Page 32 of Avelina

“At least,” he said absently. “Regular healing extends your lifespan.”

Say what? My eyes widened as I thought through the implications. When Aaron said Anick was a thousand years old, I’d assumed it was just a legend. But what if it wasn’t? I heal myself every second of every day. Am I immortal now? Holy crap. I mean, holy fucking shit.

My hands went up to my mouth in shock, but Aaron was too immersed in the book to notice. I looked down at Rogue. He stared at me as if he knew exactly what I was thinking, then snuggled up to me and rested his face on my lap.

Was this a big deal? I didn’t want to interrupt Aaron’s literary excavation to ask him. I sat there for a long time, scratching Rogue’s head and thinking.

Aaron searched for something, perhaps some kind of sign that his mother knew he would eventually read her book. He found it on page thirty-three, a poem I’d always considered odd. It was the only poem in the book and didn’t quite fit the story, as if it were stuck in as an afterthought.

In the queen’s garden, there is a key that opens up our destiny.

Covered in mud and blood, it pleads the wisdom of dishonor.

It helps you face your enemy and searches out what seems empty,

But if you wait, and don’t misread, you may avoid a slaughter.

It dreams of time beyond the trees and sounds the call to mutiny

Because it cannot help but lead the horses to the water.

For though we may not all agree, our hearts are longing to be free

And so, we’ll follow, fight and bleed until death weighs upon her.

Then through the rubble and debris the saplings grow in twos and threes

From stone to stone, their shade of creed expanding ever broader.

And so, my dragon, use the key; and in time, I’ll have with me

The only thing I’ll ever need, my husband, son, and daughter.

Aaron read the poem. Then he read the poem again. Then again and again.

“And so, my dragon, use the key,” he said finally to himself.

“Yes, it’s the poem written on the box where the girl finds the crystal key. Her family name is Dragonrider. Do you think you are the dragon from the poem?”

“That’s what she’s called me since I was a small child,” he said. “It’s a message from her. It has to be.”

“She wrote something inside the front cover where she signed it,” I said.

He raised his eyebrows, opening the front cover to look inside. It read: Time for Jo.

“My mom said it was probably a coffee joke, but I never got it. Does it mean anything to you?”

“She used to call my uncle that,” Aaron said, looking up at me.

“Well then, I guess you probably have some questions to ask him,” I said.

He nodded his head. “I certainly do.”

Chapter Ten

The dragon laid his body flat on the ground so Linorra could climb onto his back. Linorra’s words had moved him, and he now believed, as she did, that he was meant to fly with her to the far reaches of the universe. He could feel her excitement, and she could feel his. They were connected, now, by a force that neither could understand.

Aaron decided we’d missed our window to cross the oardoo fields during the day because one of us had short legs that moved like a silken goat. I wasn’t sure what that was, but he assured me they were beautiful creatures, if a bit lazy.

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