Page 32 of Heart of Chaos (Chaosborn #1)

Chapter thirty-two

Arik

The world exploded into shades of blue.

I’d felt the tear in the world—the black chasm of nothing opening up before my mate—and Baldur’s terror for Idunn had been nothing like I had ever felt before.

The garmr and myrkvolf clawing at our hide, the crush of drage and odemarksdyr around us, had prevented him from launching toward her, and we could only watch in horror as the black nothingness ate up the ice before her.

But then it was gone, the creatures attacking us no more than black vapor on the wind, and my fragile, human mate lying naked and bleeding on the ice.

And the section of the Rift that had spilled monsters into our world was closed.

Eisa, I roared, shifting unconsciously as I ran for her. I stumbled toward her, drage landing around us and shifting as they realized the battle was won.

“Eisa.” I scooped her fragile form into my arms, her head lolling to the side at an unnatural angle. I pressed my lips to hers, willing Baldur’s magic into her, and felt her chest rise in a gasp beneath me.

“Thank the fucking gods,” Revna said, crouching next to me. She’d found a fur somewhere and offered it to me, helping me wrap it around Eisa’s limp shoulders.

“I’m fine,” Eisa murmured, her lips blue in the cold as blood congealed under her nose.

“Sure you are,” I said gruffly, pressing another kiss to the top of her head. “What the hells was that?”

Eisa shook her head, her eyes blue and wide as they met mine. Across the silver bridge between our minds, she sent me the terror Idunn had shared.

The looming black shadow devouring the realms.

I pushed away the dread that threatened to overcome me. Later. We’d figure it all out later. “You were spectacular. Can you stand?”

She nodded shakily, letting me mostly lift her to her feet. I tightened the fur around her, then stilled, frowning down at her bare sternum. “What’s this?”

She looked down as I traced my finger over the strange blue marking—a bisected diamond I was sure I had seen somewhere before.

She frowned as she wiped away the blood, opening and closing her mouth as if searching for the right words.

The odd, solemn silence of the moment was broken by Ragnar’s growl as he swung his yellow eyes toward us and shifted.

He was covered in wounds, black gore leaking from his side and his throat, but his face was red with fury as he pointed a finger at my mate. “This was her fault.”

The accusation rang out across the now silent night, and I shifted Eisa behind me instinctively. She had proven herself more than capable, but she was also exhausted, and Baldur was on edge.

“The draugr came for her. Her power. Her unnaturalness,” Einar continued, turning to the other drage. “You saw what she did!”

“She saved us,” Revna shouted behind me, and I heard the shuffling as she took a step back with Eisa. “Everyone saw.”

“Your ineptitude and lack of foresight caused this,” I spat back, hands flexing at my sides as I stood my ground between them. Most of the drage remained in dragon form, wings rustling and claws scraping nervously as they watched warily from the sidelines. “Revna sounded the alarm and you told them to hold! Drage are dead because you failed to act!”

“Lies,” Einar spat. “There’s a reason it’s been so long since a blue crossed to our realm. This is a warning from the Norns! She must return to her own side of the Rift!”

Something inside me snapped as white-hot fury engulfed me. He dared threaten our mate ?

He will die, Baldur vowed, his eyes blazing through mine as I let the fury claim me.

“You have been single-handedly weakening the drage for centuries,” I roared, letting my anger fuel me as I fought the urge to transform. Baldur couldn’t be the one to strike first. “It wasn’t you that saved us from the odemarksdyr this night. It was our Queen. ”

I heard a roar of approval behind me as Sigurd blew bronze flames into the sky, several other dragons following his lead.

“I am Dragehersker,” Einar bellowed, his eyes almost manic in his fervor. “My word is law.”

I laughed, the sound cold and humorless as the oath before me crystallized. It would be a fucking nightmare, but there was only one way foreward. “Only a man unsure of his own power would have to proclaim it so loudly and so often.”

I saw the moment that Einar’s restraint snapped as he shifted and lunged for my mate.

Ragnar was old and powerful, but Baldur was faster. His jaws slammed against Ragnar’s as Revna shifted and pushed Eisa backward, her wings covering my mate as white hot flame licked my throat. Baldur scrabbled for purchase against the ice as he breathed fire down Ragnar’s throat and made him bellow in agony.

Dragons roared and took to the sky, hissing in agitation. Baldur was Drakonungr, but dragons respected only power. Only Chaos. The defense of a mate was the only legal grounds for a challenge like this in dragon law, but if Ragnar won, they would follow him as their new king without question.

The only reason Ragnar had not challenged Baldur before was his fear that he would lose.

A well-founded fear, Baldur growled as he strained against Ragnar’s frenzied bites. YOU WILL NOT TOUCH OUR MATE!

The other dragon tried to hold Baldur off with a series of snaps and spurts of flame. With a roar and a swipe of his foreclaw, Baldur tore a hole in the already damaged membrane of Ragnar’s wing.

Ragnar shrieked, and Baldur clamped his jaws around the other dragon’s throat.

For too long you have let the drage wither, Baldur intoned, his voice ancient and heady in a way I knew meant he was projecting to all the dragons.

He wrenched his head, tearing a hole in Ragnar’s throat from which hot blood gushed before snapping back down on the now crimson scales.

The dragons around us quieted to a deadly hush, the outcome of the battle already decided.

You would be the end of this whole Realm, and we would have let you.

Baldur dragged the now limp body of the white dragon toward the Rift, where the other drage parted for us.

Ragnar’s body twitched between Baldur’s jaws, and the sickening taste of blood nearly overwhelmed me.

BUT YOU WILL NOT TOUCH OUR MATE.

With a mighty heave, Baldur swung Ragnar’s body over the Rift. Ragnar thrashed once as Baldur released his throat.

The dragon plummeted into the azure depths of the chasm with a soundless finality.

Part of me recoiled at what we had just done. I had killed a man—a fellow drage—in cold blood.

He threatened our mate, Baldur reminded me with a feral intensity as he spat blood over the Rift and swung his head back to the rest of the drage.

I am Drakonungr, he bellowed, voice ringing out loudly over the ice and through every bond he shared with the dragons. Idunn is your Drekadrottning. He turned his attention to the cluster of older white dragons, all drage who had followed Einar for centuries and who now skittered back uncertainly, likely at the behest of their human bonds. Bow, or die.

Sigurd was the first dragon to move, lowering his bronze head to the ground where Eisa stood barefoot, held up by Revna.

Bryndis lowered her golden head beside her mate’s, and one by one, the dragons bowed. Bronze and gold heads dropped to the ice, followed by the younger whites, and then the ancient white beasts who had grown complacent with their power and place under Einar’s rule.

No more.

Baldur swung his head back to Eisa as we limped toward her, the dragons still bowed around us in a circle.

He lowered his head to the ice, steam puffing from his nostrils as he closed his eyes in submission. I felt Eisa’s delicate hand trace the ridge above his eyes as he purred, his voice still carrying for all to hear, My Queen.

I felt a pulse rush over the silver bridge between our minds. You killed him.

He threatened you. The words were both mine and Baldur’s, and I felt her shiver at the intensity of them.

Look at me, she commanded.

Baldur blinked his eyes open. Eisa stood before us, pale and fragile and stunning as her eyes met ours with compassion. She cupped my face, pressing her forehead to mine. Come back, Kj?re .

I shuddered as Baldur receded. I always meant to let you rip out his throat when the time came, I murmured, sending my regret through the bond–my concern that she would fear me after seeing what Baldur had done. My worry that I was more beast than man after doing it.

She caressed a mental hand over my mind as she pressed her lips to my chilled skin. You are mine. I’m glad you did it.

Your drage await you, Baldur cut in, his voice tired and distant. Speak to them.

Eisa’s eyes met mine as I stood, and I knew that the words that rang out in my head echoed in the minds of all the drage assembled. The Dragehersker is dead. Long live the king.

As one, the dragons roared.