“What…” Alashiya trailed off, speechless at the sight of her kitchen nearly swallowed up by a dragon.
He’d knocked her table out of the way, allowing him just enough room to collapse onto the floor. His tail slithered inside after him much more slowly. It looped around his great bulk to rest over his snout, which he’d dropped onto his forelegs in apparent exhaustion.
If it weren’t for his heavy breathing and bloody bandages, she would’ve said he looked entirely content.
Alashiya was, for the third time in twenty-four hours, entirely at a loss. She watched as his eyelids drooped.
No one will ever believe me,she thought numbly as she set the spoon aside and, for want of anything better to do, squeezed around the dragon to shove the door back into place.
Chapter Seven
It wasthe warm background hum of wards, strange and yet painfully familiar, that woke him. Magic soaked the very air he breathed. It tasted sweet on his tongue and woke him from his deep slumber like fingers of sunlight on his face — so soft, so loving, just ticklish enough to draw him to the land of the living once more.
It was a stark contrast to the chills that wracked his frame from the inside out.
His head was much clearer, though it took him some time to realize it. This was partially due to the pain that made his entire body into one great, throbbing wound, but most of the blame could be laid on his surroundings. Taevas had no idea where the fuck he was.
He knocked his tail off his snout and worked hard to lift his head. A splitting headache rang his skull like a bell, forcing him to squint his eyes against the harsh glare of sunlight streaming in through a partially obscured window. Something dark covered most of the old, bubbly glass from the outside. Only a few spots of light could come through the gaps, but it was more than enough to assault his sensitive eyes.
His tongue felt rough, his eyes gritty. Pain was a low butconstant roar in his mind. The chills were endless, and the churning of his guts reminded him of the handful of times he’d gotten the stomach flu. His body had turned on him. It had focused all its energy on hunting down some poison in his system, seeking to purge it, and he was left helpless as the war was waged.
And yet, despite everything, his muscles were loose. He’d slept hard and long, well into the late morning. His dreams had been blessedly blank. He was… comfortable.
A huff escaped him as he squinted at the old but well-kept tile of a kitchen floor. It gleamed in the light, freshly cleaned.
Ridiculous,he fumed.My first good night’s sleep in a century and it’s on the floor of a hovel.It was better than the barn, he supposed, but only just.
Why was I in a barn?
Memories came to him in a steady trickle. Much was patchy, but he could at least reason out why that was so.
Taevas’s lips pulled back from his teeth. A terrible growl built in his chest as flame licked upward to flicker between incisors the length of a man’s hand.
Ambushed. Drugged. Beaten. Captured.
He’d been leaving a meeting in New York and since it was a short flight, he and his Wing had decided to forgo the jet. It was all painfully mundane and safe. After all, they’d land on Drummond Island just before sunrise, which was more important that day than usual, since it was the summer solstice.
It was a holiday and a short routine flight in the darkness. There was no reason to think anything would go wrong. His last clear memory was of standing on the edge of the platform, ready to launch into the air, half his Wing ahead of him and the other half to follow.
What happened to my Wing?
Dread, cold and sickly, slithered through his veins. The dragons who made up his personal guard would’ve fought to the death to protect him. Taevas couldn’t recall a fight, only a blinding flash, then nothing at all. His next memories werefilled with the burn of drugs being injected into his thigh. He’d fought, he was certain, but beyond the impression of rage and pain and disorientation, there was vanishingly little to find in the recesses of his mind.
Taevas shook his head in an attempt to clear it and immediately regretted it. Agony bloomed behind his eyes.Did they take out my implant?
His stomach turned. The pain in his head suggested they might’ve removed the subdermal communication device he and his Wing used. It did nothing to dwell on possibilities without evidence, but he shuddered at the thought. If they could do that, what else had they done to him?
I need a phone. I have to find out what happened. Who’s alive. Who needs killing.
But when he tried to climb to his feet, he found his limbs uncooperative. They could barely hold his weight, and the attempt saw him crashing into things on either side of the kitchen. A chair was sent flying, and pans came clattering down from hooks on the wall, making a terrible clatter.
Helpless anger sent his tail lashing against the far wall. He couldn’t understand how he’d ended up in a damn kitchen in the first place, and the knowledge that he couldn’t even shift to make the experience more comfortable was more fuel on the fire.
He needed to begonefrom the hovel. He needed to know his people were safe. He needed to find some control again, to get back on his feet, and rain unholy retribution on those who’d thought to bring him down.
Fire snaked up his throat; a cruel, hungry serpent ready to strike.
A pair of bare feet stepped into view. They were attached to finely wrought ankles and shapely legs. Taevas blinked.
