Page 115 of Cruel Destinies

I went on that way, building fire and creating lines and curves in the snow until I rose and could see the shape I’d created—a heart with letters inside reading: TD + AW.

It was simple. It was unoriginal. It wasn’t math equations or history facts or anything intellectually amazing, although it was larger than two football fields. I felt better for doing it and briefly wondered if I could convince Arya to come back with me to see it.

Pushing against the air again, I lifted higher and higher into the sky until my creation was a tiny dot below me. Only then did I shake the color of my scales to a deep, rich blue color, the color I wished I’d chosen over my typical dark gray because they were the same color as Arya’s eyes.

I thought about the way she looked last night. Sleeping in my bed next to me, her beautiful face serene in slumber as some dream caused her eyes to dart beneath her thickly-lashed eyelids. The hills and valleys of her naked body, her smooth skin so delectable that I couldn’t help but run my fingers along her side even as she slept.

With my feelings increasing, I became more and more panicked that I’d wake up one day having finally fallen deeply in love, and then rush to find the face that could not and would not ever look at me with any hint of affection again. It happened to my mother—of course, she was already married to Lord Dracul and knew the risks and inevitability—but it could andwouldhappen to me, too.

The air grew thinner the higher I climbed, and the oxygen decreased, making my head fall into a fuzzy haze. I needed to plateau or dive back down soon, or else I’d pass out, but through the fuzzy haze, I finally found a moment of clarity.

The vision of the Skye Boarding House history book forced itself to the forefront of my vision. I’d been studying it earlier in the day, desperately looking for more information about the Dracul curse. Questions ran through my head in rapid succession as I’d skimmed through the text and studied the few pictures peppered throughout.

What horrendous thing did Claudette Dracul do to deserve the curse?

Was she an innocent victim?

Who put the curse on her?

And why?

On the outside, Claudette was the model shifter. She was proper and kind. She assisted other shifters in learning to use and control their powers, including an entire pack of ursas. She and Evandrus Quinn—her bodyguard—protected the humans at the house and surrounding Vancouver from a rogue vampire. During the Arctic Winter of 1899, they not only kept the boarders of the house alive but helped an entire orchard of apple trees survive—a major income source for the Skyes. Not a single apple tree was lost, which was hailed a miracle.

Claudette also stood and fought until she nearly lost her own life when the old vampire line—the Fausts—attacked and ultimately destroyed the boarding house. Leaving it in ashes.

The description didn’t specify, but I was pretty sure the violet scales, scorched and littered around what was left of the house, in addition to several red-orange feathers in the same condition, belonged to the dragon-shifter Claudette and phoenix-shifter Evandrus.

A story that didn’t seem important at the time suddenly connected in my analytical mind. It teetered on the tip of my tongue. Just out of reach. So I adjusted my position, no longer climbing, but not diving as if the exact quantity of breathable air would lend me the answer.

I hardly dared to move a single scale that would cause me to fly in any direction but straight ahead. I could see the glow of sunlight along the curvature of the earth at this altitude, but could hardly appreciate it until I received my answer.

A boarder, Alice Le Fey, who stayed at the house less than half a year, unexpectedly died at the claws of a dragon. It was reported as a random act of violence. The newspaper clipping had been printed right on the page and said in the unbiased, unfeeling language, that it was suspected that a migrating dragon mistook Miss Le Fey for a vampire due to recent vampire sightings in the area.

A Tragedy.

The story alone, a human girl being killed by a dragon shifter, was certainly a tragedy, but nothing noteworthy.

Except a few months later, a family ofwitches, five sisters in particular, visited the house. Their name wasLe Fey.

I bent into a nosedive immediately and felt the rush of oxygen fill my nostrils and muddle my mind with rapid-fire thoughts again. But I finally had an answer!

What reason would a family of witches with the same name as the girl who died have to travel to the place of their close relative’s death?

Unless it was for revenge.

Whether Claudette was to blame, whether she was the dragon who killed Alice or merely the scapegoat, it was possible—no, it wasprobable—that the group of witchescursedClaudette for Alice Le Fey’s violent and tragic death.

I shouted a stream of profanities. All the ones I knew at least. Which were a lot.

What creature could bring themselves to inflict such a miserable existence on an entire family line? Murder was horrible, yes, but what they’d done was despicable and disgusting and soulless. I wished I could get just one of those damnable witches into an interrogation chamber and flip pictures of my mother’s face over the years at them. The ones that were forever burned into my mind.

But that was ridiculous. Claudette lived at the turn of the twentieth century. The villainous witches were long dead and six feet under.

Except…

How had I not considered it before? It had been right in front of me all this time!

I increased my speed. I could fix this. Maybe. I could ensure my mother and sister, every living Dracul and every future Dracul, that they would never have to live another day wearing that heart-wrenching expression again. I needed to get to Chicago and back to the Dome,now.

---