Through the Ashes by J.A. Culican

Author:J.A. Culican [Culican, J.A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dragon Realm Press

Jaekob’s room was as big as her family's entire hut, complete with a sitting area where they were sitting now. Although it wasn't yet dinner time, they nibbled at platters of cheese, meats, and vegetables on a platter. She could hardly wait to see what Chef whipped up that night, but they had both been hungry again a couple hours after lunch. It had been a busy day, and it was rather nice to sit in quiet and just relax. It was the first time she'd been able to do that in quite some time.

As she took tiny bites of roast beef and cheese on round, buttery crackers, she glanced at Jaekob only to find him looking at her. The instant their eyes met, he suddenly found the broccoli and dressing fascinating and turned away.

She kept looking at him, curious. Had it only been her imagination?

He glanced at her again, just for an instant. Every time he looked at her, she felt a tingle from her cheeks to her toes, but also felt a rising irritation both at herself and at Jaekob. She couldn't quite understand why, though.

When he shifted his eyes to her yet again, she snapped, "Do I have meat on my face, or something?"

She immediately regretted it. When Jaekob flinched, she regretted it even more.

"No, sorry. Just... thinking."

About her? Why did she seem to care so much? In a softer voice, she asked, "What about?"

He opened his mouth to speak, paused, then snapped his jaw shut and shook his head.

Bells caught herself about to let out a frustrated huff of breath. It was time to change the subject for her own sanity. Not that they'd actually had a subject to begin with, just a weird tension she didn't understand that she could practically feel sitting thick and heavy in the air. But sitting in silence was ridiculous.

She prodded again. "So. You and your father seem to have a strange kind of relationship. I can feel the tension between you two. You want to talk about it?" Ironic. She had asked him about tension with his father, when what she really wanted to ask about was the tension with her.

His dour expression seemed to lift a little bit. "Yes, we go back and forth. I know he loves me, and I love him, but I sometimes wonder if he blames me for my mother's death when I was so little. We're dragons, so we don't exactly broadcast tender feelings of affection."

Bells tilted her head. "What do you mean, your mother died when you were little? Somehow, I doubt you had anything to do with it. Why would Mikah?"

"My first memories after the ones my mother passed on to me were during the second great human war against the Germans. Many of our people came close to starving because only our attack wings were allowed to fly, and we had to do a lot of scrounging in the Warrens to get by."

Bells didn't envy him that. She'd been on the other side of the Veil, then, and too young to leave her home on adventures in the human world.

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