Page 20 of Born in Fire (Dragonblood Dynasty #2)

Chapter 20

D orian

I’m not made for tunnels. My shoulders scrape the damp walls as we wind deeper beneath Seattle’s streets, following Daniel through this rat maze of passageways. He claims they’ll lead us to Malakai—and Elena. The air grows thicker with each step, heavy with the scent of mineral and old magic.

Caleb’s ahead of me, his back rigid with tension. I’ve never seen my brother like this—raw, exposed, vulnerable. The woman has done a number on him. Twenty-four hours ago, I’d have mocked him mercilessly for it.

Now, with Juno’s scent still lingering on my skin, I’m not so eager to throw stones.

“How much further?” Luke growls behind me, his patience wearing thin.

Daniel glances back, his face pale in the dim light of our phones. “Almost there. The main chamber is just beyond the next turn.”

I scan the walls, taking in the ancient carvings that pulse with a faint red glow. Dragon script. Old magic. This place has been here for generations, hidden beneath the human world. Another secret in a life built on them.

“Something’s wrong,” Caleb mutters, his voice barely audible. “She’s scared. I can feel it.”

I’ve never fully understood the bond between mates, although I’ve heard of it—how it forges a connection between two souls that transcends physical distance. But I’ve seen it in action enough times to know its power. Dragons mate for life. And we feel each other’s essence.

“We’ll find her,” I assure him, clapping a hand on his shoulder.

A roar echoes through the tunnels, followed by the sound of wings. The air shifts—hot, electric.

“Fuck,” I breathe as Caleb turns in a slow circle, his expression darkening. Before I can say more, the ground beneath us shudders violently. Dust rains from the ceiling as a deep, rolling boom echoes through the chamber.

The sound brings a sudden flood of fear that sends a shiver through my skin that doesn’t feel like… mine. Fuck! It leaves me feeling lightheaded for a minute. I shake it off, turning to the source of the sound.

“What the—” Luke starts, but another explosion drowns him out, this one closer.

I feel another surge of panic, unfamiliar to me. Apprehension, I understand. Anxiety too. But terror? No. I don’t fucking like it.

“We need to get topside,” Caleb orders, already moving toward the exit. “Now!”

I’m hot on his heels as he reaches the door to the outside world and shoves it open, letting light stream in. I crash into his back as he stops dead in the doorway.

God help us!

Seattle is on fire. Literally.

The city skyline, which should be a postcard of lights against the night, is now a warzone. Flames lick the sides of skyscrapers, their reflections dancing in the blackened waters of Elliott Bay.

Dragons wheel through the air, massive forms silhouetted against the moon. Dragons . In plain sight. Flying over a major American city like it’s fucking medieval times.

“Oh, my fucking God.” I can’t keep the shock from my voice. “Look at them all.”

There must be a dozen, their wings blotting out stars as they circle our headquarters. Centuries of secrecy destroyed in a single night.

“This is insane,” Luke growls beside me, his hands already shifting, claws elongating. “They’re not even trying to hide anymore.”

“Because they don’t need to,” Serena replies grimly, holding up her phone. Multiple livestreams show the attack from different angles. “#DragonAttack is trending.”

My stomach drops as I follow her gaze to the screen. This is bad. This is extinction-level bad. Humans aren’t ready for us—they never have been.

“Fucking Mara,” I mutter, thinking of Elena’s tech-wizard friend. “If only she knew what she’d started with that bullshit of hers.”

Caleb curses, his expression taut with concern. I know he’s thinking of Elena, feeling her terror through their bond.

“We need to split up,” he says. “Luke, get to the Towers. Protect our people there. Dorian…”

But I’m not listening anymore. My gaze is fixed on Craven Towers, where three massive dragons are sweeping in ever-tightening circles. The lower floors are intact, but flames lick at the upper stories, black smoke billowing into the night.

The coffee shop. Juno’s coffee shop is on the ground floor.

And she’s in there!

The thought hits me hard enough to suck the air from my lungs. Ice floods my veins, followed by a wave of heat so intense my vision blurs at the edges. My dragon surges forward, protective instincts roaring to life with a ferocity that stuns me.

“Juno’s working tonight,” I say, surprised at how calm I sound because I feel like I’m speaking from a long distance away.

“Then go,” Caleb barks, reading my expression. He glances at the others. “The rest of you, with me. We need to assume Malakai orchestrated this whole thing.”

“But he’s not with the Syndicate,” Daniel is saying. “He’s always sworn they were as bad as our human enemies.”

“Well, he seems to have drawn them out.” My brother is staring up at the towers grimly. I’m staring too, dread unfurling as I feel my shift taking hold. Temperature rising, scales erupting. The transformation into my beast moving too slowly for my tautly strung nerves.

“Manipulated them,” says Lydia. “Brought them out to give us a fight, so he’d be free to put his true plan into action. The old fucker is smart. I’ll give him that much.”

There’s another explosion as flames sear the top of the building, and rubble erupts from it. Much of it is already destroyed. My focus narrows to a single point: I need to get to Juno. Now.

“Be careful, brother,” I manage through barely human vocal cords, meeting Caleb’s eyes one last time. “This feels wrong.”

“Just go!” He shoves my shoulder.

I don’t need to be told twice. I break into a run, ducking into a nearby alley. The moment I’m hidden from human eyes, I let my dragon free.

The shift is exhilarating—bones cracking, muscles stretching, skin giving way to scales. My spine elongates, wings unfurling from my back with a satisfying snap. In seconds, I’m airborne, my powerful wings carrying me toward the Towers.

Two dragons immediately peel off from the circling group to intercept me. Fuck . They were waiting for us to show ourselves.

I don’t slow down. If anything, I accelerate, a roar building in my chest. They want a fight? I’ll give them a goddamn war.

The first dragon—slender, with copper scales—dives at me from above. I bank hard, twisting in midair to avoid its claws. As it passes, I lash out with my tail, catching it across the jaw. The impact sends it spinning, disoriented.

The second is more cautious, circling me warily. Its scales are a dull green, eyes glowing with malice.

Move! Or burn, motherfucker!

I bare my teeth, and it responds with a jet of flame that sears the air between us. I dive beneath the inferno, then surge upward, ramming my full weight into its underbelly. We grapple midair, claws raking, teeth snapping. Blood—mine or his, I can’t tell—spatters my scales.

With a twist of my powerful neck, I sink my teeth into the junction between his wing and body. Cartilage tears under the pressure. The dragon’s scream cuts through the night as it plummets, wing useless.

I don’t stay to watch it fall. Juno needs me. I know it as surely as I know that I need to draw breath.

Three more dragons block my path to the building.

Fuck! I don’t have time for this.

My wings pump harder, building speed. At the last second, I tuck them against my body and dive, becoming a missile of scale and muscle. I tear through their formation, scattering them before they can react.

Flames lick at my tail as one recovers quickly, but I’m already past them, focused solely on my destination.

The Towers loom before me, the upper floors aflame. I aim for the ground level, where pedestrians flee in terror. The coffee shop’s windows are blown out, tables and chairs strewn across the sidewalk.

I land hard, the concrete cracking beneath my weight. The shift back to human form is painful, rushed—bones compressing, scales receding. I stagger as my feet touch the ground, naked as the day I was born.

“Juno!” I roar, pushing through the crowd of terrified humans. Some scream, pointing at me—at the scales still receding from my skin, at my eyes that still glow with inhuman light.

I don’t care.

The foyer is a disaster area—smoke, dust, shattered glass everywhere. Emergency lights cast everything in a hellish red glow. Through the haze, I spot her—Juno, her blonde hair tinged gray with dust, helping an elderly woman toward the exit.

Relief floods me, so powerful my knees nearly buckle. She’s alive. She’s okay.

“Juno!” I call again.

She looks up, eyes widening as she spots me. “Dorian?”

The moment stretches between us—her standing there, confusion and relief warring on her face; me, dirt-streaked and bloodied, staring back like she’s water in a desert.

Then movement catches my eye. A dragon, smaller than the others, slithers along the ceiling, its scales the color of old blood. It’s stalking her, positioning itself above.

“No!” I surge forward, but I’m too far away.

Juno sees my expression change, reads the terror there. She shoves the elderly woman toward the door, then—impossibly, beautifully brave—starts running toward me .

“Get down!” I scream, already shifting again, my dragon bursting free in a desperate rush of power.

The enemy dragon drops from the ceiling, jaws gaping. I meet him midair, our bodies colliding with bone-shattering force. We crash into a pillar, claws tearing, teeth snapping at throats. My rage gives me strength, but it’s not enough—not fast enough.

The pillar cracks, weakened by our impact. Stone groans, shifts—

I rip the enemy dragon’s throat out with a savage twist of my jaws, not even registering its death throes as I shift back, turning to look for Juno.

“Dorian! Watch out!” Her cry is close, but I don’t see her until her hands hit my shoulder, her full body weight behind a move that knocks me sideways several feet.

I spin around just in time to see her disappear beneath a cascade of marble and concrete as the pillar collapses into the spot I’d just been standing in.

“ NO! ” The scream tears from my throat, human and dragon merged in horror. I surge back, scrambling over rubble on suddenly human hands and knees.

“Juno!” My voice breaks as I dig through the debris, tossing aside chunks of marble that weigh more than I should be able to lift. “Juno, answer me!”

A soft cough. I freeze, then redouble my efforts, digging faster.

She’s pinned beneath a slab of concrete, her lower body crushed. Blood pools beneath her, too much blood, spreading in a dark halo around her golden hair.

“No, no, no,” I moan, falling to my knees beside her. “Juno, look at me. Look at me.”

Her eyes flutter open, unfocused at first, then finding mine. “Dorian?” Her voice is a whisper, wet with blood. “Are… you okay?”

Sweet Jesus…

“Yes. I’m fine. God… Juno… God… please…” I don’t know what to say, what to do. This is beyond me.

“Good.” Her lips quirk up, the smile crooked, strained. “I… saw you. You’re really a dragon.”

A laugh, half-sob, tears from my throat. “Yeah. Yeah, I really am.”

“Just like… the tattoos.” She tries to smile again, but it turns into a grimace of pain.

I cradle her head in my lap, brushing dust from her cheeks with trembling fingers. “Don’t talk. We need to get you help.”

But even as I say it, I know. The blood. The angle of her body beneath the rubble. The coppery scent of death already gathering around her.

She knows too. I can see it in her eyes—the clarity that comes with acceptance.

“It’s okay,” she whispers. “I got to see a real dragon. Pretty cool last sight.”

“No.” I shake my head violently. “No, this isn’t happening. I can get you out. I can—”

“Dorian.” She reaches up, her fingers tracing my cheek. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not fucking okay!” Tears burn my eyes. I blink them back, not ready to mourn. Never ready. “You don’t understand. I just found you. I just found you.”

Her breath hitches, each inhale a little more shallow than the last. “Bad timing… always was my specialty.”

I lean down, pressing my forehead to hers. “Please,” I whisper, not sure who I’m begging—her, Fate, whatever gods might be listening. “Please don’t go.”

“Will you tell me…” She coughs, blood speckling her lips. “Tell me what it’s like? To fly?”

My heart shatters into a thousand pieces. “It’s like freedom,” I say, voice thick with restrained tears. “It’s like being part of the sky itself. The wind becomes your breath, the clouds your playground. Nothing can touch you up there. Nothing can hurt you.”

Her eyes drift closed, a small smile playing on her lips. “Sounds nice.”

“Juno,” I say urgently, feeling her slipping away. “Juno, look at me.”

Her eyes open again, but they’re distant now, focusing on something beyond me.

“I need to tell you something,” I say, the words tumbling out. “I need you to know—I know it’s fast, I know it’s crazy, but I’ve lived a dozen lifetimes, and I’ve never felt like this. I love you. I love you.”

Her smile widens slightly. “I’m glad,” she whispers. “Me too.”

Then she’s gone. Just like that. The light fades from her eyes, her hand falls away from my face, and the brightest thing in my long, dark life is extinguished.

I gather her to me, cradling her broken body against my chest, and I howl—a sound of pure agony that’s neither human nor dragon but something broken and wounded beyond repair.

The building continues to burn around me. Dragons wheel overhead. The world is ending in fire and blood.

And I don’t care. I don’t fucking care about any of it.

Because somewhere in the fleeting connection between us, something vital was torn from my chest. And I know, with the certainty of the ancient creature I am, that I will never get it back.