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

The next day, I tried again.

This time I appeared in the lobby of Dragonia Academy. My gaze landed on the one person who shouldn’t be there. Goosebumps rippled over my arms and ran down my back as my strides widened.

The students I passed already knew that something was up by the way their eyes grew and flickered from me to the one who was my focal point.

The gap between us shortened, and I pulled him by his arm, slammed his back against the door.

Girls’ shrieks reached my ears as the weasel’s face was inches from me.

“Give me a reason I shouldn’t torch your ass right here.”

“Blake?” Paul said, sounding genuinely concerned. “What is going on?”

“You will not find them this time, you hear me? They are not yours. I won’t let you.”

“Blake,” Professor Pheizer’s voice sounded from behind me.

“Why is he at this school? Who allowed this?”

Professor Pheizer’s eyebrows twitched as they pulled together. “Master Longwei.”

“Master Longwei?”

“Blake,” Paul tried again.

“Do not use my name like we are friends. We are not friends; we will never be friends because wyverns cannot be trusted. King Albert refused to let you in this school. Why did they let you in now?”

He frowned.

“King Albert?” Professor Pheizer asked with her hand on her chest.

“I need Lu, and this one is up to no good. He is looking for the Elementals to awaken the Saadedine.”

The truth washed over Paul’s face as everyone became silent.

“What?” Professor Pheizer questioned.

“You cannot trust him. Wyverns are not good. They will never be good. He is serving their king. Goran.”

Paul’s eyes widened, and then he chuckled. “Blake, c’mon. That is not me.”

I slammed my hand hard next to him on the wall. “Tell me, where is that shapeshifting hippogriff of yours, Nora?”

“Who?”

“I’m not someone you can mess with, Paul.” My gaze fluttered to Professor Pheizer. “He shouldn’t be here. The last time he was, dragons almost died.”

“What are you talking about?” Paul was trying to confuse me.

“Stop,” I roared, and the images disappeared.

“Blake, what is going on?” Lu finally showed up.

“This weasel shouldn’t be here. What is he doing…” My gaze fluttered to Lu, and Elena stood right behind him.

“Blake?” Lu spoke softer as I let go of Paul. He ran away like the weasel he was.

“Elena,” I greeted her, and my throat became instantly dry as my palms began to sweat.

I’d dreamed about this so many times, what I would actually say. And now that it was here, I was lost for words.

She squinted, looked at Lu and then back at me. My gaze fluttered to them holding hands before landing on Lu.

“Blake, stop,” Lu said and touched my arm.

“What the fuck are you doing? I’ve told you so many times who she is and what she has to do. Why won’t you tell someone?”

“Nobody is going to believe me.”

“Then take her to the creepers, Lu.”

“Lucian, what is going on?” Elena asked. “What is he talking about?”

My gaze met hers. I huffed, looked at Lu again. “She is not yours. Do the right thing here, before it’s too late.”

“What?” Elena questioned.

Lu glared at me. His nostrils flared.

“Elena…”

“I’ll tell her, please. Not like this, Blake,” Lu begged.

“When?”

“Tonight.”

“You better—” The pull came so fast, and the nausea pulled at my core, spread to my chest, and my breakfast pushed up my throat and onto the grass in front of me.

Tabitha was with me at once. Sweat dripped down my hairline.

“You okay? That was the longest you have ever been in, Blake.”

“She knows,” I lied. Or maybe I didn’t. She had to know that something wasn’t right. Especially how I looked at her. I should’ve told her something. How much I missed her and how hard I was trying for us to be together. Why was this so damn difficult?

“So they are going to let her claim you?”

“I don’t know.” I tried to get my breathing in order. “But we have a major fucking problem.”

Both of them looked at me.

“Which is?” George inquired.

“Paul is a student at Dragonia Academy.”

“Paul?” George’s mouth gaped.

I looked at Tabitha. “The wyvern that blinded you.”

The mother orb struggled to recharge. Usually, it only took a day. It had been three days since her last jump. Or that was what George had called it.

I asked them what it looked like when I left.

Tabitha said a bright light swallowed me, and then moments later, I landed on the edge of the lake. Always the same place.

Where was my body going when the light swallowed me?

Ming’s wise words of what was happening to the mother orb added more twirling to my gut.

She was almost done, and that was why her strength took more time returning to her.

His honest answer when I asked him how many more jumps wasn’t something I wanted to hear.

Only one.

I needed time with Elena. I needed to bring her back to this side, and I knew with only one jump left, the chance that I was going to fail was in my favor.

I used the days for the mother orb to charge to think about what it was that I truly wanted to say to Elena. If it was the last time that I was going to see her, then I had to tell her as much as I could.

The words were in my head, demanding to be spoken, but they refused to leave my lips.

How was I going to tell her that I didn’t want to live in a world where she was no longer who she was.Published by Nôv'elD/rama.Org.

Where she was only a shell of who she used to be?

Tears burned my nose and made it harder for me to swallow.

I had to try.

Around the fifth night, dinner time, Zhid ran into the dining room. He nodded and if his smile could go around his head, it would have.

The three of us looked at Ming. I’d been waiting five days for this.

He dipped his chin, and the three of us sprinted from the pillows we sat on for eating at the table. I ran as fast as I could to the mother orb with George and Tabitha’s footsteps right behind me.

She was pulsing with a beautiful, bright white light.

She was ready to take me one last time to where Elena existed.

I hoped and prayed for Lu’s sake that he’d told someone about this. About who Elena truly was.

Ming followed with Zhid as I took the mother orb and went to the lake.

I held her tight and concentrated on Elena.

She burned in my hands. My fingertips seared, but I didn’t drop her, and then, just like that, the pain was gone. A cold breeze blew through my hair, and I opened my eyes.

We were at the creepers. I gasped. They were still alive and deadly like they used to be.

Lu’s dad, King Helmut, was here with a lot of other people. Even Caleb was here.

My father stood right next to me, deep in thought.

“Dad?”

“I don’t want to talk, Blake.”

“Lucian, I don’t like this,” King Helmut said.

“Dad, please. I’m not letting her go in alone. I’ve made up my mind.”

“You don’t know what they might do to you.”

“I’m not letting her go in alone,” Lu insisted.

“I’ll go,” I yelled.

They all looked at me.

“Oh, hell no.” Dad was the first to speak.

“Lu, it’s me, please.”

Lu froze. “It’s really you?”

I nodded. “I can go in with Elena.”

“Blake, how do you know this?” King Helmut asked.

“I told you, Dad. He is not from here.”

“You are from the future?”

“No, I’m from a different time. Please, let me go in with her.”

“Blake?” Lu looked as if he was about to puke.

“I don’t have any more jumps, Lu. This is it. The last one, please.” Tears blurred my vision.

Lu stared as he understood what I was saying and nodded.

He looked over his shoulder to where his mom, the queen, stood. Next to her was Elena, looking like a little mouse. A lot like the first time she’d come face to face with the creepers.

“Thank you.” I walked with huge strides to Queen Maggie.

“You think it’s wise?” I heard King Helmut ask.

“We have to trust him some time, Dad.”

Elena just stared at me. She was unsure. That much I knew.

“Blake?” Queen Maggie questioned.

My gaze flickered to the queen, and I bowed my head.

I extended my hand to Elena. She looked at it as if it was something that would bite her. But she took it.

The sparks flew up my hand, toward my elbow. My heart clenched again. This wasn’t going to be long enough to last me an entire fucking lifetime. I led her to the creepers. She stopped and pulled me back.

“I can’t do this. I’m not who you think I am.”

“You are. Okay? I know you are. Because where I come from, we are already dragon and rider, and so much more, Elena.” I wanted to touch her face, but she jumped back and stared at my hand, so I let it drop to my side.

She looked at me again. Her hand was trembling a bit in mine. Of course, she was afraid.

“You can do this because you’ve already done it. Inside is completely different from what they are outside. I promise, I won’t leave you.”

“It’s what you say now until you change.”

“Then I’ll try to hold on as long as I can. I won’t hurt you.”

She nodded, and I led her again toward the creepers.

They became alive.

“Blake,” Lu hissed.

“She is okay, Lu. She can do it. Trust me,” I remarked.

He looked as if someone had killed his favorite pet. I pulled Elena in front of me.

“What are you doing?” she protested with everyone behind us following her lead.

“Relax!” I yelled at all of them. “She is the only one they don’t attack.” I looked back to her. “You are literally protecting me from their wrath. Close your eyes if you want to. I’ll tell you when to open them.”

She nodded. Her heart was beating so fast, and a slight tremble tingled against my body.

I used this time to press her tighter against me. To make sure my arm was around her, keeping her safe. I looked in front of me and edged forward, slowly at first, but the pace picked up.

One creeper struck. Gasps filled the air as I stopped with Elena.

It lingered, and more gasps followed. I turned my head to look at the ugliest mouth with horrendous-looking teeth and tongue reaching out to me. I took Elena’s hand gently in mine and lifted it slowly toward its mouth.

It backed away immediately. More gasps came. I enfolded my fingers and hand around hers and picked up the pace. The middle parted, and we entered.

Once inside, I slowed down and let go of her.

“You can open your eyes now.” The purple and pink glow of the flowers lightened the place. I forgot how whimsical they were. “On the other side, you will find a farm. Charles Benson owns a part of it. Goran makes them work for him. Nothing is their own anymore.”

She looked at the flowers and then her gaze flickered to mine. Warmth spread into my chest.

“How do you know this?”

“Because I keep on telling you, I’m not from here. Where I am from, things are so different.”

“How?” She was humoring me, as I knew what this must sound like.

“For one, I’ve never rebelled against you. My dad actually took me to the other side, and that was how we found you and Jako—I mean, Herbert.”

She squinted. “You knew my dad?”

“Elena, he is not your dad. He was your grandfather’s dragon.”

She swallowed. Fear filled her eyes. “He died.”

“What?” I squinted.

“My dad died the night I came to Dragonia. I knew none of this existed. Your sister and Becky told me everything.”

I huffed.

“And now you want me to believe that I’m your rider?”

“You are my rider. Look where we are.”

She glanced around. She was still not realizing that it was only her bloodline that had the ability to walk past the creepers.

“Only the heir of King Albert can enter. He raised them, and therefore he is the only one who can undo them. Him and you.”

“My dad is not some great king that once lived.”

“Once lived? Elena, he is still alive, just outside the creepers. He is Goran’s prisoner, but he is very much alive.”

Tears filled her eyes, and I stepped closer. I cupped her face. She looked at me.

She pressed gently into my hand, as if the warmth were coaxing her love for me to the front. Elena stepped out of my palm and paced slowly away from me. She turned around to look at me. “So what, we are some sort of couple in your world?”

“Actually more. We are married.”

Her eyebrows raised. “Come again?”

I chuckled. “Which your father is trying to annul once…” I stopped. She did not know about what she became in my world.

“Once what?”

I shook my head. “Doesn’t matter anymore.”

“What are you doing here, Blake?”

It was as if she could read my mind. Tears blurred, and she walked toward me. I tried to push them back, but they still obscured my sight.

“Talk to me.”

“My orbs, okay. My orbs opened the gateway to this world. Because in mine you are a shell of the person you used to be. I had this insane plan of coming here and taking you with me, hoping it would spark something for you to wake up in my world.” A tear rolled down my cheek.

She gaped at me, stared at me with I-don’t-know-what in her eyes.

“I know, so far-fetched.”

She huffed. “And here I thought a world of dragons and magic was far-fetched. How did I become that way?”

“Goran. He wanted me and got you. It’s a long story, and to be honest, I do not want to talk about him if this is our last time together.”

“If?”

“The mother orb is busy dying. This is my last jump, and I still don’t know how to take you with me.” Tears blurred again, and I swallowed hard. “So this is my goodbye.”

“Goodbye?”

“You have a Blake here, Elena. He needs to be claimed. You are everything to me, not just my rider, but my entire essence. To be honest, I don’t know how I am going to live in my world without you. You can’t back away from me here. You get that? Doesn’t matter how hard-ass and stubborn I am. I will love you with all my heart, my soul, and with every scale on my body.”

She stepped into my arms and hugged me tight. I wrapped my arms around her, breathing her in.

“I’ll love you forever, even longer,” I whispered on the crown of her head as tears blurred my gaze.

The tug came softly this time. It wasn’t its normal pull.

“I have to go. She is calling me back.”

Elena nodded.

“Promise me, you will claim me.”

“I promise,” she said.

“And tell Lu that Tabitha is his dragon. His Dent. There is something about Dents. You need to discover that. It’s linked to the Saadedine.”

Her eyebrows pulled together. “The what?”

I chuckled. “Ask Lu, he will tell you.”

I didn’t think. I closed the distance and planted my lips on hers, kissing her as if there was no tomorrow.

The pull finally came, and it yanked me out of my fairy tale.

I would never see her or kiss her again, and I did not know how to live in a world where she didn’t exist.