A little weretiger with new whiskers and one feline ear instinctively popping out in fear grabs the other two by the hands. She gives them both an urgent tug, and they run into the forest.
I shift back into scales and whip one kidnapper into a tree with my tail. The crack of bones isn’t nearly satisfying enough, and I spin, clawing him to make sure he’s not just dead—he’s eviscerated. Sensing movement, I open my jaws as I twist back around and bite down, ripping the entire top half off a fur-covered body and flinging the tainted meat away from me.
My eyes narrow as fire roils in my mouth, cleansing it of werepoison. There’s one left, and I stalk her, enough heat seeping from beneath my scales to wilt the low vegetation between us. Blood-wet leaves smolder. I could roast her alive right now, but I hold back, hoping she’ll give me more sport than the others. Why do they even bother? Only Bloodwold vampires have contrived some sort of sorcery that temporarily protects them from our firebreath. Everyone else burns.
The werewolf retreats, upright but on canine legs. She’s stayed in her half-skin form—unappealing but powerful. She’d have a fighting chance if she took up a spear or a bow and arrow, but that’s not the werebeast way. They fight with tooth and claw, relying heavily on their inner animal.
“There wasn’t much hope of you sneaking far enough into Wyndwood to hide the children and make them disappear without a trace.”
“It’s worked before,” she answers harshly. At least she doesn’t beg for a life she knows I won’t spare.
“On smaller groups, maybe. But you got greedy, and Muirvale raised the alarm so fast that you’d barely crossed the border before we were on your tail.”
“Muirvale should be in Wyndwood. You stole a whole city of weres. We’re just taking back what’s ours.”
Flames escape on a rasping chuckle. “Yours? Who thinks that? Not the weres who live there. Not your own king, the leaders of Ellonrift, or Cealastra, who approved the terms.”
“How do you know what Cealastra thinks?” she grinds out.
“How do you know I don’t?” Those who attend the Council have felt the goddess’s presence, and there’s no mistaking it. The Star of Ellonrift hasn’t deigned to take physical form there in centuries, but her divine essence tells us where her favor goes. When there’s a tied vote to break or a prolonged and dangerously tense disagreement, her celestial magic illuminates the ruler she chooses to side with, and not even Rannigan Bloodthief can argue with the formidable power in the room—or with the goddess’s final decision. It’s been that way since the second dawn of Ellonrift and the founding of the six ruling bloodlines.
Except, we haven’t had a tied vote that would’ve forced Cealastra’s appearance in more than two hundred years. Rannigan has seen to that with his murders and coercion. And Cealastra hasn’t renewed magic in decades, leaving our sorcerers weaker, worried, and praying for her return.
“Where are her eclipses now?” The werewolf backs away from me. “For all we know, Cealastra is gone, and magic is next.”
Magic is waning, which might mean Cealastra is too. The unfortunately real possibility rattles me. If the Star of Ellonrift never weighs in on another Council, even I’ll give up on the six kingdoms and their increasingly false promises of nonviolent solutions. The day that happens—maybe at this very next meeting of rulers—the Vampire King will be more of a threat than ever, especially to Torridaig.
“Do you think your politics are working?” I ask in lieu of trying to convince this werebeast that Cealastra persists, despite the lack of eclipses to remind everyone of her presence and renew magic across the lands.
“Do you think yours are?” She trembles now, her distorted, hairy feet scraping back through moldering leaves. I smell anger and fear on her sweat. Defiance and defeat.
The next Ellonrift Council is in mere weeks. I’m hosting this time and willing to give diplomacy one last try. Officially, we’re still at peace. Five different kinds of people and five leaders sharing a continent, even though there should be six sovereign rulers in place.
Cealastra gifted vampires with two starborn bloodlines and the entire east, which split into Bloodwold and Fanghaven after the border treaties came into force. She wanted to watch people moving under her starlight while the rest of Ellonrift slept. But a deceiving monster with his own kingdom stole the sovereignty of the other by massacring all but the youngest member of Fanghaven’s royal family, then schemed to speak for her at the Ellonrift Council…as his wife.
The real enemy is the Vampire King. I need to be able to strike back at Bloodwold the same way I can against these fanatical werebeasts who don’t represent Wyndwood or its king. Rannigan Bloodthief steals my people so that his people can drink them down to husks, and I can’t cross the border without risking sanctions at the Council—a yearly meeting where the Vampire King now gets two fucking votes.
“I think I protect, and you terrorize.” I move forward. She’s almost at the edge of the clearing, and I can’t let her slip out. I’m too big to crash through the trees in my dragon form, and she could finish shifting in the blink of an eye and dart off on all fours. “I think your own people are mostly against you, and you’re alone in dark little dens planning a revolution that won’t happen. I think if you weren’t inedible, vampires would’ve sucked you dry by now. And I would’ve let them.”
“Your days are numbered, Bale Cinderheart. Cealastra won’t protect you forever, if she even remains. Magic is dying, and when it goes, you’ll be the first to lose everything.”
She whirls to run, and I catch her mid-shift and mid-leap toward the line of trees in a blaze of firebreath. She burns, the stink of charred hair and scorched skin rank in my nostrils.
I turn away from the smoking puddle and blackened bark. Too easy. I’m sure the rest of the team has done much the same.
Except for Idallia. She has to find other ways to kill.
And to stay alive.
I bite down on that thought with fangs that shrink as I shift back into skin and move into the denser forest in the direction of the children. I find them quickly, mainly by scent, then lead them through the trees toward the nearest team member.
I hear my squadron throughout the woods. Each time I come across another dragon shifter, my apprehension grows. They’ve won their battles, just as I did. They have children in tow, just as I do. We’ve recovered a dozen between us, and they cling to us, not afraid even though the Elite Wing is one of the most frightening things in Ellonrift.
The werechildren aren’t worried, but I am. I’ve found everyone except for Idallia and Fyrestar. I don’t hear another fight. I don’t smell her anywhere. She got lower faster than we did, weaving through trees in a way we can’t with our giant wingspans. What did she see that sent her flying in a direction none of us took? How big a group did she go after?
“Where is she?” Kellan growls, listening hard.
I hold back the snarl I want to throw at him, especially as I let my dragon loose and shift again. My ability to scent is better. My hearing too. It means I can hear Kellan’s heart pounding now, harder than it should for the woman he refuses to get over.
