Page 27 of Mikhail
The dragon had gone too far this time. Tonight it had truly tried to hurt itself. The flight and the swim had left him spent, and he had no doubt his dragon had hoped it would kill him. He’d always had a knack for punishing himself, no matter what form it took. But it had been too much this time. Toomuch.
Shuddering, he left the cave, his body slowly shutting down as he tried to reach the cliff-side path that would take him home. He never made it. Collapsing to his knees, he squinted at the shrinking tunnel of his vision and the woman who cried out as though from a vast distance, a lifetimeago.
* * *
Piper couldn’t believewhat she had justseen.
It wasn’t possible. One minute she’d been running toward Mikhail when he stood at the edge of the cliffs, and then he’d stripped naked and jumped. She’d been too far away for him to hear her scream his name. The sea and approaching storm had drowned out any warning she could givehim.
Now it was too late. He was gone. No one could survive that jump, and if the fall didn’t kill him, the icy water and rocks below would. Piper fell to her knees by the cliff’s edge, shivering and staring at the tumultuous water surrounded in mist belowher.
And then she heard it. A deep, echoing sound that vibrated the air and shook her to her bones, like a noisy fighter plane taking flight overhead. But she didn’t see any plane. She looked up, squinted, and then her heart stopped. Something dark rose up through theclouds.
It was a beast with massive wings and a long whipping tail. There was another sound, much like the one before. Flames burst from the creature’s mouth. Piper stared at it, and only one word came tomind.
Dragon.
It was impossible. It was…impossible. She was dreaming. This could not bereal.
The bank of clouds above swallowed the creature. It had to be a trick of the eyes, or perhaps she had snapped under the stress of everything that was happening toher.
There are no such things asdragons.
She continued to tell herself this until the creature suddenly dropped from the sky and plunged into the sea. She screamed again. When it resurfaced and swam toward the shore, she saw it being struck again and again by the waves, battering it as it clawed its way through the water, its long green serpentine body huffing and fighting for breath. She stared at it, frozen in place until it reached the shore, and she saw it begin to shrink and change, becoming more and more human. She ran toward a small path cut into the cliff side. She had to see it…no,him.
The dragon had become Mikhail. She lost sight of him as he entered a cave, but she kept running until she caught sight of him again. He was dressed now, but he looked hurt. There was lethargy to his movements, and without warning he fell to hisknees.
“Mikhail!” she screamed and ran toward him, just as he fell face-first on the icy wet sand. He didn’t move, didn’t stir. When she reached him, she touched his skin with her hands. It was ice-cold.
“What happened?” a voice bellowed from somewhere behind her, bouncing off the rocks. She turned to see Randolph Belishaw racing across the beach towardthem.
“He’s—He’sa—”
“A dragon, yes. But whathappenedto him?” Belishaw knelt by Mikhail and rolled him onto his side. Mikhail coughed, and some water escaped hislips.
“He…he leapt off the cliff and then into the water. I saw him climb out of the water and go into a cave, but when he came out hecollapsed.”
“We need to get him close to a fire,” Belishaw growled. He started to lift Mikhail up from the ground. “Come.”
Mikhail blinked, his green eyes cloudy. “Beli…shaw…”
“Mikhail, what the bloody hell did you think you weredoing?”
Piper put one of Mikhail’s arms around her shoulders. Belishaw did the same. They walked him along the steep, rocky path back up the cliffs. No one spoke as the three of them struggled. Piper slipped twice; her knees banged against the rocks which cut open her jeans. She knew she was bleeding, but they couldn’t afford tostop.
She didn’t know how long it took for them to make it back to Mikhail’s house, but once they did, Belishaw dragged Mikhail to a couch in the living room that was near the fire. Piper collected as many blankets as she could and covered him up. Mikhail closed his eyes and let his head fall back on the couch, letting out a deep, shakybreath.
“Do we need to do anything else to help him?” sheasked.
“No, he just needs to warm up by the fire.” Belishaw sighed. “Ms. Linwood, I need to speak with you.” He waved her to come closer the fire place. He held out his hand, and a small burst of flames shot out at the fresh set of logs. They caught fire in aninstant.
“Holy shit!” Piper lunged backward. “You’re a dragon too?” This couldn’t be happening. She was definitelydreaming.
“Yes,” Belishaw said. “A dragonshifter, to be moreprecise.”
“And what is that exactly?” Her body swayed as a wave of dizziness swept through her. Belishaw took hold of her wrist until she steadiedherself.
“We are a race of beings who have existed for thousands of years. Our ancestors in the distant past were humans who learned to use magic to bring dragon spirits from another realm to this one. They bound the dragons to them, and the two beings coexisted in one body. We are essentially half-human, half-dragon, or depending on how you look at it, fully human and fully dragon. Either form can take over at our choosing. The ability to bond like that, the ritual of it is lost, but when we mate with others of our kind, we can reproduce more dragon shifters. We live most of our lives as humans, but sometimes the dragon takes over when the human side is weakened.” He paused, his honey-brown eyes searching her face—for what, she didn’tknow.
