THE NEXT COUPLE of days I barely saw Lucian. He was missing for some reason again; this was an old draw of his. He once disappeared on me in my first few weeks at Dragonia. However, this time I worried that it was the fear of Paul and me together that drove him away and the guilt lay thick on my chest. Running would’ve eased this tension in my body, but I hadn’t run since the day we’d found Darius’s body in the woods. When three days had passed and I still hadn’t seen Lucian I was really starting to get annoyed. I couldn’t figure out why he was acting this way.
“Where the hell’s Lucian?” I asked Becky during lunch as I walked angrily over to our table.
“Calm down, I’m sure he has a good explanation.” Becky had her arm around me.
“I told him not to do this. He’s going to give him….”
“Shhh. He can read your mind and he’s staring at you.” Becky said without thinking and Sammy’s head shot up.
“Who can read your mind?”
I gave Becky a scowling glance.
“She was going to find out sooner or later, Elena.”
“Who?” Sammy looked at Becky first and then me.
“My dragon,” I said slowly, gauging her response.
“You found out who it is?” Her eyes sparkled. “Tell me.”
“Chill, jumping pants. It’s not good,” Becky chirped.
Sammy’s smile disappeared immediately and she shook her head fast. “No, Elena. He doesn’t have a rider. Please tell me you don’t believe him.”
“Sammy, he’s a telepath. It explains the voice.”
“Wyverns don’t speak Latin.”
I stared at her for a minute.
“He loves poems though,” Becky said and Sammy gave her an angry glare.
“No, you can’t believe him.”
“Sammy…”
“No, Elena. Think about Lucian and what they have done… ” She swallowed her words.
“I know what they did to his sister, okay. I told Lucian when I found out about Paul.”
“Who else knows?”
Becky and I looked at our plates.
“You are so unbelievable.” Hurt made her eyes turn hard.
“We know how you feel about Paul, Sammy. It’s not like Elena did it on purpose.”
“I can’t run from this. If I’m a dent the way Professor Pheizer thinks I am, it will physically put me in unimaginable pain.”
“Well you can’t put Lucian through living with one either,” Sammy snapped as she jumped up and left.
Becky and I just stared after her as she pushed the doors open with more force than was necessary.
“She’ll come around, Elena. You can’t run from it,” George said making me jump. I sometimes forgot he was there too. “She just knew the Princess well.”
I TRIED TO PHONE Lucian the entire afternoon but he didn’t pick up my calls. I finally found him at the buffet line at dinner that night. I shoved him away from the conversation he was having with Dean. “Where the hell were you? Why don’t you return my calls?”
He ignored my foul mood and put both hands on my face and give me a kiss. “Relax. I’ve decided to put my guard to some use. Coop is showing me some moves like Sam showed George.”
“Why?” When had Sam started to train George?
He gave me a raised eyebrow look. “Because you can never be over trained in combat, especially when it comes to claiming Blake.”
I swallowed hard. “You’re training again to claim him?”
“I made a promise, Elena. As soon as he gets back, I’m going to give it another shot.”
“You think it’s wise after…you know.”
“It’s wise. He’s usually a bit more reasonable after a beating. It’s my best shot. I’m already getting everything in place for my meeting this Friday with the Council.”
“Professor Pheizer said you have to do all sorts of explaining about why you want to claim Blake.”
“And it’s not as easy as you think. Not having my ability yet does make it harder but somehow I always manage to get their approval.”
“Lucian.” I closed my eyes thinking about him facing Blake. He’d really gotten so big and Lucian was going to look like a mouse next to him.
“Hey, I’ve been there before, twice.”
And you barely escaped with your life. I didn’t say it out loud though.
“Third time’s a charm!”
I smiled as it was the only thing I could do to show some positivity toward the news.
I WATCHED THE NEXT day as Coop and Lucian battled. I had to say, Coop was really good. He had Lucian in so many death grips that could have easily ended his life numerous times I could hardly believe it.
My air pipe closed with every single one of them as I watched Lucian struggling to get out of Coop’s arms.
I gave it a miss after the second day of watching them, and found myself inside the library with a book about Wyverns in front of me. They hadn’t been kidding when they said they knew almost nothing about them.
From what I could gather there were five species.
The Hammer-Head, had horns and a hulking head that looked like a hammer. Its massive face featured a budgie shaped nose that was bright yellow with black stripes. Two wings instead of two front paws laid flat on his back and his hind paws looked like eagle’s claws.
The next one was called a Brown-Horn. They had one long horn on top of their head followed by a row of brown horns that ran down straight to the tip of its tail. It was one ugly bugger as tiny horns appeared all over its face and it too had a sharp bird beak.
The Spike-Tail and Spear-Tail almost looked the same. Their scales featured the same red color with black inked around the wings. The only difference I could see was their snouts. The Spike-Tail had a larger snout than the Spear-Tail and the tip of both their tails were very different, for which I assumed they got their names. One had a ball of spikes that looked like it could do some serious damage and the other one resembled a long spear.
The last one was called a Raven-Snout. It was raven black with yellow stripes along its back. Its snout was shaped like an eagle’s beak, and it had a crown of various sized horns on top of its head.
There wasn’t much in the book about their abilities but most of them were fire breathers. As I took in each image, I silently wondered which one was Paul.
“Is it safe?”
I looked up. Speak about the devil and you step on his tail.
“Sure,” I said and he sat down on the chair in front of me.
“Wyverns?” He leaned over to get a better look at what I was reading. “That book isn’t going to help you much, Elena.”
“So I’ve gathered. Which one are you: the Hammer-Head?”
He laughed. “No, I’m much prettier than that.”
I shook my head but couldn’t help giggling.
“Here,” he tapped his finger on the last one.
“You are a Raven-Snout?”
“Is that what they call us?” He raised his upper lip in disgust.
“It’s not what you’re called?”
“No, I’m a Black-Weaver.”
“A Black-Weaver?”
“It must be the ability thing.”
I laughed. “We can rewrite this book if you want.”
“Fun activities already?”
“Just a suggestion, if you are serious about us learning more about your kind.”
He gave me a hurt look.
“Sorry, it slipped out. I sometimes don’t think before I speak.”
“It’s fine. I get that nobody trusts me and half of Dragonia thinks I’ve got a hidden agenda. But I really am trying Elena. If you could just give me a chance….”
“I told you before, it’s not up to me, Paul.”
“And if it was?”
“Then maybe it would’ve been a totally different story,” I said without lifting my head from the images.
“Right, then I probably should go and watch how Lucian practices. You think a bright banner rooting for him would do it?”
I laughed. “He might be into those types of things.”
“What, you don’t know?” He joked back. “Damn, and here I thought I was going to get pointers on how to get the boyfriend to like me.”
“I don’t think liking you is his problem. It’s more of a trust issue.”
His entire body dropped, all jokes were gone in an instant. “I heard about what happened to his sister. I’m really sorry about that.”
“Me too.”
“I’m not going to lie to you, Elena. Wyverns are bad and it wasn’t easy to betray my kind and come here. Ever since I was little, I didn’t feel like I belonged. I don’t know if you know what I mean.”
“I can relate.”
“Something we have in common.”
I smiled at the thought.
“To get back to my soppy story, being different caused a lot of shit. My father tried to beat it out of me, and my mother treated me as if I was a rotten egg.”
I felt sorry for him as he said those words. Something else I could relate too. Mine just left.
“If it wasn’t for my Pappy, well, I’m sure I wouldn’t be here today.”
“Your Pappy?”
A small smile broke over his face as he stared at his hands that were delicately folded on the table. He looked up straight into my eyes when he spoke. “My Pappy was the Wyvern who wanted to have an alliance with King Albert. He was chief for a long time, and thought it would be good for the colony if we found some sort of truce, but not everyone shared in his enthusiasm so they over threw him and cast him out.” He sighed. “I knew where he lived so whenever things got too hectic for me I used to stay with him for a couple of days and regain myself before I went back. The last time I visited him, he told me to come here. I’ve got to say, it feels so good not having to watch over my shoulder anymore.”
“I’m sorry about the way some people are treating you. Some just don’t do so well when it comes to second chances.”
“It’s fine. Just as long as you know where I come from.” He used his hands to push himself from his chair. “I’ve got to go, before Lover Boy comes and decides to cut off my head.”
“Yeah, that sounds a lot like him.”
The vertical lines on his face reached his eyes and he flashed a perfect set of white pearls my way. “Thanks for the chat.” He started to walk toward the library’s exit.
I chucked the book away thinking of what Paul had said. If they couldn’t even get the names right, none of the other information about them was going to be correct. At least now I knew what they looked like.
At dinner I plunged down onto the pillow next to Becky. She was so frantic to have me solve the riddle she didn’t even give me time to properly say hello to Sammy and George. “What gets wetter and wetter the more it dries?”
“Seriously?” I asked.
“C’mon, Elena. Tomorrow is Friday, and both Sammy and George are clueless.”
“Your phone app can’t tell you that?”
“Chef knows when we use that. We can’t even use it in secret. He always knows.”
“It’s a dragon thing,” George interrupted.
“Spill.” Becky forgot all about the riddle and wanted to know how Chef always knew whenever someone cheated.
“Becks, Copper-Horns are like lie detectors. Human or dragon, it makes no difference.”
I didn’t know that. So that’s why Dad had never bought my bullshit.
“Nice job, stupid,” Becky slapped George hard on the chest and rolled her eyes towards me.
“Oh, sorry Elena. I’m an idiot,” George apologized.
“It’s fine. I just never knew that about my Dad. It explains a lot though.” They all laughed.
I saw this as the perfect time to grab something to eat. I greeted Chef with a wave and started scroll down the buffet line at the feast he had prepared for us tonight. My mouth started to water as I saw the pumpkin and steamed veggies. The smell of roasted gammon steak with pineapple and cherries pricked into the meat filled the air. There were way too many choices but I was sold only by that bulk of pink meat.
I dished up excitedly.
“Did you see today’s riddle?” he asked.
“Becky already asked me.”
He smiled.
“Give me some time though. You forgot that my Dad was fond of riddles too, I’m sure it’s in me somewhere.”
“I’m sure it is, Elena.”
I moved over to where the sodas were stacked high.
What gets wetter and wetter the more it dries? The words turned inside my head as I thought about them over and over.
I grabbed a mousse cup and put it on my tray after I grabbed a can of lemonade. “It’s a towel.”
Chef looked at me with a smile playing at the corner of his lips. He walked over to the bell and rang it again.
“So what will it be?” He asked and I looked over at Becky who did her funny dance.
FRIDAY, NOBODY WAS in the mood for lectures anymore by the time we reached Enchantments.
Paul permanently took the chair behind me now and kept whispering what Professor Georgiou said.
We were past the box and feather thing and had moved on to deeper-challenging-our-minds lessons. She gave us each an apple. She explained that we had to grab it from the person next to us using only the power of our mind. It was hard at first but with Paul telling me how I should concentrate and clear my mind the apple rolled a couple of times off his hand. He caught it just in time before it reached the ground as I struggled to make it come to me.
“You are getting better,” he said as he took a bite out of a second apple he was supposed to practice with. “Small steps, Elena. You are doing great.”
I laughed as he saw this lesson as an excuse to fill his stomach.
The bell rang and I waved goodbye to Paul. It was a pity that I couldn’t spend more time with him in the open. He really wasn’t a bad guy, but then again Lucian had been crazy about Wyland before he turned into psycho.
For dinner we had our favorite; burgers and fries. Becky had two and when I arrived George was busy stuffing his fourth one into his face.
We laughed at Lucian teasing Coop about beating his ass.
“You’re getting there, Your Highness,” Coop said in a serious tone, and Lucian’s face fell immediately. We roared with laughter as Lucian just stared at him.
“So you guys—”
The most horrifying siren interrupted Sammy’s question. A shiver of fear ran through me; the last time that siren had gone off, they had announced the King of Lions sword was stolen.
