His friend replied, “Haven’t I seen that kid somewhere before?”
They both glanced towards me in confusion, but I was too busy to address their concerns. Mav walked ahead with his head held high. Henry followed, but he didn’t look as confident. His attention was focused more on holding Angel, who frowned in his arms.
My hands gripped the counter so hard my knuckles turned white. Right now I wanted nothing more than to haul myself over it and punch them both in the face. But I forced myself to stay calm. This was our chance to get back our daughter, and I wasn’t about to ruin it with my impatience.
“Hello,” Mav said, leaning on the counter with a smug expression. “I’d like a drink, please.”
I held my tongue. Instead, I imagined punching him so hard his face became concave. I shot Ryu a glance, urging him to hurry up with the plan.
“Aren’t you listening, cripple? I said, give me a drink!” Mav snarled.
A sharp sound whizzed in the air as three clear magic daggers flew towards Mav. The alpha squealed in terror and ducked, throwing his arms in front of his face. But the daggers didn’t touch him. They hovered in the air, shimmering and sharp, just millimeters from Mav’s skin.
Ryu glared at him, his hands raised in the motion. It would only take a flick of his wrist to ruin Mav’s face permanently, but he held back. He was a stronger man than me. I would’ve had no problem making him even uglier than I was.
An ugly face to match his ugly personality,I thought.
When Mav realized he wasn’t hit, he dropped his arms and laughed. “So you just attack me on sight now? Pathetic. Well, it doesn’t matter, because—”
Ryu didn’t wait for him to finish. He flicked his wrist again, this time in a different direction. I had only a split-second to register that this time the magic daggers shot towards Henry.
My heart seized.This is it!
Henry gasped. He threw his arms up, the same way Mav did. But in doing so, he dropped Angel.
He dropped my baby!
“No!” I cried out.
Two bodies moved at the same time. I tried to launch myself over the counter, but my prosthetics slowed me down. But the other blur in my vision was faster. It shot out, a long dark shape. When I realized what it was, Angel had already landed gently in its thick coils.
“Nate!?”
A huge snake coiled on the bar floor, dark gold with brown markings. He seemed to exhale a sigh of relief. “I caught her!” he said, his snake-like voice made clear by Ryu’s dragonspeech ability.
Henry fell backwards, stunned by both the magic attack and the sudden appearance of the three-hundred pound snake in front of him. “What the fuck?” he yelled.
To my surprise, other customers in the bar didn’t seem at all phased. I caught one of them say casually, “Hey, haven’t seen Nate’s snake in a while. Looking good, man.”
“Thanks,” Nate replied, his tongue flicking out.
Gotta remember to not call people snakes in a negative way from now on,I thought in amusement.
“Scar!” Ryu cried, gesturing to Henry. He moved quicker—Ryu swooped in, agile and gentle, and scooped up Angel from Nate’s safe grasp. Her face brightened immediately and my heart melted, a massive wave of relief washing over me.
At the same time, I snatched Henry’s arm. He suddenly seemed meek, and cowered like I was going to hit him. I almost rolled my eyes.
What did Ryu ever see in this guy?
“Let go of me!” Henry cried. “Freak!”
I growled. “Watch it.”
With Ryu and Angel safely backed away, I finally felt comfortable confronting the two assholes who had nearly ruined my life.
“Care to explain yourself?” I snarled.
“The fuck you talking about?” Mav cried, stumbling towards Henry, as if both of them felt safer together. I realized now that they had probably been working together this entire time. “All we did was walk into your bar with our kid, and you attacked us!”
