Page 42 of On A Rift’s Edge (Riftworld #2)

I f Kat had been frightened before, it was nothing compared to the fear he had now.

Lyall was back in his true shape and was now face-to-face with another hellhound as large as he was.

A hellhound who was also one of his mothers.

Kat watched as the two Riftworld fighters circled one another.

He couldn’t take his eyes off Lyall’s pale fur, stained pink from his own blood.

Cesmak stalked around him, her movements predatory.

The floating sphere of water above them rotated faster and faster, then dissolved into vapor and disappeared.

“Do you understand, little human?” Gremory, Lyall’s other mother, spoke up right next to him, and Kat jumped. “My son has challenged the alpha of our clan to a battle for leadership.”

“Is this a fight to the death thing, or is pinning the other fighter to the mat enough?” Kat had a feeling he didn’t want to know the answer, but he asked it anyway.

“A death is not mandatory but often occurs.” Gremory stood straight and rigid, and even though Gremory wasn’t human or even from Earth, he caught the undercurrent of grief and worry in her words.

There was no time left to talk. Lyall and Cesmak attacked one another in a vicious assault of teeth and claws.

For several moments, neither of the two appeared to have an advantage over the other.

Then Lyall’s leg slid out from under him, and Cesmak pounced.

She came down on his body, her jaws slashing at the wound on Lyall’s back.

Lyall went limp, and for a second, Cesmak paused in her attack.

That was all Lyall needed. He flung her body off his, then twisted to seize her neck in his own jaws. She thrashed, but he only tightened his hold.

Kat had to remind himself to breathe. Everyone else in the room remained motionless as Cesmak’s movements slowed. Kat prayed silently for this not to end in her death.

If Lyall killed one of his mothers to protect him, Kat would never forgive himself.

He doubted Lyall would forgive himself, either.

Beside him, Gremory transformed, moving with grace on all four legs as she approached her wife and son.

Light rippled over her black fur, like the flash of a meteor in the night sky, and sounds that were at once harsh and melodic came from her muzzle.

Lyall released his hold on his mother and backed up. Both Cesmak and Gremory tilted their heads, exposing the soft underside of their throats to him.

Lyall altered his form back to a human shape, covered in his living leather armor. He was breathing hard and had a swollen right eye. His two mothers changed their shapes as well, with a bloodied Cesmak held up by her smaller spouse.

“It is done,” Gremory told Lyall, keeping a tight grip on Cesmak, who was gasping for breath. “You’re the alpha now.”

Lyall spat blood on the floor. “The hell I am. This whole custom is fucking ridiculous.”

He scanned the room, eyes wild, and gave a sigh of relief as he spotted Kat before he tensed again.

“Where’s Remi?” Lyall pointed at a spot on the floor. The room was a mess, with broken furniture and toppled chairs lying on a blood-spattered floor. “He wasn’t moving after Cesmak hit him.”

Giana gave a choked cry.

Kat ran over to where Lyall was pointing, with Giana coming up behind him.

The two of them hunted through the debris on the floor, and Kat did his best not to panic.

Remi was larger than an Earth chinchilla, but tiny compared to the two ferocious hellhounds who had trashed the place fighting each other.

There was no sign of him. Arimanius was slumped against a nearby wall, his broken leg in front of him. Teo was nowhere to be seen.

“No.” Lyall limped up to them, sounding frantic. “He has to be here somewhere.”

The floor swayed under Kat’s feet, and he had to reach out to grab Giana before she fell. He waited for another hellmouth to open or a water portal to float down from the ceiling, but the shaking only worsened, sending the dusty corporate art on the walls crashing to the floor.

Every window in the space shattered, and Kat flung himself on Giana as they both dropped to the floor, glass and dust falling over them.

A different roar resounded through the space, and Kat scrambled to his feet. He knew that sound.

Kaveh was here, as an Azdaha drakone, and Remi was missing.

“Get underneath one of the doorframes.” Kat pulled Giana to her feet as Lyall came closer to him, his face grim. The two of them walked blind through thick swirling dust and debris.

The particles in the air cleared, and Kaveh rose above them, coils of black scales rising through the shattered floor. He had crashed his way up through the building, just as he had erupted from the dirt of the rodeo arena during his duel with Rhys.

His giant reptilian head swung from side to side, and he gave another cry that made the walls tremble and the dust billow up again. He was searching for Remi, his Matchmaker spouse, and if he couldn’t find him, or if Remi was badly hurt…

Kat didn’t want to think about what would happen, only what he could do to stop it. His mentor and friend had only been in his drakone form once before, and the lack of control over his violent tendencies had horrified him.

He stared up at Kaveh and at the drops of poisonous green fire dripping from his fangs. Kat couldn’t find any indication that the man he knew was inside the monster that towered over him.

“Kaveh.” Kat spread his hands in a calming gesture and ignored Lyall’s attempt to tug him backward. “Everything’s going to be fine. We’ll find Remi.”

The Azdaha drakone opened his jaws wider, yawning over Kat as if to devour him. Then the color of his eyes flickered, altering from metallic gold to a soft hazel. The gaping mouth closed.

Kat allowed himself a moment to take deep breaths before stepping forward and laying a hand on Kaveh’s scaled skin. It felt smooth and far warmer than he had expected. A shudder ran through Kaveh’s serpentine body at his touch.

Good. His friend had been able to transform back before, when he had battled his clan mate to save Remi. Human Kaveh would return, and they could all calm down and settle their differences peacefully.

Something flashed by Kat’s vision, and the quivering end of a golden spear appeared, the tip buried into Kaveh’s side. He hadn’t begun to process that his friend had been attacked before Lyall knocked him to the ground, covering his body with his own.

The Azdaha towering over them roared in fury, and green flame shot across the room. It splattered onto the cracked wall, the fiery toxin dissolving the outer layer and crackling over metal supports.

It must have been Cesmak. Kat’s rattled brain tried to make sense of what was going on. The weapon was gold, like all of the ones he had seen on her armor. Kaveh was hurt and enraged, and he could kill Lyall’s mother with his poisonous fire.

He could kill all of them with it.

Lyall rolled off Kat, shouting at him to run.

Kat had no intention of doing any such thing. He climbed to his feet, watching as Lyall walked toward Kaveh, presenting himself as a target and barking commands at his mothers in the hellhound language.

No, there wasn’t going to be any more of that sacrificial nonsense from Lyall.

Kat got a running start and slammed into Lyall, shoving him to one side. He had caught him off guard, and the normally agile hellhound staggered back.

“Kaveh, that is enough .” Kat didn’t like to yell at anyone, especially his best friend in terrifying dragon form, but he needed to get through to him.

“You have to cut out the fireworks right now, before you bring down the whole building on our heads. Remi might be injured, and we have to find him. I need the real you, and so does he.”

The giant head swung down low, and the Azdaha regarded him with one gleaming eye.

The massive coil of scales fell in on itself, and a moment later a nude and dusty Kaveh reached out to hug Kat.

“Thank you.” Kaveh pulled away but held on to Kat’s shoulders. “I needed—a connection to get back.”

“You’re hurt.” Lyall came up to him, and Kat noticed blood streaking down Kaveh’s leg. “My clan mate attacked you, and I bear full responsibility.”

“He’s also naked again.” That was Remi’s voice, a little slurred, and Kat glanced up to see the same spherical water portal hovering overhead. A drenched but human Remi dropped to the floor in a wet heap, followed by Teo, who landed gracefully in a crouch.

The hopper stared at Kaveh, eyes wide with terror, before pulling Remi to his feet and shoving him into Kaveh’s arms.

Kat could only guess at what had happened, but Teo must have worked with Lyric to move in and out of the room through a water portal.

Maybe Teo had only helped Lyall return to his hellhound form and rescued Remi to avoid being killed by a pair of hellhounds or an Azdaha drakone.

It didn’t matter. The flood of relief at seeing his friend alive bumped up Kat’s opinion of the hopper considerably.

Judging by Lyall’s surprised but pleased expression, he felt the same.

Teo gave them both a nod and jumped up to cling to an intact portion of the ceiling.

“Not that I’m complaining about the nudity.

” Remi’s legs buckled, and Kaveh tightened his grip to hold him upright.

“I might have hit my head harder than I thought.” He dabbed at Kaveh’s cheek with an arm covered in living leathers, succeeding only in turning the dust there into mud. “What did I miss?”

“Kat saved your worthless father’s life, I fought a duel with my alpha, and now I’m the head of my fucking clan.

” Lyall added that last part with extra emphasis as his mothers came up to him, both in humanoid form.

Cesmak looked wary and sullen, while Gremory had recovered her quirky curiosity about everything around her.