The Dragon's War

by Lila Jean

  “You’re okay!” Tina ripped off the cloth gag and tossed it to the floor as she untied her friend.

  “Get out, all of you!” Amy said, eyes wide with fear. “There’s a bomb under the house that’s set to a timer! You have to go!”

  “A bomb?” For a brief moment, Tina paused, her heart hammering in her chest at the thought of sitting on top of an explosive that could take out a house this big. She looked up at Anthony, worry fluttering in her chest, and in that state of utter shock as she absorbed Amy’s warning, she just didn’t know what to do.

  As quick as she shock had come, though, she shook it off and helped Amy to her feet. “Let’s get out of here!” She bolted toward the stairs with her friend and men in tow. “Zane, warn everyone else! Evacuate now!”

  “On it.” He had a worried tremor in his voice. “Tina, don’t you dare die, do you hear me? Run!”

  “Great, thanks, Zane,” Draven said, scoffing as the six of them tore down the stairs. “We’re not nervous enough as it is. That really helps.”

  Beneath her, the house began to rumble. Tina’s throat went dry, since they were still a good three minutes from the exit, and she pushed on, running faster, pushing herself faster than she had ever run before.

  Suddenly, someone grabbed her around the waist, and in a split second, the world became nothing more than a blur. Nausea built in her cheeks, and she forced it down as someone gently laid her on the grass. The world still spun around her, but she briefly saw Anthony looking over her as she stared into the sky. Beside her, Amy heaved into the grass.

  It took a moment, but the reality of what had happened finally clicked for her. Anthony had saved her and Amy, but at the expense of Killian, Flynn, and Draven’s lives. They were still in the house. Tina bolted upright and stared at the mansion as the windows shook.

  “Anthony, go save them!” she screamed. “Now!”

  He nodded and ran inside, a dark streak against the world around him, and she watched in horror as she waited for four of the men she loved most in the world to emerge safely.

  Instead, the house began to explode.

  It started on the south side of the house, and the building detonated, an orange and yellow explosion bursting from every window, through the roof, kicking off doors as the entire house caught fire in an instant. The explosion ripped down the mansion, a bright stream of fire against the dark morning, until the entire house blew up in front of her.

  The force of the shockwave knocked her backward, and she hit her head against a tree. The world went dark around the edges of her vision, the light fading here and there as she fought to stay conscious, the adrenaline in her body fueling her, keeping her as alert as possible even while her head throbbed with pain.

  “No!” She screamed for Anthony, for Draven, for Killian, and for Flynn, terrified at the thought of losing them, desperate to know if they were okay as the flames consumed what was left of the house. Her head hurt so badly, but she tried to push through the pain. “Tell me they’re okay, Zane,” she said, slurring slightly, hoping her connection to the tiger shifter hadn’t been broken in the blast. “Tell me, please.”

  The earpiece went fuzzy, a bit of feedback distorting Zane’s voice, but she did hear him say one word, the most important one. “… alive.”

  She smiled and leaned against the tree, relieved beyond belief, almost brought to tears with joy that her men were okay. Her head still buzzing from the injury, she looked around to find Amy lying in the grass, eyes closed and her body still. Tina’s throat went dry, and when she tried to crawl to her friend, her head only ached more. She paused, on her hands and knees, and dipped into her magic, searching for a pulse. Thankfully, she found Amy’s steady heartbeat, and she let out a happy sigh.

  As her world blurred, dipping in and out of focus thanks to her injury, Tina saw a man’s shadowy figure approach. He had a familiar air about him, whether it was the way he walked or the shape of his head, but in Tina’s delirious state, she didn’t recognize him at first. It wasn’t until he loomed over her, a syringe in one hand, that she realized what was happening. This had to be a goon sent by King William and probably also by Cora to take her, and she wondered if perhaps this whole trap had been set simply to isolate her from her men one way or another.

  Faced with a sudden dilemma, a clear path to her enemies delivered on a silver platter and prime for the taking, she realized she would have to make a choice. Even in her sickened state, she could probably take her assailant down, or at least delay him until her men arrived as backup, but then they would still be at square one, without a plan and without a way to take William and Cora down.

  If she could get close to her enemies, she could kill them both herself and end this war before it began, without a single innocent casualty. All she had to do was stop their hearts. Once they thought they had captured her, they would most likely gloat in their arrogance, and let down their guards enough for her to strike.

  Without much time left to decide, she checked in with her intuition, asking Damara what she thought of the plan.

  Let’s do this, her goddess said.

  In that split second, Tina made her choice and let the stranger prick her arm with the needle, falling to the grass as the cocktail of mystery drugs worked their way through her system. Head aching, her world spinning around her, she closed her eyes and let the darkness take her.

  30

  Anthony

  Anthony lay in the grass outside the demolished house as the sun slowly broke on the horizon, his arms covered with black soot as he coughed into the bushes, his lungs filled with smoke as the house burned behind them. Flynn and Killian lay on either side of them, their chests heaving as they fought to kick the smoke out of their bodies, too. Draven, that charming ass, just sauntered out of the fire, fireproof as he was, and chuckled with his hands on his hips as he looked down at them. Anthony shook his head, chuckling a bit at the dragon as his lungs burned from the smoke.

  “Wait,” Draven said, looking deadly serious as he scanned the grounds around them. “Where’s Tina?”

  “Over there.” Anthony pointed around the corner of the house, toward the space where he’d left her and Amy. At the last second, he’d had to take the guys through another exit to make it out of the house in time, which had left Tina exposed in a way he wasn’t fond of. “Come on.” He jogged toward her, still coughing. His body felt weak, and even though he was lightheaded, he pushed through it to get to her.

  Amy lay unconscious on the ground, but Tina was nowhere to be seen. His heart hammering wildly in his chest, Anthony raced ahead, reaching her instantly with his enhanced speed, and checked her pulse. She would live, but what terrified him more was the fact that he couldn’t find his mate.

  “Tina!” he shouted, glancing wildly around the mansion grounds, wondering what the hell had happened. He looked at the fire, wondering if she had gone after him, hoping against all that was holy and good in the world that she wasn’t somewhere in the house.

  “Oh gods,” Flynn said softly, falling to his knees beside Anthony, a look of utter loss on his face and a piece of paper in his hand. He stared at the ground, not really present, seemingly devastated by what he had read.

  Anthony snatched it out of his hands and scanned it quickly, Draven and Killian looking over his shoulders as he read.

  Anthony—

  If you come for her, you will die, too.

  He froze, rooted to the ground with anger at the audacious threat, his body tensing with hatred for the vile man he had once called his father. The wolf king had stolen Anthony’s mate, staged this whole thing to kidnap her, and Anthony would rip the man’s throat out in the most painful way possible. Oh, his father would pay, and Anthony would see to it he felt every ounce of pain before he died.

  Neither Killian nor Draven spoke, Killian staring at the paper in disbelief while Draven fumed, smoke coiling out of his nose as he grabbed the page and read it over and over.

  Behind Anthony, Amy began to
cough. He knelt before her, still stiff with anger, trying to tend to his friend while he wrestled with his own rage. Amy looked around wildly, scooting back on her hands in panic as she noticed the fire, but her gaze eventually fell on him. She wrapped him in a tight hug, her grip tightening on his shirt.

  “Anthony, I’m so glad you guys are okay. Is everyone here?” She looked around, her lips parting as she registered the somber mood. “Where’s Tina?”

  “He took her,” Anthony said simply, his voice so deep and dark that he almost didn’t recognize it. He sniffed the air, wishing he could catch the scent of whoever had taken her, but for all intents and purposes it seemed as though the culprit had vanished into thin air.

  “It’s William,” Amy said, breathless, a look of utter fear on her face. “Anthony, your father has gone completely insane.” Her voice broke, and she swallowed hard, clearly nervous. “I fought him, wouldn’t let him do whatever he wanted to me, wouldn’t go through the rituals he needed me to complete to transfer Damara from Tina to me.”

  She gulped, tears in her eyes as she stared off at the fiery house. “Anthony, he said I wasn’t useful anymore. He wants Tina for himself, and if she doesn’t comply, he’s going to kill her and summon Damara all over again.” Amy sobbed, choking back tears. “We have to go save her!”

  Anthony scanned the faces of the three other princes, wondering if Zane could still hear them, grateful he had his brotherhood behind him. “Trust me, Amy, we will.” His eyes narrowed as he glared up at the fire. “And when we do, the five of us are going to rain hell on them all for taking our mate from us.”

  31

  Flynn

  Flynn paced a safehouse not far from Cora’s mansion, stepping over the various cords and wires Zane had set up for their impromptu tech center for the raid on the manor. The other princes yelled at each other, everyone furious, and Flynn was finding it harder and harder to focus on coming up with a plan to save their mate.

  “You should never have let her out of your sight!” Zane yelled at Anthony, the usually cool and collected tiger shifter nearly out of his mind with grief after learning what had happened. “What were you thinking?!”

  “She ordered me to go in!” Anthony snapped back, his dark eyes narrowed with fury at the implied blame in Zane’s comment. “She would never have forgiven me if I hadn’t gone back in!”

  “You should have stayed.” Killian seethed, leaning against the wall, his hands on his head as he glared at Anthony. It was truly a shock to see the normally level-headed eagle shifter so distraught with grief. “She’s gone, Anthony, and it’s your fault!”

  “Don’t you dare,” Draven said, stepping between the two of them. “Don’t you dare insult the man who saved your life, Killian. You might be bulletproof, but we don’t know for a second if you’re fireproof.”

  “Our lives mean nothing compared to hers!” Killian kicked off the wall and shoved his face in Draven’s, the two of them nearly nose to nose as they yelled at each other.

  “Shut up, damn it!” Flynn shouted, barreling through the two of them and knocking them almost on their asses. Anthony caught Draven before he hit the ground, and Zane managed to keep Killian from falling over as the demigod finally got the lot of them to stop yelling. “Every second we’re in here arguing, King William is doing gods know what to our mate.” He pointed out the window for emphasis, nearly boiling over with anger, both at the king and at his brothers, who had lost themselves entirely in their sorrow. “She’s still out there, and we have a chance to make this right.” He looked at Anthony, his voice softening somewhat, and bowed his head toward the wolf shifter. “Thank you for saving us, buddy. I don’t blame you for this.”

  “But I still blame myself,” Anthony admitted, looking broken, his hands on his head as he crashed against the wall. Shaking his head, he sighed deeply and squeezed his eyes shut in pain. “What do we do, Flynn?”

  He gestured out the window. “He has to have taken her to the Stronghold, and we’ve already been debating for ages on how to take it without the dragons’ help. Short of blowing it apart, we just can’t.” He kicked the wall hard, yelling in frustration and leaving a dent in the drywall from the sheer force of the blow. “Getting in will be difficult, but at least it’s possible. Once we’re in, getting to my father is going to be impossible unless he’s distracted by a dragon’s attack on the exterior.”

  “Then there’s no more playing nice,” Draven said, his voice tinged with barely contained rage. “The dragons need to make their choice one way or the other, and I’ll do everything in my power to make them choose us.”

  Flynn hesitated, a little concerned about the feral look in Draven’s eye. “What death wish of a plan are you cooking up, Draven?”

  The dragon prince shook his head, jaw set with stubborn determination. “I’ll do anything to save Tina.” He cracked his knuckles, straightening his back like a king. “My father said our little feud would end with blood, but what he didn’t know is that the feud is going to end a lot sooner than he expected.” He looked at Flynn, his expression deadly serious. “It ends today.”

  32

  Tina

  Tina woke with a pounding headache and a weight around her neck. It dragged toward her toes, bending her head a little with the sheer burden, the cold metal like ice against her skin. She blinked rapidly, trying to clear the sleep and grogginess from her mind, and cradled her pounding head in her hands. She sat up to find herself lying on a lumpy mattress in a dark room, the only light coming through gaps in the shutters of a closed window on the far wall. Behind her was a door with a single slot in the top of it and a slightly bigger one below, about as wide as a dinner plate. She looked around the gray stone walls, still disoriented as her memories came flooding back.

  The explosion. The house. Her men. Her mission. Kill King William and Cora Stratford.

  Tina felt absently at the weight on her neck to find a familiar necklace, the ornate metals and glimmering crystals a guise masking the pendant’s terrible power. Her heart thudded as she reached for Damara, hating that she was separated from her goddess, feeling naked and alone without the warm and steady presence she had become so accustomed to.

  It’s okay, she reminded herself. This is all part of the plan.

  True, she hadn’t exactly wanted King William to have one of these necklaces, but it would have been foolish to assume he didn’t. Flynn had said the necklace could be broken when overwhelmed with power or through a sacrifice, and Damara had immense magic for Tina to summon and do just that, though she didn’t know how long it would take. Once she was free of the necklace, she would wreak havoc on this place until William and Cora were dead.

  Yeah, easy as pie. Pursing her lips, Tina felt a flicker of doubt, but she quickly squashed it. This was Damara she was talking about, the goddess who had never once let her down, and Tina wasn’t about to let Damara down either.

  With a deep and steadying breath, she squared her shoulders and stood, surprisingly unshackled. Part of her had expected to have wrist and ankle cuffs on, but the fool probably thought the necklace and a little cell would be enough to contain her.

  She smirked. Idiot.

  As she looked around, she noticed a small television mounted on the far wall, turned off and hidden in the shadows where she hadn’t seen it at first. She walked closer, wondering why on earth they’d put an entertainment unit in a detention cell when the screen flashed to life, temporarily blinding her. She rubbed her eyes to get rid of the sudden spots in her vision and looked up to see King William on the screen, looking right at her.

  “Welcome to the Stronghold, Tina dear,” he said, back arched, without the slightest hint of a smirk or any arrogance at all. That surprised Tina more than anything since she had assumed he would be gloating at finally ‘capturing’ her.

  “Your hospitality is beyond compare,” she said dryly, gesturing to the holding cell and dingy mattress she’d woken up on.

  “A necessary precaution.” He
waved his hand dismissively. “It seems this has all gotten a tad out of control, Tina. You were never supposed to be involved.”

  “Right, just Amy,” Tina spat. “You nearly killed her!”

  “She refused to comply with her king.” He shrugged lazily. “I suggest you not make the same error.”

  “You are not my king.” Tina narrowed her eyes at him, standing tall and refusing to cower before such a horrible man. “You nearly killed my best friend, but I stopped you. You nearly killed my princes and your own son, and I stopped you there, too. You forced Damara into this world to use and abuse her power, and I won’t allow you to do that either.”

  “She’s mine,” King William spat, bristling as he leaned toward the camera, swinging from calm to furious on the drop of a dime. “Damara belongs to me. I did the sacred rites to summon her, not you. You have stolen magic from me, and one way or another, you will give it back.”

  “Why?” Tina poked the beast just a little, reining in what she really wanted to say in favor of testing the water and seeing just how unhinged Anthony’s father had become. After all, she was trapped in a confined space for the moment, and she wanted to play it smart rather than hitting the proverbial hornet nest with a bat.

  “The five kingdoms are mine, child, and you will not stand in my way.” He smacked his fist against a surface just off screen, and the camera shook. “Wolves are creatures of wealth and infamy, worthy of respect and immortalization, and I refuse to play small with the other kings any longer.” He pointed his finger at her, glaring over the brim of his nose, which was admittedly less intimidating over a screen than it would have been in person. “They will bow before me, and I will be the One King. You will never rule, girl. That is my throne!”