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“Still don’t get it,” you mumbled to yourself and raised your glimmering hand closer to your eyes. “Uh, why don’t you work?” It came out an exhausted sigh.
You moved your fingers a little bit, bent them, rubbed your knuckles together… nothing but the faint glimmer. No glow, no all so familiar tinging feeling. Just you and the drop of a shimmer on the tips of your fingers.
“Elric…”
Your gaze wavered from your palms and across the valley. There it was, the whole magic of the Fae realm stretching right in front of you. Within your grasp, you only needed to reach out and dip into it.
Only you couldn’t. A month past your father’s death, yet you couldn’t bring yourself to forget it all. No one could, that’s true, but you wished you could push it out of your nightmares for one.
Luc’s card reading came back to hunt you. The jealous boy lifted his mother’s wards from the Fae colony, and the bloodwrath swept in. Went for the kill, your half brother was an idiot for thinking it would do you out first.
The bloodwrath went for the strongest abomination Thomas believed non-human folk to be. Lord Elric. Your father you knew but for two days.
And as you were dancing together with your father, opening the grand ball the lord of the Fae colony has thrown in your honour… The jealous boy cheered and stepped aside when the bloodwrath went for his target. The one the boy thought was you.
You shudder at the memory and clasp your hands over you lap. They are shaking wildly once again. You gulp down a sob and bring your knees to your chest. The Fae rivers tinkling softly below your very feet. You curl into a ball and hug yourself as you sit on the purple grass tinged with petite blue flowers.
Too unreal. Too home. And you feel too lonely to be home.
Your friends helped, they were there for you through all. As you’ve finally fought Thomas and put him to rest for good, as you stayed to help rebuild the Fae colony…
Blood. Screams. The tainted sleeve of your gold embroidered gown. Your father’s blood. He pushed you away, covered with his back. Then came the scream. That thing tore all the way into him. He crumbled to the floor by your feet.
That memory still haunted you every night. Over and over again.
When everything returned to normal… Well, seemed to return to normal with the bloodwrath gone and all… You had no idea what to do with yourself. The guilt eased only when Nik would hold you in his arms as he lulled you to sleep. Only then did you sleep. The second his arms would leave your frame the dream would seem to pounce and haunt you all over again.
He cared for you. Dearly. You were recovering from it altogether and it sort of… happened?
“Wo-ha…” you nearly jumped when a fiery-red dragon swooped over your head. “Never seen one fly this low,” you noticed to yourself and watched it swirl around the mountain top.
And back at you?!
You jumped to your feet, reflexes of nearly getting killed every day for the past months kicking in. Defensive stance, firm posture, your gaze might have wandered to your hand. No glow. You clench your jaws. You have been practising magic with Lady Thalissa over the past month. It hasn’t been like that since your father’s death, and you have no idea why it came to be now.
A gush of wind almost swept you of your feet as the dragon landed. Dragonness, you had no idea how but you somehow knew it was a her. Intricate patterns of glowing runes and golden scales marked their way up her back and along with the wings.
“You smell human.”
You gasped. The dragoness tilted her head but didn’t open her jaws.
“I am Lord Elric’s daughter,” you insisted keeping your ground. Eyes never leaving the slowly moving target.
“You smell human,” you heard the soft voice right in your head again. The dragonness wasn’t stepping closer, rather settling on the grass and curling her tail around.
“I am half-human,” you gritted through your teeth. You wished you had your magic back. Just in case, the past months taught you everything.
“Too human now.” The dragonness would smile if she could. You saw it in the shining pearl eyes and the way she cocked her head.
A golden flash. And the dragonness… wait, where was she?! You rubbed your eyes to see, but it hurt to much. Tears welled and rushed down your cheeks.
“You are more than a half-human,” you heard the same soft voice.
Heard.
You blinked some more until you saw her. The tallest woman you have ever seen, she towered right in front of you. You jumped back, and your back knocked into a nearby boulder.
“No threat, child,” she cooed. You didn’t like her sniffing around though. “I was simply curious.”
“Who are you?” You tried to sound confident. Too bad your voice quavered.
She put her finger to her lips and said nothing. You looked her over: she was smiling. Long golden hair with pearl stands, fiery-red gown with fur hems and the most impressive woven necklace of some magic flowers and precious stones around her neck.
“More than a half-human now, dear. You can’t do magic like that.”
You followed her eyes down. To your stomach?
“Ow.” Realisation hit. “Wow. UH?!” You jerked back into alert mode. “You mean you can smell that?”
The dragonness smiled. Then came a flash, and she soared into the bluest skies you knew.
“Wow.”
Your hands were shaking as you pressed them over your stomach. But you felt happy, walking on air even.
The only thing left was how you were to tell Nik about it.