Part of me—a very superficial layer of me—reacted to this with resistance. On the face of the matter, it was shocking and even dangerous. We didn’t see people transform into beasts. We didn’t trust beings which could easily strike us down. This kind of stuff didn’t happen here, and if it did, it was probably quickly ended by the local government. The alternative was the stuff of fantasy novels. But then again, we didn’t see harpies either; we didn’t see any creature from those alleged YouTube videos in which Zada ardently believed. But perhaps reality was not so mundane and explicable as the evening news would have me believe.
A much deeper part of me—the very core of me—couldn’t be anything but impressed with his power and glory. He filled this entire cavern with all the sinuous grace of an anaconda. His scales glistened with his every movement, as if he was wearing sequins like a second skin. In spite of his sheer size, he moved with an elegance which he had belied in his human form while picking his way down that mountainside with me in his arms. It wasn’t the only familiar thing about him in the dragon form; there were also the eyes. His gigantic, amber eyes still gleamed with the innate trust and dignity to which I had always felt drawn.
His angular head leveled itself and he peered at me, prompting some kind of reaction.
“You’re beautiful,” I told him. What else could I say? I wasn’t one for dramatic proclamations, in all honesty. But if I was, I would’ve told him that I’d already said everything I needed to say back at Michelle’s driveway.
I had come to trust him… and that sense of safety couldn’t be revoked, even by the reptilian skin which papered his body now.
Theon transformed back into his human self, and there we were, staring at each other. His body shone with sweat and his eyes trained on mine with a peculiar intensity. He was still nude, now facing me, and I allowed my eyes to slip over his body and examine the rest of him. He didn’t seem to mind, or even notice; perhaps he considered his body to belong to me now. He stepped forward and my eyes darted back to his as if I’d been caught, but he didn’t acknowledge my gaze. Rather, he took my palm and placed it onto his bare chest, so I could feel the thunder of his heartbeat and the slickness of his flesh. In fact, heat was radiating off of him at a rate I’d never felt before, and that was saying something. His skin almost burned to the touch.
Suddenly motivated to express my love, my devotion, I sprang onto the tips of my toes and wrapped my fingers around the back of his thick neck, pulling him down to my lips and reveling in another salty, burning kiss. His arms wrapped around my body and held me close and I was in an inferno again, I was battered by waves again.
When we separated, I felt dizzy, drained, and satisfied. The steamy pressure of his body receded from me, and I realized that even gripping me in his arms had caused a light sweat to spring up on my flesh.
“I don’t care,” I promised him. “It’s wonderful.”
Theon’s eyes glowed brighter, even though the smile which curved his lips was small. “There is, then, one final thing to show you,” he said. “Allow me.”
“You don’t have to,” I blurted, then blushed furiously. “I mean, well, uh, where are we going?”
Theon glanced over his shoulder at me, and I tore my eyes from his perfect hindquarters.
“You’ll see,” he said. “You’ll see it all soon enough, Penelope. Here. Hold this for me.” He passed his attire into my arms. “And wait for me outside.”
Chapter 32: Nell
I used the firelight at my back to guide myself out of the cave again, waiting patiently on Theon. I exited into a blast of bitter midnight wind, wondering why he’d be willing to come out here naked. In a matter of seconds, Theon arrived to join me, skipping onto the bridge-like formation where I had sat on the first night we met. I gaped. He had transformed into a dragon again. In public! On the beach where my dad lived!
Theon leaned down to scoop me up with his massive, triangular skull, depositing me onto the bridge-shaped rock with him.
“Is this where you wanted to take me?” I asked, joking.
“Yes,” Theon said, his voice deep and husky. “It’s not far from here that we will find a portal.”
“A p-portal?”
“Do you see that island, just beneath the moon?” Theon asked.
I squinted and peered over the waves. There were no islands off the coast of Beggar’s Hole, I knew that, and yet, in the distance, I did see some dark speckles. It looked like nothing more than another formation of rocks, much like the one on which we stood. “Yes, I see it.”
“Let’s go there. You will hold my clothing for me, so that I may dress when we arrive. We will find the gate on that island, and you will finally be able to see the country about which you have so often wondered: The Hearthlands.”
My heartbeat raced. We were going to see his home country. I imagined verdant fields, and gigantic dragons arcing to and fro in the sky.
“How will we get there?” I wondered aloud.
It was probably the stupidest thing I’d ever said. Theon nudged me again with his large head, and I slid onto the back of his neck, which was as thick as a horse’s back at the junction of its base and his shoulder blades.
His black wings began to beat, showing their golden undersides, and a tiny yelp escaped my lips before I wound my arms around his neck and buried my face into his soft scales. Theon lifted into the air, taking me with him, and then we were moving over the dark ocean, ribbed with waves and hemmed in with a light mist.
I forced myself to accept the surreality of this situation. You are on your dragon boyfriend’s back… and he’s taking you over the ocean, to some island, to a portal… which will lead into another dimension… where you can see his home country. Yes. All of that is true.
I gulped and pinned my face against his neck, squeezing my eyes shut and trying to ignore the buffeting of the icy winds.
Theon settled with a jolt and I brought my face away from his neck, where it had remained pressed with my eyes tightly shut. I slid from off his back and gazed around. We were on one large rock, surrounded by other large rocks. All around us stretched black sea—and above us, black sky—so that it was as if we’d been marooned on some vast, empty, oceanic planet. Even the distant shoreline was almost invisible from here, save the dark strip at the very horizon.
The only hint of civilization was a metallic bolt which appeared to be drilled, or hammered, into the rock.
“You said the gate was here,” I reminded Theon, stooping to examine the bolt. It was then that I stood up and fell back a step.
The thing I was seeing between these rocks, which I had thought was the swirling, dark ocean, was not.
Attached to that metallic bolt was a strange, smoky canvas whose depth and substance could not be discerned. It wasn’t water which connected this circle of jagged rocks. It was a star-choked abyss, which shifted and faded, influenced by something to which I was not privy.
“Oh, my God,” I whispered.
“Yes,” Theon agreed. “This portal was only recently discovered by me, but I remember my first encounter with a different one. It is breathtaking. Not only is it beautiful… but an entire universe of worlds is only one touch away.”
“One touch?” I whispered.
Theon nodded gravely. “You only need to go through,” he assured me. “The portal will do all the rest.”
“I… But, Theon…” I turned from the portal to face him. “I can’t just jump into another world like that.” I laughed nervously, a hint of my old self coming back to me—the girl who would never dare to dream for herself, the girl who faltered when asked to let her imagination run wild. “I don’t know what’s on the other side.”
Theon smiled warmly and braced my elbows with his palms. “It’s paradise,” he said. “You’ll never see a more beautiful country in all of your planet. The hills are grassy and emerald, choked in vibrant flora. Clouds are rare and distant, almost yellowed by the purity of the sunlight. Our wildlife is prolific. The
sense of growth and succulence is overwhelming, particularly to visitors from less-fortunate worlds.”
“So I guess you won’t be needing your jacket.”
“We will return here in a matter of minutes, I promise you.” Theon guided me toward the portal. Theon took his jacket from me, draped it over his arm, and took my hand. “You will step with me into the portal.” He took one step closer to the ledge of the rock, where the bolt signaled the border of the gate. I hesitated, but he glimpsed back and smiled. “Trust me, you’ll be safe in The Hearthlands. They’ve not seen unrest since the decapitation of Emperor Bram.” I blinked and stared at Theon blankly. “Many, many years ago now,” he explained. He rubbed his thumb down the inside of my palm. “Trust me, Nell.”
I took a deep breath and nodded. We took one more step forward, and then we leapt into open air.
The world around us was briefly crushing and colorless, like falling down an inky tunnel; it wasn’t painful as much as it was uncomfortable. Then we were dumped onto our hands and knees in a foot of snow. I reeled backwards, surprised by its intense coldness, and climbed to my feet. This world looked nothing like the world that Theon had described.
The sky was low and huddled in metallic clouds. They spat chunks of snow and ice in a hail around us, and my arms came up to surround myself. Even though Theon wasn’t wearing any jacket, he took the woolen coat from off his arm and laid it across my shoulders, swallowing me in its layers.
We were surrounded by rolling hills, that much was true, and in the distance—hardly visible in this snowstorm—appeared to be mountains.
“This isn’t right,” Theon breathed, his face carved with a worry I had never seen before. “I must get closer, but I cannot uphold my promise that this is a safe place for you to be. My castle is just a little beyond here. You can stay at this gate and await my return. If you notice anyone who is not me, jump back through the gate immediately. Count to three hundred. If I have not returned by then, you must leave without me and I will come back to you when I’m able.”
“Theon, I can’t. I can’t leave without you. The gate on Earth is out at sea, and what if the water level rises? If anything happens to you here… I’ll drown back on Earth.”
Theon winced. “Of course,” he said. “Then I must secure you first, and then return.”
In the distance overhead, several shadows migrated toward us. In the blowing snow, they looked like blue blimps, but they moved with the same grace and speed as Theon had moved in the cave. But the snow had also hindered visibility. They weren’t that far away from us.
“What is that?” I dared ask.
“A pack,” he answered, “coming to inspect the activity at the gate. We must flee before we’re seen. Take my hand. Don’t let go.”
But he didn’t only take my hand. He took my hand, and he also took my other arm in his other hand, just in case the tension between our hands broke. Then he leapt, pulling me into the air with him, no hesitation, back into the black, crushing void.
Chapter 33: Nell
Theon and I, both coated in snow, sprawled across the wet, jagged rock island off the coast of Maine. I breathed hard and struggled to catch my bearings, but I couldn’t imagine how it must’ve felt to be Theon. What must it feel like to transport your significant other to your homeland, only to find that everything had changed and it’d been transformed into some bitter, wintry wasteland?
Theon was already standing, pacing on the rock. “I have to go back,” he said, his jaw tense. “I’ll take you home first. Keep the pendant. Never lose it. If I can return, I will use its power to find you.” He stooped and gazed into my eyes. “I know you must understand why I have to do this.”
I swallowed. Did he think that he might die? How dangerous were The Hearthlands now? “What’s going on over there, Theon?” I asked him. “Do you have any idea? I’m—scared—”
The words had only just left my lips when an azure-blue dragon head erupted through the portal, followed by a spill of talons, wings, and a long, whipping tail. The beast was much smaller than Theon in his dragon form, but it was still much bigger than Theon in his human form. The dragon was low and long, slinky, with an angular, strangely haughty face. Its electric-blue eyes shimmered and I collapsed back onto the rocks, screaming.
A woman emerged through the portal next, riding the back of this dragon, and she was familiar. Her body was thin and pale, her hair was straight, long, and black, and her mouth was dripping in dark red lipstick. She wore a long black skirt, a black sweater, and a neck full of gaudy brass pendants. Latex boots with thick platforms.
Then it hit me. She was the woman who’d owned the apartment. The “interested third party”…
Theon transformed rapidly in front of me, keeping his body between mine and theirs, just as he had done with the harpies. He lunged for the blue dragon and it darted back, blowing a stream of ice shards at his plated chest. The thickness of Theon’s hide didn’t allow for the offense to break through. Theon only roared in defense, even though he was significantly bigger than the blue dragon; he could have killed it, I surmised.
The black-haired woman threw her hands toward Theon. A sickly yellow haze was flung from her body like a shower of pollen, and it seared into Theon’s eyes, causing him to falter, his head to swivel and sway. He roared again, and his face convulsed. He threw his head back in a rage and a swath of white-hot flame such as I had never seen filled the sky.
Theon staggered to the left and lost his footing, scrabbling on the rocks and causing many of them to collapse into the sea. He stumbled into the water itself and slid into the battering waves. “Theon!” I screamed, forgetting how very small and weak I was. I thought only of him needing my help, him wounded, him falling into the ocean.
I darted forward and grabbed his thick neck, tugging him back onto the rocks… or trying to. Of course, he was much heavier than I. As he fell further into the water and cried out in pain and confusion, my own hands locked around his neck pulled me with him, toward the violent sea beyond. “No!” I cried, pulling harder and only losing more ground. “Theon!”
His dragon form slid completely into the water and, still clutching him, I too was pulled in. We both went underwater and I was reminded vividly of the night we’d met. Burning pins of ice sank into my every pore and I gasped involuntarily, sucking the frigid saltwater into my lungs.
I pulled toward the surface to breathe, coughing while underwater and only sucking in more of the ocean, but Theon was also thrashing in the waves and his tail and wings struck me, driving me underwater again until the tide pulled us apart. I threw my arms into the air wildly and snatched a grip on the side of this rock island, first vomiting, then coughing, then gratefully dragging the cold air into my lungs, relieved to merely no longer be drowning.
I couldn’t see Theon or the blue dragon anymore—
Warm hands secured my shoulders and dragged me backwards, into the air and out of the water. At first I thought it was Theon, even as I was dragged and draped across a narrow, scaly hide. But I realized who it must have been. My eyes bulged open. These scales were a bright, vibrant azure, and I shrieked.
The blue dragon lifted into the sky and wove in circles, lazy and smug in his victory. The black-haired woman pinned me to his back, even as I thrashed and cried out. I struck at her wiry frame, but she was surprisingly strong. “Let me go!”
Up close, she was older than she had appeared from a distance. Wrinkles encroached on her eyes, where there was a hardness one seldom found in the eyes of an adolescent.
I wrenched from her hands to gaze down to the black ocean below. Theon… He had transformed back into a human, and was crawling back onto the rock island from the water. He was completely nude, his clothing ripped off in the unexpected transformation, and his eyes were squeezed shut.
I screamed down to him. “Theon!”
Theon’s head lifted so that I could see his face. His wet hair whipped in the wind. “Nell!”
The blue dra
gon completed one more pattern and then darted down into the portal. In a flash, Theon was gone, and I was pinned to the back of an unknown blue dragon, accompanied by some kind of witch, sucked through the narrow, inky tunnel between Earth and The Hearthlands… and Theon was back at that rock island. Alone. Naked. And blind.
Chapter 34: Theon
“Nell!” I bellowed into the winds—but no sound answered me back; even her screams had been dampened into silence. A cold despair swallowed me whole. No! No!
I could only imagine the horrors being enacted in my home country, the condition of my father and mother—and now Nell. Why would they have taken her? She was nothing to them, a young Earth girl who had never even heard of The Hearthlands… until she’d met me.
Would they treat her with kindness or cruelty? What had the ice dragons done? How had they altered the very island itself?
I groped for the bolt which would signal to me one of the far corners of the portal; I could jump. I could follow them. But where would I find someone to heal my eyes? Would it really be wisest to leap, blinded, into unfriendly territory?
It didn’t matter anyway. I couldn’t find any of the three bolts securing the triangular gate. I only felt rough rock beneath my palms.