Chapter 67 #2
“Ryker was on a special mission. He was working with a group of dragons that were suspected of organizing a rebellion against your father. He infiltrated their group and was relaying what he found to us. He ended up getting caught and suffered an injury that caused his memory loss. We thought he’d been killed, and when we realized what actually happened …
well, we couldn’t take him out of the kingdom after you found him.
We’ve been watching and waiting for him to come back to us.
His memories are finally returning, at least enough that he was able to find us.
He belongs with the Thunders again. However, he can’t have his mate,” Wendy said firmly, and Brian scoffed loudly.
Brian shifted Ryker over to Mikah, who took the unconscious man in his arms. “Let me start with this. Ryker belongs to me. He is no longer part of the Thunders. He swore upon his flame to serve me. I have taken him as my right-hand man. His life belongs to me. You understand what it means to take what belongs to the dragon prince?” His voice dropped to a low growl as they lowered their heads in reverence.
Taking from the dragon royals was a death sentence.
Dragons were already possessive creatures.
No one took from a royal dragon and lived to talk about it.
“I understand the purpose of your group. However, I disagree with the secretive nature of it. The king should be aware of your existence. You want to be able to act independently from the kingdom and do your job by any means necessary. But you are not invisible and shouldn’t be treated as such.
Your lives should be honored. And your burials should be recognized. ”
“What was that device you had on his neck?” Mikah asked with a low growl, noticing the slight red irritation on Ryker’s throat.
“It was keeping him sedated. This has never happened before, and we were trying to figure out how to move forward. Ryker has a memory full of secrets. And with him having a mate, he was fighting staying with us. We needed him to be … quiet while we analyzed the situation.” Wendy shrugged unapologetically as she looked over at Ryker.
“He is a very skilled warrior. And honestly, having him by your side … you couldn’t have picked a better dragon.
” Wendy inwardly sighed. She didn’t want to hand Ryker over, but there wasn’t anything she could do.
If Ryker swore upon his flame to serve the prince, there wasn’t a thing anyone could do.
That was a binding agreement. And this meant he belonged to the dragon prince. In all senses … Ryker was his.
Brian smiled and nodded his head. “Now on that … we agree completely.”
“How were you able to find us? We had the whole area enchanted,” Wendy asked.
“Well, you didn’t make it easy on us.” Jasper snorted.
“Anyone else would have given up on the trail. But we weren’t about to give up on Ryker.
He’s part of the family now. Besides, we’re running out of time, what with the shadow that’s approaching.
” Jasper was curious to see if they had information about this.
Wendy nodded and frowned slightly. “Our spies have reported a hidden army. We aren’t sure about all of the creatures, but we’re certain there are several Unblessed fairies in the cloaked army.”
“Are you sure?” Alexa was mildly alarmed. Unblessed fairies heading toward Elysia? They would be able to enter. This was something they needed to be prepared for.
“Yes, we’re certain. But there are other creatures there as well. We don’t know the purpose, and we’re just keeping an eye on them. They weren’t moving toward the dragon kingdom, so they were just being observed. We have a scout keeping an eye on the shadow.”
“Thank you, Wendy. In the future, maybe we can set up a better arrangement?”
Wendy shook her head. “It’s best that we remain a secret. We can work better this way.”
Brian frowned. “You’re protecting my kingdom. We can keep your organization secret, but we will honor your warriors. I’ll reach out to you again another time and we can discuss this in greater detail.” Brian looked up at Alexa. “Let’s head to Elysia. We need to warn them about the threat.”
Levi, better head back to Elysia. There is an army of Unblessed fairies heading that way. Ken reached out to Levi, already knowing Alexa wanted her parents to know about this. Unblessed fairies were easy enough to deal with for Ken and Levi. The problem was what else was cloaked in that army.
We’ll meet you back there. We have information too, Levi’s voice echoed into his mind.
“Are we flying or teleporting? Just wondering, because Ryker is DRAGon his feet.” Mikah snickered and looked at the quiet room. “What? Come on, that’s funny.” He looked over at Jasper, who was chuckling quietly. “Thank you, Jasper. At least someone else here has a sense of humor.”
Alexa smiled, but her mind was spinning.
The Unblessed were still fairies. Did they really want to wage war with Elysia?
She wondered if they could come to an agreement.
She was still their princess, and she didn’t want to kill them.
And why were they with the nycrops? What was Erebus planning now?
She glanced up at Ken, whose brows were furrowed as he read her thoughts.
Erebus. Everything always led back to Erebus. A problem that they needed to deal with. The sooner the better.