Flicker the storm dragon.., p.4
Flicker (The Storm Dragons' Mate Book 2), page 4
“I do,” he said, ducking his head as he slid on a pair of shoes. What I thought I saw in his eyes before he looked down was sadness, but why would he be…
“I’m going,” I said immediately while standing up. Gage snapped his head up, and his eyes filled with a warm light, though it was tinged with concern. I was going to guess that he wanted me to go but didn’t think it was a good idea or something along those lines.
I was totally still going.
Breaker dragged me down to his lap, making a low rumble as my eyes widened, realizing just how hard he was. Luckily, Jagger’s next words brought me back to the present, keeping me from turning around and kissing Breaker… Or maybe that was unlucky.
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, little treasure. People will be talking about what happened yesterday, which will put you right at the center of attention.” Something I knew Jagger hated, and while I used to think it came from a place of embarrassment, I was now realizing it was something far different than that.
Jagger was being protective.
“Let them talk,” I said dismissively. “Like you said, half of them already assumed I’m a dragon. Plus, I’m not missing Gage’s game—the first game of the year, at that!”
“We do have a separate seating area, so it would be fairly safe,” Gage murmured, causing me to smile. He totally wanted me to go.
I shimmied on Breaker’s lap, causing him to groan before releasing me, and walked towards Gage. I looped my arms around him, and he dipped his head so we were closer.
“I’m excited to see you play,” I admitted before tilting my head in realization that I’d never been to a sporting event before, at least not one like this. “What do I wear?”
“My jersey,” Gage answered immediately, Jagger letting out a low, amused sound.
“Okay.” I nodded eagerly, loving the sound of that. “You get me the jersey, and I promise we will be there watching you.”
“Thanks, cupcake.” Gage pressed a fleeting kiss to my lips before disappearing, leaving me stunned in the best way possible. When he appeared seconds later with a gold and black jersey for me, his name proudly on the back, I took it greedily. He didn’t realize it yet, but he was never getting this back.
“Good luck.” I rolled up on my toes and kissed him again before he left, leaving me with the other two.
“You have no idea how happy you just made him,” Jagger said as he appeared behind me. I smiled up at him, because I was almost positive I did. Or at least a little bit.
“I hope so. I’m excited to go,” I admitted as Breaker said something about our seats, allowing me to escape to the bathroom as Jagger turned to answer him. I knew they would have to get ready as well, so I tried to get showered and dressed quickly, not wanting to miss any of the game.
After I was wrapped in a robe, I brushed out the curls I’d created before adding some light makeup. When I was done, I slipped out of the room and went to my bedroom, grabbing a pair of sparkly black jeans and long-sleeve turtleneck to go with the jersey. I could tell it was a bit chilly outside, so I paired the entire outfit with a pair of gold bottom high heel boots and a gold and black scarf I’d knitted a year or so back.
Turning in the mirror, I let out a pleased sound at how I looked, deciding at the last minute to tie up the oversized jersey to show off my high-waisted jeans. Perfection.
“Little treasure—shit,” Jagger groaned. I turned to look at him, noticing that he was wearing dark jeans and a long-sleeve shirt that featured the academy’s name. Dark Imaginarium Academy. The crest was prominent, paired with the shifter sector’s colors. How the heck did I get a shirt like that?
“What?” I asked curiously.
“You look perfect,” Breaker said. He’d appeared behind Jagger, dressed similarly. “Ignore him, he’s just being possessive.”
“Over what?” I loved the idea of Jagger being possessive over me, so I was all ears.
The man in question was still staring at me, almost as if he was in pain. “Male shifters seeing you look so good,” he rumbled, tugging my hand so that I was brought against his chest. “You are so damn appealing, little treasure, to literally fucking everyone.”
“I doubt that,” I murmured, flushing at the compliment. I didn’t really think I held as much appeal as he was saying, but if he wanted to think I was that attractive…well, I wouldn’t freakin’ complain.
“Right,” he grumbled, shaking his head. “Come on, let’s go.”
As we went down the elevator, me captured between the two of them, I began to feel that trickle of nerves roll over me once again. Mostly because they were right that there’d be a lot of eyes on me. I normally wouldn’t care about people looking at me—it seemed to be a common occurrence when it came to the men I surrounded myself with—but right now it was because of a situation I wasn’t equipped to handle.
Almost as if knowing, Breaker spoke softly. “We don’t have to go. Gage will understand.”
“I want to go, I’m just not sure how people will react.”
“Fear and respect, most likely,” Jagger said. “That’s how they treat most dragons.”
But I wasn’t most dragons, and I couldn’t imagine someone fearing me. “I don’t want anyone to fear me.”
“It's instinctual,” Breaker explained, his voice filled with understanding. “The aura your magic gives off is significantly different now that the spell has broken. Less dominant shifters won’t be able to help but fear you. Of course your personality will play a part and most likely soften the effect, but at the end of the day, you’re a dragon.”
I’m a dragon. Insane.
“But like we said,” he went on, “we have a separate seating area, so don’t think too much about it. I promise it’ll be fine.”
I hoped he was right.
As we made our way across the chilled campus, I noticed large groups of students heading towards the practice field where everything had happened with Gage. Where he had nearly attacked Fletcher, kissed me, and told me I was his mate. It was the moment where everything had started to click together, when I’d started to fight for the memories despite the pain.
I almost tripped as I remembered what Fletcher had said that made me pass out. “Because you’re a dragon.” He’d told me that. He’d known. But he hadn’t feared me…so maybe others wouldn’t either. Maybe I could fight that and make sure people were comfortable with me.
As we neared the entrance, that hope was squashed as I began to see what the boys had been talking about. Before, people had been offering me odd looks filled with confusion and fear when it came to my interaction with my mates, but now they were averting their eyes from me. I saw anger there also, which I didn’t understand, but it was enough to make me nervous.
Breaker’s hand on my back tightened, and Jagger shook his head in frustration. My expression was apparently making it very clear that I was, in fact, noticing everyone’s reactions to me.
“Ignore them,” Jagger said quietly.
I nodded but couldn’t follow the direction because my eyes darted everywhere. Luckily, I didn’t see anyone I recognized. I think that would’ve hurt far more, if someone that I knew, like Rachel, started to avoid me.
As we entered the stadium, I looked for Gage on the field. Both teams seemed to be shifters, but they had jerseys that heavily featured opposite colors of the shifter sector. Gage’s team had black with accents of gold, and the other the opposite.
How did they split teams here? Maybe from different years? That didn’t seem like it’d be fair, though—wouldn’t the seniors be far stronger than the freshmen? I would have to ask.
Climbing up the stairs, I managed to get a better view of the stadium and perked up as I saw Gage. He waved to me, a smile on his face, and people around us began whispering and shooting furtive glances in my direction. Breaker and Jagger led me to a box at the top of the stadium, and as we entered the room from a door on the side, I was happy to see that it was a rather cozy space. It featured comfortable seating, food, beverages, and heating. I wasn’t positive why my mates got to sit up here—I had to assume it was something to do with shifter hierarchy—but I wouldn’t complain.
Curious, I started to ask, but before I could the game started, and after that my attention was on the field. I peppered the guys with questions, only breaking to cheer for Gage. I learned that there were four teams led by senior captains. The teams were formed not by year, but rather by the type of shifter.
The violence on the field made it necessary to have some level of equality in skill, and every time someone hit another person or blood was spilled in a collision, I couldn’t help but wince. If Gage hadn’t been so lethal and large I would’ve worried about him, but he absolutely dominated the field.
I was so entertained by the game that I didn’t even realize it was halftime until people were standing and stretching.
“Ten minutes until it starts back up,” Jagger explained.
“Just enough time to talk,” a feminine voice said from the row of seats beneath us, a girl walking up to position herself in front of me. I instantly recognized her as the girl from the dining hall that Jagger had referred to as a viper.
Diane, was it?
I didn’t get a good feeling from Diane, but I didn’t exactly get a bad one either. My gaze moved to the people around her, and I realized that the ‘bad’ energy was coming from them, so I kept my attention on her. She was looking effortlessly as perfect as the first time we’d met, wearing a simple hoodie and watching me with a curious and clinical expression.
I didn’t think Diane knew what to make of me. To be fair, the feeling was mutual.
“Leave. Now.” Breaker demanded, appearing next to me. Jagger was on my other side, shaking his head in frustration.
I squeezed Breaker’s hand in comfort as I offered Diane a curious look. “What do you want to talk about?” My hope was that if I kept it a lighthearted conversation, this weird animosity would go away. I had no reason to dislike her, and I hoped she had no reason to dislike me.
“We want to know what you did to Ioan,” one of the men behind her spit out.
Diane silenced him with a snarl before slowly looking back at me, her gaze filled with caution and distrust. “That’s exactly what we want to know,” she stated evenly. “We know he sustained enough burns to kill him and that you shifted at the same time. I’m not going to assume that it was an accident, so what happened?”
Was…was Ioan dead? She didn’t say he was dead, just that he had enough burns to kill him. The guys would’ve told me if he was dead, right? Holy fates.
Jagger let out a dangerous rumble that had me curling my toes. I loved that sound, and in this moment, it did a lot to calm me down. “She does not answer to you—she answers to nobody.”
Diane paled as she looked back at me, keeping her chin tilted up. “I’d like to hear her say that, then.”
I didn’t have an answer to that. Did I answer to anyone? I answered to those that I loved and cared about, but that was because of those relationships. I suppose in this context I didn’t…
Deciding to not answer that, I eased past it. “To answer your first question, I was using the bathroom. Ioan cornered me and tried to choke me, accused me of using my body to keep my mates around—” A weird flash of a memory came over me, allowing her to interrupt.
“So they are your mates, and you’re a dragon!” she demanded, although she was hardly asking.
“Yes,” I confirmed, moving on before she could ask questions that I couldn’t answer about my shifted side. “Ioan choked me, and I shifted. That’s what happened.”
I should’ve felt guilty about him being burned and injured in the crossfire, but every time I went to feel that way, I thought about how panicked and scared I’d been. How I’d thought I was going to die.
Diane examined my face before exhaling in frustration. “She’s telling the truth, I can tell.”
Her group seemed to be dissatisfied with that, so I added, “I have no reason to lie.”
“You’re happy he’s hurt,” another girl accused.
“I’m not happy he’s hurt.” I tilted my chin up. “I’m happy he’s not around. I don’t want to see him again; it’s that simple.”
At least I hoped it was.
“You won’t,” Breaker promised. I loved that the two of them were bookends to me, keeping me insulated in their affection while letting me handle this.
Diane’s eyes darted away for a moment before returning back to me. “Just stay away from him from now on.”
Somehow it felt more of a warning and less of a command, and for sure not because she was mad at me. There was sadness and disappointment in her gaze. I didn’t understand it fully, but it made me feel empathy for her. It was almost like she felt responsible for Ioan’s actions.
I nodded, and when they left I slumped against Jagger. I noticed other students were staring at me with a bit less aggression than before, although I didn’t know why—maybe because they’d overheard what Ioan did? Was that…was that why they were mad at me? Did they think I’d hurt Ioan just for kicks?
With that thought, I felt a bit more somber watching the rest of the game, my attention straying randomly in thought. Jagger and Breaker were talking, but my gaze kept moving to Diane, feeling like there was a lot more to her story than I understood.
“She’s an alpha, but that isn’t a power signature that you would recognize, because you’re a dragon. Unless it’s an alpha that’s more powerful than you, it feels like everyone else, until you learn what to look for,” Breaker explained, clearly catching where my attention was drifting. “She’s one of the students that has taken many of the miscellaneous shifters, not living under clan rule or from the city, under her wing. Kids who don’t have alliances with anyone.”
“The academy can be a scary place when you have no one,” Jagger said. I believed that, and I was beyond thankful that I had my mates. I had thought I would only have Gage here, but I had so much more than that.
I had an entire past to discover.
Suddenly a knock on the door had Breaker turning around and crossing the room. When he opened it up and I saw security there, dread formed in my stomach. This couldn’t be good.
“What?” Breaker demanded.
“Professor Clanguard would like to speak to Ms. Bronzeheart as well as all three dragon heirs,” the security guard said quietly. Judging by the whispers in the stands, though, everyone below had heard him.
“We’ll go to his office after the game then,” Breaker bit out, shooting a look to the man in question, who was coaching on the sideline.
“His house on campus,” the security guard amended.
“Fine.”
When the door closed and Breaker came back over, I felt my stomach drop. Gage scored a try—the rugby version of a touchdown, the guys had taught me—but I could barely focus on that. Why did I have a feeling Professor Clanguard wanted to see me about Ioan? I couldn’t think of any other reason than him.
“Everything will be fine,” Jagger murmured.
I hoped he was right.
Chapter Five
Gage Bronzeheart
The horns announcing the game’s completion sounded loudly through the stadium. I was over the railing and into the rows of seating in a second flat, sprinting up the stairs towards my mate. I heard Coach Clanguard call out my name, but I barely heard it, everything completely overshadowed by the uncertainty and trepidation I could see on Bex’s face.
It was clear her thoughts were a million miles away, only half-heartedly reacting to the cheers around her before she joined in, standing and searching for me on the field. She didn’t realize I was already on my way towards her. I could tell the visit from security had rocked her, and I needed to know what they’d said to make her look so anxious.
I was already furious at them, but if the look on Jagger and Breaker’s faces were anything to go by, I had a feeling there was much more to be mad about than I realized.
Security had no damn reason to be approaching my cupcake. I knew they understood the rules here—the spoken and unspoken hierarchy—and I’d be damned if Bex was intimidated for even a single second on a campus that we ruled over. That was completely unacceptable.
Cheers sounded around me, and students called out my name, trying to congratulate me, but I was up the stairs and to our private box within seconds. Breaker swung open the door, looking unsurprised at my arrival.
“Oh! Gage!” Bexley snapped around, plastering a smile on her face and looking thrilled to see me. “I didn’t see you on the field; I was so confused. Congratulations on winning! I don’t understand rugby super well, but you did amazing—” She stopped mid-sentence, her smile dropping. “Wait, what’s wrong?”
Her brow dipped as I approached her as slowly as I could, not wanting to throw her off by the intensity coming off me at the idea of my mate being threatened. When I reached her, I cupped her jaw, examining her darkened gold eyes, a rumble breaking from my throat in frustration at her small attempt to shield her emotions from me.
“What happened? Why was security up here?”
“Oh.” She drew her bottom lip in. “That was nothing, they just said—”
“Professor Clanguard wants to talk to the four of us,” Jagger said, the indifferent look on his face not matching the power that his dragon was forcing through the room in a turbulent storm. Normally my dragon would be defensive about the idea of another dragon trying to assert dominance, but for once he was silent, aware we were all united under the need to figure out what had upset Bexley and how we could make her happy once more.
“What the hell does he want?” I bit out, glaring at the field. If he’d wanted to have a meeting then he could have discussed it with me instead of sending security to bother my mate. I didn’t care if he was a powerful alpha—or would-have-been alpha—or the sector leader. I didn’t give a shit.
