Dragon Redeemed
Reclaimed Dragons Book 2
Terry Bolryder
Copyright © 2020 by Terry Bolryder
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Created with Vellum
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Epilogue
Also by Terry Bolryder
1
Rows of trees blurred into fuzzy lines at the corners of Ryder’s vision as he accelerated down the empty highway, the engine of his motorcycle thrumming beneath him as it picked up speed.
Ahead of him, the road curved, and he angled his body with the machine, pine-scented air filling his senses as the sensation of flying teased his body.
Freedom.
Or the closest thing to it that humans could offer.
Ryder’s drives through the hills and valleys surrounding his and Landon’s temporary home offered unparalleled views. Wide vistas, endless forests, and even a lake nearby where he could go to clear his head.
As part green fae, Ryder supposed it made sense that being out in the wild connected to something deep inside him. And the dragon side of him, that itched to fly and be in control, got to be free.
But not even the cool wind and the feeling of nothing around him for miles could satiate one hunger deep inside him.
The need to find his mate.
Ryder made another turn, slowing as he reached the recently paved path that led toward his current home. Overhead, branches obscured the sky from his vision, the sun piercing through the canopy casting the road in an ethereal yellow-green hue.
The tree line widened, then opened up to a view of the house. Even from a mile away, he could see a blocky white vehicle in the driveway, with two figures standing next to it, too small to make out.
Waiting for him, he could sense.
Maybe this was Ryder’s chance at a mission. Ever since Dallin (the last dragon to be assigned a mission) had settled in with his mate, Ryder had been waiting for a call of his own.
As he slowed, reaching the driveway, Ryder saw that the two figures were Landon and Ian, the white-haired light fae who helped coordinate their missions.
Ryder came to a stop, kicked his side stand down, and shut off the ignition. To his side, Landon gave a friendly wave while Ian stood back, holding something in his hands.
Ryder tried to not get his hopes up, but protecting things was what dragons did best. With the world of shifters becoming more mixed every day, having the heart of a dragon and the strength of a fae was a considerable advantage.
Even if his own abilities were a bit…warped.
“How was your ride?” Landon asked, dark hair glinting, ice-blue eyes almost too bright to look at in the sun.
“Good,” Ryder replied, taking his helmet off and getting off the bike. “The air’s clean today. Fresher, like things are changing.”
Landon smiled. “Change is good. Upward and onward.”
Ryder knew what he meant. They’d both come through great hardship to be where they were.
Landon had been found chained, alone, and near death in a dungeon beneath the light fae kingdom. And even after all that, he maintained a good attitude.
Whereas Ryder didn’t remember anything before the chaos explosion that had destroyed the lab holding him. He just knew he was never going back.
Together they walked over to Ian, who had an unreadable expression on his face as he leaned against his car.
“So what’s the impromptu visit for? I thought we canceled our development sessions a few weeks ago,” Ryder said, holding his helmet in one hand as the three of them formed a small circle.
“This has nothing to do with your training. You two are already more than ready to take whatever chaos could throw at you now.” He tapped the manila folder he held in one hand thoughtfully. “No, this is an assignment for you, Ryder.”
Ryder’s heart beat in his chest, the prospect of new faces and new experiences making it difficult to hold back his eagerness.
“So you’ve found another beacon?”
Ian shook his head, a pensive look in his eyes that gave Ryder a strange, sinking feeling. “There’s been nothing on our sensors for weeks. No new magic signatures or even hints of people who might manifest.”
“Then what’s my assignment?” Ryder asked, eyes narrowing.
“Look for yourself,” Ian said, handing him the envelope.
Ryder grabbed it, the thick paper crinkling in his grip as he opened it. He scanned the page quickly, ignoring the minute details to get to the point.
“This project is… unique,” Ian said, still oddly calm but tense. Like someone awaiting sudden and torrential rain. “Something to keep you busy until we find another mission for you.”
“So I’m still a bodyguard?” Ryder asked. The swath of technical terms in the letter wasn’t making things clear to him at all.
“Yes.”
“Hey, that’s what you wanted, right?” Landon chimed in, positive as usual.
“But it’s not a beacon?” Ryder’s brow furrowed.
“You’ll find out more in a moment,” Ian said, his gray eyes avoiding Ryder’s gaze. “Your partner is arriving with Liz any minute. We can go over the details then.”
This whole thing was putting Ryder on edge, as though they were hiding something from him. Ryder instinctively reached out to Landon’s mind, seeing if Landon would be willing to say more, but he just gave one of his placating smirks in response.
Though cheerful, no one could ever make Landon do anything he didn’t want to.
Ryder sighed. “Who am I protecting? They can’t be human if there’s this much red tape involved.”
Ian slanted Landon an unsubtle look, and Landon just shrugged back.
Why wouldn’t someone just say something? Ryder wanted to be out there finding his mate, not playing stupid guessing games.
Ian paused for a few seconds, torturing Ryder with whatever it was they weren’t saying. “She’s a fairy,” he finally said, his whole body slumping in relief and bracing for explosion at the same time.
Time stood still for a moment for Ryder. He couldn’t believe what Ian had just said, so he tried to find a way it might make more sense.
“You mean an awakened beacon? Like she’s a human who already awakened her fae powers?”
Ian swallowed. Hard. “No, she’s fae fae.”
Ryder’s grip on his helmet slackened subconsciously, and it clattered to the ground with a crack, then rolled down the slight decline of the driveway.
Landon was a blur of color as he chased and grabbed it, appraising it with a frown.
“You can’t use this now that you’ve dropped it,” he said. “You’ll have to buy another. What a waste.”
Ryder whirled on his friend. “Do you think I care about that right now? They’re pairing me with a fairy. A fairy.”
Landon and Ian just watched him, clearly not knowing what to say.
Ryder’s fist clenched, his arm shaking slightly as he tried to calm himself. The oldest memory he had was the day he escaped the lab, but he could still remember the agony he’d felt. The excruciating pain of everything they’d put in his body. The horror of knowing he’d been made into something wrong.
He’d been rampaging in pure nightmarish chaos until Dallin and Ian had shown up. Even then, it had taken the sight of Ian’s soul bond, Liz, to calm him down.
So even though he couldn’t remember the lifetime of torture he’d endured at the hands of the fae, the scars he bore on his soul were a constant reminder of fae malice.
Ryder took a deep breath, letting the warm breeze fill his senses with the calming scent of fresh, clean air. He’d lived through hell. He could live through anything. He looked at Ian. “So why me?”
Ian’s gray eyes met his, cool and calm. “They wanted our strongest hybrid on the job. That’s you, Ryder.” He sighed. “You know not all fairies are bad.”
That was true. Ryder had come to like Ian and his friends and their mates. But that was different. This was a stranger and as likely to be evil as not.
“Why not Landon?” Ryder asked. “He seems okay with it.”
Landon looked to the side, humming an off-key tune to himself as he acted like he wasn’t there for a moment.
Ian glanced at Landon and gave an aggrieved sigh. “Landon’s… a bit preoccupied.”
That was for damn sure.
Ryder took another deep breath. Everything would be better if he could just stay calm. After all, he had been wanting to get out in the world. Do something other than gardening.
“Will it be dangerous?” he asked Ian.
“Most likely.”
Ryder had to admit he liked the sound of that. Even if he had to work with a fairy, doing something beat doing nothing. Though, obviously, this would just be a mission and not a chance to meet his mate as Dallin had.
There wasn’t a tree’s chance in Antarctica that he would ever fall in love with a pureblood fairy.
“So this fae, why is she here? Where did she come from?”
Ian’s expression tightened, and he gave Landon a slightly panicked look that formed a pit in the center of Ryder’s stomach.
Landon let out a sigh. “Ian, if you don’t tell him, I’m going to.”
“Tell me what?” Ryder asked, his dread growing like a snowball rolling down a hill.
Ian exhaled, making the seconds feel like minutes.
“Tell. Me. What?”
“Okay,” Ian said. “But give me a chance to explain before you react, because you’re not going to like it.” It was so quiet that only the air whistled around them. “She’s from the labs.”
Ryder blinked as his world slid out from under him. Then he turned and stalked away from his friends.
There was no way he would go along with this.
2
“Wow, it’s so pretty out here,” Kira said mostly to herself as she watched an endless, lush forest pass by from the passenger seat of Liz’s car.
“I know, right?” Liz, a kind, fierce woman who had become a close friend to Kira, smiled at her calmly, dark eyes glittering in the sun. “Sometimes I make Ian visit the dragons just for an excuse to see the view.”
Liz’s tone was cheerful, but Kira couldn’t help the nervousness tightening her belly.
“Why so tense?” Liz asked, glancing over at her.
“I don’t know.” Kira tried to focus on the soothing view of Earth’s woods all around them. So different from the fae wilds. “Just not accustomed to this world quite yet, I suppose.”
“You’ve only been here a couple months. It makes sense there’s still an adjustment period.”
“Thanks,” Kira said. “I guess it’s just that… practically all of my time has been spent with people I know and who know me. It’s different thinking about meeting new faces.”
Especially new dragons.
In particular, the one she was assigned to.
“Things have been pretty hectic, haven’t they?”
“Since that day, yes,” Kira said firmly. She didn’t need to say more for both of them to know what she was talking about.
The day the light kingdom fell in the fae world and all the labs were liberated.
The day she’d been freed.
“Funny to think how everything would be different if it hadn’t happened, right? You wouldn’t be here. Then again, I guess you’re a unique case,” Liz said, slowing the car and taking a turn down a quaint-looking road.
“Unique because I’m a turncoat?” Kira asked.
Liz paused for a moment, then nodded. “That isn’t a bad thing when you’re turning away from the wrong side. We were just glad for the help. After all, when we raided the laboratories and draining pits to round up all of the light fae that had been experimenting on dragons, we never expected to find a radiant fae. Let alone one who would help us make things right.”
Kira could still remember it like it was yesterday.
Standing in the lab, hearing about a rogue glamour fae and an escaped dragon who were working together. Fearing the end. Chaos and death, though it was deserved in many ways.
And the knowledge that she finally had a chance to work for something better. To make up for ever being involved in the labs.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Liz said. “Stop it, or I will personally start calling all the shifters you’ve helped and making them tell you what you’ve done for them.”
“No, no,” Kira said quickly with a little nervous laugh. “I don’t deserve any praise. I just wanted to help.” She folded her hands in her lap. “I’m glad I helped.”
“Your magic has made a difference for so many shifters and humans. You don’t even know,” Liz said, shaking her head.
Kira looked over at her friend. “I still don’t know how you trusted me not to betray you and the others.”
Liz had never judged or feared her for where she’d come from, but many other paranormals had.
No matter that Kira would rather die than ever go back.
Liz scoffed, waving a hand. “It was obvious from the start. You weren’t anything like the other fairies we captured. They’re all still tightlipped about their operations, protecting their dead elders and their own hides. Just rotten to the core.”
Kira swallowed. “Yes. I know.”
Liz looked over at her, expression softening. “You turned on your evil overlords and offered to help the second you had a chance, and with your radiant powers, you knew you would be welcome anywhere.”
That was true. Radiant fae were thought to be extinct.
There were human beacons that exhibited latent powers, but Kira was the only full-fledged radiant fae she knew of that had been born in the fae world.
Thus the reason the light fae had come for her in the first place.
“So yeah,” Liz said. “Given what you’ve given up, what you’ve risked to do this, I don’t have any doubts about you. And I’ll back you up against anyone who does.”
“Thank you,” Kira said. “I’ll try to live up to your good faith.”
Liz laughed, her nose crinkling as she looked at Kira. “Plus, you’re just so nice. How could anyone not like you? I had a good feeling about you from the moment we met.”
Kira smiled, feeling warm as she settled back against her seat. “Me too, about you.” She took a moment and closed her eyes, focusing on regaining her composure.
But she was still so nervous about the mission coming up and the dragon she’d been paired with.
“So this Ryder, what kind of dragon is he?” Unfortunately, due to her work, Kira was aware of basically every type of dragon possible.
“Ryder’s complicated,” Liz said. “I think I’ll let him explain what he is if he wants to. But he’s really strong. That’s why we paired him with you, in case you run into some of your old co-workers.”
Kira sighed. “Okay, I understand you can’t tell me his dragon powers,
but what’s he like? His personality, I mean.”
Liz was quiet, still considering Kira’s question. “You have to meet Ryder to really get a feel for him. He can be a bit stoic, but he’s very moral and one of the kindest people I know,” Liz said. “Very naturally protective as well.”
“I’m strong,” Kira said. “I really can take care of myself.”
“I don’t doubt it as a full-fledged fae,” Liz said. “But this is different. And no one is going to agree to let you do these missions you suggested without a partner. So Ryder it is.”
A partner. Ryder. Very human-sounding. Normal. No one she knew from the labs.
Not the face that haunted her dreams. Not the man that was the reason she kept going forward with her redemption mission.
Every being hurt by the light fae in the labs left a mark on her, even if it had been others doing the hurting all along.
But there was only one being, one dragon she could never truly forget.
Only one loss that left her empty and hollow.
A face that was still etched on the walls of her soul.
Kira turned her attention to the sight of Ian waiting at his car in the driveway. She needed to focus on the task at hand.
“I guess this is it,” Kira said as Liz parked the car. “Here goes nothing.”
“It’ll be fine. Ryder’s nice. You’ll see,” Liz said. Then she undid her seatbelt, opened the door, and ran out to hug her soul bond.
As Kira watched Liz hug Ian close, her heart echoed with longing and a remembrance of the only time she came close to having something so good.
Ian finally pulled back from kissing Liz and turned his attention to Kira, giving her a megawatt grin that shone even brighter than his stark-white hair.
“Kira!” He walked forward with his arm around Liz. “How was the trip?”
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