"Promise?"
"Promise."
We fall asleep tangled together, Lucky at our feet, and for the first time in either of our lives, we're exactly where we belong.
Together.
Whole.
Free.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Draco
Two months after the world learned my name, I find Charity standing in her workshop—the real one she rented in Brooklyn, bigger than our apartment. It has proper ventilation and industrial equipment. In an unexpected display of grudging support, her parents had all her sculptures and equipment shipped over to the new workshop. I wondered if they just wanted to get rid of the evidence of their daughter doing dirty work like welding, even though it served them well when she donated pieces that put them in the charitable limelight.
The dragon sculpture dominates the space, eight feet of steel courage towering over us both.
"I want to donate it," she says without preamble. "It won’t fit in our apartment, and I don’t want to hoard a dragon." She laughs. Goddess, will I ever tire of hearing her happiness? "I want to give it away."
"Where?" I ask. The look on her face tells me she's already decided.
"There's a women's shelter in Brooklyn. They help survivors of domestic violence rebuild their lives. They're opening a new community center next month, and they want art that represents strength and courage. Art that says you can be fierce, you can protect yourself, you can take flight." She touches one of the steel scales. "I want them to have this. I want women who are finding their own strength to see it and know that sometimes the most dangerous thing you can be is brave enough to leave, but sometimes being brave means fighting back. The dragon symbolizes both choices. One thing is clear–you can become the dragon instead of the maiden."
The sculpture glints in the afternoon light—wings half-unfurled, ready to either fight or fly. My name made solid. But more than that: her understanding of what it means to survive.
"It's perfect," I say.
"I thought so too." She turns to face me, and there's something mischievous in her expression. "But I'm not done with dragons."That's when I notice the workbench behind her, draped with a canvas cloth.
"I made something else," she says, pulling away the covering.
It's a dragon. Smaller—maybe eighteen inches tall, perfectly balanced on its hind legs. Same fierce expression, same half-unfurled wings, same promise of protection and flight. But scaled down, intimate. Personal.
"For us," she says. "The big one needs to go protect others. But I wanted one that stays home. One that reminds us where we came from and who we fought to become. Every time we leave, we remember we're brave enough to face the world. Every time we come home, we remember we're safe here."
I pick it up carefully. It's lighter than it looks, every scale individually welded, every claw articulated with impossible precision.
"It's incredible," I manage. "Both of them. The gift and the one that will have a place of honor in our home forever."
"Courage given and courage kept," she agrees. "That's what dragons do, right? They hoard what matters."
We arrange the donation that afternoon. The shelter director cries when she sees the massive sculpture. News crews pick up the installation—“Anima Ventis Donates Major Sculpture to Brooklyn Women’s Shelter.” Reporters quote her saying,“This piece represents what our residents are becoming—fierce, protective of themselves and each other, ready to take flight into new lives.”Charity watches the coverage curled against my side, and I feel her chest rise and fall with steady breaths.
"No regrets?" I ask.
"None." She looks up at me. "I made it for you before I knew you. Now it gets to protect other people. That feels right."
The small dragon sits on our bookshelf by the apartment door now. Lucky has already claimed the space near it as his favorite napping spot, like he knows it's meant to guard us.
Small but fierce. Protecting our castle in its own way.
Four monthslater, I'm standing on a glass platform suspended thirty feet above a museum floor, and I've never felt more alive.
The coin rolls across my knuckles—flash, vanish, return. Old habit. The crowd below murmurs, expensive jewelry catching the gallery lights. I palm the coin and let it disappear, then pull it from behind the ear of the museum staffer standing three feet away from me on the platform. Gasps ripple through the audience.
"Ladies and gentlemen," I call, my voice carrying through the vaulted space. "Two thousand years ago, I learned magic to survive. Tonight, I perform it because I choose to."
