Lava flowed past his feet as Drago Castiel entered the secret chamber on a planet very far from his home. It was a place he knew well though and the smell of hot stone and the herbs of his people welcomed him. There was nothing quite like it in the human world and it gave him the closest sense of coming home as he’d ever feel in this realm.
The quiet was nearly insanity inducing as he made his way deep into the caverns.
If only the humans knew it was possible to cross realms and star systems like this.
They were too immature to handle such advances.
It was in part why the Nay-chi lived hidden within their world.
As he drew closer to his destination, he still wasn’t sure why he was there.
It had been a last minute decision, one made in haste, from emotion, and that rarely served him. Tonight however, was one of those momentous occasions one rarely saw within a lifetime… even within the lifetime of someone like him – immortal.
He heard the voices now and still wasn’t sure he should have come.
The council had warned against it and at first he agreed, but then…
Emotion grabbed him around the throat like a fist.
He could barely breathe.
The room carved out of the inside of these underground caverns was lit merely by torches, causing ominous shadows up the rock walls. There was about fifteen people in the chamber and he recognized them all. They were the Nay-chi elders and high council led by Leil and Yosef, the only soul mated Nay-chi in existence.
“The only action to be taken must be one of execution.” One of the elders spoke sternly.
Several of the council nodded or muttered in agreement.
Drago pressed himself against the cave wall, not ready to be seen.
“We aren’t the keepers for her kind. Is it ethical to execute her? Shouldn’t we simply hand her over to her own people for justice?”
Leil. Drago smiled. Always trying to be the voice of reason.
“Her people know nothing of justice and her crime was committed against one of our own. That’s not something to be taken lightly.”
Drago frowned.
Her crime.
It sounded so sanitized.
“Believe me Zorel, nothing about this has been taken easy. It is not often one of our own is…” Leil’s words fell off and silence hung heavy in the room.
“Execution is fitting, Leil.” Yosef’s words were tender, but firm.
“We are just lucky that word of this has not spread. The last thing we need is a war between her people and ours and you know that’s what this would mean. Our people would not be held in check Leil. We must finish this here and now.”
“I know that, Hermes! You think I don’t know? You think I haven’t laid awake every night since this happened asking myself if I could order a life be taken even when I knew what it would mean for our people if I did not?” Leil stood and slammed her palms down on the wooden plank table before her.
When she stood, her eyes met Drago’s and she stopped speaking and only stared at him causing every other set of eyes in the room to track him as well.
Drago stood straight and still in the flickering light. He knew the council would look to him now that he was there. It was partially why he’d wanted to keep his presence unknown.
He moved his gaze from Leil to Kahriescie.
Dressed in a deep red tailored jacket and leather pants, her flaming red hair tied in a knot at the base of her neck, the witch stood still and stoic, staring out at nothing, hands bound behind her back. She tilted her chin up just enough to make a show of being unmoved by all of this.
Bitch
He was in this now and he would not be denied, not by her.
Ignoring the murmurs around him, he strode with purpose across the chamber until he stood directly in front of her.
“Look at me.” He demanded.
She ignored him.
She stood on a small platform that nearly made her as tall as him, but not quite. At this angle, she was staring directly into his throat.
“Like a knife to slice it open?” Drago’s tone was deceptively hospitable.
Again she ignored him.
There wasn’t a person in that room who would have cared if he ripped the throat right out of her. Not one would question him, and in truth, they would have been relieved as the burden would have been lifted off them. They would cover him, justice, such as it was, would have been served and no one would be any the wiser.
It was tempting.
He reached out and caressed her throat with three fingers before wrapping his hand solidly around her frail neck. Only then did she finally give any hint that she was aware of where she was and that he was present.
It was a moment, less than a second.
It was a tiny movement in her gaze that gave her away.
He moved in close to whisper against her ear so only she would hear him.
“I could do anything to you in this room and not a single person would care. You’re in my world now Kahri, you should be afraid.”
She openly moved her gaze to his.
Her look steeled.
“You’re too much of a white-hat Drago. I’d never fear the likes of you.” She spat the words out like ice.
She hit a nerve, but he covered it.
She wasn’t wrong, he was decidedly aligned with all that was good and true and not until this had he ever questioned that. Now he found himself asking why he was the way he was. Why did things always have to be lawful and good? Why did he devote his entire life to that end? Even in this, he couldn’t bring himself to hate her, though he would have been relieved if he had.
He removed his hand and turned his back on her. He imagined she regained her stoic position from before.
“I’m surprised to see you, Drago. Zorel said you weren’t coming.” Leil held out her hands to him and squeezed when he placed his in hers.
He looked back over his shoulder at the elder.
“For a time I thought I would stay away, but somehow, that didn’t seem right. It is my place to be here.”
“You risked traveling through a portal?” She sounded concerned.
He knew the rules about the portals and understood the reasoning behind it, but…
“How could I not?”
Leil’s face twisted in concern.
“They are seeing too much use recently. We risk discovery every time someone goes through one. It serves none of us to underestimate the humans.”
Yosef stood and placed his hands on his mate’s shoulders, tugging her back against his chest.
“We have other issues tonight my love.” He whispered softly.
She shook her head and moved her gaze to the wooden floor beneath their feet.
“You’re right.” Instantly she shifted back into their leader. “Drago, you have the most input at what happens here. What is your say?”
This was the main thing that had kept him from being here in the first place.
This moment.
“It was an act of cowardice to keep my voice from this proceeding and for that, I am ashamed. As for what is to be done with the witch—” He turned to stare at her. She continued to look unmoved. “—that is a more complex matter than I believe has been considered thus far.”
He had to put his own feelings aside and serve the good of both his people, and the humans he was charged with protecting.
“The Nay-chi are designated guardians of the humans separated here from the holy realms of Chibelle, home. We were sent here to protect them from the dark ones and to keep the legend of Chibelle alive. Those of us chosen in the first wave—” He placed his hand over his heart and winced at the remembrance of so long ago. “—we grew restless and many abandoned what we were sent for. They mated with the humans creating the vampires and the mad ones, the dampier, They taught the humans of the three types of magic, allowing for them to meddle with mortality and things that they should never have known of. They brought a curse on this land, they opened portals to other realms where shifters and darkness easily flooded through.
“We were not the brave, noble guardians we should have been and we have paid a high cost for that, being trapped here every bit as much as the humans, only for them, it is a lifetime, for those of us who know no death, it is eternity, separated from those we loved, home, and those we were meant for. We are a barren people in this land forced to watch the humans bond and grow their young, while we know only longing.
“Still, we are charged with the duty of protectors and of the ultimate law and that is a burden I bear with great seriousness. Because others have strayed, does not mean it is right. Because we are still here thousands upon thousands of years later, does not mean there is no way home and I cannot believe that they that created us have left us here permanently in the world of in-between.”
“It’s a lovely speech Drago, but…” Leil proceeded gently. “What of Kahriescie?”
He looked at the witch, then back to Leil.
“Give her to me. It was my brother she murdered. I will deal with her.”
He was pleased when the witch gasped and turned her head so fast he was certain she’d pained herself, but the rest of the room also gasped and loud murmuring erupted.
Leil raised both her hands to the room and shushed everyone.
“Drago, this is twice now you have asked this council to look the other way for you.” She was openly uncomfortable.
“The other time was for my own mistake, Leil. It was the right thing… the only thing.”
“While I don’t disagree and there is no need to drag up literal ancient history, you can’t…”
“Yes, Leil. I believe I can. I mean you no disrespect, but you and I both know that as one of the ancients, I don’t answer to the council. The Weir root is working correct?” He had heard they were keeping her drugged on the outside chance that over the decades her magic had become ingrown rather than earth born.
“Well yes, but…” Leil’s forehead crinkled from concern. “You have to inject her with it every thirty six hours. She won’t drink the tea.”
He snickered. “Go figure.”
“Drago, you are one of the first wave as you said and as such you have great respect from this council, but this, this is not your responsibility.”
“And executing her isn’t the answer.” He hated it, but it was, in the end, the right answer to this. “We created this mess. We have to be responsible for it.”
“The humans do it.” Zorel sounded decidedly offended.
“We aren’t the humans!” Drago roared. “My people, if there is one thing we can never forget is that we are not human. We answer to a higher calling, more is given us, more is expected of us and the cost of forgetting that is great. Have we not learned that by now?”
While the elders and council argued about the accountability for the witches, vampires and the ilk, Drago moved closer to Kahriescie.
“You’re a bigger fool than you brother, Drago.” She spat the words with contempt.
He only looked at her with sorrow.
“He loved you.”
He’d never understand what happened between them.
He had been against the relationship from the beginning, nothing good ever came from the Nay-chi mixing with any of the lesser species, but the witches, of all the sects…
“His soft heart was his death…”
He looked into her eyes and saw nothing that spoke of deserving redemption, yet there he was, about to hand it to her nonetheless.
She straightened and he thought perhaps rose up on her toes to bring herself closer to him before she whispered her threat… “It will be yours as well and…” She smiled slowly. “I think I’ll take a lot more pleasure from it, Drago Castiel from the first wave of the Dragon Clans. Challenge it will be, but I think well worth it.”
Her gaze connected with his core.
He’d made a grave miscalculation, but if she was going to die, it’d be at his hands and no one else’s.
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