The flames flew from his hands and closed in on Walther. His screams, I would bet, were heard for miles.
These weren’t like the other flames. This wasn’t like any kind of fire I’d ever seen. The black wisps writhing inside the flames seemed to take on a life of their own. As the fire licked against Walther’s skin, the blackness looked very much like shadows of men, their hands tearing away at his muscle and tissue until nothing but steaming, smoldering bones and silence remained.
Gerik collapsed.
“The bodies!” Jericho shouted out, “Make sure the others are dead!”
While men rushed off in all directions toward the fallen Skin Eaters, the black mist surrounding the pile of steaming bones had swirled upward into the sky, then doubled back toward where Gerik lay. It hovered over his body, touching and probing him with its tendrils of darkness.
Then, in one vicious swoop, the black mist entered his mouth and disappeared inside of him. Already violently shaking, Gerik’s body jackknifed off the ground. I wrenched free of Djordji’s grip and took off running in his direction.
“Don’t touch him, Trinity!” Stefan yelled. “He used magic he shouldn’t have. There is no telling what happened to him!”
“Gerik?” I whispered, crouching down next to him. I reached out to move blood soaked hair out of his eyes. What I saw made my heart stop.
Gerik’s eyes were as black as Walther’s had been, not a drop of color remaining. Blood covered him from his nose to his knees and his chest was heaving heavily forward, as if something within him was trying to force its way out.
“Oh gods, Gerik, what did you do?” I cried.
I jumped as Jericho put his hands on my shoulders and began to drag me backwards. “Stay away from him, child.”
“We need to go,” Djordji said, sounding panicked. “All of us need to leave. Right now.”
I turned to stare at them, disgusted. Gerik had just saved countless lives and we needed to go? Leave him here hurting? Or worse, to die?
With no warning, Gerik jumped to his feet and let loose a horrifying roar. Black smoke poured from both his nose and mouth.
Was he taller? Wider? He looked downright massive.
“Băiatul are coarne,” Stefan murmured. “The boy has horns.”
My gaze shifted to Gerik’s face. The skin had split at his hairline directly above his eyes. An inch in diameter black horns had grown upward over his head then curved down until they reached his ears in sharp points.
Another roar, louder than the first, had me covering my ears. His t-shirt and jeans were already torn and hanging off of him, yet the distinct sound of tearing could still be heard as Gerik’s body continued to heave.
“Oh my gods!” I cried.
It wasn’t only that he was growing; his skin was actually splitting apart. Invisible claws were shredding him across his chest and arms and revealing… scales? Diamond-shaped, shiny black scales appeared beneath the spitting skin until his entire left arm and a good portion of his chest were covered in them.
Stefan pulled me into his arms, trying to turn me away. “Don’t look, Trinity; this isn’t something you’re going to want to see.”
“I’m not leaving him,” I whispered. “He won’t hurt me,” I said, not knowing if that was true or not.
Stefan hesitated. He might have let go of me if Gerik hadn’t chosen that moment to hit the ground with an ear splitting scream.
His screams continued as black spikes ripped through his back, each one not quite as thick or as long as the one before it.
“Is he dying?” I managed to ask through my sobs.
“No,” Stefan whispered, his voice shaking. “Balaur…Gerik is becoming a dragon.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Hungary, 1078 A.C.E
The encampment was in ruins. Wagons had been burned and tents had been shredded. Even the horses had been killed.
And blood. There was so much blood.
The children, too. What kind of monster would order innocent babes put to death?
The men had been shredded to pieces. Their heads and limbs lay severed from their torsos. The women and girls who had been subjected to rape had been killed and left naked in the same humiliating position.
And the children…Treime couldn’t even bear to look at them again and see their tiny faces and hands covered in blood.
She watched in horror as the Gaje soldiers kicked the bodies of her people while they filled their sacks with stolen belongings.
Shaking, she tried to reach Emilian through the bond they shared when suddenly she was yanked by her hair, causing her to stumble backwards into her captor.
“My lord! I found another one!” A hand reached around her and roughly groped her breast, pulling and twisting until she cried out in pain. Leaning forward, with rancid breath, he whispered, “Maybe his lordship will let me keep you. Shame you’re so fat though.”
“What do you have there?” A short, pudgy man laden with armor sat astride an impressive black stallion. He leered down at her and her captor.
“Murderer!” she hissed and both men laughed at her.
Just then she felt the tug of Emilian through their bond. He’d seen through her what had happened, what was happening. But she knew he would never make it in time to save her.
“Are we going to kill her, my lord? Can I have at her first?”
The man upon the horse smiled and she felt her stomach roil. “She is very beautiful, isn’t she? I have never seen such magnificent green eyes. Such a shame to waste such beauty. Do what you will and then bring her to me, I’m going to take her home.”
The man behind her shifted as he swung her around to face him. Pushing her back on the ground with one hand around her neck, he lifted her tunic and began fumbling with his own.
Barely able to breathe and about to be raped, she lifted her freed hands and focused all her energy toward the man trying to push his way in-between her legs.
Flames erupted from her palms in a burst of white light. She threw them forward at the man astride her. He let loose a high-pitched scream as the fire engulfed him, then flung himself backwards in an attempt to get away from her.
His hysterical screaming and flailing movements stopped suddenly and the flaming man fell to the ground. The man covered in armor stood behind the fallen man, his sword firmly embedded in the man’s back.
He looked amused. “My dear, you’ve done nothing but further my desire for you. A sorceress is a greater asset than a bedmate.”
He gestured at a few of his men. “Grab her,” he told them. Staring at her with fear in their eyes, none of the men moved.
“GET HER!” he screamed. “Now!”
At least ten men suddenly rushed her and she didn’t even try to fight them. She couldn’t, her body was too weary from her advanced state of pregnancy to call upon anymore magic. They bound her wrists and ankles and gagged her. Throwing her in the back of a mule cart, they kept their swords pointed at her belly in case she tried to use her magic again.
She couldn’t stop the tears that came as she was taken away. They weren’t for her family or her clan, for they were already gone. They were for the fates of Walther and Emilian and their unborn child. She cried until she had no tears left and then her soul began to weep.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Present Day
Crouched by a tree, blood still dripping from the enormous black wings that had now fully emerged from his back, Gerik was watching me the way a wild animal watches their prey. It didn’t matter how small the movement, I could rub the bottom of my nose, twitch a toe and his eyes would catch it, his nostrils flaring as if the inconsequential action had stirred something in the breeze.
His transformation was complete. Lock, stock, fangs and a tail.
I was dumbfounded by the sheer size of him. He hadn’t been small before, but now, he must be at least two hundred and fifty pounds and nearly seven feet tall.
I didn’t have words. Even if I’d had them I doubted I would have be
en able to speak them aloud.
With her arms wrapped tightly around herself, Drina walked up to stand beside Jericho. “He can no longer stay here,” she whispered loudly, her eyes never leaving Gerik. “There are rules and he has broken the most important one. We cannot allow any more devastation to befall the clan.”
Jericho, with tears in his eyes, looked sadly at Gerik and nodded in agreement.
Gerik’s black eyes burned right through the Baró until Jericho was forced to look away.
“You must go, son,” Jericho said quietly, his eyes on the ground.
Gerik jumped to his feet, his entire body constricting. With a leathery snap, giant black wings unfurled behind him casting shadows over his towering form.
“Mine!” Gerik suddenly roared. Pushing past Jericho, Gerik half ran, half flew at me.
I took a brief moment to thank every single god and goddess out there that Xan wasn’t here. I’m willing to bet the Parthenon that there was no bigger high than that gained from fighting a dragon for the love of a girl.
“No!” Jericho cried out, his panic clear. “Do not touch her! Your magic, Gerik! Think! Please think about this!”
Then I was airborne. The wind rushed up beneath me and the sky grew closer. I squeaked and buried myself in Gerik’s chest. His grip on me was firm and so, instead of having a full blown panic attack, I closed my eyes and concentrated on remembering to breathe.
Minutes later, we landed somewhere in the woods where the trees grew thicker, larger than the ones near camp. There were no beaten paths to follow. I was trapped.
He set me down gently but refused to let me go.
My fingertips brushed over the hot skin on his stomach and the warm, smooth black scales over his arms and chest. Who knew a human being could possess such fire and not incinerate or die from fever.
And the magic. It was all over him. You couldn’t be this close to him and not feel it, not be drawn to it and swept away inside of it. It was as if all life around Gerik had come to a standstill. No birds chirped, no insects buzzed, even the air didn’t dare move, as if it, too, was afraid of getting sucked away in Gerik’s overwhelming presence.
Gerik had become the opposition of life. He needed nothing now. He was a self sustaining powerhouse, all rolled into one man.
I laid my hand on his heart where only one of his rune tattoos remained untouched by his anomalous transformation. I swallowed back a fresh wave of tears as I traced the three interlocking circles.
Without warning I was flat on my back with Gerik’s hands gripping my hips. Brilliant blue eyes, instead of black, looked down at me.
“It’s better this way,” he rumbled. “Without the blinding need, yeah? I didn’t think it would be, but… I can think clearly and really feel you, Trinity. Really smell you.” His nostrils flared wide and black fangs lengthened past his bottom lip. I should have pushed him away but it was beyond my ability as a woman. As a human. As a lesser creature in the presence of a god.
This magic far surpassed the soul mate bond. It was darker, dangerous and terrifyingly more powerful than anything I’d experienced. Worse even was my awareness. My head was clear, my thoughts my own, my ability to discern right from wrong was still intact, and yet I was helpless against him, against his nearness and his intoxicating power.
“I want to show you,” he murmured. “I need you to know that I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I would never have hurt you.”
“Do it,” I rasped, overcome with feelings I had no description for. “Show me everything, all of it.”
Digging my fingers in the waistband of his jeans, I yanked on them, forcing his hips in-between my thighs. “I want to feel everything that you feel,” I told him.
Gerik’s beautiful eyes squeezed closed, leaking fat tears. Without thinking, just feeling, I quickly kissed each one away.
Black eyes opened, wielding raw power. He held me tightly when I would have flown backwards as images and emotions that were not my own assaulted me.
Flash.
I felt fear. I was racing towards…me? The carnival! I was seeing myself at the carnival the day Gerik saved my life.
Someone is screaming at me not to go back there. “Gerik!” they scream, “We have children here! We will have to leave you!” I ignore them, I have to...because I need her.
And when I see her I am horrified. She is running from these creatures, all trying to kill her.
I’m using my magic, but it’s so hard to differentiate who is human and who is not in the mass hysteria and, god dammit, I’m not going to make it. I’m going to lose her before I even touch her.
I am in time. I snap the neck of one, just as he swiped at her hair.
The moment I touch her I feel whole.
Flash.
I am watching her sleep, inhaling deeply the scent of flowers that always surrounds her. I can’t bear it anymore, she cries every night for her sister and she won’t even look at me. I want to comfort her, touch her. No, I need to touch her. The need throbs, and at times it actually hurts. I keep thinking if I can’t have her soon I will die.
I reach out to finger her hair, her cheek. God, it’s so soft. Just like the rest of her. Her soft skin, her soft body. Even her lips look soft.
I can wait for her, I can. No, I can’t. I can. I should and I can.
I’m going crazy. I need to touch her. Just once. I cannot be this close to her without touching her.
A throat clears. I glance at Becki. She’s pointing at the door. Reluctantly, I leave.
Flash.
I’m watching her from across camp. She’s helping the women cook today and I’ve seen her smile twice already. When she smiles, her dimples show and I can’t help but smile too. And those eyes…
Someone has beaded her hair, probably Becki. Thank God for Becki. She has done wonders helping her move past her grief.
Her dress flutters in the breeze and my gaze ends up on her gently curved hips. I want to grab them and wrap her beautifully sculpted legs around me.
She’s not wearing a bra today; her breasts slope naturally against the thin material of her dress, and bounce with her movements. My muscles are twitching again, my insides coiling, heating. I’m going to go mad.
Shandor and Xan are staring at her again. I wonder if anyone will care if I burn their eyes out of their skulls. Maybe their mami’s?
Flash.
Onyx. I need release. I can’t look at her face, her too thin lips, and her hard straight body. It’s not what I want.
I ache for Trinity’s curves, the softness of her body, and the fullness of her lips. I want to see emeralds looking back at me and feel her long, black hair draped across me. I want to smell the rainbow that is her. I want to feel whole when I come, not drained and empty.
I’m not going to look at Onyx anymore. I’m going to flip her over and close my eyes. Close my eyes and pretend.
Flash.
Xan took what was mine. The most brutal and beautiful part of claiming my woman, my soul mate, he stole from me and took as his own.
Does she actually love him?
It. Hurts. So. Bad.
I should kill him. Only, how can I? How can I fault him for wanting her? She is everything. She is—
I am going to kill him.
He is going to kill me.
I have to get out of here. Now.
Flash.
“Gerik!” I gasp, as my emotions and thoughts became my own again.
“Was any of it real for you?” he asked, looking away, but not before I’d glimpsed the pain and desperation that shone brightly in those blue depths.
“Or was it all…” he closed his eyes and trailed off, his fists clenching.
My heart broke for him. It broke for all of us who’d been forced to yield to the otherworldly powers of nature. A power so great she thought it her right to play with people’s destinies like pawns in a game of chess.
“Gerik?” I pleaded, cupping his face. “It was…there were times when…” My tear
s finally fell as I realized that I could tell him something that wouldn’t have to be a lie.
“Gerik, you gave me everything. You gave me absolutely everything.”
And he had. If it hadn’t been for Gerik, I would have succumbed to the same fate as my little sister and died at that carnival. Without Gerik, freeing myself from the ties that had bound me to him all these years would have been impossible because I never would have met Xan. So it was true, Gerik had given me everything. He’d given me life and more importantly… love.
Grabbing me tightly, he brought me face to face with him. “That’s all I needed to know,” he whispered hoarsely.
Heat exploded around us.
“Wait!” I cried, but it was too late. The sounds of the ocean had filled the air. The scents of pine trees and cinnamon grew stronger, surrounding me. Gerik’s eyes, blue and beautiful, captivated me like even the most glorious of sunsets could not.
I could only watch, unable to move of my own free will as he intertwined his fingers with mine. A glowing white light began to form in-between our palms. Whispers of black mist trickled through our fingers, wrapping their darkness around our joined hands.
Millions of faces and places overtook my vision, strangers all of them, yet somehow they seemed eerily familiar. Somehow I knew them, knew that we’d shared the soul inside of me. Shared this magic. These were the others my soul had collected on its endless journey of finding its counterpart, time and time again, lifetime after lifetime, love after love.
“I know you,” I said to Gerik, in awe of our ageless connection. “I’ve always known you.”
He said nothing as the power between us grew stronger and brighter. The foliage was blooming around us; the trees had grown thicker, the grass higher and greener. Fresh scents of life perfumed the air as everything began to blossom full and fat succumbing to Gerik’s power.
My head was spinning. Somehow Gerik was reconnecting us using his magic. I could feel it, the way people who have bad bones can feel when it’s going to rain. I could feel him inside of me somehow, only more. He was everywhere, all at once, taking over, taking control.
The magic was pushing wildly against my hands until I felt as if could no longer contain it, would soon be unable to hold onto all that power and yet I couldn’t seem to let it go. Something inside me felt as if I had been waiting for this moment all of my life.