Core by Teshelle Combs Page B

stood up, setting her back down in her seat like she weighed no more than ten pounds. Then he pulled Cale up to his feet. “That means you can’t see each other until tomorrow night.”
    Cale looked almost afraid with is father’s thick arm around his neck. “Wait,” he said. “Let me just talk to her for a second.” But Mac tossed him towards Rory.
    “It’s tradition, Cale. Rory will make sure you stay away for the night. Usually, both dragon riders and their dragons are the same gender. I’ll have to call in a favor to get Ava ready, since she’s a girl.”
    Rory half-dragged his brother up the stairs and shoved him into his bedroom, then locked the door behind him. He jumped onto the bed, destroying the springs in the mattress as Cale crossed his arms.
    “Mom’s right,” Cale said, shaking his head. “Why is Dad rushing the dance? I just found her and we’re chasing her away.”
    Rory shrugged, opening a water bottle and chugging it. “Like he said, he’s excited. I am too.” He sighed. “My baby brother getting his wings. And at eighteen.” He shook his head. “You’re going to be famous once people find out. There hasn’t been a pact in….”
    “A hundred years, almost.”
    It was hard for Cale to be excited when Ava wasn’t close by. It made his stomach hurt to be away from her. He leaned against Rory’s computer desk, trying to ignore the emptiness. “So, you like her?”
    “Well, she’s not what I expected. Not for you at least.”
    “What do you mean, ‘not for me'?”
    Rory stretched out on his bed. It was full sized, but he was still too big for it. His room was a lot like Cale’s, but messier, with clothes and partly-eaten sandwiches strewn across the tile. And darker. Rory wasn’t a fan of bright lights. His sensitivity was literally the only blue dragon trait he inherited.
    “You know,” Rory said, already tired of the subject. “You’ve got a lot to live up t o. I guess we expected someone…better.”
    “Well, there isn’t anyone better than Ava,” Cale snapped.
    Rory held onto his temper, sat up, and turned on his gaming system. Cale sat beside him on the bed and picked up a controller. The game lit up the screen and Cale went through the motions. Each move of his thumbs resulted in the death of a fictional warfare combatant.
    “I’m not going to argue with you, Cale. I trust your instincts.” Rory paused to slaughter another video game character. “Besides, it’s dad who’s having a conniption. I know he hasn’t mentioned it to you yet–”
      “He doesn’t have to. I can tell.”
    Rory raised an eyebrow at Cale. “ You can? You’re getting creepy good at that, man. You’ve been hanging out with Cameron too much.”
    “I spend about as much time with him as I do with you,” Cale replied.
    “That’s my point.”
    Cale and Rory got along more than well. They trained together, wrestled together, demolished video game avatars together. Whenever they’d eliminated sirens, it was side by side. But where Rory and Cameron were polar opposites, Cale felt like he filled in the gap.
    “Dad will warm up,” Rory said. “He doesn’t have much of a choice. You’re kind of his last shot at a reputation.”
    Cale didn’t have to look at his brother to hear the bitterness in his voice. Rory’s avatar was merciless as he channeled his anger through it, making it launch grenades at the enemy.   Better than him punching the TV again.  Things hadn’t been the same between Rory and Mac, not since he found out that his eldest would never be able to have red dragonlings. If Cale was disappointed in Rory’s disregard for his birthright, Mac was livid, still unable to talk about it with his eldest. And because Rory had mated outside of marriage, because he’d given up his birthright, most of their father’s expectations fell onto Cale.
    Cale put down his remote with a sigh. “I’m going to take a walk,” he said. It wasn’t a lie. Not really.
    Rory didn’t