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You leave me no choice…
The words whispered through Ben’s mind before everything stopped. The wind, the rain, the thunder and lightning.
And Ere vanished into thin air.
Almost instantly, Ben could breathe again. The ground was steady again.
He stood and looked around him.
It was as if Ere had never wreaked his havoc upon the realm. There were no fissures in the ground, no four-feet-deep dirt rut where Ere had impacted the earth like a missile. The sky was the clearest, lightest blue, and white wispy clouds floated idly by.
Ben looked at his hands and arms. He was completely dry, as if the torrential rain had never happened. His muscles and bones still ached from the experience of the past hour or so; the soreness was his only reminder that this wasn’t a dream.
This wasreal.
“All right?”
Cloud was right before him, a hand clapped on his shoulder, a look of concern on his face.
“Yeah,” Ben murmured, still in shock.
“I’m fine, I guess. I didn’t…you witnessed and experienced the same thing, right?” he asked Cloud just to be sure.
The warrior gave a curt nod.
“Where did he go?” Ben continued. “Where did the Jade Emperor take Ere? Thatwasthe JE I heard, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” his mentor answered.
“And…to your first question, I do not know.”
Ben frowned as his eyes sharpened.
“Don’t you? You used to be a Celestial dragon. Where did you stay when you lived here? Where did the JE keep Kai when he was imprisoned here? And Rui and Divina? Merlin? Where are all the dragons?”
Cloud let go of Ben and sighed.
“The dragons who live here have their own abodes. Whether in the Four Seas, in caverns beneath the earth or high up on top of a mountain’s peak. But these are the free ones. The ones who do their duty and know their place. I doubt Ere is given free rein right now. I assume the Jade Emperor has…encapsulated him so that his destructive manifestations can be contained.”
Ben winced.
“You make him sound like an out-of-control weapon.”
“Isn’t he,” the Elite warrior said without inflection. It was not a question.
Ben clawed both hands through his hair, shoving the almost dry locks away from his face.
The next time he was home, he’d have to remember to get Mama Bear to cut his hair. It was shoulder length now and annoying as hell. But he never cared about personal grooming. He just cared when it became a nuisance.
“What now?” Ben huffed, his voice gritty with frustration and worry.
“Sorin is missing. Ere is…likely imprisoned somewhere. How the fuck do we fix this?”
Cloud’s usually calm, smooth brow furrowed with his own internal debate as he looked toward the ground, clearly thinking hard.
Neither of them spoke for a long time, just letting the gravity of the situation, the surrealism of their recent experience sink in.
Finally, Cloud shook his head, and was about to speak when a soft, feminine voice interrupted him.
