Black Orchid (21 page)

Adelaide
shuddered. Yes, they were in control, though only with a tenuous hold. The
animal still threatened to take over completely. She felt Nate’s presence at
her side and the peace that his touch brought her. It reminded her of what was
important.

She
fought the rage inside her. Not just her own, but her sisters’ too, as they
were feeding each other through the link she’d established. Instead, she took
all the control she’d learned over the last few months and tried to feed that
into their connection. She felt a small pause from the other three as they felt
her strength.

Then
she felt it – the glow of warmth inside her that hadn’t come from her. Lila was
fighting too, using her ability to heal emotions.

Then
the violet blue flames suddenly shut off. Ellie was fully in control now, the
dragon mastered yet again, and now she was feeding that control down the wire
to the rest of them.

Adelaide
felt a surge in her power, in the relationship between them, in the
concentration on their connection as sisters instead of animals. At the same
time, she felt the sudden increase in Lila’s emotional control and Ellie’s
overall ability to control the morph.

“Selene?
Are you doing that?”
Ellie asked.

“I’m
trying,”
came the reply. Selene was apparently using her ability to enhance the others’
powers.

With
a deep inhalation, Adelaide shut off the sunlight yellow flames spewing from
her mouth. And then Lila’s ice blue flames ceased.

Selene’s
bright pink fire continued to burn.

“Come
on, baby,”
they heard Griffin talking to her.

“He
has so much to answer for.”
Selene’s grim reply was so full of agony and pain
that Adelaide almost felt her own dragon take over again.

Then,
slowly, the fire died down and then shut off completely. The four girls sucked
in a collective breath.

But
power was still building inside them, between them, around them.

“Get
back!”
Adelaide warned the guys.

Less
than a second later, a terrible explosion of silver fire, bursting like
fireworks, flashed from where Maddox’s body was now a pile of ash. The force
was so powerful that Adelaide was thrown back. She frantically tried to find
purchase in the air with her wings but couldn’t before she slammed back into
the ground, plowing a
trough
of dirt in her
wake. Finally, she skidded to a halt.

Rolling
back to her feet, she started searching for the others.
“Nate?!”

“Here,”
he answered.
But
here
was a ways away, closer to where she’d just been standing. He,
Alex, Griffin, and Ramsey all stood secure under Griffin’s shield.

Adelaide
sighed with relief. Then she took stock, checking herself for injury. Other
than the gash on her leg from Maddox, she was okay.

She
leapt into the sky, her wings taking her quickly up into the air. That blast
had blown her several miles away.
“Lila? Selene? Ellie?”
she called out
with her mind as she searched for them.

“Here,”
Ellie’s voice
groaned.

“Me
too,”
Lila
called.

“Yes,
I’m here,”
Selene answered.

As
she watched, the other three dragons joined her in the air.
“The others!”
Adelaide called. That explosion could’ve taken out the castle and everyone in
it.

“They’re
okay,”
Griffin’s voice calmed her fear.
“I was able to throw up a shield around
them too. But I’m not letting it down until we know we’re safe.”

“Maddox
is gone and his forces released. We’re safe, Griffin,”
Adelaide
answered.

“Not
from them. From you.”

“Oh!”

Adelaide
looked at her sisters flying beside her, and a sudden bubble of joy burst
within her. They’d done it. They’d finally defeated Maddox and still held on to
their humanity.

“We’re
fine,”
Ellie said to Griffin.

“We’re
more than good,”
Lila said.

“We’re
all safe,”
Selene added.

“Forever,”
Adelaide said.

Laughter,
bright and glorious, filled her mind. All four girls
were
more than
good. They’d saved their families, their people.

“Okay.
I’ve dropped the shield. Charlotte will bring us back. But you might want to
land outside and come in through the gate. There’s not enough room in this
place for one dragon, let alone four.”

Adelaide
giggled along with her sisters. They coasted low along the ground. As they
reached the outer wall of the castle, they flared their wings. Dirt and rocks
and leaves kicked up under the force of the wind they created. Coming to rest
in a soft landing, Adelaide released the beast. As she watched, the ground came
up to meet her.

In
shining, shimmering waves, wings became arms, talons turned to nails, scales
became soft skin. With a joyous laugh, she ran to her sisters and embraced
them. Then, hand in hand, they walked through the gate into the waiting arms of
their
te’sorthenes
and their families.

All
except Adelaide. The one face she wanted to see… the one she needed to see…
wasn’t there.

Her
gaze moved from face to face, her heart pounding. He just had to be here.

“Adelaide,
your leg!” Ellie exclaimed.

“I’ve
got it.” Her father smiled as he came over to hug her. After a good squeeze, he
knelt down, and Adelaide felt the healing warmth as the gash in her leg closed
up. But she only half paid attention to what he was doing as she continued to
frantically scan the celebrating people around her.

“Looking
for someone?” a deep voice murmured close to her ear.

With
a gasp Adelaide whirled around. “Nate!” And then his arms were wrapped around
her and his mouth was moving over hers in desperate, hungry need. Relief poured
into her.

Pulling
back, Adelaide blinked up into his smiling eyes.

“You
came for me,” he whispered.

She
smiled. “Yes, I did.”

“And
then you left me to go all dragon and take on Maddox.”

Adelaide
grimaced. “Yes, I did.”

Suddenly
Nate broke out in a grin. “You are so badass.”

Adelaide
laughed, relieved that he understood. She rolled her eyes. “And don’t you
forget it.” Then she laid her forehead against his. “But I could never have
done it without you.”

Nate
chuckled, and then they turned to face the rest of their family.

At
first there wasn’t much time for anything other than reacting to what had gone
down that day. Even explanations about how it’d all happened had to wait for
now.

They
found any survivors of the cave-in caused by Maddox’s departure in the
underground base and helped them out. They weren’t all released immediately.
Instead, they had to figure out which ones had been brainwashed and which had
willingly followed Maddox in his insanity. With their combined powers, Griffin
and Adelaide worked on that together.  But it would still take them several
weeks to get through all of them.

Xavier
moved the castle back to their original Canadian location. And then he
transported any intact tunnels from Maddox’s installation to sit under the
castle. It gave them a place to house all their prisoners until they could be
processed. The castles own dungeons weren’t quite expansive enough.

Finally,
their family managed to grab some time together one evening. They gathered in
Selene and Griffin’s rooms with Selene’s parents joining them.

Nate
sat beside Adelaide on the couch. Despite being welcomed home with open arms,
he’d remained unusually quiet these last days.

“Something
on your mind?” she murmured.

He
smiled and shook his head.

“You’re
still feeling guilty?” Before he could answer, she added, “Just before I killed
Talia, I got a mental snapshot of what she was doing to you.”

Nate
raised his eyebrows. “And?”

“The
best way I can describe it was that she was some sort of emotional vampire. She
was sucking every good memory, every good emotion out of you.” She scrunched
her face and shook her head. “But she also had this feedback mechanism. She’d
take all that good, twist it into something… wrong… and feed it back into you.”

Nate
thought about that for a while. Adelaide let him process.

“So
you’re saying that none of this was my fault?”

“I
never believed it was.”

“You
didn’t remember enough to have a belief either way for a while there,” he said
dryly.

“I
didn’t need to. My faith in you never wavered. Even at that moment when you
left me and my heart was breaking, I had hope that we’d end up back here someday.”

Turning
to face her fully, he looked deep into her eyes. “We have to try again.”

“What?”

He
gripped her shoulders in his hands. “You are my
te’sorthene
.”

Adelaide
bit her lip. “We tried. It didn’t work. Can’t we just be in love? Isn’t that
enough?”

“Every
moment I have with you is enough. But I remember what being your
te’sorthene
was like. It may be selfish, but I want that back. And—”

“And?”

“Maybe
now that your memory is back, you can fix it,” he suggested.

Adelaide
looked into his eyes and couldn’t deny the hope that stirred in her own heart.
She stood. “
Te’sorthene
is worth the pain, don’t you think?”

“I
do,” Ramsey said. He came up and wrapped his arms around Lila.

“We
all do,” Ellie said. Turning, Adelaide found all the eyes in the room turned on
them.

She
smiled and then held her hand out to Nate. “No time like the present then.”

Taking
both his hands in hers, she accessed her ability to see relationships. The torn
and tattered strands between them were now almost entirely red and straining
toward each other. Adelaide looked into Nate’s eyes and let him see what she
was experiencing.

“Oh,
wow,” he breathed.

“Before
I try, I want to show you the memories I got back.”

Using
her telepathy, she showed him the flashes she’d seen when her history had been
returned to her. The day they’d met. The first time he’d managed to get her to
look him in the eyes. Playing. Kissing. Flirting. Teasing. Laughing. Loving.

Tears
trailed down her cheeks as pain tempered by love flowed through her. She’d
almost lost him. Reaching up, she placed one hand tenderly against his cheek,
finding it wet with his own tears.

Then,
with her other hand, she lightly touched one finger to her end of the strand
that represented their
te’sorthene
relationship. Pouring the love, and
the pain, into it, she forced the glow of healing into the gossamer-fine
thread. As she watched, both of their lines turned into a pulsing, deep red.
But instead of reconnecting, a sparkling pale ghost of a connection started to
form between the ends. Slowly the new section filled in, becoming darker and
darker until the only evidence of the break were two pale, jagged white marks
where each end had once been.

Adelaide
looked up with a radiant smile. She laughed, and then he laughed, and then he
leaned down and gently laid his lips on hers in a kiss of renewal and hope for
the future.

“I
love you so much,” he whispered against her lips. And then he was kissing away
the tracks of her tears.

“To
our King and Queen!” Selene’s father bellowed as he held up a champagne flute,
toasting the bride and groom.

A
great cheer resounded through the hall. Adelaide watched as Selene and Griffin
exchanged a kiss. She felt utterly secure in her own happiness with Nate’s arms
firmly around her. Selene looked gorgeous in a silky, form-fitting dress that
showed off her willowy body. Simple and elegant, just like her.

Adelaide
looked around the room through the lens of glittering threads of relationships.
So many
te’sorthene
in one place. Her own parents. Charlotte and Dexter.
Ellie and Alex. Selene and Griffin. Lila and Ramsey. And, of course, Nate and
herself.

So
many beautiful families. They would soon be separated by physical distance.
Griffin, Selene, and her parents would stay with the Vyusher. Lila and Ramsey
were going to Louisiana with her new tribe.

Adelaide
and Nate had really debated returning to their Outback home – the place where
they’d truly fallen in love. In the end, though, they decided to just visit
that home often and instead make their permanent home in Colorado with both of
their parents. Charlotte and Dexter didn’t want Nate further than one house away
for the next hundred years.

Adelaide
smiled at the thought. She didn’t blame them. Sometimes at night she’d wake up
terrified that it’d all been a dream, that he was still lost. But he’d wrap his
arm around her, pulling her close into his body, laying sweet kisses along her
neck, her shoulder, her cheeks. And she’d breathe a sigh of relief, and
thankfulness.

She
cuddled into him now, just thinking about it.

Ellie
and Alex were coming to Colorado too. They wanted Hugh’s healing abilities
close by in case there were any complications. Adelaide hid a secret smile as
she looked at the relationship line she saw crisscrossing the couple.

Ellie’s
sudden recovery of her powers hadn’t been an accident. The baby she carried had
been turning them off somehow. Adelaide could see the new little line of
relationship between mother and child, and it was different now. Formed perhaps
when Ellie learned of the new life growing inside her. Either way, Ellie’s
knowledge of her condition had helped her overcome any issues. Adelaide sighed,
content and happy as she wondered when Ellie would tell everyone else.

“What
was that sigh for?” Nate murmured in her ear.

Adelaide
tipped her chin up for a tender kiss. “Nothing. It’s just… for the first time
in a long while, I’m hopeful for the future.”