Page 69 of Memories Like Fangs
“I’m scared of being bad at this,” Little Me answered, not looking up at Mom.
“Don’t be, boo-boo! Now, why would you be scared of being bad at this?”
“Because I’m clumsy! What if I didn’t get anything from Pops and I just suck?” Little Me threw her arms up in the air dramatically while her bottom lip trembled. I shook my head at my own theatrics while my heart squeezed.
“You could never suck, baby bee,” Pops said, taking Little Me’s foot in his hand before taking off her boot.Baby bee.Fuck, it had been so long since I heard him call me that. I forgot that he used to when I was really little.How had I forgotten that?He placed a tiny white ice skate on before starting to tie it. “You could be the clumsiest dragon to ever live without any physical talent at all, and you know what? You would still be my perfect Byrdie. Nothing can change that. Besides, you have my eyes. You have my stubborness, for damn sure. You have my smarts. You take a lot from me already, and I couldn’t be more proud of you no matter what happens on that ice.”
Aunt Max passed Little Me a small Styrofoam cup. I could smell the hot chocolate with a hint of salted caramel in there as Little Me took it excitedly. She winked, “Hey, I can always melt the rink for you if you want, treesong.”
Uncle Everett shook his head. “Or, we’ll just try something else instead of defacing public property, yeah?”
Mom shrugged. “A hot tub in the winter is just as good, if you ask me. Maybe swimming is more of your thing, huh, Baby Byrd?”
Little Me just giggled.
“C’mon and drink that up, baby girl. We won’t know anything until you try, and I will be with you every step of the way, okay?”
“Okay, Pops!” Little Me said before chugging the drink. I still remember the sting of a slight burn on my tongue, yet howworth it it was. Underneath the twinge of fear I felt, I was also exhilarated and couldn’t wait to get out on that ice.
It was like some part of me knew already that I was going to love it.
As Pops picked Little Me up and carried me to the ice rink for me to find that out, my chest tightened. Sure, I remember that first step onto the ice, that feeling of being steady on my feet for the first time in my life, the explosion of hollering from my family at seeing me go, and the freedom of it all. But what I recalled the most was how much love there was here. It made my chest tighten with yearning to go back and relive it fully, knowing how few more times I would have of this. I cherished this moment, this memory. Even now, I relished in the chill of the wind, making small jabs at my face. I tried to memorize every detail, even the ones that seemed inconsequential, like the snowy ground underneath me, because I knew that there were native violets just waiting to bloom once the snow cleared and Spring arrived. The smell of bread and smoking meat permeated the scents of the Concession Stand, promising warmth and delicious food beyond here. There were so few stars overhead because of the city lights down below. With how many of them there were, it was like the stars had fallen to the ground because the sky couldn’t quite hold them all.
Wait.
I couldn’t see the city lights for all of the fog around.
The ground was piled so high with white fluff that thinking of Spring should have been an impossible dream.
There were no other scents on the wind, even as it picked up its pace out of nowhere.
“You know what they say about the weather here,” Pops said when he noticed Mom’s shiver from the growing chill. “Don’t like it? Wait five minutes and it will change.”
Chicago.
We were just outside of Chicago.
We came here every year around Christmas time to see Pops’s family.Theylived here. Yet, Pops hadn’t grown up here. He hadn’t grown up in an enchantment at all. He had grown up in Louisiana with Max as a neighbor in a human city because of his father’s job. No, I hadn’t connected that this could be his enchantment or that this would be what Lilah was looking for because Pops wasn’tfromhere. Still, there were plenty of dragon-shifters here. It was incredibly shielded, protected, and, most importantly, hidden from anyone who wasn’t a dragon or related to the family. To make things more complex, there were parts of the enchantment like this one where supernatural creatures of all kinds were safe from human eyes, but even they had no idea that dragon-shifters were among them. It was staying hidden in plain sight. I remembered all of this.
But Lilah had no idea.
There was also no way to find it out unlessItold her.
That’s it.
I closed my eyes. I searched within me for the tether I had felt before. It was still pulled taut, and I could still feel Quinn’s presence on the other side.Perfect.
I focused my feelings, trying to drill them down.
My fear of dying before Quinn saved me.
My thirst for revenge against Lilah and Cooper for everything they had done to me.
My love for Quinn.
My insanely powerful love for Quinn.
Then, I pushed that through our bond to her.
