Page 123

Then my wits returned. Grace.

Bent in half on the dirt, nose almost on her knees, both arms wrapped around her middle… and rocking like a child.

Ignoring my mother, I rushed to my mate, sliding to my knees at her side where she knelt in the dirt, deep, dark liquid seeping into her robes, and her eyes tight with pain.

“Grace,” I breathed.

My mate shook from head to toe and her eyes never left me. “Vos… I’m…”

Shushing her, frantic, I gathered her up to my chest, still curled like a child, and pushed to my feet. ‘Don’t speak, try to breathe evenly. I know it hurts. Try not to move.’

My vision blurred. I vaguely registered my mother screaming behind me, attempting attack—but she couldn’t touch me with her magik—if she still possessed it at all. I knew that.

God, help us.

‘Kham! Get Koa! Help Grace! Please!’

The sky shook with roars—both Kham and Koa’s. Then the earth trembled as four massive bodies slammed to earth once more—sliding, scrabbling, snarling, rolling like predators.

I flinched, instinctively putting myself between Grace and the threat, but Koa fought like a beast. She had one of the other dragons by the throat, and Kham finally replied in my head.

‘Moments… it will be moments… these dragons are innocent, but we will not allow—’

‘Kham, Grace is going to die. She’ll bleed out—’

“I can help! I can help!”

Grace still in my arms, I turned to find Cali tearing through the crowd.

I backed away, shaking my head as she ran forward. “No. Absolutely fucking not—”

“Put her down—we have to stop the bleeding, Vane!”

I hugged Grace tighter to my chest, but she cried out. I shook, head spinning as I looked in every direction, for any other option.

Cali stood in front of me, wringing her hands, flinching whenever the dragons screamed, or stomped.

She swallowed, her face screwed tight in fear. “You’re Dominus now—I wouldn’t defy you!” she cried over the chaos around us. “Let me help—I can help!”

My head screamed louder than the dragons.

‘Kham—’

‘The Creator provides in unlikely ways—I will be there in moments. But I am not a greenscale, that I can heal another outside the bond, Voski. And Grace is in true need.’

‘But… Cali?’

‘What choice do we have? I believe she speaks the truth.’

I looked at the disheveled, traitorous woman who had grown out of the girl I’d once loved.

Kham poured a burst of flame in the sky over one of the dragons, making the entire clearing glow with warm firelight. Cali ducked, her body recoiling in fear. But she didn’t run. And though she trembled, she continued to stare at me, waiting for instruction.

The Dominus mark. She could feel it in me. They all could. They’d seek to serve… until they sought to overcome.

“If you hurt her—if you harm her in any way, I will kill you,” I said plainly.

Cali nodded once, quickly, then beckoned me to lay Grace down.