Ashen didn’t recognize anyone, but there were a few scents in his nostrils that reminded him of something. Like from a dream.
But more likely, from Torrent’s past.
Others gave him strange looks but didn’t really pay attention to him. Then there was a gasp, a cry, and someone fell to their knees.
“Torrent?” a deep voice asked, and a large man with blond hair and bright green eyes ran to him “Torrent.”
Ashen looked into those eyes and wondered if he should know who the man was. He looked so familiar. And yet, not.
If Torrent looked into the mirror, though, he might recognize those cheekbones and that hair. The wide eyes. Though his eyes were no longer green. Or maybe they had never been.
He didn’t know.
He couldn’t remember.
“Torrent, how is this possible?” The man looked over his shoulder and growled at his mate. “You knew this, didn’t you?”
The dragon, it must be Dante, walked forward and nodded, his hands outstretched, palms up. “Levi found him today. And I told him to bring him here. I didn’t know if he was actually going to come, however. That’s why I didn’t mention it right away. Although, if they hadn’t shown up within the next five minutes, I was going to tell you, and we would have hunted him down.”
The dragon looked at Ashen then, his black-and-blue hair over his shoulders, a fang peeking out of his smile.
Ashen was really lucky that he’d shown up because he did not want to be on the bad side of a dragon.
“You…you came. It’s you,” Jace gasped as he turned back to Ashen.
Jace. His name was Jace. Ashen’s brother, well…Torrent’s brother, was Jace.
Flashes of bear cubs and honey, a family and warmth, all filled him. He staggered, and Eva put her hands on his chest.
“Breathe, Ashen. You can do this. It’s okay.”
“Why are you calling him Ashen?” Jace asked, his voice deadly. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s my name,” Ashen said honestly. He looked up at Jace, his brother, and let out a long breath. “I’m not the man you knew. I don’t remember much. Don’t blame the dragon for holding back. I think he wanted you to see me first. For I am a ghost. A memory. A wisp of being.”
“You are not, damn it,” Eva said from beside him, and he looked over.
“I’m not?”
“No, you are Ashen. You are whoever you need to be. Whoever you want. And if they have a problem with that, they can go through me.”
His banshee raised her chin and looked at the rest of the people in the bar, an angelic warrior, a demon, a brownie, a pixie, a leprechaun, a lion, and even a phoenix. So many of their kind all in one room, working together as one. They were friends.
Were they Torrent’s friends?
Perhaps.
Were they Ashen’s friends?
No, not yet. He didn’t even know himself yet, but he couldn’t wait to figure out exactly who the rest were.
“Okay…okay,” Jace whispered, holding onto Dante’s arms. “How is this possible?”
Ashen let out a breath. “I died. Because of the fates or the reapers, I don’t know. Maybe it was an accident. I might not ever know, but I died. And then I woke up again, in this new body.” He looked down at himself and frowned. “Or, a body similar to this.”
“Your skin is a little tanner than it was before, your hair a little blonder than when I first met you. Your eyes are the same, though.”
He looked down at Eva and smiled. “I think I’m finding myself, so I’m changing. Just like the bear inside me.”
Jace’s eyes went gold. “Your bear? You can shift?”
Ashen closed his eyes. “Maybe? I don’t know. I’m a reaper.”
“What’s a reaper?” someone asked.
“It’s a long story,” he said, and then he spoke of the reapers and the choices and how he’d met Eva. The others nodded, and he felt like maybe they understood. Couples and triads looked at each other as if they got exactly what he and Eva had already gone through in their short time together. And perhaps that was true. He wasn’t quite sure, but he couldn’t take too much more at the moment, so he wasn’t going to think about it.
Not yet. He couldn’t remember everybody’s name, and he wasn’t even sure he had known everybody when he was alive.
“It’s been so long since I’ve seen you,” Jace said, his voice a rasp. “Can I...can I hug you?” Jace asked, his face pink.
“If you’d like,” Ashen said, his body stiff.
Eva laughed. “Bears are the most touchy-feely shifters out there,” she said, and the other shifters in the room laughed.
“She’s got that right,” a wolf called out.
“Far cuddlier than dragons,” Dante said dryly.
The succubus that stood between them laughed. “You’re pretty cuddly, my dragon.”
Ashen held out his arms, and then Jace pulled him into a hug that was bone-crushing.
“I thought you died, baby brother. I looked at you, and you smiled, and then the flames touched you.”
Ashen closed his eyes and took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of family. “I’m alive. I’m here. Somehow.”
“I’ll never forgive myself for letting you get hurt,” the dragon said, and then Ashen remembered.
“It was a war. It was your mother.”
The dragon nodded, his jaw tight. “I am sorry.”
Ashen shook his head. “It’s not your fault. It might have even been the reapers themselves.”
“I’ll kill them,” Jace muttered.
“We already took care of that,” Eva said, her face a little pale. Ashen reached out and gripped her hand, and Jace looked between them.
“Your mate?”
“Yes,” Ashen said. “Although, we’re not bonded yet.”
“Well, let’s just tell the whole world that, shall we?” Eva said, and Ashen winced.
“Sorry.”
“No worries. However, you’re going to have to stop saying everything that pops into your mind.”
“He was like that as a little boy, too,” Jace said, his eyes wide with wonder. “We have more siblings, and our parents…”
“They’re all on their way.”
Ashen looked at Dante.
“You have been busy.”
“I’m a dragon. It’s what I do.”
Ashen sat there as he was introduced to everybody once again, even his niece and nephew, a baby dragon, and a baby bear, who looked into his newly unusual eyes and smiled, wanting hugs before shifting and playing on the floor like the babies they were.
When a small child bumped into him, he looked down and picked up the baby bear before kissing it on top of the head as if he had done it a thousand times before giving him back to Jace. He’d never met these children, he knew that. A different kind of pain slid through him over the fact that he’d missed so much.
“No worries. It’s almost like you’re back to yourself.”
Ashen shook his head.
“I’m not. I’ll never be.”
“None of us are who we were before the wars. But you’re here. I have to count that as a blessing.”