12. Jaiyana

CHAPTER TWELVE

JAIYANA

I rode on Lux’s head – not like that – as we soared through the morning light. My very first night, trapped in a strange dragon shifter’s claws as the dark, unknown island rolled beneath me, came back to me. It felt like a simpler time. Even my emotions had been more straightforward… or at least I hadn’t admitted how lonely I truly was.

Now, I rode on the back of my fourth mate, identifying the villages of the elemental clans. I understood so much more while still knowing nothing. Instead of being excited about an adventure, I faced my nightmare: the entire reason I isolated myself.

Something terrible was happening, probably to the world, and I very likely caused it.

What’s the opposite of a gold star?

Golden poo?

Is that an emoji option?

It should be.

We landed at the start of The Hunt. My dragons shifted, pulling on cargo pants and tank tops. Og inspected Rehan’s poison damage, finding it healing faster from his work but still present.

I repeated what I’d said last night. The damage was not just to Rehan’s body but to his essence. Demons existed to destroy, and the most efficient way to put down something magical was to take away its ability to heal. Og wrinkled his nose and didn’t comment.

Although my dragons were not a loud bunch in the morning, this morning had been extra subdued. I studied each one.

Tyson was not a morning dragon. Without his sharp words baiting Rehan, the two easily co-existed. Their matching camo for the day even made them look like the hot lovers I’d first imagined them as on the mountaintop.

That dream will never come true.

Some dreams aren’t meant to be.

Lux kept sneaking peeks at Og, who went out of his way to not look at the air dragon. Something went down last night. I’d heard what sounded like the beginning of a fight before two little green runes for silence seared the darkness and then vanished. Happily pinned under Rehan, I decided it was best to wait until it escalated, except it never did.

I woke up, draped on top of Rehan, with all my dragons in one piece. It was unexpected.

Instead of dwelling on the unknown, I shouldered my pack and found a faint trail heading into the forest toward Scalehive. Except no one followed me. My four dragons looked at each other, waiting for someone other than me to take the lead. I seethed.

“It’s a forest walk, and my element is earth. I’ll go first,” Og stepped in front of me.

I rolled my eyes but fell in behind him.

We walked down a narrow path in the trees in silence before I pulled out a rolled-up red paper, which I assumed was from the fire dragons. A specific sentence made me pause. My heart pinched painfully, and I glanced back at Tyson before forcing myself to breathe normally. I wasn’t hurt. This was good. It was more proof the dragons’ pull to me was the curse.

See, pain I don’t need to feel.

Except you felt it.

The opening guitar riff of Johnny Cash’s cover of Hurt played in my mind. I tried to make it stop, which only made me focus on it more. ‘What have I become, my sweetest friend,’ the little voice in my head sang.

“Everything okay, Jay?” Lux asked.

Okay, Jay. The rhyme saved me from my impending pity party, though the fucking song didn’t stop.

“Fine.” I lied. “They claim Doctor Raba had no involvement, though the questions they asked were particular and only about me.”

“Who are they?” Lux eyed the paper.

“The fire dragons,” I responded.

Lux frowned. “Sky, my father’s right hand, left that this morning.”

I flipped the paper over but found no markings on the back. “The letter has some details, but it doesn’t really have substance. Maybe Sky was just the messenger?”

Og pulled the paper out of my hands.

Anger flooded my gut. His words last night rang in my head. ‘All getting your magic back will do is give you more tools to lie to yourself.’ I wasn’t fucking lying to myself. These fucking dragons were making everything complicated.

“You don’t trust me to read either?” I snipped like a teenage girl.

Og dodged a low branch, ignoring me or possibly incapable of listening and reading at the same time.

I wouldn’t listen to me either if we’re being honest.

“Doctor Raba noted an unusually high dosage of the knockout drugs they used on your trip to the island,” Og said. “But attributed it to your high BMI. Not a possible magical metabolism.”

“It’s not that fucking high!” I stated, knowing that wasn’t why Og repeated the info. “Fuck whoever invented BMI.”

‘You don’t think we love you,’ more of Og’s stupid words from last night. ‘You don’t love yourself.’

“Like we didn’t have enough reasons to feel bad about ourselves,” I mumbled, focusing on anything but what Og said.

Rehan side-eyed me and tried to step closer, but a bush in the undergrowth stood between us.

“Doctor Raba also,” Ogden continued, ignoring my outburst. “Under truth serum provided by the earth dragons, admitted he lied about the air dragons being responsible for his injuries. It was a power play. When his plan to kidnap Jay failed, he was going to use his fall as leverage. Moreover, he’s backing Tia’s claim that Tyson is her true mate… she’s ah, saying because Tyson slept with her after marking Jay, the mate bond isn’t correctly formed, which adds to Ryker’s mind control theory.”

I wrinkled my nose, not liking Og’s paraphrasing any more than the original sentence.

“You slept with Tia after you marked Jay?” Rehan demanded.

“Wouldn’t the mark have prevented that?” Lux asked at the same time.

Tyson spluttered. “It was right after.”

Despite my resolve to see this as a good thing, my stomach clenched.

“And just for a day,” Tyson continued.

An entire day?

“I was trying to get over Wiggles.”

Regret, he regretted it.

“She was constantly on my fecking mind. All I could think about was her, but she wasn’t right for my family. We can’t even make a family.”

I nodded along with his explanation, my head bobbing oddly in time with my steps. It always came back to kids, and it always would. It was nature’s way. My resolve to free my dragons quadrupled while an odd detachment settled over my shoulders.

“Tyson, stop talking,” Og hissed. The warlock halted, forcing all of us to come to a stop, and turned around. “Jay…”

Tyson growled, cutting off Og, and stepped around Rehan to put a hand on my shoulder. “Wiggles, baby, my dad picked Tia, and she means nothing to me.”

I shrugged off his touch and held up a hand: this was good.

And if I said it enough times, I’d feel the truth of it.

‘I will let you down. I will make you hurt.’

“I was something forced onto you,” I said out loud, letting the fucking song in my head play so I would stop focusing on it. “I get fighting back.” I didn’t look at anyone. I kept my eyes on the ground. “And I can’t make a family. You’re still one hundred percent correct.” My detachment grew. “Lux, I don’t think the marks prevent sex outside of the mate bond, but from what I googled, they shouldn’t need to because the lovers wouldn’t be interested in anyone else.”

Tyson clenched his fists. “It was her tits, not her. I wasn’t interested.”

Ogden swore in at least four different languages.

I looked up, blinking at Tyson. “Are you trying to make this better or worse?”

Tyson stomped his foot. “Better.”

Lux shook his head. “I’ve watched a lot of preteens mess up a conversation this badly, but never an adult.”

Tyson’s handsome features pulled into a confused pinch.

I patted the fire prince on the arm. “It’s okay. This is good. It’s proof the mate mark isn’t fully formed, which means I am more likely to be able to reverse it.”

I plastered a smile on my face, which felt as false as it was.

Og shook his head, glaring daggers at Tyson.

“Shall we keep walking?” I shoved my hands forward.

Og scrunched up his face. “Jay…”

Before he continued, Rehan stepped forward and wrapped me in his arms. “Friend or mate, I’m here. I want to help you fix whatever you may or may not have done. We’ll keep this simple, just like you asked.”

I bit my lips together to keep from crying in relief. Support without pressure is exactly what I needed. Demons were terrible shit, and I was powerful. I needed allies, not therapists. I sank back into the arms of my too-muscled-for-his-own good dragon. His warmth and support filled me. I let myself live in his simple acceptance of the situation before standing on my own two feet once more.

Og frowned, but I saw the gears grinding behind his eyes. Hopefully, he’d back off. I didn’t need to spend more time arguing with him about the nature of curses when we clearly stood on different sides of the table.

“Look,” I refocused us on the actual problem the fire dragon’s report, delivered by an air dragon, represented. “The fire dragons are up to something, and they’re either working with the air dragons or using them. Maybe both.” I physically pushed Og, and he unhappily started walking once more. “What’s important: they’ve claimed no knowledge of me or my situation. So, for now, we need to focus on Scalehive. I came here as part of your Hunt, and Scalehive’s the only point of contact for that, so let’s review what we’re walking towards.”

Lux read from the report Oliviarose gave me yesterday. Five dragon shifters, dedicated to neutrality, spent most of their days processing applications and playing tech support to the island’s communication network… phones and internet.

My need for a weapon felt silly by the time Lux finished describing the three-story apartment built into the massive radio tower and the pencil pushers who lived in it. But, peaceful or not, one of these people knew who put me here.

Painted with dark greens and browns, the tower blended in with the forest, though the front door was a cheery yellow and had a few dead potted plants on either side. It wasn’t a good sign. To make things worse, no one answered when we knocked.

Tyson kicked the door down, bursting into a front room which contained a kitchen. Half a sandwich sat molding on a cutting board while a small army of ants marched across the counters to and from the rotten trash bin.

“Rehan, take point.” I motioned toward the stairs leading up.

Tyson growled, not wanting to give up his position at the front, while all four of my mates eyed each other, waiting for one or the other to take charge.

I sighed. “Look, I get it. I’m not in control here. But,” I sliced my hand through the air. “I’ve got more tactical experience than the rest of you combined, and I really don’t want whatever we find incinerated on sight.” I made eye contact with Tyson. “More, I don’t have magic or claws I can whip out on command.”

You are such a manipulative shit. You can use their elements.

Tyson won’t remember that, and I want Og’s Ley Line magic at our front. Now dance for me, mates. Arg.

A crazy giggle at my thoughts slipped out of my lips.

Ogden and Lux gave me flat looks as if they knew exactly what I was doing, but they didn’t interfere. As I hoped, Tyson immediately caught my drift and appointed himself head bodyguard, gluing himself to my hip.

Rehan let out an unhappy grunt, but I pushed our versatile magical warlock into the lead, with Rehan’s muscle looming over him. Lux and his ability to cast shields brought up the rear, though he didn’t call on his wind magic. We spilled onto the next level up. Rehan clipped Og’s heel, making the warlock cry out in pain and jump forward while Tyson laughed. Lux just followed at our back, still not using his elemental powers.

I’ve seen cats with better teamwork.

It’s not hopeless. They worked really well together with you between them.

Heat rose to my face. Fortunately, no one saw.

Except for Tyson, still at my hip, the other three split off and slipped further down the hall. They each opened a different door without considering the consequences. A part of me wished something terrible would jump out so they’d learn something, but nothing did. Only their steps sounded in the deathly silence. Every fiber of my being went on high alert. We cleared the five bedrooms and three bathrooms. Nothing was out of place, though a few beds were unmade, and every surface collected dust. A squirrel scampered out an open window.

We moved on. The smell of decay hit me halfway up to the top floor, and my stomach knotted.

Big, strong dragon shifters or not, death impacted everyone differently. Based on the smell, what we were about to see was not freshly cut-down dragon shifters after a battle but something far more gruesome.

A door at the top stood mostly closed. Rehan had to shove hard to get it open. The smell of decay quadrupled, and I cast a spell to cut off my sense of smell, but nothing happened. Like the magicless peon I was, I pinched my nose shut with my fingers.

Rehan stepped through, followed by Og and Tyson. By the time I stepped over the threshold, Og was bent over, vomiting up his breakfast, and Tyson had his gaze glued to the ceiling, breathing hard.

I kept my fingers on my nose and studied the scene, forcing Lux to stay in the hall at my back, though he easily saw over me.

Monitors hummed, and computer fans whirred. Dried blood covered almost every surface. Rehan’s shoving of the door had moved a corpse, which had been cut down, presumably running. Its mostly rotted body had come apart in three pieces. Two of the others still sat in their chairs in the same state of decay. The blood spatter around them suggested their major arteries had been somehow slashed. I’d need to get closer to confirm. Of the remaining two, one lay on its face in the middle and the other on its side as if having stood before crumpling.

I looked past the five corpses. No bullet holes riddled the walls. Although blood-stained keyboards and computer cases, the system was still on and functioning. This was likely tightly controlled magic or basic weapons. I didn’t see any apparent acid damage or signs of demons.

I slid to Ogden and clapped him on the back. “Do what you need to.”

I might not remember my parents well, but the first man I ever slid a knife into was a vivid collection of emotions and smells. It had been self-defense, but that kind of violence changes something inside you.

A fierce need to push all my dragons out of the room clawed at my throat, making it hard to breathe.

“Ogden and Lux go to the kitchen. See if there are clues to how long ago this happened,” I ordered. “Tyson and Rehan, second floor. Same thing. Someone had to keep a diary.”

I pulled out the phone Olivearose gave me and photographed the scene before sending it to her.

No one did what I said.

“Did you hear me?” I asked, squeezing the phone between my hands to hold back a tremble. “You don’t need to see this.”

Lux stepped into the room and placed a hand on my back. “We do.” His body heat kissed my back. “If you see it, we see it. We’re in this together.” He ran his hand down my spine. “Breathe, Jay.”

I did. One at a time, my mates controlled whatever emotion the violently rotting dead bodies brought out of them. Og straightened and wiped his hand on the back of his mouth. Meanwhile, Rehan moved slowly forward, noting every detail. Lux ran his hand down my back and rested it on my hip, supporting me. Like I was the one overreacting.

“It’s good to know you care,” Lux whispered in my ear.

“I don…“ I snapped.

“But we’re your mates,” Lux said over my lies. “Your equals. You cannot protect us.” He ran his hand down the seam of my thigh. “If you treat us like I treated my students again.” He cupped my sex and pulled, making me pulse with inappropriate lust. “I will make sure you are incapable of crossing the two.”

His threat felt more like a promise, and heat rushed through me. I dropped my fingers from my nose, unsure if I was going to pull his hand off me or encourage him more, but the smell knocked reality back into place. I replugged my nose and nodded.

“Got it,” I said, my voice hilariously nasally.

“Why is this computer smashed and the rest aren’t?” Tyson asked from a desk off to one side.

Lux released me and stepped back, his beautiful gaze glued to me and only me.

He’s right. You do care. You’ve led men into battle without so much as a warning.

They were my soldiers; these are my, well, something different.

Soul Mates, Jay. Dragons who love you.

I shook my head to rid myself of my thoughts and stepped to the fire prince and his half-melted computer. The hard drive was decimated with only half a stick of the RAM fused to its slot.

“Is this where your headshot was taken?” Rehan asked behind me.

I stood and turned to find Rehan kneeling on the dark wood floor, which looked identical to the one in my horrible headshot from my initial paperwork. Runes had been scored in a circle barely larger than a person. An edge of any of those runes could easily have been the unidentified smudge in the picture.

The water heir reached forward and brushed one of the runes. At his touch, the marks flared with a fluorescent-green glow, each one taking on the distinct markings of a familiar spell. A translucent tentacle of power streaked toward the ceiling, reaching for the dragon’s shield protecting the island.

“Rehan!” I yelled.

The glow bloomed to life before a familiar shimmer lit up the room.