Dragon's Ground (The Desert Cursed Series Book 2)

by Shannon Mayer

  “Lila,” he said quietly, “what can we expect to face?”

  “Dragons.” She snorted.

  A laugh bubbled up in my chest, but I said nothing.

  “No shit,” he rolled his eyes, “but anything else besides the obvious? Spells, traps?”

  She snapped her wings hard twice, bobbing in the air in front of us. “Well, yeah. Both really. The thing is, coming in this way toward the mound is good. Because there are no traps and spells directed toward interlopers coming from the wall. It just doesn’t happen, so why waste the effort?”

  I squinted one eye at her. “But? I hear a but coming.”

  She flipped over once in the air and then nodded. “Yeah, a great big but. Gigantic-ass but.”

  Bryce snorted. “What is it?”

  Lila flew in loops around our heads. “We have to cross the whelping grounds to get to the mound.”

  The blood in my body might as well have all been sucked out right there. “You are. . . you’re not serious, are you?”

  She shrugged. “Why do you think Amalia said what she said about three of us being the smallest, the ones to break in?”

  Three. . . but not three. Amalia had looked at me when she’d said that and it was almost as though I could hear her thoughts. “Not you, Lila. You’ll stay with Bryce and watch our escape. Maks and I will slip in.”

  “Maks is as big as me, if you hadn’t noticed,” Bryce said.

  “Not as a caracal, he’s not.” I drew a big breath, held it a moment before I blew it out in a rush. “We’ll slip in, you two nail down the retreat. Lila, you good with that?”

  “How will you know if the spells are onto you?” She frowned.

  “Maks, you can see them coming?” I made myself look at him. His blue eyes locked with mine.

  “You sure you trust me?”

  I didn’t look away, but into myself. He’d never done anything to harm me or my friends, far more than I could say for those I’d always thought I could trust. “Yes, I trust you.”

  He seemed surprised by that statement but covered it quickly with a nod. “Then it is you and me going in. How far is it, Lila?”

  “Couple hours,” she said.

  The four of us rode through the forest with only the sounds of the breaking trees for noise to cover our passage. I was sure at one point I saw a pair of rainbow eyes watching us, and that one of them winked at me.

  I lifted my hand, acknowledging Pret’s presence but didn’t speak to the others. He would either keep quiet or he wouldn’t. There was nothing I could do to change his mind.

  The hours slipped by and I found myself walking next to my brother. Twice Bryce got off big Ali to walk beside her, a soft smile on his face.

  I walked beside him. “I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve seen you smile like that. Before the Oasis. Long before.”

  He lifted a hand and I tensed until he dropped it on my shoulder. “Do you remember when Shem tried to kidnap you?”

  I put my hand over his. “Okay, yeah. Why are we bringing that up now?”

  A sigh slid from him. “There is more to the story than crazy Uncle Shem going on a bender. You were what, four years old?”

  I took his hand from my shoulder but didn’t let him go. “Five. I was five.”

  “Do you remember much of it?” He quirked an eyebrow up at me, the question gentle but insistent.

  I gave a quick nod. “I remember it all.”

  “Tell me what you remember. Please.”

  I wanted to roll my eyes, but again there was an urgency to his question.

  I looped my arm through his, liking him at my side. I’d been so small when he’d been hurt we’d never stood side by side. I could get used to this, having him here and in my life again.

  “I woke up and Shem was in my room. He called me kitten like he always did, and said he had to show me the stars, that they were in a special alignment just for me.” I frowned, feeling Maks and Lila watching us, listening. “He scooped me up and put me on his back and then crawled through the window. There were nothing but clouds in the sky and I knew something was very wrong.” I stepped over a log, gathering my memories around me.

  “I think I knew that he meant me harm but probably didn’t understand how bad it could have been. And then he was running, and he had a hold on me and there was a horse ahead of us. Jaxar, the fastest horse in the desert.”

  Bryce nodded. “And you fought him.”

  “The horse?” Lila shot up and into the conversation.

  I laughed. “No, I shifted and fought Shem. He couldn’t hold me. I was too flexible and fast and he couldn’t get his hands on me.”

  “She shredded his hands,” Bryce said, and the pride in his voice warmed me. “She ran back to us. Father and I followed the blood trail for days before we found him at a distant watering hole, his hands a fucking bloody mess.”

  I sucked in a sharp breath. “I didn’t know you’d followed him.”

  He shrugged. “It was my first hunt for a traitor. He claimed you were special that he’d been called upon by the Emperor to protect you. To train you separate from the pride and show you the way of your abilities.”

  I didn’t like the sounds of that. “Did you kill him?” Shem had never come back to the pride.

  “I didn’t. Father sent me home and said he’d handle it.”

  Handle it. We all knew what that meant.

  Lila caught a gust of air and twisted sideways. “Wow, and that was your uncle? Your family is messed up.”

  I realized why the story tugged on her. I lifted my free hand and brushed it along her front leg. “Not in blood, but in the pride, yes. He was like a brother to our father.”

  “And he tried to kill you,” Maks said behind us.

  I shook my head. “No, I never felt that kind of malice from him. I was scared because in my heart I felt that he would take me away forever.” I’d never really talked about that incident. My father had come back from the hunt and I’d slept between him and Bryce for months until I gained my courage back enough to sleep on my own.

  I’d created a three-sided stall outside my bedroom window and my first pony, Gemma, lived there, breathing over me as we both slept.

  “Why is this important now?” I asked Bryce. “I mean it’s a shit story and all, makes for a good way to pass the time, but. . .”

  “Maybe he was on to something,” Bryce said. “Maybe you are special, and we kept you from that.”

  “No. I would never want to be apart from you and Dad. As little time as we had with him, I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

  Bryce tightened his hold on my arm and tugged me into his side, hugging me. “Me neither. Though I really wish I hadn’t been such a fucking pill the last fifteen years.”

  I snorted. “I assumed you were faking all along.”

  He pushed me away from him, laughing, and I was laughing and even Lila and Maks were grinning.

  Peace settled around us in a place that only held death. The stories flowed between us, of growing up in the desert, of the tricks we’d played on our father, of the trouble we’d gotten into. All of it spilled up and out of the two of us, purging the dark side of our relationship and healing old wounds in ways nothing else could have.

  Bryce glowed with happiness, and it was warm and felt like there was nothing we couldn’t do now that we were together again. Really together, not just living the ghostly existence we had been in the Stockyards.

  Those hours. . . I would look back on them as the last time I felt whole, when I had those I loved with me and I knew I was. . . enough. Just enough. I didn’t feel like the weak link as I had for so many years and it caused a cascade of emotions that I barely held in check. I didn’t feel like I had to prove anything.

  That sense of wellbeing ended as the sun reached midafternoon, the clouds shifting enough that a few shafts of light slid through.

  Lila hovered in the air ahead of us, no longer moving forward. She turned and swept back, landing
on the front of my saddle. “The whelping grounds are a quarter mile ahead, and in the center of them is the mound. It is open, a cave that dives deep. You want to go to the very bottom of it. The jewel will be in that hoard of treasures in a small wooden box. The jewel is in a ring setting.”

  Maks and I dismounted as did Bryce. I looked to Lila. “Okay, where should we come out? Where will you and Bryce be waiting for us? Here?”

  She thought for a minute and then snapped her tail once in the air as if snapping her fingers.

  “Run east to the marker. We will work our way to the outskirts of the grounds and wait for you there,” she said, but there was a glint in her eye. “We need to hurry.”

  “You have a plan?” I reached out and touched her back. She bobbed her head.

  “Yes, I do. But it means leaving you and Maks to fend for yourselves,” she said.

  Bryce grunted. “I can’t leave her.”

  Lila growled. “You will get her killed. Night is falling. She and Maks will be able to slip into the mound far easier if it’s just the two of them. If you were smaller in your shifted form, I’d say you could go, but you aren’t. You’re a damn lion.”

  The timing, though, seemed off. “The marker is hours away from here, less if we go hard. Maybe an hour at top speed. The jewel can’t possibly be that deep,” I pointed out.

  “Three miles straight down,” Lila said. “And trust me, you’re going to have a hard push to get to it.” Well fuck, that was not quite what I expected. “And assuming no one notices you’re there,” she added.

  Maks snorted, almost a laugh. “What’s new?”

  I had to smile. “Can’t be worse than an army of ice goblins.”

  “Or a giant White Wolf, Bear, and Raven,” Lila said.

  Bryce shook his head. “This is insane. We should be sticking together. That’s how a pride survives.”

  But I heard it in his voice, he already knew it was the best choice to send me and Maks in alone. He would do what Lila and I were suggesting because no matter that he didn’t like it, this plan would be our only shot at getting the jewel and getting all of us out of the Dragon’s Ground alive.

  I went to him and gave him a quick hug. “If we aren’t back in a day, go to the desert. Help Steve and Darcy find Kiara. She’s pregnant.”

  He stared at me. “They don’t deserve you as an alpha, Zam.”

  “I’m not the—”

  He put his hand over my mouth. “I say you are. And don’t you let anyone tell you differently. You are the alpha of the Bright Pride Lions.”

  “There has been no official trial.” I smiled at him, fighting the way his words sent a zing of energy down my spine.

  Lila tapped me. “What’s a trial?”

  “I’m betting Steve didn’t,” Bryce said, and I shrugged.

  “Are you really surprised?”

  Lila tapped harder. “What trial?”

  Bryce looked at her. “To become an alpha, you must prove yourself willing to give your life to save your pride in an official capacity.”

  “Well, shit, she’s tried to save you and she did save Darcy,” Lila pointed out.

  He shook his head. “It has to happen after someone names her alpha. Which I just did.”

  I found myself standing a little straighter. “Then you are my second.”

  He grinned. “I never doubted that. Who else would you pick? That sheep fucker Steve?”

  Lila snickered. “He didn’t really fuck a sheep, did he? Did he?”

  I shrugged. “After we were divorced, we caught him passed out in the sheep field one morning. Wool all over his crotch, his pants around his ankles.”

  She giggled and covered her mouth with her tiny claws to keep the noise down. “Oh, my goddess of the sky, that’s hilarious. What I wouldn’t have given to see that.”

  “At least it was after you kicked his ass out,” Bryce said.

  I snorted. “Still took me too long.”

  I knew we were both stalling. It was as if we’d found each other after fifteen years apart. His injuries and the lies of Ish had kept us separated and she’d known it would.

  I glanced at Maks. “Ready?”

  He nodded. “I am.”

  I gave Bryce one last hug, pulled Lila to me and squeezed her in my arms, and then I shifted to my cat form. I had my kukri blades and the flail on me, and not much else. Because what else was there?

  A nose bumped into my side and I looked over to see Maks as a caracal next to me. His blue eyes were the same, but otherwise, he would have passed for a creature of the desert with his sandy coat and black-tipped ears.

  “Let’s go.” I started out in the direction of the whelping grounds.

  Lila called after us, or more accurately, after Maks.

  “Maks, do not be a poisonous back-bunched toad. Look after her!”

  I snorted and looked over at Maks. “Richard the Third.”

  He rolled his eyes and looked over his shoulder at Lila. “Thy tongue out venoms all the worms of the Nile, Lila. As always.”

  She laughed, and I joined in. “Very good, the Cymbeline?”

  “Yes, I read it in the Stockyards. It had a number of annotations, I assume yours?” He glanced at me as he spoke.

  I smiled. “Yes, those were mine.” We trotted along at a good clipped pace, leaving Lila and Bryce behind us. My belly grumbled, irritated that we’d only eaten the dried foods we had on us as we’d traveled through the forest.

  Before I could say anything, the forest around us began to thin, the trees broken and charred in places until we stood at the very edge of the whelping ground.

  Night was still an hour off, but the dusky, cloud-filled sky was enough cover that we drew as close as we dared to see what lay ahead of us.

  Maks let out a breath as though he were a balloon being popped. “How in the fires of the desert hell are we going to cross this?”

  I stared at the scene in front of us. How indeed.

  Chapter 23

  Merlin made sure that the satyr Marcel was able to keep up as they ran from the Stockyards, but he needn’t have been concerned. The goat man easily paced the galloping horse Merlin rode.

  “We have to pick up someone before we go to Zam,” Merlin said.

  “Please tell me it’s a beautiful woman,” Marcel said.

  “It is, but she’s not for you,” Merlin said with a shake of his head. “She is a priestess of Zeus with a wicked temper and I rather like her.”

  “Damn, a priestess? They are amazing in the sack, you know. Zeus teaches them all his dirty tricks,” Marcel said and then continued to ramble on about a priestess he’d known years before and all the fun they’d had, most of which involved positions Merlin knew to be impossible. But they sounded good.

  No, Merlin’s mind was racing ahead. If Ish could not be counted on in the least, their problems were far deeper than he’d thought, worse even than he and Flora possibly realized when they’d started this journey. He frowned. He would have to tell her all the truth now and allow for her to leave if she wanted.

  His shoulders slumped. He’d been an asshole most of his life, he knew that. It was in his blood after all.

  Now, he was doing his best to change, but it was hard. If he didn’t tell Flora the truth, then he knew she would stay. That would give him longer to prove that she wanted him in her life. Longer for him to prove that he was not the man the world had known.

  He shook his head. That was not the important thing at the moment. No, he had to find a way to Zam. He had to tell her the truth about her lineage.

  “Fuck,” he growled under his breath. Things were getting out of hand in a damn hurry.

  “Yes, that’s what I’ve been talking about, flouncing!” Marcel laughed. “Did you really flounce Ishtar?”

  His jaw ticked. “A long time ago, yes. I did it to irritate the Emperor.”

  “Did it work?”

  “He tried to kill me, so I suppose it worked,” Merlin muttered, and Marcel let out a
braying goat laugh that made the hair on Merlin’s neck stand at attention. Sweet baby goddess, that was a horrid noise.

  It wasn’t long before they came into sight of the hut he’d left Flora sleeping in, and before he even looked inside, he knew she was gone.

  “Damn it, Flora.” He pinched the bridge of his nose.

  “Did you leave her a note?” Marcel circled around the hut, sniffing.

  “I did. I told her I wouldn’t be long, that there was something I had to do.” Which begged the question, just what was she up to? “Maybe she went to Zam?” Merlin frowned, thinking. That was possible. But he wasn’t so sure. He circled the hut, still frowning. There at the doorstep was something that made his heart stutter. The burn mark from a bolt of lightning, and a thin line of golden sand that lay over top of it.

  He spun his horse and put it into a gallop, heading east. Stupid, this was stupid, and he knew it. But what would his world be like if he didn’t have the woman at his side he knew he’d waited for all these years.

  “Wait!” Marcel yelled. “That’s the wrong way! You said Zam is in the west!”

  “She is,” he shouted back. “Go to her; tell her what you’ve seen. I must go to the desert!”

  The Jinn had taken Flora.

  Chapter 24

  The night seemed to fall in increments, an inch at a time in the surrounding forest, but that darkness didn’t take away what lay in front of Maks and me.

  The whelping ground of the dragons was immense. That was the only word I had for it. The female dragons curled around their nests, their noses touching the tips of their tails regardless of their size, color, or body style. Some had wings, some didn’t. Some were huge, others were no bigger than the horses.

  It was the sheer number of them I couldn’t wrap my brain around. Each one curled on a nest that held dozens of eggs.

  Maks put his mouth close to my ear. “There has to be a thousand females here.”

  That was what I’d estimated the number at. A thousand times dozens of eggs? How the fuck had we not had our world overrun by dragons?

  I turned to him, whispering my question. “How is this possible?”