Page 25 of Dragon Awakened

"I'll help you," Rhiannon agrees, following Freya into the kitchen.

"Be right back," Grace says. She gets up and heads to the bathroom, leaving me and Amy alone in the living room for a minute.

And it's...nice. Like, really nice.

A warm glow suffuses me. Back in Wynrath Crest, when I had exactly one friend and one secret boyfriend, I always fantasized about a carefree life like this. Hanging out with girlfriends, enjoying handcrafted adult beverages, chatting about romantic partners.

Of course, I never imagined having three partners--much less that I would be working on a scheme to sneak into hostile territory to try to find my fourth. I also never imagined that the entire weight of the dragon world would be on my shoulders, or that I'd be at the center of some kind of ancient prophecy.

I chuckle quietly to myself--but maybe not as quietly as I think.

Amy shuffles closer on the couch and then nudges me with her elbow. "What's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing. Or maybe everything." I wave a hand around expansively. "Life."

Through the doorway, I watch Freya and Rhiannon start mixing up that next round of martinis. As they do, they share a couple of shots of vodka, and I shake my head. Unlike me, those two are serious heavyweights.

"I'm not sure I'd call your life funny," Amy muses, giving me a knowing glance.

We've spent the evening catching up on the events of the past few days. Freya and Rhiannon filled us in on more details of the investigation into the bombing of the summit and their efforts to rebuild, and Amy and Grace gave a full rundown of their harrowing escape from the Fire Kingdom. I apologized about a hundred times for accidentally abandoning them there, but Amy just rolled her eyes.

Before long, the spotlight ended up on me, of course, and I got to tell the entire story of meeting Malik, getting kidnapped by the Shadow King's minions, and escaping from the Citadel. I'd already hashed all of it out with my mates, but it was different, explaining what happened to Amy, Grace, Rhiannon and Freya.

Amy kept interrupting to ask questions--a lot of them about my relationship with Malik and my new life with three mates. But she wanted to know details about the Shadow King and his fortress, too, and I caught the same flickers of dark knowing in her eyes that I found in Rhiannon's.

Amy knows about their heritage now, but I'm not sure if anybody else does, so I haven't had a chance to ask her how she feels about it. Considering we have a moment to ourselves, it occurs to me that there's no time like the present.

I glance her way, and then off toward the kitchen again. Delicately, I begin, making the conversation about me at first instead of about her. "I will say--the whole half Shadow Dragon thing threw me for a loop."

"Right?" She laughs, high and free, and I look over in her direction.

Apparently, I shouldn't have worried so much about bringing up the subject.

She grins and lightly kicks my ankle. "I always knew we had something in common."

"Yeah, but did you think it would be this?"

"Not in a million years." Leaning her head back into the couch, she plays with the cool, chunky rings on her fingers. "I always knew there was something, though, you know? Something Mom wasn't telling us? Considering she was so open about living in this huge, free-love commune, I never looked at it too closely, though. I mean, what could be a bigger secret than that?"

Guilt still gnaws at me. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you. I felt so bad keeping it--"

"It's fine. I get it." She waves my concern away. "It does explain a lot, though. About both of us."

I've thought that, too. "Do you think it has something to do with your dragon not Emerging?"

"Maybe. All the rituals we tried were generic, you know? It was one of the things Mom was always squirrelly about. She didn't exactly lie, but she said that she wasn't fully Air, Stone, Fire or Water, so none of their specific Emergence rites were likely to help."

Yeah, that's not a lie, but it's far sight from the full truth, too.

My heart leaps a bit within my chest. "Maybe there's some Shadow Dragon Emergence rite that would help."

"I've been looking into it," she agrees. "Apparently, their Sorceress does something with a pure black flame, but there are, like, zero details, even in my mom's super fancy magic books from the shop."

I sit up straighter. How could I forget? "I stole a bunch of old scrolls and stuff from the Citadel. Maybe there's something in there?"

"Ooh, stolen Shadow Dragon artifacts?" A gleam appears in Amy's eyes, and she rubs her hands together. "Sign me up."

"I gave them to Rhiannon to put in the vault." They seemed secure enough with me when I was hanging out with my mates, but they should really be under lock and key. "Also..."

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