The Blood King

by Abigail Owen

  Before she’d sent him to war, she’d wanted to tell him something. Something important. Something unexpected, because she’d never seen it coming. But she’d worried about being a distraction. And still, the bond between them was a concern. Especially when he was going to fight.

  So she’d held her tongue. She’d tell him when she knew they were all safe.

  She was still mulling over that train of thought when a shout smacked into her brain. “They’re coming for you. Get away!”

  Skylar recognized the voices. The two white dragons who’d sworn allegiance.

  “What the hell is that?” Gorgon demanded.

  Before she could answer, he suddenly tensed beneath her.

  “Hold on!”

  She didn’t have time to look around for whatever danger he’d sensed before he flipped upside down. A second later, he jerked in the air. Had something hit them or was he trying to shake her off? Either way, the sudden motion had her scrambling to hold on, but she’d been warned about the tips of those spikes. Not even Fallon’s blood had fully healed Kasia’s wounds, leaving scars.

  With nothing to grip and gravity doing its damnedest to yank her off, Skylar fell from Gorgon’s back with a screech. She flailed for a second as she dropped away from him, like if she reached for him hard enough, she could get back there, but his dark gray form grew smaller by the second. Part of the clouds they’d been flying through writhed above him.

  White dragons, come for her.

  Shit.

  Her time skydiving, something she’d decided was prudent to know as a pilot, kicked in. Skylar flipped over so that she oriented with her belly toward the earth, her legs and arms out for balance, bent at the knees and elbows, the most stable position in the air.

  Usually when she jumped, she wore a full-faced helmet. Without that protection, her eyes watered and blurred with the force of the freezing wind. That had to be why the ground seemed to be wriggling beneath her. An indistinct sea of green and white, black, and blue. Throwing out one arm for balance, she wiped a sleeve across her eyes. It didn’t help.

  Not that she could do much about plummeting toward the ground. They’d made it over an uninhabited swath of land above the mountains. Even if she survived the impact, no one would be there to immediately help her. Her best hope was to remain calm and stable. Assuming Gorgon’s maneuver was caused by an enemy attacking, preferably one of the dragons on her side would catch her.

  Skylar tipped her head back, searching the skies above her. Her fuzzy vision and rapid blinking between squinting didn’t help much, and what she could make out wasn’t good. Dragons above her battled and grappled in a clash of titans that echoed off the mountains around her.

  With no warning, something both hard and smooth wrapped around her, and Skylar grunted as her downward momentum jerked harshly sideways.

  I’m in a freaking talon?

  “I’ve got you.”

  Immediately, she recognized the voice of one of her loyalists. Skylar turned her head to see the other one taking up position, flying beside them.

  “Thank the gods—”

  Something barreled into them like a fucking freight train, and Skylar flopped in her rescuer’s grip like a fucking rag doll. A screech of terrible pain pierced her ears, coming from her friend, and suddenly she found herself released, flung back into the sky.

  As soon as she managed to stabilize in the air again, she couldn’t find either of her white dragons. She wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve, but it didn’t help.

  Then, for the second time, all the air left her in a painful whoosh as she was plucked from the sky yet again. This time, the scales of the creature that had her were so white they turned almost translucent, giving them a purplish hue. Not one of hers.

  Dammit.

  “Over here!” she screamed. Maybe her two followers could find her if they were still alive. Help her. Or one of Gorgon’s people. The only way they would know she was being hijacked was if she made a racket. Skylar did just that, until that talon squeezed harder, cutting off her air.

  “Okay,” she wheezed. Granted, she was only able to squeak the word, but the creature who had her must’ve caught it, because its grip loosened.

  Briefly, she considered sending her captor to Ladon, but no telling how that would go. She was running on fumes after sending such a large group all the way to Ben Nevis. Besides, she hadn’t teleported a creature this large before. It could drag her with it, and they’d both get stuck in that in-between. If she wasn’t so drained, she would’ve risked it, but she couldn’t.

  Which meant she was along for the fucking ride for now.

  She urgently searched around for any of her people following but couldn’t see much above them, given the dragon’s bulk being in her way, and didn’t see anyone below or trailing behind.

  Desperately, Skylar tried to think of something, anything she could do to get out of this, to force him to release her.

  An idea occurred. A bit of a crazy one, but…what if she could teleport just a piece of him?

  Again, she risked sending the entire dragon and herself with it. But if she could loosen his grip, she could get away. She placed her palms against the rough leather skin of one knuckle and called on her fire. Staring at a single scale, she pictured sending only that piece, like a swirl of flame captured in a bubble. Then she shoved that imaginary bubble. In an instant, the scale disappeared, opening a raw gash beneath.

  With a screech, the dragon went crazy, flapping and contorting in the air as though he wanted to run away. His thrashing slammed her around so hard, she couldn’t try again on a bigger piece of him. Immediately he stopped and hovered.

  “Do that again, and I’ll crush you until your bones turn to liquid.” He squeezed to emphasize the point.

  “That was…graphic.” Skylar didn’t doubt it, though. Exhaustion hovered at the edges of her consciousness. Even sending that small piece had drained her. No way could she do more. Shit.

  With a gut-tumbling drop, the white dragon angled toward the ground, picking up speed as it tucked its wings closer in to its body. The snow-covered, jagged-edged peaks of the mountains rapidly grew larger, despite her still-watering eyes, hurtling up at her. For a blink, Skylar wondered if the dragon who’d caught her had lost its marbles and was preparing to slam into the unforgiving rock, kamikaze style, taking her out with it. At the last minute, though, it banked.

  That was when she saw him.

  A flash of black on a peak above her before he disappeared, rapidly showing up on a cliff just behind them.

  Maul.

  She and Kasia had left the blessed beast behind to help guard Ben Nevis, but she should’ve guessed he’d ignore that order. The animal seemed to have only one goal: watching over the Amon sisters.

  Her asshole captor flew in close to the mountains, navigating a series of sharp turns as he moved them deeper into the range. Maul kept up, though barely, trailing them in quick teleportational leaps. The dragon would follow a bend or navigate an outcropping, and she’d lose sight of the hellhound only to see his black form pop up a second later. The dog could jump only short distances, and to where he could see, but still, he was there. Losing ground, but there.

  Skylar considered ripping off parts of her jacket to leave as a scented trail for him to find when he fell too far back. She might die of hypothermia, but he’d at least find her. Except the white dragon holding her slowed, dropping down a ravine to the rocky bottom with an icy river flowing over rocks formed when time began.

  As far as Skylar could tell, they were alone here.

  Wings outstretched, sending nearby drifts of snow flying, her captor landed. The dragon had to hop a little, as it kept its hold on her, managing to touch down with only three legs. The thing stood silently, sniffing the air like a dog.

  “So…you are one of Serefina’s daughters?” />
  The charred voice reverberating through her mind had apprehension doing its damndest to seize up her nerve endings, crawling through her like spiders. She knew that voice.

  Pytheios.

  No way would he risk showing himself here. Not this close to his most powerful enemies. The white dragon in whose talon she still lay lifted its leg, holding her upright and presenting her to the horror that unfurled from the darkness of a cave she had not seen until this moment.

  The Rotting King of the Red Clan. Her parents’ murderer. The bastard they were all trying to kill.

  Deep red scales caught the sunlight, even dimmed by clouds, as the dragon moved closer. A scent of putrid meat clung to him like a dense, invisible fog, a thousand times worse than Maul’s, and Skylar held her breath. As he came farther into the light, she could see how the fucker’s wings were disintegrating, reminding her of moth-eaten rags.

  Pytheios wasn’t called the Rotting King for nothing.

  Skylar faced him down not with dread inside her, but with pure hatred. The emotion threatened to burn her up from the inside out. “I’m already mated, asshole. You’re too late.”

  He slithered closer, the decaying scent of him growing stronger, reminding her of the night her mother died, that same scent wafting on the warm breeze. Skylar had to swallow down the sour bile that threatened to upchuck her breakfast all over her captor’s claws.

  Before Pytheios could speak, suddenly Maul appeared directly in front of her. Immediately, he flashed an image of Skylar and Kasia both teleporting together, and she knew what the hellhound had in mind.

  Did she have anything left? Didn’t matter, she’d have to try.

  Her arms dangled loosely over the white dragon’s talons. Skylar reached for her fire even as she slammed her hands into Maul’s chest, digging her fingers into his fur to hold on.

  And, for a heartbeat of a second, she thought it had worked as that silent void took hold of her senses. But sound and light returned too fast. As she came back to herself, still held in those damn talons, Maul disappeared with a yelp of pain that lingered in the air, even after he was gone.

  More than that, without her willing it, the flames covering her skin snuffed out like a candle in a hurricane. Iron bands of panic gripped her lungs, squeezing harder than the beast who held her, her heart taking off.

  What was happening to her powers?

  Pytheios lowered his head to regard her silently from one blazing red eye for a long moment. “Who said anything about mating you?”

  A woman Skylar hadn’t noticed before—older but still strikingly lovely with white curls around her face—clothed in a simple black jumpsuit, climbed up Pytheios’s back. Glided more like, until she stood on his shoulder facing Skylar.

  “I can feel the power radiating from her.” The woman gave a smile that would make a snake’s skin crawl. “She’ll do nicely, but not yet. She’s drained right now. She also hasn’t fully realized her potential.”

  What the hell?

  Pytheios loosed a low snarl, loud enough that a few small rocks tumbled from their precarious positions on the mountainside. The woman ran a soothing hand over his scales. “Not long, my love,” she murmured. “A month at most. Worth the wait.”

  “Not long until what?” Skylar demanded, doing her best to control the terror trying to hijack her body and her mind. She twitched in the bonds of the claws holding her still only to wince as it clamped down on her. “What do you think you’re going to do to me?”

  The woman shrugged. “Suck your essence from you until you die.”

  She said the words the same way she might’ve said she’d bake a cake or take a leisurely walk.

  Then she reached out and tapped one finger against Skylar’s forehead. She murmured a few indistinguishable words, and Skylar felt unconsciousness enveloping her like an avalanche she was helpless to run from.

  Ladon.

  Her mate’s name flitted through her mind, her last thought of his blue eyes. At the same time, a searing pain at the back of her neck penetrated the darkness overwhelming her senses. She lolled forward in her captor’s grasp, and oblivion claimed her.

  …

  Ladon paused walking in from the perch to the comms room. He and Samael had flown up together, but midshift…

  He turned to face the black dragon shifter. “Did you hear that?”

  Dark eyebrows winged high. “Hear what?”

  “Did someone call my name? A woman?” He didn’t want to put a name to what he’d heard, but some part of him knew anyway.

  “I didn’t hear anything.” Samael’s expression remained neutral, but Ladon still got the impression the other man was questioning his sanity, or at least his hearing.

  Maybe he should be, too, but the fact that Samael hadn’t heard it only confirmed what he already knew in his soul to be true. He’d heard Skylar. His mate’s husky, sexy-as-sin voice was unmistakable.

  And he was relatively certain he wasn’t losing it, hearing her voice wherever he went. So, what had that been?

  A sudden, lancing pain sliced across the back of his neck. With a hiss, he grabbed at the skin there, certain he’d find the hilt of a knife plunged deep. Instead, his hand encountered his own brand, white-hot to the touch.

  Skylar.

  Their bond?

  But what had snapped it into place? Why now?

  Heart slamming against his ribs, Ladon closed his eyes, listening, waiting for her to speak again. Only silence greeted him. He reached through the darkness behind his closed lids, trying to feel the connection that he’d heard destined mates could experience. Hell, he’d seen it. Brand and Kasia in a short period of time were practically one mind.

  But he couldn’t feel Skylar, and her voice didn’t reach him again.

  However, he couldn’t shake the dread that ate at him now like acid on his skin. Something was wrong with Skylar.

  “Fuck.”

  Ladon stalked the rest of the way into the comms room. Since he’d taken over as king, this room had seen little use. Set up to communicate between their various Blue Clan mountains, other clans, and the Alliance leaders in each of the colonies, he hadn’t needed it. No other clan had interest in communicating with him, and he’d lost the other mountains of his clan, pulling all his people back into one single place to defend, intending to build back up from there.

  Now, he finally had a reason to use this space. He sat in one of the black high-backed chairs at a console. One full wall was filled with screens and monitors, operated by the stations built into the long desk. Pushing a series of buttons, he brought the room online. Their model hadn’t been upgraded in years, thanks to Thanatos’s inability to care for his people before himself and his position with Pytheios, so it took a while to get everything humming.

  Finally, a face appeared on the screen before him. A woman he didn’t recognize, but a gold dragon based on the glittering eyes. “My name is Ladon Ormarr. I’m the—”

  “I know who you are.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Then you know who I want to talk to. Don’t waste my time.”

  His tone of barely leashed anger must’ve penetrated, because the woman winced and hurried to do as he’d asked. The few minutes it took grated. By the time Brand and Kasia appeared, Ladon was up and gripping the back of the chair to keep from stalking around the room.

  The second Brand and Kasia appeared, Ladon was on them. “Has Gorgon not arrived yet?”

  “How the fuck did you know that?” Brand demanded.

  “What happened?”

  Brand made a gesture and two men with pale hair and the ice-blue eyes of white dragons walked into the room. Men Ladon immediately recognized. The white shifters who’d sworn allegiance to his queen.

  “Do you know these men?” Brand asked. “They just arrived yelling about needing to speak with you—”

/>   Ladon cut him off, directing his words not to Brand but the two men behind him. “Tell me Skylar is safe.”

  Kasia and Brand looked at each other.

  One of the white shifters stepped forward. “We tried to warn them, but our clan attacked before we could get close enough. They took her.”

  “Who took her?” Ladon growled. But the black hole of dread threatening to drag him in and crush him told him the answer.

  “We don’t know. The Green and White Clans attacked together. A white dragon got to her. We tried to save her.”

  Given the jagged bone protruding from one of the men’s arms, Ladon believed that. He cut his gaze to Brand, hands on the table, so he could lean in closer to the console. “My bond with Skylar just solidified. Where is Gorgon? And where the fuck is my mate?”

  “Shit,” Brand spat.

  Yeah. They got it. Skylar had to be in trouble. His stubborn mate calling to him had to be the only way that bond formed. Nothing else made sense in this moment.

  “Brand.” Kasia’s voice shook as she grabbed his arm.

  His friend took Kasia’s face in his hands. “Don’t make assumptions. Let’s find Gorgon.”

  “Go,” Ladon said.

  For a man as big as Brand was, he moved damn fast when he wanted to. He was out of the room in an instant.

  Kasia went to follow, but Ladon stopped her. “Kasia, wait.”

  She turned back to the screen. Though she visibly trembled, even across rooms and screens, and her face paled, she remained calm. A quality she and her sister shared.

  “The first time you heard Brand in your head…what did it sound like?”

  Kasia’s eyes widened infinitesimally. “Like he was right there, beside me, whispering in my ear. Why?” She leaned forward, studying him. “Did you hear Skylar?”

  “Yes.”

  “Just now?”

  He ran a hand around the back of his neck. “Yeah.”

  “What did she say?” Her tone kicked up a notch from calm to urgent.

  Ladon scrubbed the same hand down his face, running his thumb over the scar. “Just my name.”