Page 169 of Ash

Tyrez wanted to shout his exultation to the moons above, but he didn’t want to frighten Ash. The golden Dragon’s fragility and uncertainty vibrated through the link.

So Tyrez swallowed his enthusiasm, dialed his energy down to a dull roar, and replied.

It means that you are mine. And I am yours.

38

As of late, Dani’s dreams had taken her into the sky. But tonight, she ran on four paws.

And she dreamed:

She wondered about that. Where were her wings? If this was the result of her misfiring imagination, shouldn’t she be a Dragon?

After all, she’d had Dragons on the brain, as of late.

A quick scan of her surroundings caused her to worry that this dream might devolve into a nightmare. She was back in the realm where so many of the Legion Dragons had perished.

The gravel beneath her paws was no longer soaked in blood. The tide had long since washed it clean. Or, perhaps, in this figment of her imagination, the battle had never happened. The place certainly looked deserted, and the broken chains no longer dangled from the cliffs where Ash had hung.

But she couldn’t stay on this beach where so many had died. She pointed her nose toward the cliffs and trotted over the coarse gravel, avoiding the waves that crashed against the shore.

Without wings, she’d have to climb. She flexed her paws and noticed she’d retained at least something of the Dragon in this dream—the wicked talons gleamed at her. When she raised them to the stone, she discovered they could penetrate it if she pushed hard enough.

She dug in and climbed.

The talons helped, but wings would have been much better. Perhaps now that she’d steered Tyrez and Ash toward each other, her inner Dragon had subsided. The thought gave her a pang of sorrow. She didn’t think it was just due to the lack of ability to fly, even just in her dreams.

The cliffs seemed endless, but at last she clambered up onto the top. So high, she could almost touch the clouds. There was no sign of the portal that had once existed up here. Was she in an alternate reality? It seemed like she was the only living thing in this place.

She paced right to the edge and stared out across the ocean.

Something glimmered at her from the clouds.

Dragon wings, one set shining gold in the moonlight. And another gleaming much darker—a mixture of blues and greens.

Her heart threatened to leap clear out of her chest. Ash and Tyrez.

They ducked and dodged through the clouds, trailing vapor from the tips of their wings. So beautiful, they made her throat ache. She longed to be flying with them.

But it wasn’t her place.

Tyrez began to climb, and they both vanished into the clouds. She waited for them to reappear. Something drew her eyes high—and then she saw it.

At first she couldn’t distinguish what dropped through the disguising vapor. It seemed like such a tangle of forms—suddenly, she realized that’s exactly what it was. Two Dragons, tangled together.

Ash and Tyrez.

Her eyes blurred with tears, and her heart felt as though it was tearing in two. But this was what she’d wanted, wasn’t it? They needed to be together.

She reminded herself that this was just a dream. It didn’t help. As they plummeted toward the ocean, entwined in each other, her fingers curled into fists, the talons digging into her own flesh.

Suddenly, she was pulled in. For a single, blinding flash, she felt what they felt. It dropped her to her knees, and she opened her mouth in a soundless cry of passion and despair.

Dani bolted to a sitting position. Had she screamed aloud? It had seemed so damned real—her heart was thundering, and her body quivered with the after effects. It may have just been a dream, but it had been powerful as hell.

Was it real?

The voice was tentative. Ash’s voice, she was sure of it. Dani glanced around, but there was no one there.

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