Once upon a Dragon Gift (Once Upon a Dragon Series Book 4)

Days seeped on by.

I found myself on the roof of the castle, just below Elena’s room.

I tuned in almost all the time now.

It was a nightmare, to be honest. Every time Elena was awake, the questions would start and then the panic would set in. Goran really did a number on her. The worst part was, every time someone tried to calm her down, they did the opposite. Whenever that someone was me, it was as if I made it twenty thousand times worse. So I stayed away.

Around three, she finally settled down and fell asleep.

What Adolph had said kept turning in my mind. Overpowering my thoughts.

She would’ve died if it hadn’t been for the Vastech. Irene prophesied this. She saw exactly what was going to happen. This was what those words had meant. Why it was fulfilled the second she went to Goran as it was only a matter of time before it turned into a reality.

My gaze blurred as tears pricked.

I pinched my eyes, trying to stop the waterworks.

My wife was gone, and her papi, who was easily thousands of years old, was saying that there was no coming back from what had happened to her. Time wasn’t going to heal this one.

She would’ve been better off dead. I cringed, thinking about it. I was that selfish, begging her. She knew that something was wrong, and I should’ve listened.

“Stop feeling sorry for yourself, Blake,” Lu’s voice came from my left.

My lips curved as he reached me. He was walking around in a nightshirt. Because of the frost he shared with Tabitha, Lu hardly felt the cold.

I wondered how he felt knowing that he shared his uncle’s gift.

Goran was a Snow Wielder, even though his dragon was a Swallow Annex.

“You okay?”

“No, I’m not. Elena doesn’t remember me, you, her family, her friends. She doesn’t even remember who the fuck she is. We’ve truly lost her, Lu.”

“Then we go back to the beginning, Blake. We introduce ourselves to her, start building a relationship with her again.”

I sniffed and wiped my face. “Adolph said that it won’t—”

“I don’t care what Adolph said. He is underestimating all of us. We have to try.”

I sniffed again.

“It’s not a lost cause, and you know that.”

I nodded. If it was one thing that I loved about my blood brother, it was his endurance. He refused to give up.

“How is she?” he asked.

“Restless, afraid, even though my aunt and her father have told her many times that it will be okay. It’s like Adolph said, life was scaring her shitless now.”

“A part of me is glad that she doesn’t remember.”

“How can you say that, Lu?”

“How can you not? Can you imagine the shit that monster put on her, did to her? She would’ve been too traumatized, too different. That trauma pulls people apart. It would’ve pulled you apart too, whether you are a Dent or not. She wouldn’t have been our Elena anymore. This way, she has no idea what has happened to her. Time will fix this. Elena will push through. It will get easier.”

I understood what Lu was saying. But I didn’t agree with that Dent thing. My love for her, my patience and friendship would’ve helped her to get through it all.

Lu has done so many interviews in the past few days, as I refused. I didn’t want to be in the public’s eye answering questions about Elena. What her condition was doing to me. It would make me look weak.

Lu was a great friend.

He sat with me as we just listened to the surrounding sounds of the night. We didn’t have to speak words. We were content just sitting with each other, in silence.

Around six, the sun peeked over the horizon. The colors were so beautiful, pinks and orange hues with a tint of red. Elena would’ve loved to draw this. She would’ve captured this moment’s essence, too.

Now she doesn’t even remember how to do that.

I got up, and Lu followed my gesture. We found Tabitha and Dad in the kitchen. There was no sign of King Albert or Jako.

“Morning,” I greeted and opened the fridge. I took out some food from last night. Everything that had happened has flattened my appetite. But right now, my stomach said otherwise.

I could devour an entire cow.

Glass dishes filled with leftovers sat on top of each other. I grabbed the first few, and Lu helped.

We put it on the table, and Dad got up and grabbed plates. Tabitha put on the kettle. Nobody said a word.

From the corner of my eye, Tabitha hugged Lu. He put his lips on her forehead and kept them there.

So much has changed that it was almost magical.

The way the two of them were so close. I envied that. I missed that with Elena.

Fucking Goran. I should’ve killed him that day. Why didn’t I?

A hand squeezed my shoulder, and I looked at my dad.

“It’s okay. She is safe.”

I nodded, even if I hated it with all my heart. She wasn’t here. That was not my Elena up in that room. She was a stranger. Someone that looked like my wife and my Dent.

I’d lost her in the in-between. Was she still there, or did she simply vanish?

I wolfed down food. It tasted stale as I swallowed, trying to fill this stubborn, empty spot in my stomach.

“Morning,” Jako said, as he entered the kitchen.

“Morning,” everyone else muttered.

Nobody asked how Elena was doing. Everyone that could tune in did.

Just then, her screams filled the palace.

I jumped from my chair and rushed up the steps two at a time. Working my legs harder to get there faster.

“It’s okay, it’s okay.” My aunt was there first, trying to calm her.

“Where am I? What is this place? I can’t be here; please, please, make it go away.”

“You are safe. I’m so sorry.”

Elena’s sobs were heart-wrenching. Her door closed before I could enter. My aunt had locked it, and I got what she was telling me. I would only make it worse. Her pleas still overpowered my hearing.

I knew I shouldn’t tune in as what left her lips broke my soul.

She couldn’t deal with a thing. Not even my aunt.

I leaned against the wall as tears rolled down my cheeks and sobbed my heart out.

Constance spoke a subdue spell. It would let Elena sleep for now.

Her cries turned to whimpering, and after a few minutes, it too grew quiet. The door unlocked, but I didn’t enter. I sat in the hallway.

The door eventually opened, but I didn’t look up at my aunt.

She took the spot next to me.

A soft hand tapped my leg, and my head turned to hers.

Tears laid thick in my aunt’s eyes.

King Albert sauntered down the hallway and paused as he saw us sitting in the hallway. “Constance?”

She sighed and got up. “We might need to think about giving her the serum, Al.”

“Don’t, please.”

“There is nothing I can do. Keeping her awake, forcing her to deal with whatever she is going through, is cruel.” Her voice faltered, and she walked with huge strides back into her room. She stopped before she entered and stared at the king. “Goran made sure that she’ll never get back to us.”

I’d had him, and it was all the king’s fault that the bastard lived. The king’s shoulders shook as he sobbed silently. A part of me was so angry at him as everything they’d done was for nothing. Sending her away with Tanya, nothing. Killing Cara, nothing.

He sniffed. “You should’ve killed him. I’m sorry that I stopped you.”

“It’s too late now,” I muttered and left. She was breaking my heart, as I did not know how to reach her. How to get her to come back to us.

I was almost as lost as she was.

Tanya came and stayed. Jako left. Nobody knew where he went. Tanya tried. She tried whatever she could, but there was nothing left to take away or to persuade that Elena would be okay. It was as if whatever she was going through was set in stone. That this was her destiny.

But like every other parent, Tanya refused to give up. It ended with a big fight between her and King Albert.

I watched her pack the next morning.

“So that’s it, you’re just giving up?”

“What do you want from me?” Tanya yelled. “I’ve tried. I can’t get through to her. That is not Elena.”

I nodded. “So you give up just like you gave up on Cara?”

“Don’t give me that crap. You were not there.”

I stared at her, and she looked at me; I closed my eyes. She knew it wasn’t the truth. I was there. Every fucking second.

“Sorry.”

“I could’ve healed her, Tanya. Cara didn’t have to die. But you were so set that my father would betray the king! Everybody was doing this for me, but nobody gave me the fucking chance.”

She stared at me. Tears sparkled in her green eyes. “Then fix her, Blake. Now is your chance. Fix her!”

I stayed silent. I couldn’t fix her. I’d tried.

“None of us can fix her. That is not Elena.” She grabbed her bag and rushed out the room, toward the entrance.

I stayed. Kept trying daily. It was as if Elena only got worse and every day turned into every second day and on and on.

There were times that I wanted to give her the serum and put her out of this nightmare she was living in.

Constance was doing whatever she could. But Elena struggled to handle life. Her fear was just too much. I realized this was what Adolph meant by seeing it so many times and that it was the reason they’d created the serum.

I couldn’t help to think that she was still under a spell that made her see monsters in our places. I even voiced it one evening to my aunt.

She shook her head. “It was spells that did that, Blake. Magic gone bad leaves marks. Marks that nothing can repair.”

“So it’s a hopeless case. That is what you are saying?”

“It’s too much all at once. The palace is over-crowded. Too many people that she has to remember.”

“Then what are you suggesting? I’ll do it.”

“Give her time. All of you need to give Elena time. Go back to Dragonia. Learn more about Garrison, and let’s see how long it takes for her to just get out of her room.”

“There is no deep end with this one, is there?” I asked.

“No, I’m afraid not.”

I nodded. “Dragonia it is then.”

The first few days back at Dragonia, I was constantly on the phone with my aunt, the king, and my dad. Any news about Elena that could put this vortex in my gut to rest.

But there was no recent news. She wasn’t getting any better, and I doubted they would tell me if she was going backwards.

I couldn’t even take my revenge, as the guy who’d done this to her was dead.

Thinking back now, Lu would’ve died if they’d had to stick to the original plan of him taking my place. Goran wanted his dragon, and he would’ve done whatever he did to Elena to his nephew.

He had proved that with Elena. She wasn’t just Albert’s daughter, but Queen Catherine’s daughter, too.

The week that followed, I spent all the free time I had inside the library. I gave Lu and Tabitha as much privacy as I could. Nobody wanted to be in the presence of the broken Dent.

I sighed as I closed yet another book. There wasn’t a cure for whatever Goran had done.

There was no way to reverse it. The Vastech kept her alive when she should’ve died. There wasn’t any more the Vastech could do.

She might as well be dead. Losing her memories was like being dead, an empty shell filled with only the unknown and fear.

That was the last thing I wanted for her.

The chair in front of me screeched, and George plopped into it.

“What is the plan?”

“There is none.” I pushed the books to the edge of the table.

“I know you. You will not give up. Maybe we can find something as Garrison.”

I nodded, but I wasn’t in the mood for Garrison. My thoughts weren’t in the right place at the moment.

They might not read my mind, but it didn’t mean that they couldn’t pick up on my feelings.

“You want me to call them?”

“Give them more time. They’ve done so much.”

“What does your aunt say?”

“She is still the same.” I shook my head as I pushed the tears away.

“He really did a number on her.”

“I shouldn’t have left him.”

“Blake, this is not your fault. Nobody knew that he placed something on you.”

“The king did.”

“What?”

“King Albert did. He saw it, but couldn’t hear what he was saying, and then the asshole took that away from my memory.”

George didn’t say a damn thing. What could he say? None of it mattered now.

“I know there is something. I can feel it. Call it a hunch.”

My lips curved. He meant well, but I didn’t want to put my hopes on a hunch.

The bell rang, and it was time for Art of War. The class was so needless now that there were no more dangers around the corner. We had Garrison and the Saadedine. He lived in all the Dents.

But I went. Tried to get my mind off what was.

I developed a headache during the afternoon and tried to sleep it off, but sleep refused to come. Everything felt so off-balance. I was off-balance.

I tried to clear my mind and went for a flight.

The air always had a way to clear my head, but that didn’t seem to work either.

When I got back and shifted to my human form again, it was as if my headache had gotten worse.

During dinner, I was a grouch, and then I helped myself out in the shower. I was tense, and maybe that was the reason for the headache, but it wasn’t that.

I crashed early. Lu and Tabitha weren’t in the room when I passed out. Probably gave me some privacy.

Oblivion finally came, and I could still feel how my body was shutting down. Tiny jerks set off my muscles as the darkness consumed me.

A slight beep sounded in the back of my mind. I did not know what that was, but the urge to go to it was overpowering.

Light changed the darkness, and it was a strange dream that followed. Extremely vivid.

I was in the air again. The wind whistled through my scales.

The emotion inside of me wasn’t what I was stuck with now. It was lighter, filled with hope.

I found a crystal ball that had a purple hue buried deep in the ground.

The presence of another was right behind me, but I had no idea who. Was it Elena?

Everything changed, and I was in the water. I found another on the sea bottom, deep in a cave. That claustrophobic feeling of not being able to breathe pressed against my lungs, and just like that, it changed.

I was back in the forest. Another orb in my hand. The scenes kept changing. Then I was digging, then dangling from a rope. Still, I wasn’t alone. There was always someone with me.

It all led to a big white orb. There were monks around me. And the speed of light came again. It was like a meteor shower. Hard to explain. So weird.Content (C) Nôv/elDra/ma.Org.

I was standing in front of Elena. She stared at me.

“You are not making any sense.”

“I’m telling you; you and I are meant to be. You are my rider.”

“That means that…”

“Your father is King Albert and your mother was Queen Catherine.”

“No, you are insane.”

“Elena, I don’t have much time. Please. Just go to the creepers and see for yourself. They won’t harm you.”

Tears welled up in her eyes, and I kissed her on her head.

It all changed again; I was back with monks.

My eyes flew open. And just like that, I knew what it all meant.

There was a way to get Elena back.