But it is obvious. They wanted me out of the way so they could raise my child the way that they wanted.
Dracul sees I have come to the correct conclusion and he sits down again. “I am sorry, ValamAtrux. Our mother is a ruthless, heartless, power-hungry being. You must come for your daughter if you want to save her.”
“Save her?”
“From our mother,” Dracul says.
“Why are you telling me this?” I ask.
“Because a child should be with its mother,” he replies simply.
I put my hand on my stomach as I try to get my head around his news. I feel like I am going to be sick, but something doesn’t feel right about this. Why would he risk his own life to come here and tell me this?
“You are lying,” I say to him. “You are Remiel, aren’t you? You have come here to get me to go with you so you can keep me away from my husband.” It is the only thing that makes sense. Surely my own mother wouldn’t be so cruel as to tell me my baby had died and then keep her from me. Would She?
He shakes his head. “No, Sister. I am who I say I am. I could not in good conscience keep this from you anymore. You must come for your daughter. I will help you once you arrive. But hurry. You must act soon.”
“Wait,” I say as he Astrals out, taking the image of the clearing with him, leaving me in my Underworld garden, shocked and cold to my bones.
This cannot be happening. It just cannot. It’s not possible. It’s a lie, all a lie to mess with my head, and it is. I drop to the ground with a choke and that feeling I have had since I woke up not a Vampire anymore of being hit by a truck goes up to feeling like I was hit by a train. I feel like I have been run over on a train track and my body is scattered all over. My heart can’t take the pain and my head is about to explode with the fury that V.A. has. She is screeching in my head in rage, and suddenly She bursts out into the open. Scales, talons, wings, tail, the lot.
I roar at the sky, sending a stream of fire so high that it brushes the clouds overhead. I stamp my feet and the ground rumbles underneath me. I take off with a powerful swoop of my wings, needing to get to the Dragon Realms and to see if this is true. I need to see if I have a daughter. I half expect to find a couple of Dragons coming to me after my call, but I am flying around alone and as I try to rip open the portal, as Finn taught me to do, I find that I can’t. It is completely closed off. I have been shut out.
I get the shock of my life, when just as suddenly as She appeared, the Dragon disappears in midair and I am back to Aefre, falling to the ground at a rapid rate. Screaming my head off as I plummet to the ground, I finally have the wherewithal to Astral myself to a safe landing with my heart pounding so fiercely, I am afraid it will pop out of my chest. I promptly pass out with my scattered thoughts on why my various parts have split so decisively into four.
I come to completely alone. That surprises me. Surely someone must have seen, or at the very least heard, my display of Dragon temper and come to investigate why my human form was falling to the ground. Apparently not, I snort to myself as I get to my feet. Such concern.
I brush off my jeans and sweater and look up as I sense someone watching me. It is Lincoln. He is some way away, clearly hesitant about coming to my aid. I just stare at him, rooted to the spot, not wanting to scare him off by running to him and throwing my arms around him and telling him how much I miss him.
He stares back and is about to take a step forward when Chrissy appears by his side and takes his hand in hers. He steps back with a look down at her and she says something to him, and he turns his back on me and walks away with his new Alpha, swinging her big hips and fat arse in triumph.
Okay, she isn’t big-hipped and doesn’t have a fat arse, quite the opposite in fact. I am just feeling even more sorry for myself now. I stalk back across what I now realize is Lincoln’s extensive gardens with as much pride as I can. I tried to Astral, but it seems V.
A. has gone on strike since Aefre pushed Her out of the front several hundred feet off the ground, and I never did manage to excel at Faerie transportation, to my shame.
As I walk over my own gardens, my phone buzzes in my back pocket, still there after the last few minutes of craziness. I pull it out and it’s a message from Lincoln. Very short and to the point: “See you when I can.”
Well, I huff, seems that Chrissy has him well and truly pussy-whipped. I don’t need him, I decide. All I need is some Aspirin–say what?–and CK. He will make everything better. I can only imagine that I somehow managed to calm down my rage and realized that flying off to the Dragon Realms half-cocked was a very bad idea. I will form a plan and then I will go and see what is going on, and by the old gods, if I have a daughter there, she will be coming home with me.
“My sweet?” CK says as he joins me in the gardens. “Where have you been?”
“Oh, up there,” I say and point to the sky. “And then all the way back down here. Without wings!” I add with a loud yell, flapping my arms to make my point.
“How did that happen?” he asks calmly, even though I am starting to get some V.A. back and She is pissed.
I hold my head with my hands and close my eyes. CK grabs me and I open my eyes to see his concerned ones.
“How can I help?” he asks.
“You can’t,” I say. “I have to get them back under one umbrella and soon. But there is something else. Can you take me to Ponte please?”
“Of course,” he says and without another word Teleports us to our castle.
“What is this about?” he asks after I lie down on our bed with a soft sigh.
“Did you not see me before?” I ask, sitting up. I mean how could he not have seen a thirty-foot-tall Black Dragon flapping off the ground?
“No, should I have?” he asks. At my querying gaze he adds, “I wasn’t in the Underworld.”