Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
Cinder-Kiln Tavern, in the middle of the town square, blazed with light, raucous voices spilling out whenever its door swung open. The contrast between the energy in there and the hushed streets made Ash’s skin crawl.
Race pulled his hood lower—keeping his telltale hair hidden—and shoved the wooden door open. The common room hit them with a wall of heat and noise. Smoke from the massive stone fireplace hung thick near the ceiling beams, and the smell of spiced ale drenched the air.
Armored soldiers sprawled at tables overflowing with beakers, their helmets hooked over chair backs. The few non-shifters inside hugged the shadowy edges of the room, nursing their drinks.
Race ushered her to a table set against the far end. A shiver rushed through her as predatory eyes tracked their every step. Ash hastily dropped into a chair at the table scarred with claw gouges and scorch marks. Race took the one beside her, his back to the wall.
Attor and Koal arrived moments later. There was no sign of Skaldr as the men claimed their seats.
Attor lifted his hand, and a dark-haired serving girl rushed over, her fingers twisting in her faded, stained apron.
“Five ales.”
The girl bobbed her head and hurried away.
Ash tried to ignore the stares fixed on them—on her. She’d dealt with sly glances when she was with her ex, but those had been dismissive. These were open, voracious, and she was prey.
The prickles in her palms grew stronger, and she clenched her fingers.
A light-haired shifter lounged two tables over, one finger tracing the lip of his mug, his nostrils flaring as he scented the air. Her stomach churned.
The soldiers’ conversation hadn’t stopped, but the atmosphere shifted, taking on a different edge.
Race leaned back, all lazy menace and dark glares. “Ignore them.”
“Can they smell me as…human?” she whispered, rubbing her palms on her coat.
“You smell of me, which is better.”
Her face heated, and she smoothed her coat again, the prickles sharper now. Race’s hand found hers under the table, his calloused grip warm, anchoring her. “Besides, I marked you. They would sense that first. It’s all about claiming with these dicks.”
If anything, the buzz in the place grew louder. Ash swallowed hard. She’d genuinely never felt like prey before, and these were shifters who didn’t bother hiding their savagery.
Koal moved his chair and sat back, his broad shoulders blocking her from the worst of the gawkers. She gave him a grateful smile.
“Good, Skaldr’s here,” he murmured, not even looking back. “Maybe he has something.”
Ash glanced over her shoulder. Skaldr had stopped at the front, speaking with a grizzled shifter, coins changing hands in the shadow of tankards.
The serving girl returned with their ales. She handed out the mugs, and as she reached across the table to set the last one down, her sleeve rode up, revealing rope burns circling her wrist. Ash’s breath caught. The girl’s glassy gaze rushed to hers, then dropped as she hurried away.
“She’s property,” Attor said, his voice flat. “All the non-shifters are now.”
Ash’s stomach twisted, and in her distress, her nails dug into Race’s hand. His thumb stroked her skin, anchoring her. Around them, laughter rang off the soot-blackened beams, but every sound echoed like a death knell.
Voices bled together—rough Draconian, scraps of English—and somewhere in the jumble, one word cut through. Portal.
Her gaze flicked to Race. He still lounged as if bored, but his grip on her hand tightened fractionally—his warning clear. Don’t react.
Skaldr returned, straddling a chair between Koal and Attor, his grudge with Race apparently packed away for now. Race’s thumb continued to trace slow, steady circles against her skin.
“We should keep the talks for the house,” Skaldr said. “Too many of these bastard snakes around.”
The soldiers?
The serving girl brought food to the table in the middle and pivoted before a drunken man could catch her. She collided with the light-haired shifter who’d been watching them. He grabbed her wrist and hauled her onto his lap.
Ash flinched at the terror in the girl’s eyes.
“Don’t react.” Race gently squeezed her hand. “Eyes on me.”
She met his quiet stare, her pulse hammering. She released his hand, picked up her mug, but her fingers shook. Her ale sloshed, splashing her coat.
“Oh—” She jerked and thudded the mug onto the table, hastily wiping the spill with trembling fingers. Sparks prickled under her skin. Christ. She brushed her hot face with her fists—and her hood slipped off.
Ash froze.
Race swiftly tugged her ale-damp hands onto his lap, covering the faint crackle of power. “Breathe.”
Koal and Attor stilled—predators about to burst free as the smell of metal and smoke thickened the air.
“Well, well,” a gravelly voice drawled from behind her. “What do we have here? A delicious human?”
Her heart slammed against her ribs. She looked up. It was the same blond shifter who grabbed the girl. His armor, which marked him as a soldier, dazzled a bit more than the others. But his gold-green gaze gleamed with greed.
Race’s eyes burned a deadly burgundy. “She’s claimed.”
“Is she?” The soldier’s smirk grew. “Funny, it smells more like…a surface marking—no seed claiming.”
The tavern fell silent.
Did Race’s claim mark mean nothing here?
“That won’t work on me.” Race nailed him with a stare that promised bloodshed. “Continue in that vein, and you’ll find out. She’s mine.”
Then it hit her. Seed claiming.
Shit. Her stomach sank.
At the lake, Race had taken care of her needs. But he’d chosen restraint, pulling away before they crossed the line.
The soldier’s nostrils flared, and a slow, feral smile formed on his thin lips. “By the sweet fires—for someone so small, she reeks of power. A prize for the king.”
The absolute weasel! Ash gritted her teeth. She was her own bloody person.
“Walk away,” Race warned. “While you still can, soldier.”
“Soldier?” The twit laughed. “I’m Talon-Marshal Flaeron Vraxus of the Second Battalion, His Majesty’s service. By decree, she now belongs to the Crown. Stand aside, wingless. Leave real dragons’ work to those who still touch the sky.”
Wingless?
Fed up with being talked about as if she were an object, Ash shot to her feet. “Listen up, you bootlicking sack of scales—”
In the next second, she was scooped up and outside of the tavern as if the winds had blasted in and taken her—except no wind smelled of warmth and burnt embers or made her pulse leap like crazy.
“Put me down, you big lummox!” She thumped Race’s chest as he strode down the cobblestone street, then she stretched up to see over his shoulder. “That crown-fawning windbag Talon-Marshal can take his bloody decree and stuff it up his backside! Oh, hullo, Attor.”
“Stop riling the locals, Ash,” Race muttered, but a tinge of amusement brightened his crimson eyes. Then he turned to Attor. “He will come after us. Take Ash.”
The older male rubbed his nape. “Sire, better she stays with you. Koal, Skaldr, and I will divert Flaeron if need be. Just so you know, he once walked at Malcarion’s side—until he was cast out. He’ll do anything to get back into his good graces.”
Wonderful. So, the bootlicker would come after her now.
“Makes little difference.” A muscle jumped in Race’s jaw. “He gets in my way, he dies.”
They reformed on a smoke-darkened porch of a broad, timbered house.
Ash tried to get down, but Race growled and firmed his hold on her. He nudged the warped door with his elbow, and it groaned open. Floorboards creaked as he carried her over the threshold before letting her slide down his body.
Ash swept her tangled hair back and took in the quiet interior.
Fire crackled in a squat stone fireplace, warming the spacious communal room. Light played across a scarred oak table with chairs on one side, while on the other, worn navy armchairs flanked the hearth.
A stooped male shuffled from a side passage, his wisps of steel-gray hair caught in a thin tail. Faint gray-blue scales shimmered on the back of his weathered hands in the lamplight.
“Evening, sire,” he rasped.
“We’re expected,” Race said, pushing his hood back, revealing his loosely braided silver hair.
“Yes, yes.” The old man bobbed his head.
“I be Bregga, retainer here.” He offered Ash a kind smile.
“Your room’s atop the stairs, Mistress—fresh quilts and water.
Two chambers below for you and yours, sire.
Pantry’s bare of supper, but the kettle still remembers how to boil for tea. Outhouse in the back.”
“That will do,” Race said.
Bregga nodded and shuffled off down the passage again.
Ash glanced at the tight staircase hugging the left wall, lamplight spilling warmly over the wood.
For the past few nights, she’d slept against Race, using him as both mattress and heater. Now, with so much strife between them, that simple comfort was lost. She rubbed her temples wearily.
“You’re about to fall off your feet. Up you go.” A heavy palm settled on her lower back and nudged her, and tension rushed straight back into her.
She climbed the worn wooden steps, sliding her fingertips along the smooth banister, her gaze fixed on a small stained-glass window at the top of the stairs—the only bit of color in the dingy, cramped landing.
Race moved past her, his hard body brushing hers. He opened a narrow, dark timber door. Dim light from the room carved the planes across his face as he stood back and waited. He raised an eyebrow when she stalled. “Ash, standing there won’t make me disappear.”
“You have a room downstairs.”
“I don’t sleep. Much.”
Right. Blowing out a deep breath, Ash trudged into the attic-like room warmed by a compact, three-legged pot-bellied stove in the corner. The space was barely large enough to swing a cat—not that she would swing the poor kitty—the massive bed occupying nearly three-quarters of the room.
Race ducked through the low doorframe, entering behind her. The door clicked shut, and her heartbeat tripped.
He strolled past her, close enough that his warm, seductive scent curled around her. He headed straight for the window and freed the bottom hinge with a sharp twist. The pane canted outward, and cold night air spilled inside, carrying the acrid trace of old smoke and damp stone.
With his palm braced against the wall and his shoulders tense, he stared down at the street as if he’d rather be out there.
His shoulders rose and fell as if he took a deep breath.
Then he yanked off his cloak, tearing it free, and flung it onto the bench beneath the window.
His ebony dagger followed with a sharp clatter.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
Oo-kay, then. Ash skirted the bed, where her backpack sat on a folded, patched fur throw. She removed her coat and hung it on a wall hook beside the basin.
“Do you think they got Flaeron?” she asked, turning to find him watching her, his eyes dark with something she couldn’t quite discern.
He shrugged. “Unlikely. He’s with his soldiers. Better if they slow him down and return once it’s safe.”
She rubbed her cold hands down her tunic. “So, he’ll come after me.”
“He can try.”
“Race—”
“He won’t touch you.” Cold, so cold.
Okay, okay, she knew he wouldn’t let that happen. But unable to settle, she crossed to the pot-bellied stove and held out her hands. “Why did he call you wingless?”
“He assumed I’m a non-shifter. I can conceal my signature essence.” He sank onto the bench, his silver hair pewter in the misty moonlight. “Ash—”
“Let’s stay focused on our survival,” she blurted, staring at the crackling red embers.
He reached out, caught her hand, and pulled her over. His gaze held hers. “Avoiding it isn’t going to change what’s between us. Ask me what you want.”
Her heart thundered in her ears. What is Vaesarra to you?
It was obvious he had unfinished business there.
She pulled free and tucked her hair behind her ears. “Why is Skaldr so angry with you?” she chickened out, not ready to hear about Vaesarra. “He said all those things, accusing you of abandoning them, why?”
He braced his arms on his thighs, his head lowered. Silence stretched, growing tauter around them. When he finally spoke, his voice was low, harsh. “Because he has no idea of the truth.”
Ash frowned. “Then why did you leave?”
The muscle in his jaw jumped. He reached behind him, slammed the window shut, and shot to his feet, prowling the room like a barely leashed storm. His eyes darkened, shadows pooling in their burgundy depths.
“Race?” she whispered, her stomach hollowing under the weight of his silence.
“I didn’t leave…” The words seemed dragged from him, his skin pulled taut over the bones of his face. “I was captured during the coup, thrown into Tartarus, and shackled there for over five centuries.”