Page 101 of Dragon’s Rebel

Chapter 44

The door closed behind Corwyn and Jean-Claude, and Rebel heard footsteps receding down the hall. As soon as they faded away, she began working on the shackles.

The chains on the shackles were just barely long enough for her to reach into her boot top. Their search of her had been quick and careless—they were thinking in terms of weapons and magic.

Despite their taunts, they seemed to have forgotten she was a thief.

With superpowers.

Rebel worked a concealed lockpick out of a slim pocket inside her boot. She inserted it in the first lock, and it melted in her hand.

Fucking magical locks.

The second pick was her magical one. “Should have started with that,” she muttered.

She looked over at Thorne, who had wrapped his hands around his knees and was shivering. “Thorne?” she said. “You okay?”

There was no answer, and he didn’t look up. She didn’t even know if he could hear her.

She worked faster, working the pick into the lock until the shackle sprang free. The second one was easier.

As soon as it was open, the magical force shield dissipated. Stupid, keying the shield to the shackles.

She tiptoed to the hallway door and lay flat on the floor, looking through the crack between the floor and the bottom of the door.

She could see the heavy boots of a guard, and hear him breathing. So that was one.

She did the same thing at the other door, the one that led back to the room with the secret passage. There was a guard outside that one too.

Damn. That meant she was going to have to get Thorne on his feet and moving under his own power. She didn’t have her Colt, and if those were hellhound guards, they were going to have her for lunch before she could drag Thorne three feet.

“Why do dragons have to be so damn big?” she muttered.

She went over to Thorne and sat down on the floor, just outside the bubble of his shield. He was lying on his side now, curled up with his wounded arm next to his body.

Cautiously, she reached out and touched the shield.

Her body jolted, and her fingers went numb. It was like touching an electric fence—which she knew because she’d actually touched a couple, in her early days as a thief.

Her mentor had never warned them, if they forgot to check. He figured pain was the best way to learn.

Rebel took a deep breath and concentrated. She couldn’t let herself be distracted, even if Thorne was…

Not dying. He was going to be fine. “You’re going to be okay,” she murmured. “And I’m going to kill Corwyn and Jean-Claude with my bare hands. Unless you want me to leave you one.”

She reached out with her mind, feeling for the frequency of the magical field so she could match it. She’d never dealt with one so complicated; it was like different fields crisscrossing at different frequencies.

Pattern. There had to be a pattern.

She closed her eyes and focused, examining it in her mind. Short choppy waves going this way. Long smooth waves going this way, and this way…

There was an internal ‘click’ when her brain matched the pattern. She put her hand out, and it went right through the shield. Carefully, she pulled and stretched the shield, pulling it over her like a blanket, making herself part of it, then coming out the other side.

She was through.

She was horrified when she saw Thorne’s arm. The toxin was still eating through his flesh. The edges of the wound were blackening, and the center was still bubbling. The stuff seemed to be working its way into his veins, and they were turning a horrible greenish black color down into his hand, and up towards his heart.

She tried to wake him up, but he wasn’t responding. Okay. Shackles first, then she’d try again.