9. Beckett

Staring at the destruction the Plasma Dragon caused, Beckett second-guessed himself on approaching her. There were two ways this could go. The first way would be that the dragon would turn and blast him again with Plasma magic and gravely injure him if she managed to hit the same place twice. The second would be her calming down and shifting back into Kaida so they could talk. Considering his injury still had his scales burnt in his chest, he chose to land on the ground and shift back into his human form.

I am much smarter than that to approach her like this. She leveled multiple buildings with ease. Fuck, she blasted me out of the sky. Me! One of the four strongest dragons on this island. How fucking strong is she?

That is a small amount of power she just showed us. Tread with caution, his dragon told him before he retreated to the depths of Beckett’s mind to heal.

Beckett looked down at himself and noticed his skin was charred from where the Plasma magic touched his dragon form. The only bad part of being a Dragon Shifter was both the dragon and human forms shared the injuries. With him shifting, it allowed the magic to speed up a little to heal it, but it would take more than that to heal completely.

I definitely need to warn the guys not to piss Kaida or her dragon off. I have never seen a dragon cause this much damage with one attack.

He looked over at the beautiful, deep purple dragon and thought about his next move. The dragon was staring at the building which seemed to cause the weird black haze. He could see Kaida’s dragon fighting the effects of it the moment she breathed it in. Her dragon was going berserk and she managed to fight it off long enough to destroy what was distributing the effects.

Does this mean she cannot be easily influenced by magic? If so, that gives her an edge over Witches and Faeries. Holy shit... she really should be queen.

Kaida’s dragon started to sniff the air. Beckett froze as his mind went through scenarios of what could happen. He wasn’t sure what she would be searching for but hoped it wasn’t locating another source of where that magic came from. Beckett already knew why she was drawn here in the first place. This peninsula was where elite magic users would flood before the Kings and Queens of the kingdoms tightened the barrier around the island. There was something about this place that held magic for people to pull from to perform stronger spells. Beckett remembered his parents and the others’ parents talking to him and the other three princes about how they needed to keep people from this area as much as they could when they passed down the responsibilities to them. Whenever any of them asked what exactly was there, no one could give them a clear answer. It wasn’t a safe place to allow magic users to go because they could awaken something that should remain asleep.

When the dragon swung her head and looked at Beckett directly into his eyes, his blood ran cold. He wasn’t sure if whatever caused her to basically go berserk was still affecting her or not. Her large but lean form slowly turned and began to walk toward him. Beckett could feel the earth shaking underneath his feet. He looked directly into her eyes to show her that he would not back down. If he did this to a Lycan, it would cause a bigger issue than it would with his mate.

My mate. That’s right! That is how I can connect with her.

Beckett opened himself up to the bond and allowed himself to connect with her. He shut it down when he noticed the black haze and realized that was why his own dragon didn’t follow suit. When he did this, Kaida’s dragon shook her head momentarily. When she looked back at him again, there was some recognition there. This was a good thing. The dragon recognized Beckett as her mate. Now, the only thing he needed to worry about was if she liked the fact that Beckett was her mate after breathing in something toxic. He could feel her attention on him through the bond. Something inside the chord between them told him he had reached her and could speak to her.

Hello there. Kaida, I think you need to shift back. We shouldn’t be here. Then Beckett gave it another thought. Or could you fly us back? This area is not safe... as you have noticed.

A rumble inside of the dragon’s chest had Beckett feeling relieved. When the dragon lowered herself onto the ground and maneuvered her wing to leverage Beckett to climb onto her back. Beckett felt his shoulders lower before he walked over to the dragon. Her head moved forward and nudged him upward by his ass. Beckett looked back at her, gave the dragon a wink, and said, "All yours, baby. Get us back to the house, and I’ll show you." It was followed by another rumble and then a puff of purple smoke at him. Beckett chuckled to acknowledge his mate’s dragon and continued his ascension onto the dragon’s back.

Once he was settled, Beckett bent down and patted the dragon’s back. She wasted no time getting into the air. With a single whoosh from her wings, they were airborne. Beckett’s arms wrapped around one of her spikes along her back to steady himself as they made their way to the clouds. Within minutes, their home was in view. Beckett was surprised at how quick the dragon was compared to what he knew other dragons to be. His own dragon would have taken longer to get to the house from the peninsula, even at the slow pace they are flying.

How damn powerful is she now? I really need to go into the archives. We don’t know nearly enough about Plasma Dragons to help Kaida through this.

Then the dragon’s body rippled, and Beckett felt Kaida’s dragon lose altitude. He looked ahead and noticed her head was drooping. Another ripple, and Beckett lost his balance. His hands clutched at the air as Kaida’s dragon was losing her form. Beckett called on his dragon, who was still recovering from the attack. His dragon pushed out his wings, and Beckett caught himself. He quickly looked around and found Kaida in her human form, plummeting toward the ground.

FUCK!

Beckett threw into his wings and flew down after Kaida with all the energy he could muster. His dragon’s energy was depleting fast, and Beckett’s heart was in his throat as he closed the gap slower than he wanted. He kept his hands outstretched to grab her as soon as he got close enough, but the distance wasn’t closing. He was going to miss.

A flash of green flew past him and snatched Kaida from her fall. Beckett felt his dragon roar at seeing his mate being taken from him and straightened out his wings for Beckett to get a look at who had done this. Beckett’s heart filled with rage as he looked but didn’t locate her promptly. Then, a green dragon landing outside of their house caught his attention. He knew that dragon. Arlo’s large Terrain form looked like its own section of land with Kaida lying on the ground in front of him. Beckett flapped his wings to make it to the ground just as Arlo shifted back into his human form.

Kaida lay on the ground with her eyes closed and heavy breathing. In his mind, Beckett knew that she was just asleep and recovering from what she endured in her dragon form. However, in his heart, he just saw his mate on the ground after falling from the sky. He noticed Arlo kneeling down to check on her and roared at him. Arlo jumped away from Kaida with his hands up in surrender. Beckett immediately scooped Kaida up and headed into the house. He needed her in his room and surrounded by his scent before his dragon lost it. Everything was a blur as he ran to his room. He could hear his name being called, but it didn’t register until he placed Kaida on their bed and pulled their blanket over her.

"Dude. What the hell happened?"

Arlo’s voice caused him to growl. Beckett tried to tell himself that he saved Kaida’s life, but he was still in panic mode. Kaida’s black and purple hair was sprawled out over the pillow while her face was pointed up. Her skin was paler than usual, which caused Beckett to be alarmed that what happened took more of a toll on her than he’d thought.

"I can go ask the Faerie and Witch if they have anything to help the process along to heal her."

Beckett growled, "They have names, Arlo. Use them."

"I honestly don’t know them."

Beckett shook his head, "For someone who is interested in Kaida, you’d think you would learn the names of her friends."

Arlo tried to suppress his gasp, but it didn’t work. Beckett still heard it. He knew that Arlo and Esen had been looking at Kaida the way he did when she first arrived. They had been trying to ignore it and trying even harder to hide it, but for some unknown reason...it felt right for them to feel a pull to her.

Beckett’s dragon was only mad that his mate was hurt and someone not mated to Kaida touched her. While she was falling from the sky, his dragon wanted it to be HIM that caught her because it was his duty as her mate to protect her. He was not the one that kept her safe. He wasn’t even the one who protected her from whatever happened on the peninsula.

"I’m not growling at you for wanting Kaida. I’m mad that I wasn’t the one who kept her safe. I should have just had her walk back with me. I should have had her shift and walked back. Or even had her sleep it off before she flew. I am so fucking stupid."

"How could you have known that her dragon would have cut out when it did? No one can predict these things from freshly shifted dragons."

Beckett chortled at that, "I did. We encountered something today. Something that our parents have told us about."

"Oh?"

"More on that later. Call the others. We need a meeting. There is a lot we need to talk about."

"You sure that’s a good idea with Blaze?"

Beckett thought about it for a moment and sighed heavily. No, he wasn’t sure if being around Blaze after this morning was a clever idea. If anything, Beckett needed to be on the opposite side of the island, away from Blaze right now.

But we also need answers on Plasma Dragons and why three men feel the pull to one woman. That’s unheard of in dragons.

"Where is Blaze, by the way?"

"I honestly don’t know. I think he mentioned going to the club to cool off. He said it as he was growling; and we all know none of us can understand his ass when he talks like that."

Beckett thought about it for a moment. "I don’t want him near Kaida without me here, but we need to discuss some things. We also need to do some research in the archives."

"Who is the ’we’ in this conversation?"

"Me, you, and Esen. Blaze will only cause issues with what we are looking into."

Beckett turned around and narrowed his eyes to Arlo. His blue eyes had some mischief in them. Beckett wanted to smack him for giving him grief, but it did get him out of the mood to kill someone. How? Beckett didn’t know. Arlo had a way with these things. One minute, they could all be at each other’s throats; the next, they were all buds again. Arlo claimed not to have the ability to manipulate emotion, but sometimes Beckett thought he was keeping that secret.

"Alright. I’ll track Esen down and meet you there. I honestly don’t think Blaze will be home anytime soon. He usually doesn’t roll in until dawn after a meltdown."

Beckett nodded his head in agreement and then looked back at Kaida. He heard Arlo’s feet rescinding from his room and then down the stairs. Kaida’s color was already returning to her face, meaning she was healing. Beckett was relieved not to have to run to her friends for help, knowing that all four of them would tear him a new one for letting her get hurt, especially the Lycan.

If she has managed to connect that well with those four and draw in three males... I don’t want to imagine what else is possible for her. But I guess it’s time to find out whether I’m ready or not.