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“Then what?” I asked, desperate to know just how dark his thoughts had turned. “You were going to end it all and throw yourself off the edge?”
He didn’t move, or rebut my statement, and my heart gave a frightened lurch. I went on as if he’d confirmed my suspicion. “Wouldn’t your dragon save you, Anthony? If you threw yourself off the edge here, would you not simply shift and fly away?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. My magic is too powerful now. I can’t stop it. Maybe it would let me die. I’m not worthy of it.”
I frowned at him, trying not to show how much his mood was scaring me. “You’re really not making any sense. You finally found me, and you just want to give up on life? On us?”
“You rejected me,” he croaked, his voice thick with emotion. “You don’t want to stay with me. You want to go home. To the human world. Which you have every right to do.”
He sounded hollow and depressed, and it brought tears to my eyes.
I stamped my foot, desperate to get through to him, then regretted the action as pain coursed up my ankle. “Stop being such a drama queen! We had a fight because I was mad at you—and rightly so. You made love to me, then left me. I’m the one who’s allowed to be angry, but that doesn’t mean you just give up on us.”
His eyes burned with a fiery glow that slowly turned more red than silver. “You don’t want to go home anymore?”
“Well, I kinda do,” I muttered. “But only because you’re still being an idiot. If you pull yourself together and deal with all that shit about your magic and stuff, then I’ll stay. We’re meant to be together, aren’t we?”
I sounded like the idiot now, waxing lyrical about us being fated, but I had to get him to listen to reason.
Anthony jumped down, landing on the stones in front of me. “But I’m an abomination.”
I rolled my eyes. “You. Are. Not. You’re perfect.”
“Perfect?” he whispered.
“Well, for me anyway.” I flipped my hair back off my face. I was sweating now and everything was sticking to me. I couldn’t tell if it was the heat of the fire behind us, or nervous tension. But right this second, I was glad of the frigid air.
“Isn’t that how the fated mate thing works?” I added. “If you’re a freak, then I must be too, if we’re perfectly matched, but I don’t think that’s how it is.”
“Anthony!” Carlak’s scream penetrated our conversation. Anthony and I jerked and turned to face the door, just as a wooden beam cracked and broke amidst the fire.
I cried out, falling back against Anthony’s chest. “Your brother’s still in there. You need to stop the inferno.”
“I don’t know how.” Anthony sounded desperate. But he still pushed me behind him and rushed toward the flames with the obvious intention of trying to help his brother.
“You do know how! You have to!” I screamed out. “You made the fire with your magic. You can use your magic to stop it, too.”
I had no idea how magic worked, but we had to save Carlak, and the castle, before it all collapsed into dust.
I grabbed Anthony’s arm and yelled above the sound of the inferno around us. “You said you’re more powerful than you ever realized. You have to use that power to save your brother.”
“I’m afraid,” Anthony whispered, though I heard it as clear as day.
“Not as afraid as I am, as your brother is!” I cried, tears streaming down my face.
I didn’t know where the next words came from, perhaps a mixture of my dreams and everything I’d learnt since I’d arrived. Or perhaps it was simply intuition. I tapped into every bit of inner knowledge I had. Anthony needed me as much as I needed him. He’d saved my life and given me a second chance the night he found me. Now it was my turn to show him the way home again.
“Stop denying who you are and step up! You might not be the next king, but you’re still a prince of the Black Mountains. And you’re also the most powerful sorcerer this world has ever known! Use that, and do somegood!”
Anthony stared at me for a second, then turned to the fire and roared, thrusting his arms out in front of him and calling back the flames.
I stumbled back, staring in awe as flames blazed in Anthony’s palms and he sucked the fire from the tower and back into himself.
The moment all the flames were gone, he groaned, falling to his knees.
I grabbed for his shoulder. “Well done!”
“Go.” He groaned again, hugging his middle as if in pain. “Find Carlak.”
