Breath of Fire (37 page)

I’d had enough. My body had had enough. It was time to fight or die. The red glow of my fire erupted around my body and spewed from my mouth. Black smoke curled from my nostrils. The air around me whipped with gale-force winds, and lightning flashed in arcs just over our heads. But Eunice laughed at me and held me tighter in her grasp.

I could feel the urgency in Julian’s magic, and I knew he wanted me to take more from him. I drew his magic in until it filled me to bursting. Eunice’s eyes widened in surprise as she felt the link that existed between me and Julian. My Drakán magic was powerful, but it was my Atlantean magic that would destroy her.

The pressure in my chest built to the point of bursting, and the castle walls began to crumble around us. Eunice’s hold on me lessoned as she moved to dodge chunks of flying granite.

Rocks filled the doorway, blocking our only exit, and I flinched as the stones blew into the room like bullets and turned to dust as they made impact. It wasn’t my magic that had caused the explosion. Julian staggered into the room with a grey cloud of dust and debris. His dragon form was gone, and his naked body was badly damaged. Blood dripped steadily down his side and was smeared across his face and neck. His arm hung limply down at his side—useless. But he was alive.

Eunice raised her hand and gathered her fire in the palm of her hand. She pointed it toward Julian and sheer terror for his life forced me to fight harder against her bonds. Julian stumbled to his knees, and I screamed his name. A ball of orange flame grew larger and larger, and as the intensity of its heat grew, the color changed from orange to white. It looked as if she held a bolt of lightning in her hand.

I pulled the thread between us harder, finding the strength to stand on my own two feet, while praying for a miracle. And then Julian did something so unexpected I almost staggered beneath the shock of it. He shoved every ounce of power he had through the thin thread that bound us. It was painful and at the same time invigorating. The rush was euphoric. But the rush didn’t last long.

Julian had given me his power and left himself with none. He was no better than a human now, and his wounds were mortal. I embraced his power with my own and shoved everything I was—Drakán and Atlantean—into Eunice. The fire consumed us both. Her laughter grew and raised chills upon my skin. But her laughter died as my flame grew hotter. The red flame turned to orange—then yellow—then blue. No one could survive the power of the mating fire.

Her body blurred through the flames, the intensity of it uncomfortable even for me. My body hurt, and I wasn’t sure Julian would live, even if I succeeded in killing Eunice. But he had to live. We both had to live. I thought of the lost Promised Child and fought harder through the pain.

When the blue flames around us turned almost white, Eunice released the vise around me and my lungs and organs took a great sigh of relief at the loss of pressure. She reached toward me with her hand, and I knew if I let her touch me that it would be the end. She would take my heart with her into the Realm of the Dead and then I would have no choice but to follow her.

I stomped my foot, displacing the ground beneath me, and moved my arms back and forth in a gentle sway, controlling the elements in a dance that was unfamiliar and second nature both at the same time. The ground shook with the force of my power. The once-beautiful white castle crumbled to ruins, and large stones fell dangerously close to our bodies.

As Eunice’s hand moved closer, I slashed out with the vicious claws of my silver dragon, ripping out her heart and crushing it to dust. I pushed my power harder, and the stone walls crumbled faster, trapping her under their weight. Her shrill screams of terror pierced my soul and vibrated over my skin. I blew one last breath of fire and watched as her body went up in flames.

I fell forward onto my hands and knees. My body was slicked with blood and sweat, but the walls were still falling and I had to protect Julian. I shoved his power back down the thread. His body jerked as he accepted it, and the renewal of energy gave him strength so his wounds began to heal. I wished I could have said the same for my own. I was completely spent.

He crawled toward me and covered my body with his own. He used his magic to erect a shield around us and protected us from the falling rocks. I huddled beneath him on the cold marble floor and waited to die.

Then as suddenly as it started, the wind stopped blowing and the rocks stopped raining down on us. The lightning ceased and the thunder faded out with one lingering rumble. Everything around us was completely still—there wasn’t even the sound of a pebble falling in the rubble.

The calm before the storm.

An ominous crack reverberated across the entire Realm, and the floor began to shift beneath us.

“We must leave this place before we are destroyed with it,”
Julian said.

He shifted back into his dragon form, and I whimpered as he pulled me gently into his arms. He launched us straight up, where the ceiling of the castle had once been, and into the eerie whiteness of the sky. Another crack sounded. Then another.

I felt a rush of magic against me as Julian opened the liquid silver door of the portal, and I sighed in relief as it shimmered before us. The dragons who’d survived the battle grabbed the walking warriors and the human prisoners on their backs and fell in line behind us.

Just before we went through the portal, I looked back at what had once been the Realm of the Gods. It was completely destroyed, and it would soon be nonexistent. A dark cloud of black was gaining on us, slowly rolling over the pristine whiteness until the dark completely consumed the white. Big chunks of the Realm broke off and were being sucked into the blackness like a vacuum.

“Hurry,”
Julian called out to his people.

I felt his muscles bunch beneath me and we soared toward the portal just as another crack sounded. The Realm of the Gods trembled with fear. It thrummed like a tuning fork as it shattered, deafening us with its resonance. It began to spiral in on itself, losing light and color in the black hole of nothingness as we raced to escape it.

For a moment, I wasn’t sure we had escaped.

I groaned in pain as we landed in a heap in the middle of the ballroom we’d started in, and Julian quickly shifted back to his human form. He buried his face in my neck, and I could feel his body tremble with each shuddering breath he took. Other dragons and warriors began filling the space around us until everyone who was still alive had made it through. Julian closed the portal with a wave of his hand, and a resounding cheer went up around us.

I found the strength to lift up my head and looked around the room. We were significantly less in numbers than what we’d been, and I knew we all had a long road ahead of us trying to rebuild.

I looked down at my body. It wasn’t pretty. I’d have new scars to add to the ones on my back. I lifted my head and finally found the courage to look at Julian. His gaze was somber and his eyes colder. I could already tell Eunice’s treachery would make a new stumbling block for us. It would be harder than ever to get him to open himself to love after what she’d done.

I held the sides of his face between each hand and kissed him gently. “We’re alive. And you are our king. My lifemate. My love.”

The ice in his eyes thawed, and I felt his magic and his dragon wrap themselves around me. We were entwined in the middle of the ballroom, our bodies naked and battered, while chaos reigned around us. But we might as well have been alone. We were lost only in each other.

“You avenged our people,” he whispered against my ear. “You are a worthy queen. My lifemate. My love.”

I knew the words were as close as he could come to telling me he loved me. It was enough. For now.

Chapter Thirty-Two

I waited at the boarding gate inside the airport for my flight back home with a mixture of trepidation and sadness. My wounds were healed for the most part. At least the ones on the outside.

I had to go home. There were things to see to. I was still the Enforcer, and although Julian was still acting as Archos for all five clans, my people needed me. They’d faced too much upheaval lately and their behavior was getting out of control. Yes, Julian and I were stronger together, but since there were no immediate conflicts to deal with between the clans, I figured it was the perfect time to go home. I needed the comfort of my own hoard, and I needed to comfort my people. And I needed to figure out a way to deal with my new powers and who they made me. Without Julian.

Recognizing the other half of my blood brought me a peace I’d not thought possible. I now understood why the push and pull between my human and dragon was so strong. They were natural enemies. I’d need help learning how to embrace them both. I was hoping Noah might know someone I could talk to—a mentor I could spend some time with to teach me how to grow in my powers.

The results of what happened in the Realm of the Gods were bittersweet. I discovered, after we returned back to the Earth Realm, that I’d absorbed some of Eunice’s powers while we were locked together in combat. I had no idea if I’d keep them forever or if they’d slowly fade away. Whatever the case, I now had enough Drakán power to keep my clan in line and get them on the path of becoming a healthy clan.

Julian had been busy the last few days as well. He’d decided to set up a community for all those who’d lost their powers due to Erik’s experiments. We had no clue what their lifespans would be, but they all seemed to be aging—some of them frighteningly fast. Julian was determined to give them peace and comfort until their lives ended.

I’d destroyed the Realm of the Gods with the strength of my and Julian’s combined powers. The curtain had been completely torn down between our two worlds. Needless to say, the gods were pissed. Now that the Destroyer was gone and they no longer feared that power, I had a feeling they’d be showing themselves a little more boldly. I had no idea where they’d be making their new home until they could build a new Realm. I just hoped it wasn’t here. But that was a battle I’d have to face another day. I just hoped they gave me a little warning first.

I checked my watch and tapped my foot nervously as I waited impatiently for the boarding call. I stood alone, staring out the large windows, watching the planes come in. My scent reeked of danger and violence as it never had before, and even the humans sensed it, so they kept their distance.

My carry-on was gripped so tightly in my hand that my knuckles turned white. I was doing the right thing. And if the idea of being separated from Julian made me feel nauseated, it only proved to show that I’d become too dependent on him. I felt the tingle of magic along my spine before I heard his voice in my mind.

“Do you really think running away is the answer?”

I shivered as if his words had actually whispered across my skin. I had less than five minutes before I’d be safely inside the plane.

“It seems like someone who could defeat the Destroyer shouldn’t be such a coward.”

“I need a little space, Julian,”
I whispered.
“I haven’t forgotten what happened between us before we entered the Realm of the Gods. I need more from you than you’re ready to give, and I’d rather separate myself now before it becomes too hard. After five hundred years, I think I deserve to have someone love me for me, not for what I can give them.”

“You need to give me a chance to show you what I’m willing to give. I’ll not stop wanting you. That should be enough for now.”

“Believe me, it’s not. I also haven’t forgotten that you lied to me about who I really am. I’m Atlantean, Julian. That will never change. Can your dragon accept that?”

“You are Drakán, Rena. My dragon doesn’t see you as anything but that. You can’t blame me for keeping those details from you. I knew it would only conflict you more. You already feel my absence. How long can you live without me?”

“For as long as it takes,”
I said with way more bravado than I felt. It was actually a question I was curious to know the answer to. I had no idea how my body would react to us being so far apart. But I had to let the two halves of my powers figure out how to coexist peacefully. Without throwing Julian in the mix. My Atlantean magic had already made it clear that it didn’t care for Julian.

“It sounds to me like you’re playing with fire. Make sure you don’t get burned.”

“You don’t scare me, Julian.”

“I’ll give you the time you need to get things straightened out with your clan. But if you take too long I will come after you. You are my lifemate. We belong together. And I will not live without you.”
He shut the door to his mind, his words more of a threat than a promise.

My body already missed him. I wasn’t so sure about the other parts of me. I searched one last time for the link that joined us together—just to say one final goodbye—but there was no trace of him in my mind. I’d hurt him. I’d felt it before he’d put up his shields. But it couldn’t be helped.

“
Goodbye, Julian
,” I said before getting on the plane. I didn’t look back.

About the Author

Liliana Hart is the USA Today and New York Times bestselling author of the MacKenzie Family Series, as well as more than twenty other novels. She lives in Texas with her husband and cats, where she’s hard at work on her next book.

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