Page 40 of Wild Bond (Wild Bond #1)

T here was a horrible, sickening crunch. I jerked in the saddle before a sharp pain pierced my side and my lower leg was crushed under a large weight. Almost immediately the weight lifted as Skye went limp beneath me. She had intentionally taken the brunt of the impact, and the intense wave of agony that was coming from Skye suddenly cut off as she surrendered to unconsciousness.

My stomach plummeted as Skye’s large body tumbled the several dozen feet to the ground. Luckily—or perhaps unluckily—we scraped and slid most of the way down, rather than a straight fall.

Thankfully my legs were latched firmly in the saddle, and I was able to stay mostly upright without breaking my very fragile human neck.

Worry for Skye pierced through me. When she finally slid to a stop, coming to rest partially on top of a large boulder, I released myself from the saddle straps and rolled ungracefully off her back.

The wind howled, whipping my hair in my face as I scrambled to my feet. The pain in my leg was excruciating as I tried to put weight on it, and I guessed something had to be either sprained or broken. My side ached whenever I took a deep breath, and I could feel warm blood dripping through my fingers when I probed it through the leathers.

I touched my shaking hand to Skye’s flank where she lay sprawled behind me, wings spread wide, head tipped to the side, emerald eyes closed. She was still alive, but because she was unconscious and her mind blank in the bond, I had no way of knowing where she was injured. Dragons were tough but not invincible, and even though I couldn’t visually see anything wrong, I knew there had to be some injury.

I could still hear the yells and roars above us as riders fought and dragons from both sides shot flames into the night amidst the thunder and lightning, as the battle raged on.

I was hardly aware of any of this though as I cried in the bond, Skye? Skye, come on! Wake up! Other than a faint twitch of her head, she lay unmoving.

Everything in me wanted to stay with her, but I had to concentrate on the threat. Spinning around, I pulled two daggers from their sheaths at my waist. The rogue rider and her dragon had crashed as well and fallen not too far away. I faced her as she was getting to her feet, the fall appearing to have done less damage to her than to me, thanks to her full armor. Still, the burn on her shoulder looked bad.

I looked behind her to where her dragon lay unmoving, and my heart sank.

The dragon was dead, the female’s long neck lying at an awkward angle. And even though, technically, the dragon had been the enemy, I still felt the loss. Losing even one dragon was a tragedy—a tragedy I was placing squarely on the shoulders of this mystery rider.

A rider who stood so calmly next to her dead, bonded dragon. If that had been Skye . . . I couldn’t imagine how she was remaining so calm and unaffected.

“Who are you?” I demanded, taking a step closer and cursing at the pain in my leg. She held a sword, but the way it hung awkwardly at her side made me think she had little experience with it. If I could just get close enough . . .

The rider just laughed. “Do you really think I would reveal that to you?”

No, I didn’t. But her blade was still lowered and held loosely at her side, and I had made it another step closer.

“Why are you doing this, then?” I asked, instead of answering her. “You’re dragon riders. Why are you attacking us here? Why now?”

She said nothing.

“The fact that you waited to attack until nearly half of us had already gone home implies some knowledge of what goes on at Three Points. Are you after someone in particular?”

“No,” she replied simply. I couldn’t see her face, but I could hear the smug grin in her voice.

“So, the fact that the future leaders from all three kingdoms are here right now had nothing to do with it? If your attack is successful, you could possibly take them all out in one fell swoop.”

The woman laughed, and there was something unhinged and possibly familiar in the sound as she answered with a shake of her head. “That was someone else’s idea. I just needed a way to test out whether the bonds were working, and this opportunity was too good to pass up.”

See if the bonds were working? Someone else’s idea?

“Whose idea?” I demanded, wondering if she was just cocky enough to tell me.

She took a sliding step toward me on the rocky ground, and I was careful to mirror her movements. I forced the pain in my leg, my worry for Skye, and for Rake, and all those fighting above us into the background for now.

“Uh-uh-uh,” she tutted waving her sword tip back and forth before her. “You’ll have to discover that for yourself, Rin.”

“You know me?” I asked, inching forward the slightest bit more. Part of me even wondered for a wild moment if this woman was the queen, but then, dismissed the thought. The sound of this woman’s voice, and the way she moved and carried herself, suggested a much younger woman. Not to mention the queen walked with a cane.

“Of course, I know you,” she snapped. “By now there probably aren’t many in the three kingdoms who don’t. And don’t come any closer!” she warned, her voice rising to a slightly nervous shout.

I had managed to shuffle my way over so that now we only stood a few yards apart. Deciding to divert her attention, I gestured to the battle being waged overhead, keeping a hand still fisting a dagger pressed to the bleeding wound at my side. “It doesn’t appear to be going so well for your forces. Your plan—whatever it is—is failing.”

She shrugged, again not seeming concerned that even now the riders she led were dying above us. “The bonding potion works. That’s all I care about.” She waved a dismissive hand upward. “They are unimportant. I can make as many riders as I want.”

“Bonding potion?” I repeated in confusion. Glancing over to where the broken body of her dragon lay behind her, I again wondered how this rider hadn’t reacted to the fact that her dragon had just been killed. In fact, it didn’t seem to matter to her at all. She should be nearly catatonic with grief. I knew I would be, if it were Skye . . . unless the bond with her dragon . . . the bond wasn’t real.

What she had said about making her own riders finally sank in. Horror hit me as realization dawned. “You-you’ve created a potion that forces a bonding?”

She shrugged again. “I had some help, and it’s a little more complicated than that, but yes,” she answered calmly; as if what she was admitting to wasn’t a heinous crime against nature, against the very fabric of the world as we knew it—and a perversion of the worst kind. To force a dragon to bond with someone who was not their rider, to manipulate a connection that was so pure . . . the very idea made me shudder with revulsion. Then my mind went to the people who would decide to be a part of such a horrible thing. To allow themselves to be bonded in such a way . . . unless of course they were forced as well. Then they would be victims just as much as the drag—

I felt sick to my stomach.

“The people,” I breathed, swallowing hard. “The people who have been kidnapped or gone missing . . .” My mind thought of all those people from Dessin and all over Baldor. Borden and all the other victims . . . Lessa and the other children. Then I thought of the dragon we found chained up in the woods, and the dragon who was even now locked down at the compound, the dragon who had gone crazy, most likely from this vile potion.

I glared at the woman before me. “It was you.” Everything. All the clues, the trail Rake and I had been following and piecing together for months. “It was all you,” I repeated. “You forced those people and those dragons to—” I couldn’t even finish the sentence.

She said nothing, and a cold anger quickly overcame me. With a cry of rage, I leapt forward, ignoring the burning pain in my leg. The woman stumbled back, not expecting the sudden attack. I was able to swipe the weapon out of her hand easily with one of my blades, while holding the other to her throat.

She went still as I sheathed my other dagger, and in a single move, ripped the helmet from her head. As the rider’s face was revealed, I almost— almost —lowered the dagger in shock.

“ Mercedes ?” I breathed in utter disbelief to see the princess of Baldor staring back at me, with an unrecognizably mocking smile on her face. A face that was bare of glasses, I noted absently.

“Not who you were expecting, I’m sure,” she taunted.

“But . . . but why?” I demanded. My shock gave way to the seething anger once again. “Why would you do this?”

She shrugged again. “I told you why.”

I opened my mouth to argue that I had no idea why in the Nine Realms she would do such a thing, when I remembered our conversation during tea with the queen.

“You wanted to become a dragon rider?” I said in disbelief. “ That’s why you did all this?” I gestured to the sky above us.

It appeared that many of the real dragon riders had realized the rogue riders weren’t trained, and they’d changed tactics. They were no longer outright attacking, only defending themselves or evading.

The only reason the fight was even lasting so long was because I could tell the dragon riders were trying their best not to hurt the younger, inexperienced dragons who didn’t know what they were doing. My heart lurched at the thought that they had been forced to bond and were being manipulated somehow by Mercedes, and whoever was helping her.

“Yes,” she confessed baldly. Then her face crinkled with confusion, and her eyes narrowed. “I thought you of all people would understand. Being elevated from a prisoner and a thief to a dragon rider and everything that comes with it. It must have been a dream come true. Who wouldn’t want that? Before you bonded, wouldn’t you have given anything for that opportunity?”

“Not at the expense of other people’s lives!” I argued. “Nothing is worth that.”

“I disagree,” she said calmly. “And besides, the people I took for my experiments were nobodies. Low-lifes that were contributing little, if anything, to society. They won’t be missed.”

I thought of the people she was describing. People like Borden or Lessa or other poor orphans—people like me before Skye found me. A fresh wave of disgust rippled through me, and I almost didn’t recognize the cold voice as my own as I inquired, “And the dragons? What about them? They aren’t low-lifes, as you call them. They’re innocent creatures.”

For the first time, something like true remorse came over her face. “A regrettable necessity. Though their sacrifice will not be in vain now that we have the potion.”

“You really think your mother will condone the death of so many dragons? So many of her own subjects?”

“Once I show my mother what the potion can do—that we can use it to create all the dragon riders we want—she won’t care. It will make us the most powerful kingdom in Palasia.”

“And what about kidnapping me?” I gritted out, having just realized she had to be behind that as well. I was unable to keep from grabbing the front of her armor and shaking her. Right then I could have cared less that she was a princess. She had just admitted to killing and kidnapping dozens of people, not to mention dragons. “Why? I’m already bonded. What help could I be to your experiments? And why put me in the trials?”

“I decided to speed up my plans after our conversation by the dragon. I knew from your questions you were on to what we were doing, and I decided to kidnap you while the other riders—and especially that spymaster—were away. I wasn’t sure how much you knew. If those Zehvitian cutthroats we hired hadn’t blundered your initial kidnapping so badly, I would not have had to take matters into my own hands in such a way.”

“That was you?” I demanded. Thinking back to how Valla, Zade, and I had all almost been killed. Zehvi hadn’t been behind the attack after all. It was Mercedes. It had always been Mercedes.

“Of course,” she admitted without an ounce of guilt. “We have several other elixirs we are working on developing, and I thought testing them on a naturally bonded dragon rider would be informative. But when I finally did manage to test them on you, you were impervious to most of them . . . even when I gave you a stronger dose.

“I knew then I should just get rid of you. You and your dragon were of no further use to me. I had already had to kill that crime lord to keep him from blabbing. But you, you had been so nice to me . . . I couldn’t bring myself to kill you outright. I knew there would be no risk of you remembering anything—no one ever does—so I thought, what better way to deal with you than throwing you into the trials? That way you would at least have a fighting chance to survive, and if you died, it wasn’t my fault.” She shrugged again and I found myself wanting to slap her for it—for the sheer indifference of the gesture.

But then she continued, “We were already close by. Flying you over and sneaking you in was no problem with his help.” Mercedes didn’t seem to be even talking to me anymore as she spoke. How had I not noticed how mad she was?

“ His help?” I asked.

She stared at me, as if startled I was still there, then waved away my question. “Not important.”

“Do you mean Prince Pierce?”

“My brother?” Her condescending laughter echoed around us. “You honestly thought he was behind all of this?” She shook her head as if the suggestion was ridiculous. “Though I’ll admit he does seem the type, he would never be able to accomplish what I have with the potion. He’s too arrogant and short-sighted to ever conceive of such a thing.”

“You’re right. Not even he could conceive of doing something so perverted and evil.”

For the first time, a flash of real fury lit her delicate features, but then it smoothed out like it had never been.

Skye began stirring in the bond, not yet to full wakefulness, but close. Pure relief filled me as I turned my head in her direction.

It was only a moment, a fraction of a second that I was distracted, but Mercedes took advantage of it.

Grabbing my wrist, she pushed back from the dagger while simultaneously stomping down on my injured foot. Hot, fiery pain reverberated up my leg, and I cried out. She then hit me hard in my bleeding side, harder than I would have thought her capable of.

I crumpled to one knee, my injured leg no longer able to support my weight. Gasping through the blinding pain, I still saw the kick coming and was able to block it by dropping my knife and gripping her foot before it made contact.

A familiar presence came to full awareness in the back of my mind, but I was barely conscious of it as I used my superior strength to toss Mercedes to the ground. The fact that even injured I was able to overpower her just proved that, whatever polluted bond she had with her dragon, it couldn’t compare with the real thing.

Mercedes scrambled to her feet as if to flee, but I dove forward, grasping her ankle, and watched her hit the ground hard.

She screamed in fury as she grasped something in her hand that lay on the ground.

My dagger, I realized too late.

I rolled to my back as she rose over me. The dagger was clutched in her shaking fist, her face a mask of maniacal rage, an insane light shining in her wide eyes.

“I’m sorry it had to come to this,” she panted, raising the knife.

I grew still, waiting for the knife to plunge downward, intent on blocking the blow with the other dagger I held concealed beneath my thigh, but it turned out not to be necessary.

A vicious roar split the night a second before a blur of jade scales smothered my vision, followed by Mercedes’ terrified scream that cut off abruptly.

I blinked in surprise, suddenly staring up at a view of the cloudy night sky partially obscured by one shimmering jade wing.

Skye’s emotions assaulted me, sharp and thick, first rage, followed quickly by a fierce protectiveness that soaked into every part of me. The instinctual need to keep her rider safe was so much a part of her that it overshadowed anything else.

I turned my head just in time to see Skye’s head lift from the now dead body of the princess, and a pungent satisfaction at having dealt with the threat washed over me. As she turned her long neck back to look at me, I tried not to focus on the blood covering part of her snout.

Her sinuous body turned until she stood over me. Her head lowered and her breath wafted against my hair as she scented me, reassuring herself I was all right.

I took a deep breath and allowed my eyes to close for an instant. “You didn’t have to kill her, you know,” I told Skye out loud. “I had a plan.”

A rumbling growl was Skye’s only answer. It didn’t even enter her mind to feel guilty over her actions; she had successfully protected me from a threat, and that was the end of it. I tried to feel some sympathy for Mercedes but couldn’t bring myself to at the moment. Distantly, I wondered whether there would be any repercussions for Skye killing a princess of the realm, but considering what Mercedes had done here today, I thought not.

I assessed Skye in the bond and could feel that her injuries were superficial, though the fact that she had been knocked out concerned me. She assured me she was fine and thought my worrying about her was unnecessary.

Raindrops finally began to fall, but I just lay there and let them soak into my clothes and hair. Another moment passed before I told myself I had to open my eyes and get up, even if my side was killing me and my ankle was throbbing. They might need our help. Though from the sounds of it and what I had glimpsed earlier, I had a feeling the other riders had the battle pretty much under control.

As if to attest to that, as I opened my eyes and Skye moved back so I could stand on my feet—or foot, rather—a familiar dark shape separated from the battle and headed straight for us. Skye and I didn’t have to wait long before Rake and Naasir alighted at the top of a small incline of rock not far away. Rake dismounted and made his way over to me. He barely even glanced at Mercedes body where it lay on the ground before his gaze came to rest on me. He took in my bloody side and how I was leaning against Skye for support and favoring one leg.

He, of course, still looked perfect. His black hair was a little wet and windblown, and the blade in his hand was covered in blood, but it all just made him look more deadly and attractive.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

“Why am I always the one who’s injured?” I grumbled petulantly. Not that I wanted Rake to ever be hurt, but it still felt a little unfair.

Despite the situation, a glint of humor lit his eyes as he relaxed. “Your reckless penchant for trouble comes to mind.” Before I could refute this claim, he motioned backward with his head towards Mercedes. “I take it there is a good reason for that?”

Naasir moved toward Skye, making an odd humming noise in his throat as he butted his head against hers, the gesture almost affectionate. The sight warmed something in me that had grown cold after the night’s events.

Finally, I looked back at Rake and sighed. “Skye was protecting me. She thought my life was in danger.” Rake sheathed his sword, stepped closer, and took me in his arms, mindful of my injuries as he did so. The warmth of his arms around me felt amazing, the comfort of his mere presence seeping into me like I was a desert in need of water.

“She was behind it all, Rake,” I said against his chest. “It wasn’t Pierce. It was her all along.” Thunder cracked loudly overhead as if to punctuate my statement, and the rain began in earnest.

“We don’t have to talk about it right now,” Rake murmured in my hair, his large hand coming up to cup the back of my head. “We need to get you inside to see a healer.”

“Not yet,” I protested, clinging to him. “Can we just . . . stay like this? Just for a while longer?”

I didn’t want to have to go inside just yet. I knew that once I did, there would be lots of questions, and other people needing to know what happened, and I didn’t want to face that just then. I didn’t want to think about those poor people Mercedes had subjected to such an awful fate, especially those we fought here tonight. I prayed that Lessa wasn’t among them, but then was she being held somewhere else? My worry for her was like a constant ache in my gut. And then I thought of the dragons . . . it made me want to have Skye kill her all over again. I hoped we would be able to find a way to help those that had been given the potion before they succumbed to its deadly outcome. Then again, maybe Mercedes had resolved that issue since she had taken the potion herself.

But I forced myself not to think of all that right now. Rake didn’t answer, he just held me tighter. I felt his lips press into my hair.

I wasn’t sure how long we stood like that, finding a moment of peace in the chaos around us, watched over by our dragons.