Chapter 20
Chapter
Twenty
Did he really think she would leave without him? The vexing dragon.
Ash raked back her hair and turned toward the kettle, but trepidation crept through her. Race could be so bloody inflexible when it came to her.
A low growl rumbled through him, and his hard body pressed against her back, his arms tightening around her waist.
“Don’t taunt me, heart-fire.” He nipped her earlobe. “Not if you want the whelp to live.”
Ash heard the cold intent in his voice, and her heart skipped a beat. But she wasn’t about to back down. “I’m not letting you kill poor Koal.”
Their stalemate hung heavy as Ash fought herself not to turn to him—because her damn dragon was that tempting. His chin settled on her shoulder, his palm stroking her lower belly.
“You drive me insane, woman. You can throw the whelp in my face all you want, but you’re mine, Ashaya. Every storming breath.”
He licked the mark, and her knees nearly buckled, desire thrumming through her, hot and heavy. She sagged against him.
“Much better,” he grunted against her skin.
She snorted, lightly elbowing him in the belly—
“Oh, shit. I’m sorry!” She spun around. “I didn’t mean to. You’re still healing.”
“Feather-tap.” He dismissed it with a wave.
Shuffled footsteps echoed, and Bregga’s stooped figure appeared with a coal bucket. “Begging pardon,” he wheezed. “The stove needs feeding.”
Hastily, Ash stepped out of the way. His scale-sheened hands trembled slightly as he donned his gloves and cranked open the iron door then shoveled coal into the glow. Sparks leapt, snapping like teeth. “Gets bitter cold before dawn,” he muttered.
Did it? She wasn’t sure, not when her skin still burned from Race’s mouth on her neck. Maybe a blast of cold air would help.
As if sensing her problem, Race cast her a little smirk, rubbing his chest; the two claw lesions below were already scabbing over.
Ash rolled her eyes, grabbed another dishcloth, secured the kettle, and poured steaming water into the mugs, the sharp scent of tea leaves curling upward, soothing her.
“Thank you, Bregga,” she said, giving the old man a warm smile. “Proper tea is a blessing.”
He nodded and grimaced as he straightened.
His eyes flicked to the kitchen window and the faint pulsing of the ward’s blue light.
“Used to be every other week they’d take the little ones,” he rasped, leaving the bucket in the corner.
“Now, them young are so few, and still, they cart off one or two.”
The weight of his words settled like lead in her stomach.
“You must have seen a lot from this house,” Race said, his tone deceptively casual as he removed the elastic band from his loosened hair and refastened it into a stubby ponytail.
“Aye.” The old man’s hand fidgeted with something in his coat pocket, his gaze distant.
“My Naimi, she helped where she could. Even non-shifters find ways.” He shuffled closer.
Before Ash could step back, his gnarled hand pressed something small into her palm.
“Helped her go about unnoticed, time to time. Might serve you better now.”
Ash blinked at the pea-sized stone, blue as the Fijian seas, golden motes flickering inside like trapped stars. “Oh, I couldn’t—”
“Take it.” The old man’s eyes held a fierce light despite his bent frame, folding her fingers over it. “Them children deserve better than cages. Tea’s getting cold, mistress.”
Race took the jewel, his nostrils flaring as if scenting its magic, then handed it back to Ash. “What if we were Malcarion’s men?” he asked. “You could’ve signed your own death warrant.”
Bregga snorted, the sound rough as gravel. “Aye, could’ve. But Mal’s dogs don’t speak polite to ones like us, nor look at a lass with respect. I’ve lived long enough to tell an evil face from another.”
Well, now, Ash smiled. Cautious and observant.
“The morvaen stone dulls dragon-sight,” Bregga went on. “Won’t hide you proper, but might blur their tracking.” His voice cracked, his rheumy eyes growing wet. “My Naimi used it to walk the western passes unseen, helping them families leave. Until they caught her.”
Her heart ached for him. Ash touched his arm. “I’m so sorry.”
“Not your fault, lass.”
“You’re taking a risk, old one,” Race said quietly, a nerve pulsing in his jaw.
“What more can they take?” Bregga’s wheezy laugh held no humor as he shuffled for the door again. “I’m just an old retainer, watching them young vanish every time wards flare. Can at least help where I’m able.” His gaze shifted back to Ash. “Wear it close to your skin, lass.”
“Time to move.” Attor walked in, sidestepping Bregga. He handed Race a shirt. “First light soon. The others have already left. I’ll see you there, a mile from the basin.”
Race nodded, shrugging into the shirt, and Attor slipped out.
Ash glanced at the steaming mugs sitting untouched, then at Race as he buttoned his black shirt. “I made tea. Drink some. You can’t very well save the world running on dragon fumes alone.”
“I know what I want…and it’s not tea.” His voice, so low and sensual, sent desire resurging like a lit fuse. Her gaze rushed to his.
At his tormenting smirk, her face heated. He knew.
Ugh. She scrambled for composure. “Umm, well, give me a few minutes. I need to put on my boots and grab my bits.”
Soft laughter followed her, and she scrunched her face as she hurried to their room. But all too fast, reality hit her at what awaited them.
They were leaving. Back to the basin and the dreaded portal.
Race ghosted between trunks at the southern side, holding Ash’s hand. Night clung to the dark elms. With bark like coal dust and their crowns so tightly interwoven, a regiment could disappear within the blackness. Jaw clenched, he tried not to let the sheer pitch black overwhelm him.
Ash gripped his hand tightly, her touch soothing, anchoring. But the slight prickles against his skin betrayed her unease, and he masked her power with his mind.
The humid air in this place nearly suffocated him, thick with loam and the rank stench of decaying vegetation, as he slowed.
Shadows flickered ahead. Attor, Skaldr, and Koal emerged from the dense underbrush. A swish of air, and a dozen resistance fighters scaled down the tree trunks behind them.
Every head bowed. “Your Majesty.”
Hearing that title, grief knifed him in the sternum, the same jagged shock he’d suffered when his parents fell. As for his brothers? His shoulders tensed. Questions still burned in his gut—
Ash’s thumb stroked the back of his hand, soothing the storm that always tore through him whenever he thought of his brothers.
But Race let none of his inner turmoil show, inclining his head at the Resistance.
The soldiers parted, and a mountain of a male strode forward, his scalp shorn to a bristle-length shadow, the sides of his head covered in scars.
Attor gestured to the big shifter. “This is the Resistance’s Talon-Marshal—”
“Varkyn,” Race said. “I remember.”
“Sire.” The male bowed. “For King Erycian and Queen Serelith, our lives are pledged to you. To justice.”
The weight of those words hung heavy, but Race didn’t falter. “Are we good to go?”
“You have five minutes’ head start. Then we strike.”
Race nodded. “Three days hence, I’ll return. Attor will arrange a meeting place.”
“I’ll set men to watch for your return,” Varkyn said. “Might need another distraction.”
Race exhaled, then drew Ash into his arms. About to dematerialize, he stopped and looked back at the males watching. “Who’s the leader of the Resistance?”
“Why, Attor Vurnoss,” Varkyn said.
His gaze locked with his sire’s head enforcer’s steady, unflinching stare. Quiet, unobtrusive—always in the background, always the one who got things done. He wasn’t surprised. “I thought so. See you soon.”
He held Ash close and dematerialized them, reforming behind the massive crystal rocks on the ridge overlooking the basin. Heat rose in waves, and the sulfur-tinged air shimmered. Sweat trickled down his temples. The caldera below glittered like shattered obsidian in the torchlight.
Ash grasped the rock, peering around it. “So many of them,” she whispered.
“They are hunting us.” He crouched, watching the portal guards pace their rounds, the humid air distorting their shapes, and they wavered like mirages. The red ward runes crackled around the portal.
“I can’t dematerialize us across,” he murmured. “Too much ward and magic interference might disrupt my ability. I can’t take that chance. We make a run for it the moment they’re attacked. Ready?”
Ash nodded. She swiped her hand over her sweaty brow, leaving a streak of soot. And his chest tightened as he watched her. No, he refused to allow even so much as a hair on her head to be harmed.
He rose and held out his hand.
“Wait. I don’t want to lose this.” She slipped the morvaen stone she fisted into the backpack pocket—
Yells broke out, shattering the quiet. The guards sprinted up the caldera toward the forest where the fight erupted, but two stayed behind.
Fuck. “Ash, I’m going to take out those two. Stay behind me. Got it?”
“Yes,” she rasped.
“Now.” He grabbed her hand and ran down the slope, onyx gravel skittering like an avalanche breaking loose, dust flying.
“There!” someone shouted.
The two guards charged across the basin, their talons half-formed.
“Stay here—” Race pushed Ash behind a looming shard of night-glass rock and summoned his Gaian sword. As it took form, the two men leaped at him.
Race lunged, blade swinging, and scored a deadly hit, slicing one’s hand clean off the wrist, its talons airborne—
A screech echoed, blood spraying everywhere.
“Get the female,” the other snarled, lumbering for Race as the bleeding fucker rushed across to Ash, roaring, “Talon-Marshal Flaeron awaits you, Storm Summoner.”
He’d fucking figured out her powers.
“Then come and get me, you overgrown lizard,” Ash snarled.
What the fuck—?