Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
MARI
I'm on a cold cement floor. I have been since I woke up.
I don't know how long it's been. The room is dark and damp.
I can hear the long-off whirring of machines that remind me of the dam, but they're different.
There's a smell in the air. Fumes. I haven't seen or heard anyone. I think I'm here all alone.
Metal cuffs dig into my wrists. I'm chained to a radiator in an old office with some rotting desks and computer equipment that's dusty, like storage room. There are shelves on one side with moldy, rotted cardboard boxes stacked up around them.
I try not to move because it makes the chains clang and I'm afraid that someone will remember I’m here and come. At the moment it feels like I’ve been forgotten, and I want to keep it that way for as long as possible until help arrives.
Do my dragons know I’m gone? They must by now. I sniffle. I can’t believe I let myself get taken like that. What an idiot.
I shuffle to sit against the wall. I can’t stand up, but I can lay down to un-crick my back at least. I rest my head against the freezing bricks. If I get out of this, I’m pretty sure I’ll never be warm again.
My stomach cramps again, and I try not to think of the implications of these pains that are coming at what I think might be regular intervals.
No, I can't think of that, not while I’m here alone.
I hear far off talking that begins to get closer, and I realize it's a male voice, but he must be on the phone because I can't hear who he's talking to.
‘Yeah. As promised.’
‘Of course. I wouldn't come without the Tribute, but I’m the one who keeps her, and I join your leadership board. That’s what we agreed. She will be at my side at the dinner.’
‘Yes, of course, I'll be there.’
He hangs up when he's close, and I see a silhouette looming at the door. He flicks a switch, and I hear a delayed snap and a light flickers on overhead. I get my first look at Aziel. He’s nowhere as tall or bulky as I expected.
In fact, he’s bordering on skinny. He doesn’t look lean, though, just weak.
His beard is short, and his eyes are cold.
The rest of his hair is blond, but greying a little at the temples, and I errantly wonder how many years dragons live before they go grey.
I guess if I ever get out of this, I can ask one of my dragons, but I try not to think of them right now. They’re coming. They have to be.
‘So, you must be Aziel,’ I say, raising my chin and looking at him defiantly.
He snorts at me, his eyes moving over me, lingering on my belly.
‘There was a time when your kind would at least give us Tributes who were unspoiled,’ he sniffs disdainfully and then rolls his eyes, ‘but I suppose a Tribute is a Tribute, so you'll have to do.’
He makes a noise of disgust.
‘What are you going to do with me?’ I demand.
‘You're coming with me. You're my in with the Sky Demons. He’s been wanting a female Tribute in his quiver for some time.’
I wonder who he is, but the dragon man doesn’t name names.
‘I don't understand. I’m just some human. I was chosen from a lineup by Tor,’ I snarl.
He tuts. ‘No. That may have been how it happened, but you were marked for it by the stars themselves. A Tribute is power and favor, and Drey gave you to his pathetic friends!’ he snarls. ‘You were meant to be mine!’
He sighs, a shaky hand coming up to smooth his hair and it seems to take a lot of effort for him to calm himself down.
‘But it doesn’t matter,’ he says with a wide, awful smile at me. ‘I’ve rectified Dreythos’ error. Now, you’re mine as you were meant to be and what you bring will be mine as well.’
There’s a righteous fervor in Aziel’s eyes and I realize two things from his words. One, he’s crazy. Two, the baby and I are in even more danger than I thought because he really believes this shit.
I need to buy time.
‘I don’t get it,’ I say. ‘Drey was gone. You had a faction. You were in charge. Why throw it all away?’
‘In charge? Of them?’ he sneers. ‘Those weak, pathetic excuses for warriors? They couldn’t even track down their own females after the bitches left!
My father wasn't even a part of the Stormriders. He was Sky Demon. But because my mother was here, this is where I was raised. Below the others, never strong enough to wield the power that I deserve. My half-brother, Titus, was a great warrior, a leader of the Sky Demons. It should have been me taking his place after he was slain, but instead, I was stuck here playing second fiddle to Morcai and then that asshole, Dreythos. Pathetic idiots. Fools. All of them! I am the one who can bring the Sky Demons into the modern day. I’m the one who will protect our kind from the humans. Me!’
He nods vigorously, filled with his own righteousness.
My stomach cramps again. ‘Can I go to the bathroom?’ I ask.
He blinks and frowns at me as I bring him back from his grand daydream about subjugating my kind to my mundane urinary needs.
He rolls his eyes and turns away. ‘Soil yourself for all I care. You’ll be hosed down after we arrive, I’m sure. Though, I suppose I'll have to wait until you've given birth to your whelp before I can take my rights as your master.’
‘Where are you taking me?’
But he doesn’t answer, clearly finished talking to me, muttering something about having to wait for ‘those two idiots.
I shiver as he turns away, hoping I’m found soon.
At the door, he looks down the hallway and his nostrils flare.
‘Impossible!’ he hisses.
He lunges back into the room and strides toward the radiator, taking a key from his pocket and opening the cuffs. He pulls me up, and I grab my belly with one hand as he hauls me along. I struggle to keep up, so he grabs me by my hair and pulls me along behind him.
I squeal and another cramp wracks my body. I bend over with a groan and wetness flows out of me, splattering to the floor.
I remember this. My heart leaps horribly. This was what happened to mom just before she was taken to the bed that she never got up from.
He recoils almost in horror, dropping my hair. ‘Did you piss yourself?’
‘My water broke!’ I snarl, terror of what comes next outweighing my now paltry fear of the weak dragon in front of me.
We hear another noise that echoes through the concrete hall like metal on metal. He takes hold of me again and hauls me toward an elevator.
I wonder why he doesn't just pick me up, but then I realize it's because he's not strong enough and I laugh at him weakly.
‘You really are spineless, aren't you?’ I goad, hoping that he'll stop in the corridor and monologue some more the way villains did in the old movies we used to watch.
He pushes me against the wall hard, and I just stop my face from meeting the brick with my hand. I turn around and stay where I am.
‘You could never have been a leader,’ I say. ‘You don’t have the strength.’
‘Shut up,’ he snarls. ‘You’re coming with me to the Sky Demons, and you will give me the standing that I have worked for!’
I hear someone yell my name from above us and I scream as loud as I can. Aziel springs forward and tries to stop me, but I somehow slip out of his grasp.
He turns too fast, and his back is to me for just a split second. Tor and Brax’s lesson from all those weeks ago comes back to me. My fingers track down his spine and I find that cleft next to the fifth vertebrae, the one that will give me precious time. I jab my finger into it hard.
He snarls and tries to twist around, but I grab onto him. He whirls me with him, and I don't let my finger move out of that tiny button that I know will take him down.
He falls to the wet floor, and I keep my finger where it is, hoping to kill him, but another contraction has my body jerking and my finger loses the spot. My hands are shaking so much that I can't find it again.
‘Son of a bitch,’ I mutter as I stand awkwardly and lope down the hallway in the direction of the sounds I heard.
I shout their names, and I hear them calling for me, but I don't know where they are in this labyrinth. I run through the door, and I smack right into Drey and Tor.
My eyes are wide and wild and full of tears as they exclaim over my sudden appearance. I grip onto them hard, and I point back down the hallway, ignoring their questions.
‘I’m fine. He’s down there. Don’t let him get away.’
Drey squeezes my arms and nods, taking off after his nemesis. I sink against Tor, holding my stomach and letting out a low moan. I'm safe, but I'm not safe.
I know down to the very fiber of my being that delivering this baby is going to kill me, just like it killed my mother.
I sink down, panting hard. Everything's shaking. I can't breathe. I hear Tor shouting next to me. I think he’s on the phone, but I can’t figure out the words. Where’s Del? She promised that she would be here to help me. She told me she wouldn’t let me die.
‘Mari? Shit! Mari? We need to get her back Now! Call Del!’
My dragon didn’t want to leave Mari, not even with Tor. I don’t understand, but I don’t have time to argue with him about it, so I push him down as I run after Aziel. We can’t leave him alive. He’s too much of a threat to our mate. And our faction.
He’s already at the top of the stairs and I lunge after him, taking as many as I can at a time, but on the roof, he’s already transformed. The coward won’t even fight me. He’s trying to make his escape.
I roar into the wind. And I leap into the air, changing too low and taking out half the old roof as I do. I hear it falling in behind me as I beat my wings hard, climbing high and gaining on him easily.
I tackle him in midair. He rolls and we fall towards the earth.
He's grabbing me, holding me in front of him. I scratch at him, taking a chunk out of his shoulder, and he roars. I slip out from under him and sail upwards on the current, looping around to find him ascending rapidly up into the thick clouds ahead. He hopes to lose me in them. I can’t let that happen.