Roaring, I came bursting upward, as if surging from the bottom of a lake. Bodies blasted outward, arching in sprays of boiling water and blood. The blast had me rising too, but only to fall with its release. I landed on my feet and shuddered, nearly crumpling. Desperation had summoned my magic, but now, I paid the price. Thankfully, my enemies paid it too. They drowned in that scalding water, going limp just before my magic gave out and dropped them in wet heaps. It gave me enough time to recover. I stood there panting as the drowned dragonsstarted to revive, my stare searching the sky—searching for Aras. He was gone.
“The sorcerer took him, Your Majesty!” one of my dragons shouted down to me. “They just vanished!”
I roared and made to leap once more. But by then, more dragons had made it past those who tried to defend me. They filled the sky, cutting off my escape. I launched myself anyway, intending to burst through the battle as I had the pack who had tried to kill me. But as soon as I was airborne, I was hit from several directions. I screeched in fury and tumbled back to the ground. Lying in the mud, I stared up at a ceiling of enemy dragons.
Maybe the Eye had been telling the truth. Even with all our preparations and my greater control of magic, my enemies had overtaken me, and my mate had been abducted. I couldn't save Aras. Couldn't even see him. I wouldn't have the comfort of feeling his love down our bond while I died.
A flare of red crossed my vision again. I was not going down this easy. Especially not when Aras needed me. If I could survive long enough to find a break through the mass of bodies above, maybe I could track my mate. I had to get to Aras. He was more important than my kingdom and everyone in it.
Soldiers screamed, and I knew it wasn't just my enemies. My people were falling, many would never get up again. And still, they fought. I heard my father call to my mother, and my heart went cold. Aras mattered most, but my love for him didn't destroy the love I held for my parents or even what I felt for my loyal troops. I had to get to my mate, but first, I had to end this.
Fuck the Eye's predictions. I would win this war and retrieve my mate.
With a roar, I swiped out and slashed through a dragon's throat. As the mass of them closed in on me, I used everything I had to strike out, my head included. I bit, clawed, and speared blindly. I blasted them with boiling water. Lost in the darkness of their bodies, I knew only rage, urgency, and pain.
My immortality couldn't keep up with the wounds I received. My vicious opponents cut me deeper and deeper before I could heal. My legs buckled. My magic flickered to nothing. I lashed out. Blood soaked the ground beneath me.
I knew better than to go to my knees. So I leaned into a dragon's bite while I stabbed up with all five claws of my right talon. As my enemy sought to pull away, I crushed his jaws in my grip, then tossed his dead body aside.
“Fucking bastard!” someone roared.
I knew I wasn't the only one with loved ones on that battlefield. As I said, the entire nobility of the Gavemor Dread had come to Renris. Whole families were out there, trying to murder me. And every dragon I took down was someone's relative. The shrieks of a female dragon was all the warning I had before I was hit again. The good news was that she took me out of that death dome. The bad news was that I hit the ground at a bad angle and hard enough that my wings broke.
Rage filled me. How would I track my mate without my wings? Everything was falling apart. All the plans we'd made crumbled around me, as useless as my wings.
I groaned and floundered on my side, trying to get up.
The female who attacked me stalked forward, the other dragons withdrawing. Must have been her son that I killed. No, not a child. A mate. I recognized the blind determination in her eyes. Great fuck. I had just killed her mate. Now, I had to kill her or she would kill me, and my mate would be lost.
Have I mentioned that our women are more vicious than our men?
Behind the female was a patch of sky. Pale blue like Aras's eyes. His and his father's. Risarren wouldn't hurt Aras. I had to believe that. Of course, he wouldn't. It had sounded as if he'd been searching for Aras for years. My mate would live. He might not have the life he wanted, but he'd be alive. That thought calmed me. It gave me the strength to accept whatever came next. No, I wouldn't just lie down and die, but I was at peace with it if that's what happened. And I'd take as many of those motherfuckers with me as I could. Starting with this bitch right here.
With a freshly broken mating bond, she wouldn't be thinking clearly. But I was. More importantly, I was steady. My training returned. Muscles remember things better than a mind. I saw paths to her weak points and plotted a course.
Silently, I leapt and came down atop the female's back. She jerked and thrashed, but I dug my claws into her flesh and held on. More shrieks came, but these were of pain. And I had just begun. She dropped and rolled to dislodge me, but by then, I had her throat in my mouth. Females don't have as many horns as males, especially down the back of their necks. So, I easily found a weak spot where I could bite her from behind.
“Kill him!” she shouted. “Get this piece of filth off me! Kill—” Her words ended in a gurgle.
As she fell, I lifted my head and spat out her flesh. The circle of dragons around me growled and closed in. They'd given her a chance, and she had failed. Now, it was their turn. I saw my death in their eyes. Here it was. Another united attack. That female had made a grave mistake by coming at me alone. Even injured, I was stronger than her. But these males wouldn't make that mistake.
I limped away from the corpse, my wings dragging behind me. The bones thrummed, fighting to align so they could heal. My magic was depleted, lost with my strength. At least the flesh wounds had stopped bleeding. There had been a particularly annoying one seeping into my right eye. But now, I saw clearly. I saw everything clearly.
“Come then!” I shouted. “Kill me. But know that you were not good enough to bring me down alone. This day will haunt you forever. It will unman you. Weaken you. Because you will always remember that a man who you saw as beneath you, ruled legitimately, justly, and with more power than any of you could hope to possess.”
The dragons looked at each other.
“I'm all right with that,” one of them said snidely.
Another chuckled.
Then they locked stares on me.
Just as they came for me, a roar echoed down from above. A distinctive dragon roar. And on the heels of it came a blast of water.
I blinked as the dragons before me were knocked away by a ring of water. The gushing didn't stop until they were yardsaway, giving me a clear line of sight. The battle had continued around me, but I saw more of my soldiers than the enemy. Holy fuck, were we winning even as I lost? Then I looked up.
Dragons still filled the sky, but many of them swam in tunnels of water that magnified the sunshine. I lifted my face to the light and roared. My allies roared back. Among them was a dragon I had known since I was a child. Ellas. My heart surged with hope.
