Dragon Fey by Mara DragonClaw (top 10 books to read txt) 📕

Aubrey Drakeson burst into more tears and rushed forward. Aria stood awkwardly as her mother hugged her close and cried into her shoulder, “My baby, my poor baby,” after awhile she seemed to become contented with hugging Aria and rocking back and forth slightly. After getting over the initial moment of not knowing what to do, Aria hugged her mom back fiercely as though she was in a dream that she would wake up from if she ever let go.

Charles Drakeson was just standing there, not seeming to know what was going on as he hadn’t gotten a very credible look at Aria before her mother had engulfed her in a hug, “Umm… Dear?”

Aria managed to pry Aubrey off her a little bit, thinking that she should give her dad a chance to see her better. Aubrey seemed to get the message and pulled away too, still crying. Before Aria could do anything else, she was hugging her dad and crying; he was crying too, “My baby girl,” he just whispered and kissed Aria on the forehead.

Before long, the four of them were all hugging, This is how it should have always been… The thought ran through Aria’s head dreamily as she stood with her family. Her real family.

“Umm…….. Should I come back some other time?” Jack’s voice came from the doorway and broke the silence. They all turned around to see Jack standing in the doorway. He had shifted back to the appearance that Aria had first met him in, and he seemed to be trying to hide the blacks spots in his left with with some kind of red sash. Like that will work for very long. Aria was not in the mood for her older brother.

“Oh, Jack! Did you hear that we got your sister back? Now you two don’t have to keep searching for her! Isn’t it wonderful?” Aubrey was really getting into this and didn’t seem to know of Jack’s involvement in getting Aria “rescued”. This is not going  to go down well. Aria really didn’t want to talk to Jack right now, he would just spoil her good mood.

“Um, yes Mom. I helped Jynx find her, actually.”

“No you didn’t,” Aria didn’t like the way he had put that last part, “I found you. On accident. And then you kind of betrayed my trust. I don’t really want to talk to you right now,” she didn’t figure that sugar coating it, even for the sake of her parents, would do anything other than make the rift between her and Jack wider.

“Jack, what is you sister talking about?” The way Charles said it, Aria could tell that Jack had a reputation for doing stuff that involved breaking the trust of other dragon fey.

“I’m talking about when you get me to help you with your stupid wing and then you get your twin brother to kidnap me.”

“Hey! That was Jynx’s idea, not mine! And it all turned out good, right?” Jack was panicking, grabbing at straws to try to make him look innocent.

“Hey! Blaming it on me? That is not cool dude! You're the one who asked me to come up with an idea to get her here!” Jynx was very indignant.

“You what!? Jack, have we not talked about stuff like this? I thought you promised to be more responsible! Ug…” Aubrey was getting exasperated. So it isn’t just me… Aria thought slightly smugly.

“Umm... Uhh… Can we please just talk about this some other time?!” Jack folded.

“Fine, but you're not getting out of this talk young man!” Go Mom! Aria was really enjoying the whole thing.

“What did your sister say about your wing?” Charles seemed to have gotten something completely different from everyone else out of what Aria had said.

“Oh, uh… Nothing!”

“Jack, answer your father!” Aubrey was way past exasperated now.

“Oh what the heck,” Aria rolled her eyes as she reached over and pulled Jack’s sash of as he futilely tried to stop her. As the red fabric fell away black spots were revealed on jack’s wing, bigger than Aria remembered them.

“Lords! What is that?” Neither Aubrey nor Charles seemed to understand what was on Jack’s wing, though they appeared to be able to tell that it wasn’t good.

“He has wing rot. It’s a parasitic fungus that attaches to the wings of insects and fairies. It starts as simple black dots, but starts to eat away at the wing until it becomes a hole,” Aria gestured to the holes in Jack’s wing, “Eventually it will spread to the other wing and completely destroy both of them both. When it reaches that stage, there isn’t a way to get rid of it or fix the wing.”

“It must be quite rare then if it’s something we haven't seen. Oh dear, I don’t think I know anyone who can treat that!” Aubrey voice was panicked, she seemed to have forgotten that she had been angry with Jack only moments before.

“Relax Aubrey, I’m sure there’s someone, somewhere, who can help him,” Charles futilely tried to calm his wife.

“Oh, there are many someones. The problem is not availability, but willingness,” Aria glared at Jack, “He pretty much ticked off his only chance of ever flying properly again.”

“Huh?” Aubrey and Charles didn’t seem to get it.

Aria sighed, “All the fairies in my Hollow know how to treat wing rot, including me. The fairies from my Hollow hate dragon fey, severely limiting his options to pretty much just me. He seriously ticked me off while I was in the middle of fixing his wing. Now, I am not going to help him; I suggest he either starts working on making friends with some fairies, or starts getting used to the idea that he is never going to fly again,” she glared at Jack.

“Come on! All I did was bring you home!”

“You tricked me!” Aria was outraged that he would try and justify misusing her trust. She had met him, a stranger, in the woods and had offered her help to him only to find out that he had had her kidnapped.

“Stop it you two! Our family has just been reunited, I will not stand to see you two fighting with each other!” Aubrey was getting into what Aria would later find out to be her “moods” while Charles was inching back away from her slightly, “Please dear, fix your brother’s wing. Jack, apologize to your sister!”

Aria and Jack glared at each other. Aria held her glare, but after about a minute Jack got creeped out and backed off, “All right all right! Sorry Aria.”

“Aria?” At first Aubrey didn’t realise that Jack was referring to his sister, “Oh! Yes, Aria,” Aubrey sighed, “What a lovely name. Wish I had thought of it.”

“But… Didn’t you name me?” Aria remembered that Jynx had told her how Jacob had been the fairy that her Hollow that was supposed to be traded for her, and that he had already had a name that Jynx could know and tell her.

“Yes, I did,” Aubrey said wistfully, “But I did not name you Aria. They must have changed that when they took you. Humph. They must have thought it was to dragon fey for someone who was going to be living with them,” she said “them” with a certain amount of contempt.

“So… What was my name?”

“Dracolia,” Aubrey smiled to herself absentmindedly as she said the name that she had given her daughter all those years ago. Charles shouldered her and gave her an “I thought we agreed not to talk about that” look, though Aria couldn’t fathom why, “Oh, right. Sorry,” Aubrey blushed. Again, Aria couldn’t fathom why, “But you know, Aria is a much better name. It wasn’t like you were named Dracolia for very long anyway, it would probably just be confusing for you to switch.”

“Oh, uh, okay.”

“Isn’t there something you want to tell your brother?”

“Oh, right. Fine Jack, I’ll help you with your wing,” Aria rolled her eyes behind her mother’s back. She did not like doing it, and contented herself with a silent promise to do it the old fashioned way that they had taught for a reason that no one ever quite figured out that was known for being quite painful.

Jynx tried desperately to get them on a more pleasant topic. He had seen Aria’s eye roll, along with the smirk that followed, and knew that that couldn’t be good news, “Aria might be Anim Tamier,”the way he said it made him sound almost hopeful, though Aria didn’t have a clue why. Was her being Anim Tamier that big a deal to him?

“Might be Anim Tamier? Jynx, she has to be Anim Tamier. There is no way on Earth for her to have had a pet fey windle if she wasn’t Anim Tamier,” Jack rolled his eye at his brother.

“Oh! That is wonderful! Imagine, my little girl the leader of our Coulve! It would be just the thing to help all of us get back on our feet, wouldn’t it?” Aubrey was even more ecstatic than Jack was when he had first told Aria about being Anim Tamier.

“What do you mean, ‘help all of us get back on our feet’? What happened?” Aria didn’t see why her family would have to get back on their feet, from what Jynx had told her, they ran what seemed to be the only school in the Coulve. Had something gone wrong?

Audrey fell silent, and Charles continued on not saying anything. Finally, Jynx spoke up solemnly, “Remember how I said our family ran a school?” Aria nodded, “Last school year one of the students went missing. No one knows what happened to her, just one day she didn't show up to class and when they sent some other students to check on her she wasn’t in her room. It completely ruined our reputation. We might not be able to get anyone to come this year.”

“When does school start?” Aria wondered if she had enough time to help them fix their damaged reputation.

“It starts in about a week, next Carnsday,” Jynx shook his head sadly, “We’re running out of time to get ready, and we can’t get ready until we know how many students there will be. So far, it looks like zero.”

“Well then… How would me being Anim Tamier help anything?”

“If you were Anim Tamier, you would be the leader of the Coulve,” Jynx tried to explain, “because of the way most of our society works, that would restore our reputation by extension. I personally think that this way of thinking is stupid, but we’ll need to count on it if we want to get back into the Coulve’s good graces.”

“Why would me being the leader of the Coulve get you into their good graces?”

“Beacuse… Well just because. Who can say why things like that effect what fey think of other fey?” Jynx shrugged helplessly.

The five of them stood in silence until Aubrey finally spoke up, “It’s starting to get late, Aria will need her sleep for tomorrow. I’m assuming that’s when the council wants to have her tested?” Both Jynx and Jack nodded, “Thought so. They always plan it for the next day, ha, they don’t give any time to prepare. Well go on you two, show your sister her room. You're father and I still have some work to do, so we’ll be staying down here for a while. Love you,” Aubrey kissed each of them on the forehead, lingering at Aria the longest, “Goodnight my darlings,” she said as a farewell for the night as she pushed the three of them out the door.

“So… What now? Last I checked I didn’t have a room here. Because, you know, I haven't been here in 13 years.”

“14 years,” Jack corrected her.

“What?”

“You are 14 years old.”

“What?!”

“You didn’t know that?”

“No I didn’t know I was 14! How could I have