Charred Tears (#2, Heart of Fire) (3 page)

“You look the same. Clearly, you did not learn anything, either.” This time, there was no mistaking that someone was talking to him.

He twisted in the direction from where the voice came. His breath caught.

In the shadows of the forest was the shape of a woman he remembered too well. Tall, willowy and beautiful, the woman’s hair shimmered like spun gold while her blue eyes stood out from skin so pale, it resembled the pure snows that topped the mountains where he’d first met her a thousand years ago.

“Freyja?” he asked, not trusting his vision. “I thought you were gone.”

“Deep asleep, like the rest of our kind.”

Our kind.
Chace shifted to his knees to face her fully but didn’t trust his body not to collapse if he tried to stand.

“Dragons,” he said.

“Yes, Chace. Dragons.” Her tone carried the mocking note he recalled despising long ago. When she walked towards him, it was with grace that made her seem to float rather than risk sullying her feet on the sand.

He watched her approach, able to see the feminine beauty that drew him to her long ago. Her self-control was evident in every step she took and the emotionless expression on her face, and he recalled what it was that drove him away, too.

She’s no Skylar.
Freyja was complicated, conniving, controlling. Even in bed, where Skylar was completely uninhibited with him, Freyja never lost her composure. Skylar was free spirited and gentle in comparison, with a genuine smile, fun sense of humor and a way of making him feel at ease. She was too honest to keep her opinion of him hidden, too blunt for her intentions to remain secretive, too good to plot to bring someone else down.

Skylar had helped him escape from her own people.

Freyja dropped him directly into a thousand-year downward spiral.

Why didn’t I see how different Sky is before this?

Poised and perfect, Freyja sat on the edge of his front porch, holding his gaze. Her long dress of white shimmered, giving him the sense of being in a dream once more.

“Turning your back on me was one thing. On Gavin’s daughter?” Freyja shook her head delicately.

“I didn’t know she was his daughter.”

“What better test of one’s true character than to see what he does when he’s unaware of the trial?”

Chace said nothing. His hands were shaking, and he wiped his clammy palms on the thighs of his sweats. Freyja was right. Gavin was right. He thought he’d been protecting the other shifters. He’d gotten lucky that Gavin was Skylar’s father.

But what if that wasn’t the case? What if Skylar had died because of him?

“There’s only one reason you’re alive.” Freyja sounded amused.

“I know,” he said in a hushed voice. “If I die, Skylar dies. At least I can be of some use by staying alive.”

“Her magic is gone.” Freyja twisted to gaze at the cabin. “She feels so … sad.”

“That makes two of us.” Chace’s body was straining. He shifted until he was comfortable enough to retain his seat without passing out from effort. “You have a magic cabin?”

“Our lairs are all magic out of necessity. There was a time when the dragons had enemies, which was why we needed magical lairs and protectors to safeguard us during the day,” she said, facing him again. “That was very long ago, though someone appears to be trying to bring that era back.”

“Dillon.”

“The griffin?” She laughed. “He’s the muscle, not the brains. No, the mastermind still hides.”

She shimmered and for a moment, he was able to see through her to the cabin door.

“Are you really here?” Chace asked. He touched his forehead. It felt hot again.

“Are
you
?”

He rolled his eyes. “Why didn’t any of you feel the need to share your insight with this newbie dragon? Why release my magic and leave me to try to figure things out?”

“You pissed me off,” she said, shrugging. “You weren’t ready to know about us when we met, and I assumed a few hundred long years would teach you the lesson you needed to know before we revealed more.”

“Yeah, that worked,” he muttered.

“Unfortunately, I was involuntarily banned before I could help you, walk you through the politics of our complicated shifter family, so you were prepared for what’s coming.”

“What do you mean?”

“Differences of opinion, mainly.” She shrugged elegantly, but her tone was too casual, warning him there was much more to her words than she was willing to tell.

“Something happened within the shifter community to get you banned, didn’t it?” he asked.

“That’s not for us to discuss here and now. You had everything and gave it up. This time around, you get to earn it all back, if you can,” she said and stood. “Anyway, I came to tell you that there’s a place you need to go.”

“Not sure you noticed, but I’m not in any shape to travel.”

“Cry me a river, Chace. You had it easy for a thousand years. So now you get to do things the hard way.” She smiled. “Before you do anything, before you look for
her
– if you were even planning on finding Gavin’s little girl – you need to return to the place like that where it began.”

He was quiet, thinking. He’d met her in the mountains of his home in a Nordic kingdom that no longer existed, but they’d eloped, or planned on it, traveling by boat to the mainland to what was now Scotland. Once there, he’d been enamored by a red-headed beauty with blue eyes and managed to sleep his way through half the clan’s women before Freyja figured it out.

“You remember where we broke up?”

“Mountains,” he said. “You left me in the mountains of Scotland.”

“Dragons love mountains. We can be close to the sky. I suggest you find the nearest mountain and climb it to see what’s waiting for you.”

“My power!” His heart began racing. If he had his magic, he could find Skylar again.

“No. Something better.”

“Not sure I like the sound of that.”

“Oh, so you have learned a thing or two over the years,” she snapped. “Time for you to wake up, Chace.”

“The first thing I’ll do when I have my magic back is put the smack down on you and Gavin.”

“Two days.”

“Chace!”

He wrenched awake, out of the too real dream. Chace oriented himself with some difficulty, blinking until he made out Gunner’s face hovering over his.

“You were talking in your sleep,” Gunner said. “I wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

“Okay?” Chace’s voice was cracked and rough from days of illness and not talking. “What about this is
okay
?”

“If you’re pissed, you’re good.” Gunner flashed a smile then began his routine poking and prodding of Chace’s wounds for the morning. “Your fever broke.”

Chace said nothing, staring at the ceiling. Gunner finished with his head wound, rewrapped it, then moved to the wound in his side.

The dream with Freyja was emblazoned in Chace’s thoughts, too real to be anything but a vision placed in his mind. He’d forgotten how beautiful she was; likewise, he’d forgotten how much they butted heads, and not in the good way, like he did with Skylar. Skylar wasn’t obsessed with controlling others, in teaching them lessons they didn’t want to learn.

You don’t deserve someone like Skylar.
Gavin’s parting words made Chace flinch, because they were true. As much as he hated Freyja and Gavin for messing with him, he wasn’t able to blame them for the terrible choices he made that almost cost Skylar her life.

But how foolish was he that it took him almost dying to see what was right in front of him?

Chace’s gaze dropped from the ceiling to Gunner. The panther shifter’s face showed the signs of three days of hard living. He didn’t complain, though, not about losing his magic or helping his friend under such circumstances.

“Hey, Gunner.” Chace pushed himself up.

“You need water?”

“No.”

Gunner waited expectantly, ready to hop up and grab whatever Chace asked him for. Chace wasn’t sure what to say.

“Thank you,” he managed finally. “For being my friend despite me being … me. I don’t think I’m easy to deal with sometimes.”

“This is the fever talking.” Gunner stretched to touch his forehead.

“No.” Chace batted his hand away. “I mean it. Thank you.”

Gunner sat back. His confused reaction only reinforced what Gavin and Freyja had said – that Chace didn’t know how to appreciate what he had unless he lost it. He wasn’t going to lose his friend, though.

“You’re not gonna try to kiss me now or anything, are you?” Gunner joked. “I mean, it’s cool if you’re batting for the other team now, but I only kiss girls.”

Chace laughed hard enough that his body hurt and he became dizzy. He shook his head and steadied his breathing to keep from passing out from exertion.

“Promise. I’m not going to kiss you,” he said. “You had your power stripped because of me and spent three days trying to keep me alive. I just don’t think I ever told you that I appreciate your friendship in the five hundred years we’ve known each other.”

“This is a first,” Gunner confirmed. “But you don’t have to, Chace. We’re more like brothers than friends. We take care of each other. It’s how this works. Although …” Gunner’s smile was warm. “… I appreciate it.”

“Now that our special moment is over, here’s the bad news,” Chace said with a grin. “I need to climb a mountain.”

“Let’s backtrack a little. Can you even walk?”

“Not sure.” Chace chuckled. “I have to do it, Gunner, even if it kills me.”

His friend sighed. “You need some real food then. I think there’s some magic left in your cabin. It’s kept the fridge full for me the past few days, though I’d say it’s obsessed with oranges. Feline shifters like me need meat.” Gunner crossed to the kitchen. “You’re healing quickly but I don’t think quickly enough to climb a mountain. It might kill you.”

Chace glanced around, wishing he was able to feel the subtle hum of magic that used to fill his cabin.

Freyja was right. He’d had everything and given it up. For what? To spend the last years of his life alone and regretful? He’d never appreciated his cabin’s magic or Gunner’s friendship or anything at all about Skylar. He had a chance to try to make things better or at least, to try to make it up to those who deserved better from him.

“It’s a chance I need to take, Gunner.”

“I’m going with you.”

“If a cat can’t find its way out of a tree, what chance do you have on a mountain?”

“My personal vendetta against heights aside, I’m not letting you do this alone.”

Chace said nothing, genuinely touched by his friend’s concern. Gunner was leaving his comfort zone to help.

I’ll pay you back someday, brother. Promise,
Chace thought.

Chapter Four

Thirteen-year-old Skylar sat in the room, lit only by the light from a single window. It was high in the wall, and both the walls and floor were made of cold concrete. Her surroundings and their musty scent reminded her of the basement of the farmhouse where they’d lived before moving to the two-story colonial where she’d been taken from.

How long had she been sitting there, waiting? At least a day. The sun had set, and she’d been left to shiver in the darkness without even a blanket. Unable to sleep, she’d dozed fitfully until dawn crept into the cell.

“Are you okay?”

She jumped. Groggy and tired, she hadn’t heard her captors bring in the man seated beside her. He leaned against the wall, legs outstretched and smile quick, while she huddled in a corner.

“My name is Mason,” he said. His skin was as dark as the corners of the cell, but his brown eyes were much warmer. “What’s yours?”

She hesitated, scared. They’d snatched her out of her house, bound and hooded her and thrown her into the trunk of a car, driving for what felt like hours. Her voice was hoarse from screaming. And then she’d been dragged here and the hood removed.

No one would tell her where she was, what happened to her mother.

“I promise. I’m here to help you through this.” Mason had kind eyes and a warmth about him that made him different than the stone-face man who grabbed her.

“S…skylar,” she managed. “I want to go home.”

“I know. Are you hurt?”

“No.” She lifted one elbow to show him the scrapes from the trunk.

“Good. I’ll make sure you’re treated well. Okay?”

Skylar awoke with a jerk. Her heart was flying, the fear and coldness of the dream making her shiver. Unlike the others, she didn’t recall the whole thing this time, but she remembered a cell. And Mason. He’d been smiling, always her friend, even in …

“Where the hell was that?” She’d learned to tell the difference between memories and dreams. This was a memory. The harder she tried to recall it, the faster it slipped away. “Dammit, Skylar!”

With a sigh, she got out of bed. Her first instinct was to want to see the scrapbooks again, to assure herself that the cold and emptiness remaining from her dream was only a tiny part of her life. That she had a family that cared.

She knelt on the ground and bent to look under the bed. Nothing was there.

“Hey, house. Can you bring back the scrapbooks?” she asked quietly.

She waited, staring at the space under the bed. Nothing happened. Disappointed that the house might not be as easy to work with as Chace’s cabin, she sat up.

The scrapbooks were neatly sitting on a freshly made bed.

“You are awesome,” she told the magic house. “How about some pizza?”

We have a pizza date.

A pang of heartache hit her hard enough to render her breathless. She’d planned on having a pizza date with Chace, who agreed, then took her to a meeting where he betrayed her. She wasn’t able to think of pizza without also recalling him and what he’d done.

“No pizza,” she whispered. “Ice cream.”

Not the best start to my morning …

“No, wait. Pizza. I’m not going to let
him
stop me from eating my favorite food!” she growled.
Pizza and Chace shouldn’t hurt me like this!
“Ice cream. Okay, ice cream, house. Final decision.”