Page 16 of Scorched by Fate (Drakarn Mates #3)

SIXTEEN

SELENE

Vyne's growl vibrated through the stone beneath me just as a scream ripped through the air like shattering glass.

My mind scrambled to catch up as I jerked awake, muddled by the haze of sleep, but that scream—the shrill, fractured sound of it—dug hooks into my ribs and wrenched me into full awareness.

Burnt air clawed my throat, a rush of sulfur and steam making my lungs sting with each breath. Vyne was already moving, a shadow of coiled muscle and tension at my side.

I sat up too fast, nearly tangling myself in his wings as they flared wide. They blotted out what little morning light there was, stretching like shields over me while his claws flexed against the ground, nearly carving into the stone with the force of his restrained fury.

Another scream echoed, high and desperate. My stomach twisted.

That voice was human.

“Stay,” Vyne growled, not looking at me. Just one word, clipped and commanding.

“Wait—” My arm shot out, but too late. He moved faster than I could keep up, his entire frame lifting into the air with a single beat of his wings. Wind whipped over me as his shadow disappeared into the sulfur mist hanging above.

My pulse thundered in my ears.

Stay? Seriously?

Not in this fucking lifetime.

The scream echoed again, and instincts I couldn’t argue with shoved me upright.

The grip of fear clawed its way up my spine, but it was overrun by something heavier, louder. Move. My body, my muscles, every ounce of my awareness latched onto that need.

The ridges leading upward were unforgiving. Shards of volcanic rock scraped at my palms as I climbed, the grit slipping underneath my boots and threatening to spill me onto the unstable terrain below.

By the time I crested the ridge, I could barely think through the heat and the choking pressure in my chest. But my focus narrowed fast when I spotted the source of the chaos.

First, the woman. Ragged and trembling, trying to hold her ground even as her feet scraped against loose rubble edging toward a fissure. Her clothes were tattered, her bare arms streaked with grime, hair clinging to her sweat-soaked skin in uneven clumps.

She was human. There wasn’t any mistaking that.

Then her pursuer. He was Drakarn. His scales shimmered red, shot through with golden undertones. I didn't recognize him or the armor he was wearing. Was he one of the Drakarn from Ignarath that Vyne had mentioned?

He moved with almost lazy slowness, stalking toward her like the whole mountain belonged to him. And her? She was nothing to him but something breakable.

My heart, already pounding hard, lurched.

Far above them, the clash of wings and roaring snarls shattered the silence. Vyne. Locked midair with someone equally massive. Their bodies tangled into an overwhelming storm of claws and fangs that blurred beyond my ability to follow.

But it was the woman’s scream—the sharp, splintered crack of it—that dragged all my attention back. Her legs wavered beneath her, inching across the ridge. And that red-scaled bastard? He took another step forward, his pupils fixed on her with something too cruel and calculated to ignore.

I moved before I could think.

The knife Vyne had given me felt too small, too light in my hand as I gripped it tight enough to turn my knuckles white. What I wouldn't give for a gun right now.

Fear buzzed under my skin, clashing against the instinctive pull roaring through me to do something. My pulse hammered loud in my ears, drowning out everything but the scrape of my boots over the rock.

I descended the ridge, staying low, moving fast against the unstable ground. Shifting grit slipped underfoot, rock scraping against my palms and knees every time I braced myself against a drop too steep for balance.

Ahead of me, the red Drakarn shifted his weight forward, wings twitching just enough to draw attention to the brutal size of his frame. He stalked toward the human. It wasn’t a question if he was going to act, only when.

Another half-sob, half-choking sound wrenched its way out of the woman. She stumbled another inch backward, and her heel skidded dangerously close to the wide fissure cutting through the ridge.

Hot air hissed from steam vents near the cracks in the earth, the sound sharp and uneven enough to claw through my focus. My legs burned from the scramble, my breath coming too fast, flooding my lungs with sulfur-tainted air.

But there wasn’t time for pain, for doubt.

When I dropped the last few feet from the ridge and shoved myself between them, the red-scaled Drakarn finally noticed me. His head shifted, eyes locking onto me with a predatory calm.

I raised the blade to level with his chest.

“Get back,” I said, though the quaver in my voice betrayed something thinner than confidence.

The woman went still. Her breathing was still too loud, too ragged. I’d worry about that later.

The Drakarn drew in a breath through wide flared nostrils, his lips quirking upward enough to reveal serrated fangs.

“You’re either brave,” he drawled, voice dark and unnervingly smooth, “or stupid.”

“Try me.”

It wasn’t my cleverest line, but my grip tightened around the knife all the same. The edge of its hilt dug sharp into my palm as I shifted closer, as steady as I could force myself to be.

The red-scaled bastard chuckled, low and sharp as breaking rock. It wasn’t loud, but it hit heavy, curling out with enough force to vibrate through the ever-thinning space between us.

“Stand aside, human.” He tilted his head slowly, his tail flicking behind him with a few unhurried snaps. “This one is mine."

“Not anymore.” I took one step back. Far enough that he’d have to do more than swing lazily to reach me. For every inch I moved, though, it felt like I was sinking deeper into boiling water.

Behind me, I could feel her trembling. Her panic, her desperation, was a raw heat spilling into the space like the sulfuric air hissing dangerously from the nearest vents. She had to keep it together. If she made a break for it, there wasn’t anything I could do.

The Drakarn’s gaze burned, yellow and sharp, catching at the thin line of my knife like nothing more than child’s play.

For a moment, I thought maybe—maybe—he’d say something else. Some drawn-out breath of mockery to give me the chance to step back, shut him down before this could escalate even further.

But no.

His whole body shifted instead, his weight rolling forward into one swift strike.

It came fast—too fast. The whip of his tail lashed through the air a half breath before his claws could follow, spiking against the loose rubble ahead of him as I barely threw myself back far enough to evade.

Heat stole the air from my lungs, pulling a searing gasp out of me as my boots scraped against stone, and the knife twisted forward on instinct alone.

The strike didn’t land. He was faster, and his twisted grin made sure I knew it.

“Sloppy,” the Drakarn taunted.

I couldn’t waste time trading jibes with this beast, but it was everything standing between the woman and the narrowing sliver of rocky ridge left beneath us. I stepped forward again, blade steady, pulse anything but.

Come on, Vyne.

It was almost enough to keep him in place. Almost.

Then the sound hit.

The thump of a limp and heavy body crashing against unforgiving stone.

Then the roar.

Louder, more raw, deeper than my knife or his claw could have cut past.

It carried sharp across the ridge, rough and furious, breaking control of every sound or thought I’d tried to hold onto in the moment.

When Vyne came down from the air, it wasn’t calculated, smooth, or finely executed as I’d come to expect from him. This wasn’t control.

This was rage, and it hit with force enough to split the ridge wide beneath both Drakarn.

The red Drakarn bucked under Vyne's impact, claws scrabbling against crumbling rock as he reeled forward. His wings flared for balance, but Vyne didn’t let him recover. Talons locked deep into his opponent's shoulders, ripping downward in a vicious arc that sent blood splattering across the ridge.

The clash was deafening—snarls and bone-rattling roars that echoed around us. Vyne’s movements were sharp, relentless. Calculated violence gave way to unpredictability, and I caught the glint of his fangs as he lunged for the red-scaled warrior’s throat.

Air rushed past me in dizzying bursts that stole my breath. The fight was too fast, too brutal—green and red scales blurred in and out of the sulfur haze rising from the heat vents.

This wasn’t the Vyne I knew. His precision was still there, but it was wrapped in something unrestrained. Something that didn’t stop for control or reason.

My chest tightened painfully as I forced myself closer to the woman. Her ragged breathing was practically a wheeze now, audible even above the hiss of steam and the crashing of claws on stone.

"I'm here," I managed, my voice sharp and strained as I crouched low. My knees pressed into the unstable rock, hands tightening around the knife until the metal cut cold into my palm. She flinched at the sound of my voice, her eyes cutting toward me in recognition before another tremor in the ground wrenched her focus away.

Above us, the battle whirled in unpredictable surges. Vyne struck fast—aiming for weak points with brutal efficiency—but the red-scaled warrior lashed out harder, the weight of his strikes threatening to overpower Vyne’s speed.

A snap of wings. A hiss of claws. The silence of held breath before a tail cracked the air.

Vyne twisted mid-dodge, his wings beating downward in a ruthless push that drove his enemy farther back toward the ledge. His claws sliced clean along a vulnerable patch of scales near the other Drakarn’s chest, and the snarl that erupted in response sent a spark of panic rocketing through me.

I couldn’t look away. Couldn’t even blink.

The red-scaled warrior lunged, his claws reaching wide with a force that could crush bone—and barely missed. He stumbled under his own weight as Vyne rolled out of the way, dragging a second strike along the length of his enemy’s exposed side.

Blood splattered the ridge in dark streaks.

It was violent. Brutal. Terrifying.

The woman whimpered again behind me, tearing my attention away just long enough to see how badly she was shaking. Her hands clutched at her sides, fingers pale and trembling, her chest rising and falling too fast as she gasped for air she couldn’t seem to find.

“It's going to be okay,” I said to her firmly, keeping my voice low and steady despite the nauseating churn of dread in my stomach. “Just stay behind me. I’ve got you.”

Her head jerked in what might have been a nod—hesitant, broken—but her weight shifted forward like she meant to try. She didn’t say anything, her cracked lips trembling as her eyes darted between me and the fight above.

A hiss snapped my attention back to Vyne just in time to see the red-scaled warrior’s body twisting unnaturally at the ridge’s edge. A final swing—a desperate last strike—broke through Vyne’s attempts to pin him fully down, and the larger Drakarn’s wings flared wide as he slashed upward.

The blow grazed Vyne’s wing, ripping through the delicate membrane as he snarled and pressed in harder.

Together, their weight sent a tremor crashing through the ridge as the unstable ground beneath them buckled again.

“Vyne!” I shouted, my voice sharp enough to cut over the volcanic hiss.

He didn’t hear me—or if he did, his focus stayed locked entirely on his opponent.

His claws drove forward, ripping through the edges of armor-like scales and drawing a guttural, labored roar from the other Drakarn. Even through the blood, the snarling, and the unrelenting violence of the moment, Vyne’s purpose rang clear.

He wasn’t just fighting. He was finishing this.

The ridge groaned under their combined force, crumbling farther as the red-scaled warrior’s claws lost their grip.

But as the fight tipped all its weight into the battle above, it left the ground beneath me wobbling too close to breaking.

Another fissure split through the stone just inches behind my heels, and I grabbed the woman’s arm fast to pull us both back before the broken edge of the ridge could give way entirely.

Her hands clung tightly to my arm now, fingernails digging into my skin like she didn’t trust her own legs to hold her upright anymore.

I caught her eyes again.

“Please,” she begged softly, her voice cracking under the force of what should have been louder words. “Please, help me. Save me from these monsters.”