Page 128 of Ensnared

Get your swords.

In the weeks I’ve known him, one thing I’ve never felt from Azar is even a single iota of uncertainty. That command, terse though it was, terrifies me.

What exactly is going on?

I don’t argue. I turn and hit the elevator button, and when it opens and the doors part, Jade’s standing there, her enormous blue eyes wide. “You forgot these.” She lugged my swords, my daggers, and the holsters for each up here.

“Thank you.” And I really mean it. I was genuinely worried that Azar wouldn’t be here when I got back. Could he have told me to get them as an excuse, to get me away so he could leave?

I’m not sure.

“Head back down,” I say. “And?—”

“Stay put. I know. Gordon and Gideon and Rufus are all there, pacing and shouting.”

That’s not very promising, but I don’t have time to deal with it. At least I feel like Rufus and Gordon have some genuine affection for them. I know Gideon does.

None of them are power players, but if I’ve shown anything, it’s that sometimes weak people can do amazing things in the right circumstances and with enough bravery. And that’s what I’m going to try to channel today, too.

While Jade travels back down, I buckle my steel to my body. “I’m ready.”

Azar, miracle of miracles, hasn’t left yet.

“What’s going on? What happened?”

That crack, that inversion you felt, that means more blessed have come.

Wait. More blessed? More dragons are here? From where? “More dragons are here. . .from your home?”

I’ve missed the last two scheduled meetings with my father, and it appears he’s become impatient. He grunts. And only the flame blessed can portal.

Oh, shoot.

The flame blessed.

Until now, Azar has been the only flame blessed. He’s been the uncontested superpower on earth. Nothing could touch him. Nothing could harm me. But if another flame blessed is here. . .

And if Azar’s nervous, what does that mean?

There’s only one way to find out who was sent.

I don’t allow myself to fret. I don’t allow myself to freak out, either. I may be weak, and I may be more of a liability than anything else, but one thing I don’t do is freeze during a fight. What skill I have, I won’t forget out of fear. “Let’s go see who showed up on our door.”

They wouldn’t have come through a door. Your doors are much too small.

If Azar can make a joke, things will be alright. Surely.

But when I climb onto his back, he’s stiffer than usual. His movements are blocky, almost, and I realize that this is what Azar looks like when he’s nervous. I mentally downshift into the place I go before a fight, the place I go when I need my mind to be clear, and then I push that serene sense of calm outward, trying to share the tiny thing I can do with him.

Thank you.

As we launch into the sky, I notice that blue and green and brown dragons are teeming on the ground below, and electro dragons are darting and spinning around in the air outside.

“Are these ours? Or are they from elsewhere?”

Ours.

That’s a relief, at least. “Where do we think the new arrivals are?”