Frostbite (The Dragonian Series Book 3) (14 page)

ORRIED WAS AN understatement and Blake was missing in action. What Blake had done was called Intervening and by law, Nicole could claim me as her dragon without any further ado.

How it all worked was still Greek to me, but the one thing I got was unless you’re Blake, if someone interferes with a claiming, the dragon automatically becomes that Dragonian’s property. I didn’t know if it went for me too, since I was what he was, but I wasn’t going to tell anyone and find out.

I hate the word claiming now even more, and I had never thought so much about it until now. I guess seeing everything through a dragon’s perspective was a whole different world.

The rest of the day I searched everywhere for Blake. It was hopeless and I had a restless night.

The queen still somehow managed to jump in-between a giant Nicole claiming a baby Rubicon, which I assume was me. She dragged me to that forest and then turned into the queen. I could hear her saying my name, but it wasn’t directly, it was floating on the wind.

I woke up the minute she burst into flames again. Cold sweat ran down my back as I remembered Lucian telling me about Queen Catherine being strapped to her bed and set on fire. No person should die that way.

The next day, class couldn’t move fast enough. Every subject dragged and I kept staring at the clock. Each second that ticked by felt like an hour.

When the last bell rang I ran to my room to change. I pulled on my robe over my naked body and ran to the trees close to the lake. When the coast was clear I shifted and flew to the mountain where I’d met Blake for the past five weeks.

He wasn’t there and I shifted back, pulled on the robe and waited by one of the boulders. If it was him who had put that image into my head….he’d lied.

I racked my mind for any other explanation, but none came. It was just an image, but I knew for a fact it wasn’t mine. It had that same familiar feeling as the image I’d gotten that day in Professor Gregory’s class when we covered the Green Vapor.

Could Blake really do that?
Lucian said he didn’t own that type of ability, but then again, Lucian only knew about four of Blake’s abilities.

“Sorry I’m late.”

I jumped but didn’t look at him. I could see through the corner of my eyes his hands fiddling with getting the robe over his head. I closed my eyes.

I could feel the heat from his body radiating as he sank down onto the boulder next to me.

“Are you okay?” he bumped me softly.

“I don’t know.”

“Elena, she didn’t claim you.”

I gave him a stern look. “Was it you?”

“Was it me, what?”

“You know what I’m talking about Blake.” I got up, scared to speak about this, afraid someone else might hear.

“No, I don’t.”

“The hell, with the evil patsies and everything,” I spat at him. “It wasn’t me, and it sure wasn’t Cara, so I don’t know who the hell imprinted that scene into my head. Paul was the only one, Blake.”

“It’s not Paul, okay,” he said fast. “The desert wasn’t scary enough, Elena.”

“I don’t care.

“She wasn’t afraid of it. It was as if she expected it, so I wanted to change it… and it happened.”

I kept staring at him. “She could claim me if she ever found out.”

“They won’t, you’re a Rubicon, Elena.”

“You don’t know that.” Nicole was Lucian’s cousin, but she was far from Lucian. The total opposite to be exact, and I so didn’t want her to become my rider.

“What is going on with us? I don’t get this.”

“I do.”

“Please share.”

“We’re the same, Elena. We’re bound to have some sort of link with one another that makes us different from all the other dragons.”

“All my life I’ve been different, but never in a million years did I expect to be this.” My hands gestured down my body.

“You still don’t like being a dragon?”

“That’s not what I said. I love my dragon. She has helped me with a lot of things that I would never be able to make peace with on my own.” I went back to the boulder and sat down. “Why did you help me?”

“She’s not worthy enough to claim you,” he said.

“Why do you care who is worthy enough or not?”

“You’re a Rubicon. Only the best of the best should be able to claim you, never forget that.” He looked at me in such a way that I thought he was going to be able to see my deepest secret. The one where I’d broken his promise and crashed madly in love with him. I hid my face inside my hands.

I looked back at him, he was still staring at me and I could feel his peacock-blues. His face came closer to mine and for a short moment I couldn’t breathe, then he snapped his head away, got up and walked to the nearest tree.

My heart started to thump and I didn’t know what had just happened. I could feel we were almost there. I could sense that Tabitha was far from his mind and Lucian was nowhere near mine. It was only us.

“There are rumors that Arianna is going to try to claim one of us next. I’ve got a feeling that it’s going to be you, so we should start preparing for it. She’s a bit more fierce than Nicole.”

“Are you shitting me?”

“I can help you.” He was back in front of me in a crouching position.

“Blake, you can’t. If anyone finds out what it is you can do…” I closed my eyes and shook my head. “I can’t become Arianna’s, she’s even more evil than Nicole.”

“You won’t, just trust me.”

“I take it you know her fears too?”

“All of them.” He gave a seductive smile.

“You know when she’s planning this?”

“The way some of the Dragonians spoke about it, soon.”

“Then we should get started.”

OR THE NEXT couple of days I froze every time Master Longwei’s voice came from the speaker system. He hadn’t once mentioned my name or Arianna’s, or the word claim, but it’d led to a lot of restless nights and I somehow missed Paul’s stupid voice inside my head. He sure had a way of calming me down.

The afternoons with Blake were the only things that helped, even though he trained me harder than ever; I somehow forgot what it was he was preparing me for.

I was drained every afternoon and barely had the strength to notice anything else that was going on around the Academy.

Becky and Sammy disappeared after dinner and I took a long bath. I would wake up every single time when my gills appeared and realize that I had fallen asleep in the tub.

When I got out, I would usually be wide awake and have a bit of strength left to do my homework for the next day.

When I left the bathroom that night the most beautiful dresses were strewn on Becky’s bed. Not the modern fancy type of dresses but the princess kind, with undergarments and corsets.

“Is Halloween coming early this year?”

Becky laughed. “No silly. It’s for the Testrial ball.”

I gave her the best confused look I could muster.

“Seriously Elena, where is your mind lately? You know what?” she said with her hand in the air. “Don’t answer that.”

I giggled.

“The school has banners everywhere,” Sammy said.

“I guess my mind is not on balls and …okay, that did not come out the way I wanted it to.”

The two of them laughed after they gasped.

“My brother is seriously rubbing off on you.”

“You guys are talking about balls?”

“No,” somehow I managed to blush which made them laugh even harder. “Whatever.”

Becky got up and put her arm around my neck. “Not to worry, dearest Elena. I got you a ticket and a dress.”

“You are the best,” I said and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

“I know, I’ll be here all week.”

She guided me to the bed and for the next couple of hours we tried on dresses with all the undergarments and corsets. It took about half an hour just to get in and out of one, but it was the most fun I’d had in a long time. I’d gotten lucky with a dress that transformed me into some type of frost princess. It was gorgeous. It snugged my torso beautifully, even pushed up my breasts and showed a bit of cleavage, but not the slutty kind.

The fabric reminded me of snowflakes, and the bottom of my white dress fanned out in a beautiful ice-blue color.

“Elena, that dress was made just for you,” Sammy said with admiration.

“I love this. It is gorgeous.” I looked at my figure in the mirror and then at Becky. “Where did you get these dresses?”

“Mom dropped them off about an hour ago. She’s been in Elm for the past couple of days shopping for the ball and everything. She even said she will make our masks, if we decide on the dresses.”

“Elena is going to be the snow queen.”

“I should really try to harness my frost.”

“Tabitha is not going to like that.”

“Screw Tabitha. She’s not the only frost princess in town,” I said with a twinge of jealousy in my tone.

The girls laughed.

Blake popped into my mind. I wondered if he would even be there. Maybe he was one of those guys that didn’t even like dances, that would be a shame.

I crawled into bed thinking about the ball and really started to wonder if Blake had some sort of a link with me. If he could hear and see what I was thinking. That would be just my luck.

I closed my eyes and in a couple of seconds I started dreaming about dresses and knights hiding behind different masks.

HE NEXT DAY I saw all the banners about the Testrial ball. Maybe a ball was exactly what I needed. To just enjoy myself with Becky and Sammy. Then Dean and George popped into the picture too, and although I’d gotten really close to both of them, in a brotherly kind of way, I still felt like the odd one out.

I met Blake on the mountain, but we had to cut it short on the Thursday because Becky had gotten permission to go and meet Lucille to pick up our masks.

“Elena it’s just a ball.”

“I don’t care. I’m sick and tired of practicing how to be a Rubicon. Arianna’s threats have to wait for now.” I walked behind the tree to shift back into my dragon figure. “Let me guess, you don’t like dances and dress-up?”

“Is that even a question?” he asked and I giggled.

“So I’ll take that as a no.” I stepped out from behind the tree.

He just chuckled. “So, I’ll meet you here tomorrow?”

I shook my huge dragon head. “Nope, I have to get ready for the ball.”

“Elena.”

“One day is not going to make me worse. I need a break. Go do something with Tabitha, you guys are still together, right?” I couldn’t believe I’d just asked him that.

“Yes,” he said in a sarcastic tone.

“There you go, see you on Monday,” I said and dove off the cliff.

“See what I mean?”
Cara said.

“It’s not like that.”

“Yeah right. That boy feels exactly the same way about you as you do about him.”

“You haven’t met Tabitha yet.”

“I don’t need to.”

I giggled at Cara’s comment. She sure knew how to make someone feel special and I was glad that she was a part of me.

At three the tram stopped right in front of the Bayside Inn where we’d stayed a couple of months back for the King of Lion’s revealing.

Lucille had been living in one of the suites for the past week.

When she opened the door, I received a big embrace and a kiss on the cheek. Sammy and Becky were next.

“So, where are the masks?”

“Patience,” Lucille answered her daughter and led us into the small lounge area that was right in the middle of the gigantic suite.

She disappeared into another room while Becky made us some coffee.

Lucille carried three boxes and placed them gently on the table. Becky thrust our cups into our hands and went for the boxes.

Her mother just stared at her with a slight twitch, tucking in the corner of her mouth.

Sammy and I went closer to see what the masks in Becky’s hand looked like.

“Mom, these are gorgeous. Did you kill a swan for these?”

Lucille laughed. “They are fake feathers Becky. I know a thing or two about making masks.”

She handed Becky the one that went with the green dress she was going to wear. The texture of the mask felt soft, with huge green feathers around the eyes. It was really stunning. It even had a bit of a green shine if the light reflected on it at just the right angle.

The yellow dress had a yellow sequin mask to match and I never knew masks could be so beautiful. There were yellow feathers too, but not as many as the first mask.

Then Becky took out the mask that went with my dress. It was pure white, and Lucille had used a sparkling white fabric to cover it. It really looked like it was made of frost.

“I love it, it’s gorgeous, Lucille.”

Lucille shrugged her shoulders and had a huge smile plastered on her face. “I’m glad you girls love them. I can’t wait to see what you are going to look like tomorrow.”

We put the masks back into their boxes and placed them gently on top of one another.

“So how are things going at school?” She looked straight at me.

“You mean how am I dealing with being a dragon?”

She gave me a soft yet concerned look.

“I’m fine. I got over a lot of things, things I never thought I would and it’s all thanks to …my dragon form.” I wanted to say Cara, but I knew I would get funny stares from Lucille and I really didn’t want her to worry about me any more than she already did. I was fine.

“Then I’m glad.” She smiled. “I know it couldn’t have been easy for you. I was shocked when Becky told me that you turned, and into a Rubicon. I have to admit it’s still a bit confusing on so many levels.” She looked at me and shook her head. “Forgive me, I’m babbling way too much again.”

“Not at all,” I said just as I put the coffee mug to my lips.

We enjoyed the afternoon with Lucille, she even got pizzas brought up to the room and we ate until it was time to go.

“So, we’ll see you tomorrow at two?” Becky said as she hugged her mom.

“I’ll be there five minutes before two.” Lucille wrinkled her nose at her daughter.

“Thanks for the pizza,” Sammy gave her a hug after Becky.

“You are welcome.”

I was last. “Thanks for the beautiful masks. They are really something.”

“I’m glad you love them. I can’t wait to see you girls tomorrow in all your glory.”

“Okay,” Becky broke our hug. “It’s time to go. I don’t want to be late or make Master Longwei mad and decide to ban us from the ball.”

“Drama Queen,” her mother mumbled.

“Love you,” Becky yelled as we ran down the corridor to the elevator.

“Love you back.”

The tram ride back to the Academy went fast but only because we couldn’t stop babbling about how beautiful the masks were. We tried them on in our room and I had to say, they were all uniquely stunning. I really couldn’t wait for tomorrow to come.

I struggled to fall asleep that night and when I did, I dreamt about the twenty cannon shots and the crazy, wailing, clucking sound of baby Elementals. I woke up in a cold sweat as the pain of Cara stirring inside of me felt real. It disappeared the minute I realized I was inside my bed and safe. I glanced over at the other beds and found two heaps covered with blankets, sleeping soundly.

My head hit the pillow hard as I just stared at the top of my posted bed.

When was I going to get rid of all these stupid dreams?
I knew my answer was as soon as I spoke to someone about what had happened, but I couldn’t. I didn’t trust anyone, and Blake was already helping me with so much. He also had a lot to deal with himself, and I couldn’t burden him with more Elena crap.

I stayed awake until Becky’s alarm clock went off and I couldn’t wait for the school day to just be over and done with, then it will be the time for the ball.

Classes were boring as everyone around us talked about masks, tiaras and hair appointments in Elm this afternoon. That was why Lucille was coming to help us get ready.

For the past two days, we weren’t allowed to go down to the Coliseum or Parthenon dome as Master Longwei had gotten a company to come and set up for tonight’s ball.

None of us had any idea of what it would look like tonight, as it was a huge surprise and guarded twenty-four-seven by people from the company.

At night the site was protected by an invisibility spell, so we couldn’t even peek.

In history class we had a break and everyone began talking about the balls King Albert’s mom used to hosts. It was why Dragonia Academy had a masked ball every year. We hung onto the Professor’s every word as she gave us a history lesson, one that wasn’t boring, but reminded me a lot of Cheng’s lessons.

I really missed him a lot.

I closed my eyes and pushed myself back into the story about the queen’s dances she’d held on a regular basis, which, I might add, King Albert hated. We all laughed at that part.

At two Sammy and I ran back to our room. The hallways were crowded with students trying to get to the lobby and down to Elm. I was grateful that we would get ready in our room.

We found Lucille with a table with snacks inside. Our dresses lay beautifully on each bed with the masks and shoes.

I cringed when I saw high heels.

“Elena, you have to get used to them, seriously.” Becky rolled her eyes.

“I’m going to break—”

“No you are not,” Lucille said. “They go beautifully with that dress and it’s a dress that doesn’t go well with pumps, now go get your butt into that shower.”

I did what she said and when I got out, Sammy slipped in after me.

Getting into the dress took up half an hour all by itself. Lucille put up a fight with the corset and I felt as if I was never going to breathe again. I just hoped my gills wouldn’t come out to help with breathing tonight. It would ruin the picture completely.

The frost dress with the ice blue skirt was an absolutely stunning picture. Lucille used plenty of whites on my eyes and used some sort of glue and applied small white stones at the side of my lids to make them stand out. My hair was taken up with curls hanging loose over my shoulders. When I was done, Becky was next. She bitched and complained when Lucille pulled the corset tight.

“It’s painful to be beautiful, suck it up,” Lucille said and pulled the strings tighter.

“Does it have to be this tight? I can hardly breathe,” she said as her mother tied the laces together. Sammy just shook her head and I giggled softly.

Becky’s dress was absolutely beautiful. It was green and went perfectly with her swan mask, as she’d dubbed it.

Her hair was taken up into a French roll and her mother did an amazing job with her eyes. They stood out and the picture was a mixture between fairy tale and Goth, which was so Becky.

Sammy had the yellow dress. She sucked it up like Lucille had told Becky and when her dress was on, Lucille took a small break. We had a couple of snacks and some champagne. Becky’s mom was the coolest ever.

After our break it was time for Sammy’s hair, and when she was done, Lucille helped us with our masks.

The picture in the mirror of three princess-like figures wearing masks was breathtakingly beautiful. Lucille took a couple of pictures and we jumped at a hard knock on the door.

Becky slipped into her high heels, pulled the dress slightly up and went to open the door for who I could only assume would be George and Dean.

“Wow!” George said and threw his arms around Becky.

“I’m in here too, mister,” Lucille said which made us laugh.

“Sorry, Lucille, thanks for the heads up.”

Lucille shook her head softly and gasped as George and Dean entered. They looked absolutely stunning in some sort of tuxedo, but the jackets weren’t traditional, they were something completely different, something that reminded me of fairy princes.

“No wings?” it slipped out, and Lucille and Sammy laughed.

Dean just gaped when he saw Sammy and she twirled. “You like?”

“You look absolutely breathtakingly beautiful.”

An ache tugged at my heart again, thinking how Lucian wasn’t here to see any of this.

“Wow, Elena. Ice Queen.”

I laughed. “I had to put something on that was going to fit me, don’t you think?”

He smiled gently and gave me a hug. “You are far from an Ice Queen.”