Page 35

Early the next morning, so early it was still late, a roar woke me. I bolted upright and stared at the ceiling. Stone dust rained down on me, forcing me to hunch and hide my eyes. Another roar came, and I felt it in my chest.

“Kas,” I whispered.

He's close. He's coming for me. The thoughts sent a shivering rush of emotion through my body. I didn't want to be the King's weak human mate who had to be rescued. That being said, knowing that Kas was doing everything he could to get me back made me feel damn good. It made that glowing warmth in my chest burn brighter. To be wanted like that, to have someone search endlessly for you when you went missing, to know that they wouldn't want to go on if they couldn't find you—it was fucking satisfying. It shouldn't have been. I shouldn't admit that it was. But it's the truth. I felt empowered by Kaspian's need for me. Because I needed him back.

Standing up, I went back to staring at the ceiling. Under the thunderous anguished sound of my lover looking for me were other noises. Feet running. Voices raised in horror. Had Kas actually found me? The roar moved away. I could feel him there. Above me. Circling. Could he feel me too? Kas shrieked. The ground shuddered.

“Oh, fuck. Is he going to literally tear apart the city to find me?”

People screamed. I didn't think it was my Tyasmoran captors. Kaspian was terrorizing his citizens. Those poor people were up there, running for their lives because the King was losing his shit over his missing mate. This wasn't the best PR for Kas, but I didn't think he cared.

Then other roars came. I felt my mate's fury. Something cracked. Thundered. The building shook. With wide eyes, I realized that Kaspian's guards were trying to reel him in. A fucking Dragon fight. No, a dragon fight with a little D. And that was even worse.

“Kaspian!” I shouted. “Kas, I'm here!”

I stared at that fucking vent. I had tried for over an hour the night before to scratch a ledge out of the seam so I could use the bone to pry it open. It hadn't worked. But I wasn't giving up. And now was the time to try again.

I grabbed the bone from under my pillow, stood on the bed, and dug into the faint seam with the sharp end. It snapped. I kept digging. Kas kept roaring.

Then the roaring faded.

“No!” I cried and dug faster. “Come on, Kas. I'm right here. I can feel you. Why can't you feel me?”

In a panic, I gripped the bone with my fist and dug like a fucking savage. Fragments of stone broke off. Pieces of bone turned to dust. Then, suddenly, a chunk of stone cracked off and fell. I stopped to gape at it, denting my pillow. Then, with a growl, I slammed the blunt end of the bone onto the vent.

The whole thing fell.

I jerked out of the way just before the stone panel brained me. Then I looked up into the darkness. I had a path out, but how was I going to get into it? I hadn't thought that far ahead.

“Fuck,” I muttered as I felt inside the shaft.

It went straight up.

I jumped off the bed and tossed the bone away. The stone panel was on the floor in pieces. I wasn't worried about the crash alerting my captors. The noise had been drowned out by dragon roars. But now those roars were growing faint. And with the evidence of my escape attempt in shards on the floor, a second chance became an impossibility. It was now or never.

In desperation, I yanked the mattress off the bed and lifted the wooden frame onto the foot, leaning it against the wall. It formed a makeshift ladder—slats becoming rungs. I climbed the ladder up into the ventilation shaft. Once inside, I had to take a moment for my eyes to adjust. But then I grinned.

The shaft only went up a foot before it turned sharply. I grabbed the ledge and hoisted myself up. Shaking my head, I crawled along the shaft. A magical city full of magical people but their buildings still had to follow the laws of nature. Rooms needed air flow. Especially underground rooms.

The shaft angled upward. I crept along it until I reached a metal grate. The ground floor. Cocking my head, I listened and peered through the grate. The room was full of shelves with crates stacked on them. Some sort of storeroom. Maybe it wasn't the ground floor. If this was the basement, then I'd been below it. No wonder Kas couldn't smell me.

I pushed on the grate. It held firm.

Shit. Something else I hadn't thought of. Furious, I reacted automatically and punched the grate. The thing went flying into one of the crates. I gaped at the metal panel, lying on its side amid a waterfall of grain that flowed from the crate it had shattered. Then I looked at my fist. The broken skin of my knuckles pulled together before my eyes.

“Fucking Dragon essence. That stuff is amazing.” I crawled out of the vent just as I heard footsteps coming down the nearby stairs.

I ran behind a freestanding shelf and hid.

Two of the Tyasmorans came into the room. One of them instantly spotted the mess I made.

“What the fuck?”

“Maybe it got knocked over when the King hit the house with his tail.”

“That's a grate.”

They moved toward the vent. Right in front of my shelf. I set my hands on the shelf and shoved with all my new Dragon might.

The shelf toppled with ease. Not just toppled, it slid forward several feet and then toppled. The men had a second to cry out, but then their cries were muffled by all the shit they had on that shelf.

A roar came. Closer this time.

I looked up. My chest tingled. Kas. I ran to the stairs.

Halfway up, the doorway at the top filled with Tyasmorans. I paused. Groaning came from behind me.

“How did you get out?” Enor gaped at me.

“It doesn't matter. We need to get him back below the ward before the King locates him!” Valen rushed me.

I jumped backward, off the steps, and landed on the overturned shelf. Groans turned into painful grunts below me. Debris stabbed and slashed at me, but I scrambled away, ignoring the pain. As soon as I got clear of the wreckage, I climbed to my feet and searched for a weapon. Not much to be had. So I took a wooden box from a shelf and tossed it at Valen.

It hit him in the face. In. The. Face.

Valen shrieked and jerked back. Holding his bloody face, he shouted, “Get him! Kill him if you have to. We can't let the King find him!”

There went his promise not to hurt me. But I guess that had been broken when they first smothered me.

I scurried around another shelf. A box of glass bottles caught my eye. I picked up the entire box and launched it at Enor. Glass broke, and Enor growled. The bottles had been full of liquid and the stuff soaked him. I grabbed another crate and tossed it at him before he could recover. It, too, was full of bottles containing liquids. Cracking, gushing, and then Enor started to smoke.

Enor looked down at himself as his friends came up behind him to help. My eyes widened. Two liquids combining and instantly releasing vapors? That wasn't a good sign. So, instead of holding back, I rushed them. I didn't want to be on the trapped side of Enor.

Just as I got even with Enor, right as his buddies reached for me, that stinky smoke turned into flames—a chemical reaction that any science teacher would have been proud of. I could hear Mr. Ellis from eighth-grade science class in my head. “Science is cool!”

Or hot, as the case may be.

Screaming in shock, all three men reeled back—Enor falling to the floor. Shelves caught on fire. The other Tyasmorans caught on fire. Everything fucking burst into flames as I took the stairs two at a time and tried not to be flammable.

I emerged into sunlight, smoke and flames bursting at my back, and instinctively slammed the door shut. Off-kilter, I went reeling across the room. And right into the middle of a group of Tyasmorans.

I caught my balance, grinned, and said, “It's been a slice, boys. But my mate's calling. Gotta go!”

From behind the shut door, men screamed. One of the Tyasmorans ran for it.

“No!” I shouted. “Don't open it!”

He didn't listen.

I ran, barreling aside anyone who tried to stop me because—

Boom!

It wasn't just a buildup of fire using up its oxygen. It was also a chemical fire. And chemicals turn fire into a freak. The backdraft was strong enough to create sound. Shit, maybe all those magic components in the lower basement compounded the effect. Whatever happened to create that magnificent explosion, it took out several more of my captors. While the rest were shouting, I ran toward the front door.

When I was halfway down the corridor, the entire wall and part of the ceiling gave way, crumbling along with the front door. I backpedaled, arms waving to clear the air, and squinted upward. Through dust and raining debris, a pair of glowing green eyes stared at me. Dragon eyes. A glossy white head pierced the haze, bringing those eyes closer. They widened, then focused behind me. And narrowed.

A talon the size of a truck reached into the opening and grabbed me. As Kas drew me out like a prize from a vending machine, he breathed in. Deeply. I cringed, thinking he was going to roast all those Tyasmorans. Instead, he put out the fire that had already spread upstairs.

“Take them!” Kaspian snarled and drew back.

Armored soldiers raced through the opening Kas had made and apprehended the surviving Tyasmorans. Meanwhile, Kaspian clutched me to his chest, drew back on his haunches, and then launched us into the air.

The city spread beneath me, and the damage of a deranged dragon was revealed. All right, not deranged, but definitely enraged. Several buildings in the Tyasmoran neighborhood bore the signs of dragon ire. They were all still standing—likely thanks to Kaspian's guards—but it was clear that Kas had been zeroing in on my location and didn't give a fuck about property damage.

I laid my face on one giant claw and sighed. It was a partial escape and partial rescue. We'd been partners in gaining my freedom. How perfect was that? But it wasn't why I sighed. Kas wasn't the only one who had gotten anxious about our separation. Being near to him again calmed me. Everything was all right now—that's what my heart was saying.

Seconds later, Kas landed in the castle courtyard and quickly shifted into his man's body. Even as he shifted, he held me, folding around me until he was hugging me tightly—arms wrapped around me and head folded over mine.

“Mate,” he whispered and let out a long breath. “You are safe.”

“Hey, babe.” I squeezed him back. “That was good timing. I had just gotten free. They had me hidden under a spell. I heard you roaring and broke out.”

“I know.” He drew back enough to look at me. “I felt you near, but I couldn't find you. And then you were there—brightness in my soul. As if the sun rose inside me.”

“In your soul, eh?” I grinned.

“In my soul.” He leaned down.

I met his lips halfway. Instead of the passion that usually burst between us, I felt something softer. Tender. His hands cupped my face. His warmth invaded me. Everything else fell away. My heart pounded rapidly, reaching for his. And this time, his heart reached back.

Light and joy exploded in my chest to shoot through my body. Kaspian sighed into my mouth. His hands slid down my throat, then to my back. He enclosed me in himself. His scent filled my head. Kaspian's flesh filled my hands. And his essence filled my soul. Yeah, my soul.

Gasping, we eased back and stared at each other.

“You love me,” he declared.

“Aw, man!” I jerked back. “You just fucking ruined the moment. God! Why do you do that?”

Kaspian chuckled and pulled me back into his arms. I stiffened, but then he brushed our lips together. “I love you too, Met.”

I went still.

Kas leaned back to look at me.

I saw the truth in his eyes. Felt it surging from him in demanding waves. Of course, his love would be aggressive. It couldn't be anything less.

“Well, since you used my nickname, I guess I can forgive you.”

“Forgive me? For what?”

“For being a dick!” I pointed at him. “You ruined the best moment of my life.”

“It will not be the best moment of our lives for long.” Kaspian smirked and took my hand. “We have much to look forward to.”

“Yeah, uh.” I looked him over, then glanced over my shoulder at all the castle guards who were getting an eyeful of my man. “Let's get you dressed first. No need to share your goodies with the public.”

Kas looked at me, then at our audience, and grinned. One of his knights landed, blocking the view, and then shifted, giving the soldiers something else to stare at. Me as well. Kaspian instantly noticed my focus and lost his smirk. Seeing Sir Vadron in all his masculinity, Kas growled and lifted me off my feet to toss over his shoulder.

I laughed the entire way to his bed. He loved me. I won. Game over.