Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 92392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 462(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 462(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 308(@300wpm)
And then, cutting clean through all of that warmth, this cold fear slipped down my spine.
Then the wall across from me darkened.
What’s that? What’s happening to the wall?
Coils of black smoke seeped through the plaster, carrying the memory of fire.
One thin wispy ribbon.
Then another.
And another.
Until the wall could no longer hold whatever lived behind it. Hundreds of smoky ribbons bled through every crack at once and slithered through the air, twisting and turning like a nest of living serpents.
What the fuck?
Soon, those dark coils gathered and circled one another. They braided, knotted, and thickened into a darkness so dense it no longer resembled smoke.
The dragon-shadow. . .
He began to form right in front of me. He was bigger than I’d ever seen him. His massive head emerged from the swarm of hissing, coiling smoke with large horns carved from darkness. Whiskers unfurled into the air like ink poured into water.
Suddenly, his golden eyes ignited inside the darkness. Looking at them almost felt like staring into the sun.
His neck followed.
Longer.
Wider.
Higher.
Then, the rest of his body poured upward. Smoke folded over smoke. Scales shimmered. And this colossal dragon occupied the entire ceiling of the large space.
Oh. My. God.
The fluorescent lights flickered.
The bed frames hummed low against the floor.
Every IV line trembled.
This insurmountable power rolled off him in waves so immense the air bowed, and I almost fell to my knees. Even if a person couldn’t see him, I had no doubt people would know there was something otherworldly in here.
This. . .is what. . .our daughter did. . .
This was what her blood had purchased.
Of course, they won the war.
Pride swelled so fiercely in my chest it hurt, yet grief answered just as quickly.
Is she. . .here too? The Death Guardian said I would see her.
Desperate, I searched his enormous shadowed-body for my daughter. My gaze went to any pocket of air where a small shadow could be a curl of smoke shaped like a tiger or baby.
No.
Hope collapsed within my chest. I closed my eyes and did my best to hold back the pain.
Did the Death Guardian lie? Why can’t I see her? I need to. . .see her just. . .once. . .please.
My eyes burned.
Sound came—the snap of the double doors’ hinges twisting.
I opened my eyes.
A guard held the doors open.
I tensed.
Kenji stepped through the doorway in mid-change, pulling a black long-sleeve shirt down over his tattooed muscular chest. The fabric caught on the ridges of muscle before it settled against his ribs.
He must have done a quick wipe down of blood and death, then hurried straight to me. His hair was still wet at the temples.
Before the shirt’s hem dropped past his sides, I caught the white edge of a bandage under the cloth.
The guard backed out of the room.
The double doors closed behind Kenji.
And the oddest thing occurred.
The dragon-shadow turned his massive head. His gold eyes fixed on Kenji. His long mouth opened around a sound I could not hear. The silent word slid through the space between them.
Kenji nodded.
What?
I widened my eyes. "H-he can talk?"
"Yes." Kenji put his gaze on me. "And his name is Goryū."
I shivered. “Goryū.”
The dragon-shadow snapped his view to me.
My bottom lip quivered. Every instinct I possessed screamed at me to run.
His colossal body flowed toward me.
Oh, fuck.
Smoke unraveled from his scales, spilling behind him in long ribbons that dissolved before touching the floor. Every movement bent the air around him, making the fluorescent lights pulse more and the IV lines sway as though the room itself was struggling to exist beneath his presence.
Goryū stopped inches from me. Heat rolled from him.
His nostrils flared.
Once.
Twice.
He drew in one slow breath, and that inhale wrapped around me, lifting loose strands of my hair from my shoulders. Smoke circled my wrists, my waist, my face, as though the dragon wasn't merely smelling me. . .he was remembering me. His whiskers drifted toward me, brushing lightly over my cheek. It was so faint I wasn’t sure if I felt him or I simply imagined it.
Then. . .the impossible happened. He lowered that colossal head down to the floor and closed his eyes. His horns dipped toward the floor until his forehead rested just inches from my feet.
The space shivered.
I widened my eyes. “W-what is he doing?”
“He’s bowing to you and saying thank you.”
My heart cracked and warmed at the same time.
Kenji frowned. “Goryū, rest.”
Monitors rattled.
The windows hummed.
I didn’t think Goryū wanted to rest at all.
Kenji sighed. “Please.”
And little by little, the dragon-shadow began to faint, unthread, and unbraid as those wispy coils drew backward into Kenji’s body.
Goryū folded in on himself. His gold eyes went last.
Then the room lost half its air.
Just in case, I braced myself for a vision of Kenji’s memory. Every time my sight had reached for a person since the ritual, the vision came without asking. Kiko's face had opened for me like a book with the spine already broken. My gaze on Yoichi, Deja, the doctor, and others.