“Let her go!” he snarled, his dragon’s rage merging with his own.
Attor and Koal moved as one, blocking his path, their huge swords a blur of steel. With a roar that shook the abbey walls, he countered their lethal dance. Millennia of battle with demoniis and demons blurred his blade as his desperation to reach Ash grew.
Power crackled, and the air split open in the courtyard, revealing a portal. Skaldr leaped through the gateway with a shrieking, fighting Ash.
Koal and Attor fell back in a practiced formation in front of the whirling gateway, blades countering his attack.
“I’m sorry it’s come to this, Your Highness,” Attor said, regret heavy in his voice. The formal title scraped Race’s nerves raw. “But you left us no choice. You’re needed back in Lemuria.”
Both warriors leaped through the portal as its edges began to collapse, the air crackling with fading power.
No!His dragon thrashed beneath his skin.Bring her back.
Fuuuuck!
Race summoned his obsidian dagger, slipped it into the back waist of his leathers, and leaped through the shrinking gateway, his mind thick with blood rage.
He put Ash in danger.
Now he had to go back to the one place he swore he never would.
He would incinerate the bastards for forcing his hand!
Ash stirred awake in sweltering heat, rubble biting into her arms and face. A faint, sweet scent lingered in her nose, and bitterness coated her tongue. Her stomach churned, and she groaned, desperately trying not to heave.
She blinked her blurry eyes, trying to make sense of the gloom. She’d been in the snow-covered abbey with Race?—
Oh, shit.She jackknifed upward, memories swamping her. Race facing those three men, one of them grabbing her, slamming something in her nose.
He’d bloody chloroformed her! Bastard.
Her heart in her throat, her gaze darted about, taking in her surroundings, and she blinked at the rough, dark walls and the twilight at the entrance.
A bloody cave?
With her captor nowhere in sight, Ash pushed to her feet. If there was a way in, there had to be a way out.
A scuff of boots on granite echoed, and she froze. Her captor stood shirtless in a dark passage leading deeper into the cave, looking as if he’d climbed out of a bloody Viking comic, with his harsh expression and wild red hair. Steam rose from his bare skin—how odd—as he pulled on a shirt.
“Going somewhere?” he asked mildly.
“You absolute prick—” She slapped her palm against the rough, surprisingly warm wall as another wave of dizziness made her head swim. “I demand you take me back!”
“Keep your voice down,” he growled, sounding more beast-like than human.
“Don’t you shush me.” She scowled, refusing to cower even though his amber eyes glittered with animalistic intensity in the gloom. “You drugged me!”
“No, I just let you smell asomnarapod—adream bane.You were too loud.”
“Too loud—tooloud? No one asked you to abduct me, you arrogant jerk. You had no right. I demand you take me back!”
“No.” He stalked for the cave mouth.
She gritted her teeth, anger racing through her veins like a lit fuse.
Calm down, Ash. Think.
She inhaled a shaky breath and nearly gagged at the hot, acrid air burning her nose and stinging her eyes. She dashed away the tears, determined to find a way to escape this God-cursed place.
