Chapter 33
Thirty-Three
Casimir
Florian was pacing back and forth on the ledge and hadn’t stopped doing so the second he spotted me in the skies.
“Where have you been?” he shouted the second my wings settled at my side, the rush of wind fading so he could be heard. “You said three days, Caz. Three days. It’s been a week!”
“I know,” I growled. “I’m not happy about it either. But …”
“She’s pissed at you. They’re pissed at you. And since you weren’t here, they’ve taken it out on me.”
“You’ll be fine,” I said, waving off his concerns. “You’re a big boy. Is there anything else I should know?”
Florian glared at me, but he didn’t say more about himself. He’d said his piece, and now it was past. That was how it was with him. It’s why we got along so well.
“Other than you breaking a promise to your mate?” he replied at last.
I growled, eyeing the warlord. Such barbed words were not his style. Something else was making him uneasy, but there would be time for that later.
Right now, I had to fix things with Anna. Without her, nothing else mattered. Wordlessly, I brushed past Florian, heading inside to get dressed before I went looking.
Once I was decent, I found the women on a rock out behind the cabin. I was not going to call it a chalet, which made me sound like a pompous dick. That was the last impression I wanted to give Anna.
“Ladies,” I rumbled, stepping around a tree and approaching to within easy earshot.
Neither of them had turned their heads to acknowledge me, and that didn’t change now. That stung. I tried not to let the hurt of disappointing my mate take over, but it wasn’t easy. I hated this feeling.
Never again.
“I’m sorry it took me so long to return.” I started to go into my long-winded explanation, the one I’d come up with on the flight over, but stopped. It was too manufactured. Too political.
Too much ice tyrant. Not enough Caz.
“I fucked up,” I said bluntly, stifling the urge to go to Anna and turn her around in my arms, to beg her to show me how to make it right. “I should have sent word. I didn’t. That’s on me.”
“Yes,” Anna said at last, turning until she could see me. “It is.”
I crumpled on the inside as I took in her face. The long lines, the obvious lack of sleep. And most of all, the look in her eyes. Disappointment stung worse than any anger. I had let her down. Badly.
My dragon howled its impotent fury at me as well, but it was nothing compared to my own self-loathing.
“You swore to me once, Casimir, that no matter how difficult, you would be there for me. You swore I could trust you, and you broke your word.”
I wanted to impale myself on my own icicle. Freeze myself solid. Fight the Red King. Anything so that I didn’t have to hear the pain she was trying to hide behind anger.
“What more can we expect? You said you wanted to change things,” Ella said, speaking when Anna couldn’t. “Have you decided to betray that as well?”
I jerked upright, stung by the verbal slap.
“I am late, yes. I did not send word I would be late, yes. But I have committed no other sin. I have not wronged you otherwise. Be mad, be hurt. I will suffer that pain as I must, as I deserve. But be careful of the insults you levy. They can’t be taken back. ”
“Spoken like a true tyrant,” Anna whispered, shaking her head at my commanding tone.
I wanted to grab her up and take to the sky, to remind her of the fact that to me, nothing existed but her and making her happy. Why couldn’t she see that? Why was this such a big deal to her? She was safe, secure, fed, with her friend. I was only late, and for good reason!
Matching anger rose within me. I hadn’t been loafing off, drinking beer and forgetting her.
“Or spoken like someone who’s spent seven days looking for your other friend,” I countered hotly. “Someone who has spent far more money on this search than anything else during my reign. Ever. Spoken like someone who was upholding one promise he made, even if he failed at another.”
Anna’s eyes opened a hair more. “Did you find her?”
I hated myself for having to crush the spark of hope that flickered to light in her.
“No,” I told her, facing my failure head-on.
“I didn’t. That’s why I took so long. I couldn’t bear to come back empty-handed, to let you down.
So I pressed harder, took more time. I bought off more pairs of eyes.
We raided three different homes based on tidbits of information, and I have nothing to show for it other than breaking another promise to you by not returning on time. ”
Maybe she was right. I was a failure to her. That was all there was to it. I should have only screwed up by not finding Milly. That should have been the only thing I did wrong. Instead, I had compounded my error.
Some mate I was. Always forgetting what was important, what was right in front of me.
At some point during my speech, both women had turned to look at me. Sitting side by side on the rock, same posture, same unhappy look on their faces, it was easy to recognize them as friends, if not sisters. The body language was too identical not to be.
“What’s the holdup?” Anna asked, more curious than angry. “That much money should make it easy. To them, she’s just a clippy. They should be happy to sell her for a higher sum.”
“In theory,” I growled, my dragon and I aching at the distance between us. I needed her calming touch, keeping me grounded and clear of thought. The longer I’d been gone, the worse it had gotten.
The truth was, I was back because I couldn’t stand to be another day away from her. The fog and the pain and the protective fury of my dragon wouldn’t have let me.
“So why not then?” Ella asked, head cocked slightly to the side. Her eyes were sharp and curious.
“The hunters have gone to ground. They aren’t opening up their ranks to anyone.
If there’s another market—and I’m sure there is at least one, if not multiple smaller ones—they are keeping it incredibly close to their chests as to where.
” I smacked a hand into my fist in frustration.
“That’s the problem. If we could find one, if we could get in among them, it would be much easier to track her down. ”
“And catch your elite in the act.”
I nodded. “If I can prosecute Bryna, show that the use of the grounded as “wage” slaves is forbidden—”
“Then there will be a sudden influx of freed clippys,” Ella said in understanding. “And you’re hoping one of them is Milly.”
“Wing-Clipped. Grounded. Not that,” I said sternly, catching Ella’s eyes until she nodded at my meaning. “But, yes. Unfortunately, I can’t find the markets anymore. They’re too well hidden.”
“From you.”
Something about the way Anna spoke plunged nails into my spine. Worry pooled like snowy waters in my stomach. My dragon was coiled restlessly, not liking what it was seeing from her or her body language. “What do you mean?”
Ella was looking at her friend now as well, nudging Anna in the shoulder and trying to break her eye contact with the ground.
“Anna. What are you thinking?” she pushed.
“We’re going about this the wrong way,” she said with a tight, unhappy smile.
“We are?” Ella and I exchanged confused looks.
“Yes. You’re trying to infiltrate the market as a buyer.”
“I suppose that’s one way to look at it, yes.”
She finally met my eyes, and what I saw there made me shake my head. My dragon flattened its wings against its body. “Whatever you’re going to say, the answer is no.”
She sighed wistfully.
Ella jerked, comprehension dawning. “Anna, no …”
“What?” I asked, stepping forward worriedly. My dragon roared, her wings spreading. It couldn’t sense the problem, but it was ready for a fight, ready to protect its mate at any cost. “What is she suggesting?”
Anna and Ella shared a look, and then Ella spoke for her. “That if you can’t get in as a buyer, you need to get in as merchandise.”
As merchandise. But that would mean—
“No!” I howled, my dragon surging forward and pushing me to the edge. The world glowed bright silver as the monster sought to break free, to coil around its mate and shield her protectively from everything. Including herself.
Ice spread out from my feet in a slow oblong circle shape as my anger leaked through. Blades of mountain grass and stones alike were covered in a pure white sheet two feet across. Then three. Then ten.
“Caz,” Anna warned as the frozen tundra approached their rock.
I was losing control.
Inhaling sharply, I yanked back on the beastly part of me, hauling it back. The monster resisted. Putting our mate in harm’s way was absolutely unacceptable. It wasn’t willing to entertain the idea. Period. Its fury lashed through me as it fought for control.
I knew this sensation. Knew I was in danger of snapping. There was no calming the berserker rage it was working up. Not when it was this determined. I could only hope to redirect it.
With a roar, I flung my fist out, unleashing everything that had been building from the moment I locked eyes with Anna for the first time.
All my rage, all my frustration. I let go of all the stress I had been fighting back.
I let go of all the fear. Fear for Anna and what it had to be like living in my world.
And fear that you’re going to screw it up with her. Fear you’re going to lose her.
I let it all go.
The icy power shot from my hand, hitting the calm surface of the lake behind the women. The cold washed over everything else in a wave of frost. When it cleared, the entire lake was ice. The entire thing had frozen solid under my outburst.
Deep, stressful rumbles and groans followed as it settled and shifted on the soft ground underneath.
“Wow,” Ella whispered, both women staring, stunned.
I fell to one knee, panting. “I’m sorry. But the idea of sending you back there. Of putting you in danger, where I can’t protect you? I can’t do that. I can’t let it happen.”
Anna stepped off the rock and carefully picked her way across the ice field to where I was crouched.
“Caz,” she whispered, taking my chin in her perfect little hand and lifting it skyward to force me to look at her. “You need to find their market.”
“But …”
“Milly is out there. I need to find her. You need to find your elite.” She pulled me to my feet and worked herself into my arms, pressing tightly against me. “It has to be this way.”
I didn’t want it to be. I hated the entire idea. Tearing Kylma apart building by building to find them would be less painful. There had to be another way. So why haven’t you come up with one?
Time was running out for me to do so. By now, people would be asking questions about Milly, why she was so important, and just who was looking for her after all.
We had to try a different method. Mine had failed. Maybe Anna’s would succeed?
My dragon thrashed and tore at the ground in my mind, wild with protective fury and fear.
No. We can’t. We protect her. Keep her safe. We can’t let her go back. Not now. Not ever.
“It won’t work anyway.”
We both looked over at Ella. She shied away from my gaze but met Anna’s.
“What do you mean?” my mate asked.
“Oh, sure, you could get captured and taken in,” she said, her eyes slightly unfocused as she followed her chain of thought. “But you’re missing the next part, Anna. The one where he finds you. He can’t do that.”
I held my breath. There was a way. But I wasn’t going to suggest it. I didn’t want to endorse this wild plan in any way. We would do it the same way I’d tracked Ella down. Piece by piece.
Anna sighed. “Damn. That is a problem. He would need to be able to find his way to me from far away.”
“Yes, he would.” Ella said thoughtfully.
“I’ve been feeling him lately,” Anna said quietly, looking up at me. “When you’re approaching. I knew you were coming back a minute or so before I looked outside and saw your dragon. Is there some way to increase that? Can you give it some extra juice or whatever?”
“Maybe.” Ella looked at me now. She could see that I knew but wasn’t going to volunteer the information. I tried to compel her to be silent, but the only way to do that was to use an alpha command.
Something I couldn’t bring myself to do. Not after the way she had suffered at the hands of one of the elite already. It would break her.
“What is?” Anna asked, clenching me tightly.
After a week without any contact, having my mate in my arms should have been reassuring. It should have settled my dragon down. Instead, it was only making it more agitated, working it up into a frenzy of protective desires.
“He could claim you,” Ella said in thought. “Track you through the mate bond. I’ve heard rumors it can be done if the dragon is powerful enough.”
Anna looked to me. “Is that true, Caz? If we were … If I let you claim me. Could you find me?”
I longed to shout out that they were wrong. That it didn’t work that way. That Anna needed to stay far, far away from everything to do with this. That she should go somewhere I could protect her, keep her safe. We were talking about risking eternity! That had to mean something.
“Yes,” I said instead. I would not lie to my mate. That was a line my dragon and I both agreed we would not cross. If she asked, we would tell her the truth. We had broken her faith in us once already. Never again. “I could.”
Anna took a deep breath, and I looked at her in horror. No. She wouldn’t …
“Complete the bond, Caz,” she said, her purple eyes never flinching as she looked at me. “I want you to claim me.”
But she didn’t want that. Not really. I knew that. She just wanted her friend, and I was not going to let her do something so permanent for that.
“Come with me,” I said, taking her by the hand. I didn’t want anyone else around for the conversation that was to come. This was between my mate and me. Because once we were alone, Anna and I were going to talk.
And I was going to let her know in no uncertain terms that she was not doing this.