Page 132 of Dragon 7

Before the prick came, I slid my hand farther inside until I could rest two fingers lightly against both of them.

When she took the sample, his whole body stiffened, and his lips pushed into the tiniest pout I'd ever seen, but no cry came.

Look at you being a warrior.

The doctor continued with another sample. “The nurses are happy you’ve been in here with the twins. Somehow you keep them quiet.”

I kept my fingers against the warm small bodies. "But, the twins keep wanting to cry a lot, even when they've eaten and been changed. Are they okay?"

"Premature babies often have nervous systems that are still developing, so they are having difficulty regulating themselves. That’s why they appear more jittery or easily startled. It will calm with time."

"So they're not in pain?"

"No, Tora. They are doing very well, actually. Their weight is good for the gestational age. Their lungs are stronger than expected. We have them on oxygen as a precaution only."

I let out a sigh of relief. “Alright.”

The doctor frowned. “Babies born on an island of war. What a way to start off their lives.”

“Yeah.”

The doctor picked the chart back up and began jotting down notes.

I watched the twins and suddenly the room around me went thin. The hum of the incubator pulled back. The voices in the corner faded out. The fluorescent light dimmed, and a new vision came.

I was on a mountain.

Cold wind moved across my face and smelled of pine resin, snow, and stone. The sky above me had gone to the deep blue of high altitude. Below me the world fell away in green ridges and white peaks all the way to a horizon I could not name.

Two young men were rushing through the air, chasing someone yet their feet didn’t touch the mountain. So fast, they floated through the air.

They were enormous men.

Shirtless.

Identical faces.

Both at least six-four. They must have been close to two hundred and forty pounds of pure muscle. Broad shouldered. Thick necked. Narrow waisted. Their forearms were carved with veins. Their hands looked like they could break stone if they were tired of breaking bone.

And they moved like predators.

And then. . .I just knew. . .they were Hiro's sons. The shape of the eyes. The set of the mouth. The faces I had just been watching breathe in an incubator now grown into the faces of men.

Their hair was long and fell to their elbows. The first twin had white hair—the color of snow. A tattooed white tiger climbed over his chest. The beast’s claws curved up his throat and stretched to the underside of his jaw with all these beautiful roses around it.

When he turned, his white hair lifted, whipped in the air, and showed the storm clouds and lightning tattooed on his back.

His brother had black hair pulled into a long braid down one side, the loose hair on the other side moving with him in the wind. His chest carried a massive tattooed black tiger.

And just like his brother the claws struck under his jaw. But instead of roses, lotus blossoms surrounded the claws.

When he turned to run off with his brother, his back showed the wind. A large tattooed swirling current with cherry blossoms caught in updrafts and mist.

The twins hit the ground, and then they rose in the air, spun around, and raced back my way.

I shrieked and jumped to the left and that was when I saw who they were chasing.

Hiro.