at all right now. How are you so able to recall seeing Baldur when you and I went to The Vault?”

“I don’t know…” I reach up, rubbing my temples. Because Strom’s right; I shouldn’t be able to recall anything of that event, or of that meeting right now, since it all took place in Sweden.

But I can.

As I think about it, the image gets stronger in my mind, even more vivid, of when I first met L?rke in all her statuesque perfection, and of seeing Baldur across the vast cavern that gave The Vault its name. As I see it all again, I don’t just see the strange artist Baldur Siguresson across the cavern anymore, but feel him—as if his opal-gold and crimson eyes press right into my very soul.

Beautiful. So beautiful. His voice whispers through my mind again as I lock eyes with him in the memory. Most dragons can’t speak mind-to-mind without being life-mated, but I feel power rush over my body yet again from that one connection.

The power is so vast, it staggers me now as it pours like runnels of sunlight over my flesh, dancing in intricate patterns almost like it’s being painted upon me. I have to grip the table as an eroticism so tremendous it’s overwhelming has me panting hard now, as Strom straightens in alarm at the table.

He catches me, before I fall from that incredible, delicious sensation.

“What was that ?” Strom asks as he nets me in his arms. I don’t fight it, heaving with an eros so vast, it’s like I’m being drowned in luscious light, the slick touch of wet paint, and the soft whisper of a paintbrush.

“I don’t know.” Aesa’s Truthstone is buzzing on my chest like a hive of bees now, though not in a bad way. As the memory of Baldur fades, that sudden heat of sex and lust goes with it .

But not before I feel a whisper of touch upon my lips, like a kiss. My lips fall open; Strom’s do too.

“I felt that,” he whispers as he stares at me. “Was that… Baldur?”

“Holy fuck.” I blink, as my gaze snaps to Strom. “That’s impossible. We’re not life-mated. He didn’t put any sort of curse or magical connection on me when I was in that cavern with you and L?rke. There’s no way he could touch me now. Or you.”

“Isn’t there?” Strom’s intense question has me thinking, however, as I feel so many threads of everything that’s happened recently, finally pull together.

“When I took the blue drakaina’s scale from her at Riksfold, she gave me a vision of taking it to Baldur,” I say now as I purse my lips and breathe out slow, talking it through. “I didn’t understand then, but now… that must have been Hekla Siguresson, our blue Icelandic drakaina who fought our enemy Bone Mage—Baldur’s sister. Remember at the Battle of Riksfold, individuals in all our families were targeted by our small enemy Bone Mage drakaina, Litha. Our blue Icelandic drakaina was, as well.”

“Which makes her for sure the other Siguresson, Baldur’s sister Hekla,” Strom says seriously now as he stares me down.

“It’s as if Hekla gave me her scale and that vision, because she somehow knew she had to get Baldur and I to meet properly,” I say now, as something else strikes me. “When my cousin Rhennic was talking about me taking a Fourth Bloodmate, I got a vision of Baldur then, too, my own Bloodwalker magic confirming it. And if Baldur kissed me just now, as I was thinking about him… perhaps he knows he has to meet me and bond me, as well.”

“With power like that, what we just felt, pushing through the ether to contact you, I’m sure Baldur has more than a few sights on bonding with you.” Strom shakes his head. “Maybe he did put some kind of magical connection on you, and you just don’t know it. L?rke knows him. We need to speak with her, see if we can get his whereabouts. Because if Baldur Siguresson is the right candidate for your Fourth Bloodmate?— ”

“We need to find him.” I steel myself now; glancing at Bjorn sleeping like the dead, I feel my heart firm. “I will do anything to save my First Bloodmate, Strom, even taking a Fourth one I don’t know at all into our bond. I will do anything to save Bjorn from my magic—and from my bond to Mikkel—killing him.”

“I know you will,” Strom says gently as he smiles. “You and that pig-headed bastard fight like banshees, but when it comes right down to it, you love each other tremendously. In a way I’m not sure any of us will ever match—or understand.”

“Hey. I love you, too,” I say firmly as I touch his cheek. “I would never choose between you and Bjorn, ever . Bjorn needs us now, though. I will do what has to be done, even life-mating with someone I don’t know shit about, to save his ass.”

“And get us more firepower against the Black Dragon—something we desperately need.” Strom nods, a practical fighter like me, to the end.

It’s something I’ve always loved about him. Despite his teasing flirtatiousness, there’s a frighteningly competent tactician and fighter inside Strom. He’s far more than a pretty face, though I love that about him, too. He’s a Jarl-Heir, and he didn’t get that position from his great-grandfather by simply being charming.

He got it because, like me, he’ll do anything it takes to protect the people he loves.

I feel his excitement now, however, as we put together a conclusion that doesn’t feel like a total dead end. As he pulls out a cell phone from the pocket of his tactical pants, the same ones he had on earlier during our battle in the amphitheater, Strom makes a quick call.

I hear L?rke’s brisk, “Yes?” on the other end of the line.

“L?rke. We need you real quick. Can you come back on over here? Without Mik?” Strom says at once, relinquishing his grip on me to put a hand on his hip.

I hear a long pause. “Sure. One sec.”

L?rke hangs up. It’s a minute before the door between our suites opens and L?rke returns. Still dressed in her chic outfit from before, she’s got a stylish professional headset on and a gilded tablet computer to hand with a stylus. Her pale violet gaze pins us as she taps through a few last notes and screens.

“Yeah, uh-huh,” she says on the phone, speaking to someone else, “get Philo in there, at once. He’ll do the job and do it right. No, I don’t want Cruxus—he’s too brutal. I have to go.”

I don’t even want to know what part of her business dealings L?rke was just managing as she takes the headset down now, pressing a button to darken her tablet before setting it down on the table. Statuesque, she crosses her arms, buffed and perfectly manicured nails tapping on her arm.

“What’s up?”

“L?rke. Can you get us contact details for that Icelandic artist who occasionally paints with his magic at The Vault? Baldur Siguresson?” Strom asks, as we both watch L?rke.

“Baldur?” Her eyebrows shoot up as her pale gaze flicks between us. Before her eyebrows knit. “Unfortunately… not really. He’s sort of a… wild hermit. He contacts us when he’s ready to display some art, and we organize an entire event around it. He always does it from a pay phone at a bar in Reykjavik. We’ve back-traced it. It’s a place called The Squeaky Mouse. He’s a pillar of the community, and still nobody knows where he lives; Mikkel and I have visited twice, trying to get firmer contact details for him, but he’s like a ghost. He just… doesn’t exist when he doesn’t want to be found, even to all the resources we have—which, believe me, we have thrust in that direction to make contacting him more reliable. Why?”

“Rikyava and I think we finally have a lead on her possible Fourth Bloodmate,” Strom says before I can answer.

It’s then that L?rke looks at me— really looks at me. “Rikyava. Baldur’s impressive in his magic, but…”

“But what?” I challenge her now, feeling like there’s some big stopping point here I didn’t consider.

Something L?rke knows, and I don’t .

“He’s not a fighter.” L?rke gives it to me straight as she watches me. “The drake’s a dreamer, Rikyava. Sure, the art he makes is almost hauntingly impossible, beautiful and powerful to take in, but… he’s not the drake you’re looking for to fight the Black Dragon. In all the years he’s been spontaneously showing up to make art for Mikkel’s and my clubs, he’s never once challenged anyone. He’s a renegade, sure—a hermit for certain, but a warrior? I seriously doubt it.”

“I’ll take that into consideration,” I say as something inside me clenches. Though L?rke’s words are sage, and her opinion and observations astute, since she knows her warriors, something inside me doubts that she’s right.

If Baldur Siguresson could have left a kiss on my lips from gods-know-how-far away without us even being bonded one bit, then he’s got far more firepower in his magic than anyone gives him credit for.

Or perhaps, than he’s ever showed anyone.

It’s a conundrum to be solved later. For now, we still have no useful information on how to contact Baldur, or even where he’s located, other than the general location of Iceland. It’s not a gargantuan island, but it’s big enough.

Strom has clammed up, pensive now, as L?rke looks between us. I sigh, but even as I’m tempted to slide into a dangerous funk, I remember something.

“Hang on.” Leaving the table, I head to my things we brought from Sweden and rummage through them. In a moment, I’ve found what I’m looking for; the bright blue scale I liberated from our dead Icelandic drakaina at Riksfold.

Returning to the table, I run that dazzling sky-blue scale through my fingertips, seeing darker lines of cobalt lance through it, even a shimmer of pure gold. She was probably beyond beautiful in the air, with colors like that, I think to myself.

But even though the blue drakaina’s signature of life, her soul, has returned to the Void of Ancestors now where it belongs, Aesa’s Truthstone hums upon my chest as I hold the scale. An idea comes to me, then.

An idea I have no clue how I’m going to pull off—or if it can even be done.

“We need to do a Bloodwalking. A proper one,” I say as I grip the scale in my fist. “That blue Icelandic drakaina was our best source of intel yet on our enemy Bone Mage drakaina Litha. We’ve lost Alfhild Fey’s information on Litha and what artifacts she was looking for, thanks to said drakaina offing Alfhild before we could get anything out of her. Alfhild’s conscripted drakes were helpful with a few small tidbits, but they had nothing else about our enemy drakaina, other than her name. We need more. If this Icelandic drakaina,” I gesture with the scale, “was sister to Baldur, then maybe we could kill two birds with one stone, talking to her spirit beyond the Veil where she now resides with our Ancestors.”

“You’re remarkably lucid in your memories tonight,” L?rke notes just like Strom did, as she lifts an eyebrow at me.

Just then, I realize she’s right. I’ve been just as lucid about my memories concerning the blue Icelandic drakaina as I have been her supposed brother, Baldur. It makes me wonder now if their entire family possesses some magic that could help me.

Some magic I need, to regain my memories from the Black Dragon Knights.

“Regardless.” I glance at L?rke, then back to Strom. “I think we need to try a Bloodwalking. Soon.”

“Wouldn’t that be risky?” Strom inhales a deep breath. “Someone’s been lying to you via the Void of Ancestors, Rikyava, manipulating you—a few times now. How can you be certain any information you get from that place, in the supposed voice of this blue drakaina, would be trustworthy?”

“Not to mention that your First Drake is in no condition to do a Bloodwalking right now.” L?rke snorts as she crosses her arms, jutting her chin at the still-snoring Bjorn. “Unless you want to kill him even faster than being bonded to my brother is already doing.”

I know their points are valid as I also glance at the sleeping Bjorn, still out cold. But as Aesa’s Truthstone hums upon my chest, its smooth silver swirling with golden runes and flashing a bright crimson like that ancient drakaina’s battle-ready eyes, I know a Bloodwalking is what we need.

The question is, can we get any useful information out of it without being deceived again?

Or get it done quick enough, without draining Bjorn to death?