Page 61 of Valor’s Flight (The New Protectorate #5)

An examination of the guard proved mostly useless. He was dressed in basic hunting gear, but had nothing in his pockets. No tags, no tattoos. The only interesting things about him was that his hair was shaved close in a soldier’s style and that he wore a plain gold chain around his neck.

A dragon who looks like Jaak and a handful of witches. Did he hire mercenaries?

Pulling some old, salvaged cord from his pocket, Taevas quickly bound the man’s wrists to his ankles before dragging him into the bushes. He’d probably live, but Taevas wasn’t particularly concerned one way or the other.

Slinging the rifle’s strap over his shoulder, he ripped open the driver’s door.

The vehicle was brand new and obviously luxurious, with a spacious back seat, leather interior, and a navigation panel that came with autonomous capabilities.

Taevas had been in enough cars like it to recognize the particular warp of the windows as being bolt-proof.

Aside from its defensive capabilities, it was a bizarre choice for a getaway vehicle, and even stranger for an abduction.

Autonomous vehicles were flashy and easily traceable, whereas an older model wouldn’t have been noticed on the road.

Clearly, someone in this operation had more money than sense.

What the fuck is happening here?

Taevas’s mind spun, but he still made sure to find the key fob skillfully hidden in the cup holder, of all places. Leaving it there, he popped the trunk and circled around the back.

Inside was everything he expected: dragon-ready restraints, a black bag, a rolled up tarp, a biometrically locked hatch holding what he could only assume was more weapons, and a small plastic case.

Within the case, he found nearly a dozen capped syringes of what looked like two different medications.

He recognized one as a powerful sedative, but the other was unlabeled.

Taevas’s lips thinned. It didn’t take a genius to guess that whatever was in those unlabeled syringes was the suppressant. His skin crawled just holding it.

As he aged, he’d learned that there was no true honor in war or fighting, but there was something truly vile about drugging an opponent.

His first impulse was to empty the case onto the dirt and slam his heel down on them, rendering them useless. But now wasn’t the time for morals.

His Chosen had been threatened. Nothing, not even his honor, mattered more than that.

Shoving a handful of syringes into his pockets, he quietly shut the trunk. His gaze darted to the trees. Worry for Alashiya pulsed with every beat of his heart.

I could end this now, he thought, bracing a hand on the hood of the vehicle. I could take this car, track her down, and we could run.

He wanted to. By all the gods, he wanted to.

But if he left now, the car would almost certainly be tracked by Sergei from the air.

If he picked up Alashiya without finishing things, he’d put her in even more danger.

They could be chased. Run off the road. Hunted from above by a dragon who probably wouldn’t hesitate to burn the vehicle and anyone in it.

Regret tasted like bile on his tongue. Taevas couldn’t help but wonder if he’d made the wrong decisions.

If he’d taken the risk of being surveilled and just called someone from the Thompsons’ phone, would any of this have happened?

What if he’d just left on his own with a promise to return for his Chosen?

He couldn’t escape the feeling that he’d messed everything up. His people and his Chosen needed him to make the right decisions, but he couldn’t. The great Isand, who’d united the clans and signed the Peace Charter — a failure at the one thing that truly mattered in life.

And now Alashiya was out there somewhere on her own, afraid and angry with him. If he never saw her again—

No. No. That wasn’t an option.

Taevas shook himself and turned back toward the house. Following a different trail than the one he’d used before, he got back to the yard just in time to see Sergei gesturing harshly for his men to search the woods.

Gods, I hope Shiya got off the property.

All he wanted to do was slink into the trees and take out the guards one by one, making sure no one would be able to hunt her down, but he forced himself to trust her instincts.

The only reason he had been able to find her when she hid was because he was intimately familiar with her scent.

If those men were as human as they looked, witch or arrant, they wouldn’t have that advantage.

She was a nymph. A queen. They could walk within a few inches of her and be none the wiser. He had to believe that.

Taevas watched the men stalk into the darkness between the trees.

He held his breath as a shudder passed through the leafy canopies.

Perhaps it was a breeze, but something felt different.

While he’d always gotten the sense that the forest was alive and hostile, it didn’t compare to the electric current of menace that pervaded the air.

The forest hadn’t exactly been kind to him when he chased Alashiya down, but it hadn’t felt like this.

Perhaps it was because it’d known he didn’t mean her any harm.

Maybe it sensed the connection between them or that to some degree Taevas had been imbued with her essence and recognized him as belonging to her.

These men had no such claim.