Page 69 of Between Despair and Hope

“I don’t think she’d mind at all. But you could always, you know, ask her yourself.”

I gave a non-committal grunt. She’d clearly told him enough.

“You won’t hurt her.”

“And you’re so sure?”

“You could try, but she’s more powerful than you now.”

Something tightened within me at the statement. I had never been one to care or think too much about my abilities. Hanwen had blessed me more than most, but compared to my father’s gift of that great and terrible fire, I’d never thought my manipulative divinity compared. He could conjure his fire out of nothing. Regardless, I knew how strong I was and didn’t hate knowing I could overpower most anyone. But Dewalt was right. She was more powerful than me. At least, to a degree.

“I have access to her blessings.”

“Yeah, no shit. You bonded.”

“No, the other ones. When I was fighting Declan, my hand—it lit up. I haven’t tried, but I assume I have the shadows too.”

“Fuck, could you make a dragon too? We could create an army,” he breathed.

“How did she do it?”

I reached into my well of divinity and attempted to bring the dark divinity out from within, and, while I didn’t know what I was doing, black power curled around my wrist and hovered in my outstretched palm. I made the shadows larger, using my other hand to help cup them. It almost felt like the wind I could pull to me, except icy cold.

“Well, they coated her, the shadows, and I’m pretty certain she just thought really hard about the memory she used to form them.”

“What memories did she think of? I know his—” I nodded toward Irses. “But I don’t know what I should think about.”

“I think she just picked ones that were clear in her mind. Something she could easily draw from.”

Before I could think anymore on it, the vision of him holding Emma to his chest and comforting her was in my mind, as clearly as I’d just seen it. I felt the shadows in my hands shift, and I threw myself deeper into the memory, even if I didn’t want to. I was committed by then. My friend was doing what I couldn’t, and that was all there was to it. Eyes closed, I felt something heavy in my palms and slowly opened my eyes. The dense divinity swirled around its body, and I wanted to see the dragon I’d made with my own two hands. As I pulled my shadows away, it made a strange sound. When it repeated the sound, my jaw dropped.

It meowed.

The black mist cleared, and Dewalt burst into raucous laughter. I couldn’t help it as a smile tugged up my lips.

“Well, shit.” I said, disappointed. “A fucking cat?”

“At least it’s cute. Maybe it will breathe fire or something.”

I glared at him then looked at the tiny kitten in my hands. It curled up in my palms, almost too big for me to hold, and licked its front paw. The fur was glossy and black, matching my friend’s own hair, but it had bright blue eyes I recognized better than my own. Dewalt tilted his head as he looked at it.

“What were you thinking about? Emma, obviously, but what else?”

“Nothing,” I growled. Thankfully, he only raised a brow at me before he turned back to the dragon, who sat down on his haunches, much like an obedient dog. I didn’t know if I’d ever seen the creature so still as he watched the small cat in my hands, tilting his head.

“Don’t you even think about it.” The dragon’s eyes cut up to mine. “Leave Yvi alone.” I rubbed a thumb over the cat’s forehead, tracing the small, white streak on its otherwise solid black body.

“Yvi?”

“It was the cat’s name in Elora’s book.” I set down the feline, and it immediately rubbed and twined itself between my legs before doing the same to the dragon before us, who looked at me and tilted his head again, appearing confused. I chuckled before I reached out and petted his muzzle again. “And I have the perfect name for you.”

An hour or two later, I had finally begun to relax. I’d made Dewalt point out every dragon to me, their name, and the memory which had formed them. He wouldn’t tell me two of them, claiming he didn’t know, but I thought he suspected. The one named Shika, who had black mist which clung to her form and swirled in her eyes, and Ryo, the smallest dragon I’d just named. Given Shika’s coloring—deep, blood-red—and the shadows surrounding her, I had a feeling I knew what the memory was, especially because of her name. Ryo, on the other hand, was a mystery. I’d have to ask Emma, but I dreaded the idea. I knew she would want explanations and assurances I wasn’t sure I could give.

And she deserved those things, truly. But while Dewalt and I made our rounds with the dragons, I found my mind drifting to the thoughts I’d blocked out. If I poked around the inner recesses of my mind, I found I could penetrate the draíbea fog, and I remembered more clearly things the shifter had said and done to me. Some memories felt so real, I hadn’t been able to focus on what Dewalt was saying, forcing him to repeat himself.

The two of us sat on the ground while I used my divinity to throw a giant, compacted ball of dirt for Ryo to chase after and bring back to me. Irses and Hyše, the rust-colored dragon with a temper, looked on with what I could only interpret as agitation, but Traekka and Ifash joined in with fervor. I formed two more balls for them to play with, and all three of the beasts toppled over one another. Using my divinity felt strange after being in the dampening cell for so long, but it was welcome.

“You going to talk about it to someone?” Dewalt pulled me out of my thoughts, and I had to blink a few times to focus on what he’d said.

---