Chapter 17
“What!?” Vyktor’s rage made the very stone of the mountain shake. He had woken in the dragon realm with a sore head and a great fury. “Where is Aria?”
“She is back where she belongs, with her people,” Eldor said calmly. “We did this for your own good, Vyktor. You were obsessed with her. She’s just a human.”
“A human who…”
“Yes, I know, saved our lives. The fish we eat save our lives by sustaining us, but we don’t form romantic relationships with them, Vyktor. You’ll see now that you’re back here. Your head will clear. You’ll understand that I did the right thing for you.”
Vyktor snatched Eldor in his hands and snarled, his teeth snapping at the ends of the man’s nose.
“You will build another device. You will open the portal and you will return me to Earth, or I will take you apart piece by piece until I do. Like one of your machines, Eldor. I will lay out the little bits of you and I will feed them to the birds as you watch.”
The threat was delivered at a volume no louder than his normal speaking voice, but it was all the more frightening for it. All who heard it knew instantly that he meant every violent word.
“I can’t make another…”
“You figure out how,” Vyktor insisted. “Or it will be the end of you. I promise that on my father’s heart.”