Page 20 of Fated to the Dragon King (Alpha Dragons’ Fated #4)

Hayley

As far as prisons go, mine was quite nice.

I could sleep on a large comfortable bed, watch TV on a flat panel, wide screen television.

All the latest streaming channels were available on it.

I had my own bathroom complete with soaps, shampoos, a hair dryer, plush rugs on the polished tile floor.

An assortment of towels sat in a cabinet and hung on racks.

Fiona and Damon, unmindful of observant humans, flew me to the palatial estate on a clifftop overlooking the Pacific. The flight terrified me, as a single slip of Fiona’s talons would send me hurtling earthward and into the sea. Boom! Dead on impact.

Shark bait.

She didn’t drop me, and actually set me rather gently in a walled courtyard. While I shook from reaction and terror, she and Damon both shifted into their human bodies. They watched me impassively as I got myself together and halted my chattering teeth.

“Your first flight?” Fiona asked.

Unable to speak, I merely nodded.

“Do what we tell you,” Damon said, looming over me, “and you’ll be fine. It’s Alaric we want.”

I dry swallowed and managed to squeak a single word, “Why?”

“That doesn’t matter,” he replied stiffly. “You’re not a threat to us, no one will believe your story of dragon shifters. That’s why we can let you go, despite your knowledge of us.”

I supposed that was true enough. I absently thought of the beach people, and what they’d tell the authorities. That a pair of dragons kidnapped a woman and flew away? Ensue the laugh track.

“Come on,” Fiona told me, taking my arm. “I’ll show you your rooms. Don’t try to escape, this place is like a fortress. And we can find you wherever you go.”

My gut informed me, similar to a voice in my head, to round my shoulders, keep my face lowered. Stay cowed, never show the spine I so recently discovered within myself. If Damon and Fiona think of me as a lily livered coward, they may slip up. They may make a mistake, permit me to escape.

Now, I crossed the suite to the sliding glass door that opened onto a balcony.

The suite sat on the second floor, and the cliff dropped steeply below to the surging surf crashing over the lethal rocks.

I peered down, unable to see much in the darkness.

The estate house had been built right on the edge of the precipice.

With a locked door on one side and a steep rocky cliff on the other, I was indeed stuck.

As Fiona had searched me and taken my cell phone, I had no way of calling Alaric, or the police, for a rescue.

Gazing off into the black distance, I suspected Alaric already knew I’d been taken.

Would he do as they ordered? Surrender this so-called “authority” to Fiona in exchange for my life?

What about his life? Fiona offered to spare him, let him go home in peace, if he gave up his power.

What power? Willow said that if Fiona took control of their homeland, she’d cause a destructive war between dragons and humans.

Therefore, she must never be permitted to take control of anything more dangerous than a car.

In the wrong hands, a car could become a lethal weapon.

“Fiona must never be given any sort of control,” I muttered, my stomach tight with stress. “I have to get away from here. Help Alaric. He might not love me, but he’ll certainly try to find me. Delay Fiona, search for me, kill her. And Damon.”

Then again, maybe he won’t.

“Toy?”

I turned away from the black ocean to find Fiona entering the suite. She carried a tray of food that also contained a coffee pot and a cup. I shuffled past the sliding glass door, shutting it, my head down in abject submission. I peeked up through my hair to see her mouth twist in contempt.

Good. Keep underestimating me.

“My name is Hayley,” I muttered.

“I don’t really care.” Fiona set the tray on a table. “You’re Alaric’s human play thing. I’ll bring you food once a day, I suggest you make it last.”

If I worried she and Damon wouldn’t feed me, that idea faded. She’d brought fruit, sliced bread, butter, deli ham, bacon, and those pre-sealed cups of mayonnaise. Enough ingredients for at least five sandwiches. She pointed to a refrigerator on the far side of the suite.

“That has water, wine, small bottles of whiskey.” Her beautiful mouth curled in a sneer. “In case you want to drink yourself insensible. I’ll bring more tomorrow.”

“If –” I began, hesitant. “If Alaric, doesn’t, you know, submit, will you kill me?”

Her finely arched brow lifted. “Of course.”

“Oh.” I hung my head.

“Threats of harm do little if the threats aren’t followed through.” Fiona tittered. “He’ll submit to my demands, toy. He loves you.”

No, he doesn’t. He may try to find me, but he’ll never let you destroy the world. Not even for me.

After a long moment of studying me, as though she suspected I played her, Fiona turned on her heels and stalked out.

I listened to the lock engage, then straightened.

It occurred to me that the pair of them may be watching me via cameras.

Hungry, I made myself a ham and bacon sandwich, and ate it while ambling around my prison.

Surreptitiously, I studied the corners, the vents, the ceiling light fixtures. I saw nothing that could be a camera lens pointing down, but that truly meant nothing. These days, current technology made cameras all but invisible.

Hoping that Damon and Fiona hadn’t bothered to install any covert surveillance, since I was nothing but a low life human incapable of deep thought, I finished my late dinner on the balcony. The restless ocean pounded the rocks below, the faint starlight glimmering off the foam cresting the waves.

At dawn. While my captors are still sleeping. I’ll lower myself from the balcony to whatever is below it, then down the cliff’s face. Once at the water’s edge, I’ll make my way across the boulders to freedom.

No, I’m not a rock climber. But I am fit. People scamper up and down cliffs all the time. They even scale El Capitan without ropes or crampons. Surely, I can find enough toeholds to climb down this cliff.

After all, going down is easier than going up.

I shut the door to keep the air conditioning inside and opened the fridge for a bottle of water. I drank it while searching the suite for anything that might help me in my escape. I found nothing. Of course, no handy ropes lying around, no potential lockpicks, nothing I might use as a weapon.

After shutting off the lights, I laid down on the bed. I doubted I’d get much sleep since my stress and tension continued to rush through my veins.

I murmured a prayer to Lanokota.

***

“Oh, lordy, this isn’t good.”

On the balcony with the cliff and the sea still in half darkness, I saw enough that a shiver ran through me.

The precipice wasn’t as rocky and jagged as I’d hoped.

A drop from the balcony to the cliff wasn’t far and I found a landing place.

However, beyond that – let’s just say Fiona and Damon knew something of holding a human prisoner.

Nervous, scared, I paced the suite, while trying desperately to think.

A dragon could simply fly off the balcony.

Unfortunately, Lanokota hadn’t offered me dragon wings.

Nor did Alaric know where I was to fly in and rescue me.

I dared not wait until such time as he might find me.

Fiona might come in at any time and throw me from the suite and onto the deadly rocks below.

“Courage, dammit. You can do this.”

I stalked to the edge and looked down, studying the cliff.

The early morning sunlight had crept over its face, and showed me spots where I could, with care, climb down.

I’d need to make my way to the left, creeping along the edge to the ledge a short way below.

From that ledge, I thought I saw more useful toe and hand holds that might enable me to cling to the face.

I sucked in a deep breath and climbed onto the railing. The lashing sea looked so very far away, the cliff so incredibly treacherous. My mouth dry, nervous sweat trickled from my arm pits down my ribs. I could kill myself doing this. But, would Damon and Fiona murdering me be any worse?

Either way, death hung at my shoulder like a thundercloud.

I could not wait to be rescued, as the rescue might not come.

Alaric and Willow had no idea where I was.

Fiona already said she’d kill me if Alaric didn’t follow through with her demands.

Most likely, Alaric had already written me off like a bad debt.

I had only myself to rely on.

Holding my breath, I eased my body over the railing until I hung on it by my hands. I let go, and dropped to the steep slope a dozen feet down. Catching my balance before I tumbled over the cliff, I peeked over the edge. My head spun with vertigo.

“Okay, don’t do that again.”

The slope was rough with broken rock and gravel.

Not easy by any means, but also not as bad as I feared.

Crab-like, I worked my way toward the ledge, using both hands and feet, then slid backward onto it.

Okay, the first part was over. I took a moment to study the jagged precipice and sat down on the ledge.

I glanced upward. The balcony above looked so very safe.

And now, so very far away. I half expected to see Fiona or Damon peering down at me, ready to shift into their dragons and pluck me off the ledge as easily as they might a stranded cat.

The thought, the image in my mind, scared me into rolling onto my belly and edging my way down.

At first, the going wasn’t too bad. As long as I looked neither up nor down, that was. I focused on the hand and footholds, taking one small step at a time. Finding another ledge large enough for me to stand on, I paused to catch my breath and glance around.

Almost halfway there. I can do this.

Once more, I examined the terrain and suspected that if I moved from the ledge and to my right, I could locate an easier path. In fact, what I saw resembled a trail leading to the water’s edge.

Glancing up, I saw the house’s wide overhang.

The balcony I departed from was quite a distance away, and I saw no sign that my escape had been discovered.

At least no shouts proclaimed it, no flying dragons flew past in search of me.

Fiona and Damon would surely know I didn’t break the suite’s door down.

Gaining hope and courage, I dropped from the ledge. The uneven and loose rock broke under my sneakers. My heart in my throat, I grabbed for something, anything, that would halt my lethal tumble down the cliff and to my death below.

A handy boulder sticking from the cliff halted my terrible slide. Breathing hard, my heart thudding in my chest, I clung to the precipice with my hands and feet. Holy shit, that was close. While not daring to look down and behind me, I slowly took in the path I needed.

Slowly, as carefully as a bomb specialist defusing an explosive device, I crabbed my way toward the sort of trail leading down.

Closer to it, I saw it wasn’t a path at all, but rather a narrow line between boulders stuck into the cliff.

There wasn’t enough room for my body, but I struggled toward it anyway.

Sweat stung my eyes and stuck my hair to my face and neck.

Inching lower, I gripped the rocks with my hands and sought for toeholds I couldn’t see. Salt spray from the crashing surf both wetted me and made the rocks more slippery. It also told me how close I was to my goal. If the ocean reached me, I was nearly there.

Hope and triumph surged within me. I beat them. I escaped Fiona and Damon, halted their attempts to force Alaric into surrendering his power, his authority. I would find a phone, call Alaric, tell him never to give in.

I gripped a smooth rock wet from the surf. Algae made it slippery, more treacherous than I thought it would be.

My hands slipped.

I grabbed for the rock again, panicking. Loose in its bed, the damn thing fell out like a broken tooth and came with me.

Terror filled my soul as I fell.