by Zoe Chant
He stepped away from her and the nearest trees, and allowed his mind to fill with a dragon’s longings. He would fly high, he would burn his enemies to ash and gone, he would find the finest treasure in the land and lay it at his mate’s feet.
His blood ran hot and his wings unfurled. Lucas leaped upward into the sky. Below, Journey waved him on, her expression bright with unspoiled joy in watching his transformation. He dipped a wing in response, then concentrated to make himself invisible to all but other dragon shifters. He hoped Journey would enjoy the surprise of watching him blink out of view. Then he flew on, leaving the castle behind.
The forest spread out below him. Now and then he glimpsed a cottage or a castle. The trees grew less dense as he came closer to the city, broken up by large glens and shining lakes. When he had been a young dragon, he had learned to dive into the lakes and snatch fish in his jaws, like an osprey. Lucas dipped lower, thinking to do so now. Transformation took a great deal of energy, and he was very hungry.
A burning pain pierced his chest. Then a second, agonizing shock wrenched at his body, forcing it to change shape against his will. He was suddenly a man again— a man falling from the sky.
Dragonsbane! Lucas realized. I’ve been shot with an arrow dipped in dragonsbane!
He hit the water with bruising force and plummeted toward the bottom. He instinctively held his breath and tried to swim away underwater. But his chest burned with pain, and he was dazed from the fall and the shock of the icy water. His boots and sword were pulling him down, forcing him to exert himself just to keep from sinking further.
He barely made it to the shoreline before he was forced to surface. He managed one gulp of air, and then rough hands seized him.
It was a group of masked men, like the assassins who had tried to kill Journey. Lucas fought, but he was outnumbered and wounded and breathless. Before he could do more than knock one man down, something sharp stung his back.
More dragonsbane, he thought, wincing at the idea. But though the pain didn’t increase, he immediately felt dizzy.
No, he realized. It’s a tranquilizer.
Lucas woke abruptly, his eyes flying open and his body jerking. Metal rattled. He was standing up, cold stone at his back and cold metal around his wrists and ankles. Even without looking, he knew the metal wasn’t gold.
There was no moment of disorientation. He immediately remembered what had happened. And with a single glance, he knew where he was.
He was chained to the wall of one of his own family’s dungeons.
It was a small cell of gray stone, smelling of dust and granite. There were no windows, but burning torches cast a flickering light.
Lucas jerked at the chains, but they had been made to withstand even the more-than-human strength of shifters; his ancestors had sometimes imprisoned each other, usually in battles over the throne. He pulled and yanked as hard as he could, but accomplished nothing more than making his wrists and ankles bleed.
He finally gave up and leaned against the wall, exhausted. He still wore his jewelry, but his sword was gone. The wound in his chest seemed shallow and small, no more than a pinprick— it must have been a dart rather than an arrow— but it felt like a red-hot poker had stabbed him through and through. His dragon was silent within him, quelled by the dragonsbane still burning in his veins.
But his physical pain and helplessness concerned him less than the implications of his plight. Whoever had imprisoned him obviously didn’t want him dead, so his jailers couldn’t be after the throne itself. They were most likely the same people behind the attempt on Journey’s life.
In that case, he was imprisoned to stop him from protecting her. They probably meant to keep him here while they searched for her. Once they found and killed her, he would be released.
Lucas knew it was useless to struggle, but a surge of fear and rage made him again throw himself against the chains. A red haze clouded his sight. He felt no pain. He heard himself shouting, but he didn’t know what he was saying. He could think of nothing but protecting his mate.
Cold water dashed into his face, bringing him to his senses. Lucas coughed and shook his head, blinking to clear his vision.
A masked man stood in front of him, holding an empty bucket.
“Fight as hard as you please,” the man said coldly. “It won’t change a thing.”
Lucas didn’t recognize his voice, other than that his captor had a Brandusan accent. Then he looked closer and saw that the man wore an earbud. He must be getting his orders from someone trying to conceal his identity. Every word he said was probably dictated by an unseen watcher.
His knees felt shaky and every muscle in his body ached, but Lucas took a deep breath and made sure his voice was calm.
“No matter what, I will not marry Raluca. If you kill Journey—” The thought of it choked him. It was so easy to picture her sprawled on the ground, her emerald eyes glazed in death, her warm heart stilled forever. When he went on, he despised himself for being unable to prevent his voice from shaking. “If you kill her, I still won’t marry Raluca. So there is no point to any of this. Drug me again and release me. I don’t know who you are, so I won’t be able to take revenge.”
There was a pause, no doubt while the watcher spoke into the earbud. Then the masked man said, “I do not believe that you would betray the honor of a lineage of a thousand years for mere revenge.”
“Believe it,” Lucas said.
Another pause. “Princess Raluca knows nothing of this.”
Lucas had never thought she did. But suspicious of where the conversation was going, he didn’t reply.
“If you will not marry her, she is worthless,” the masked man continued. “Then I will have to kill her and you. That will leave one of your cousins to inherit. And then I can arrange an alliance for that cousin which will suit me almost as well.”
Lucas stared at the masked man, letting his dragon show in his eyes. The man took an involuntary step back.
As I guessed, Lucas thought. He’s not a dragon himself. He’s just some trusted minion.
“Release me.” Without even meaning it, Lucas heard his voice drop to a draconic hiss. “Do you know what it means to imprison a dragon? Do you know what it means to threaten a dragon’s mate? Dragons do not forget. Dragons do not forgive. If by some miracle you live to escape this cell, I will hunt you to the ends of the earth. Nothing you have been promised is worth dying in dragonflame.”
Once again, the man took a step back. Then he jumped as if someone had shouted in his ear. Squaring his shoulders, he demanded, “Where is Journey Jacobson?”
Fury burned within Lucas, but he restrained himself from struggling. Thrashing around and exhausting himself would get him nowhere. But even chained and unable to shift, he had his voice and his wits.
A dragon’s tongue is sharper than a dragon’s tooth, spoke the sweet remembered voice of his mother.
His father had added, Do not forget, Lucas. Words are weapons.
“Heed my promise,” Lucas said. “I speak to both of you, the man who stands before me and the man who whispers in his ear. If at any time you release me and leave Journey unharmed, I swear on my honor that I will not take revenge. If you harm Journey or do not release me of your own accord, remember my other promise. Dragonsbane has an antidote. I will not be a man forever.”
The masked man twitched nervously. He took a step toward Lucas, then another. His head darted this way and that. Then he suddenly thrust his hand into his pocket, bringing out a key.
“You will not regret this,” Lucas promised.
The cell door was flung open, and four more masked men burst in. One grabbed the man holding the key and hustled him out. The other two grabbed Lucas and pinned him tight to the wall, while the third shoved a gag into his mouth.
Lucas was ready to explode with frustration. He’d been so close to escape!
“Your tongue is as deadly as your flame,” remarked the man who had gagged him. “You may not speak e
xcept to tell us where Journey is. When you’re ready to do that, tap your right hand against the wall.”
Lucas closed his right hand into a fist.
The man who had spoken reached into his pocket and removed a vial. “Have you ever swallowed dragonsbane?”
Only pride saved Lucas from letting the nauseating rush of fear show on his face. That was supposed to be the most agonizing form of torture in existence. They said that dragons who were subjected to it begged for death.
“Where is Journey?” the man demanded.
Lucas tried to think quickly and clearly, for he suspected that soon he would not be able to think at all. His family had ten castles scattered across the country, most in areas unreachable by motor vehicles. It would take a dragon days to search them all, and it would take weeks for his minions to do so. Unless Journey was very unlucky and they chose to search her castle first, all Lucas needed to do to signal her to flee was to hold out for two days.
Two days of hell, he thought. Can I bear it?
He opened his hand and tapped the wall. When the man undid his gag, Lucas said, “I flew her to the airport in Budapest. She’s halfway to America by now. I was going to renounce the throne and follow her there, but first I wanted to find out who had tried to have her killed.”
It seemed like a plausible story. It certainly would have been a better choice than what he’d actually done.
The masked man slapped him hard across the face, snapping his neck back and knocking his head into the wall. “Liar.”
“It’s true!” Lucas protested. “Don’t you think I’d do anything to keep her safe?”
“I know dragons and their mates. You wouldn’t have been able to bear parting from her so quickly. Where is she?”
Stubbornly, Lucas repeated, “She’s on an airplane.”
“Pry his jaws open.”
Lucas fought, but there was little he could do with his arms and legs bound. The men dug their thumbs into his jaw, forcing it open, and grabbed a handful of his hair to jerk his head back. Then his chief captor stepped forward and poured a stream of dragonsbane down his throat.
It burned like acid. Lucas tried to spit it out, but the men forced his jaws together and pinched his nose shut. In his struggle to breathe, he swallowed involuntarily.
The pain was like nothing he’d ever felt before. He’d thought the dragonsbane would burn his throat and stomach, but the agony only started there. Within seconds, it spread through his entire body. Lucas tried to double over, but the manacles held him tight.
Don’t scream, he thought desperately. Don’t give them the satisfaction.
A minute later, he was screaming.
“I tire of listening to him,” the masked man said. “Gag him again.”
Lucas barely noticed as the men again stuffed the gag into his mouth. He could feel nothing but agony burning him alive from the inside out. He understood now why victims begged for death.
I can’t bear it, he thought. I would rather die than endure days of this.
But then he thought of Journey. She loved him. It would break her heart if she lost him. For Journey, he had to hold on.
For Journey, he thought to himself.
He clung to her name like a spar as he was tossed about in a sea of pain.
For Journey...
For Journey...
For Journey...
The pain stopped.
At first Lucas couldn’t comprehend what had happened. Then he tasted the sharp tang of heartsease. They must have poured some into his mouth. He tried to lick his lips, and found that he could. The gag had been removed.
It was another minute or so before he recovered enough to open his eyes. He was dangling from the manacles, his clothes and hair drenched in sweat. His whole body was shaking uncontrollably.
The masked man leaned forward, vial in hand. Lucas flinched back, but all the man did was flick a single burning drop of dragonsbane on to Lucas’s hand.
Of course. They still needed to prevent him from shifting. Lucas wished he’d thought of it as soon as he’d come to, then realized resignedly that he wouldn’t have had the strength to shift anyway. Even without the dragonsbane, he doubted he was strong enough now.
“That was twenty minutes,” said the masked man.
Lucas stared at him, disbelieving. Surely it had been hours!
He’s lying, Lucas told himself. He’s trying to scare you.
It was working. Whether it had been hours or minutes, Lucas knew he couldn’t endure that agony again.
“Where is Journey Jacobson?” the man demanded.
Now that the dragonsbane no longer burned within him, Lucas could register the cramping pain in his shoulders and wrists. He attempted to stand up, but his legs wouldn’t support him.
“Talk,” said his captor.
Lucas tried, but his throat was too raw and dry. He got one syllable out, then broke into a fit of painful coughing.
His captor reached into a bag and brought out a flask. Lucas flinched again as the man raised it to his lips, but the liquid inside was only water. He was allowed a few swallows before it was withdrawn.
“Talk,” the masked man repeated.
“Castle Balaur.” Lucas had to force the words out. They felt as if they choked him.
The man stood still, staring at him. He— or rather, his hidden master— was no doubt trying to tell if Lucas was lying.
Whoever captured me knows me well, Lucas thought. Even if it’s only by reputation and a few brief encounters. They know about mates, and how much I must love Journey. They know of my honor and they know of my pride. And they know I would not give her up unless I was broken beyond repair. I have to prove that they broke me.
An idea came to him immediately, but his pride made him hesitate. Then he thought of Journey, of her open heart and her courage, and reminded himself that he would do anything to protect her.
He focused on his pain. On his fear for himself. On his fear for Journey. On his regret at leaving his friends at Protection, Inc. without so much as a proper goodbye. On his stupidity at getting himself captured. On every humiliation he’d suffered at Grand Duke Vaclav’s hands when he’d been a boy. And instead of keeping his feelings under control, he invited them to sweep him away like a dry leaf in a hurricane.
Deliberately, he thought, If Journey dies, it will be all my fault.
Lucas began to cry. Hot tears ran down his face as sobs racked his body.
Even as he let himself drown in terror and despair, a cool, distant part of him thought, It’s been twelve years since the last time I cried. I’d forgotten how it makes your nose run.
He’d been eleven and sparring with Grand Duke Vaclav, bare-chested and with blunt swords dipped in dragonsbane. His great-uncle had “killed” him repeatedly and criticized his technique at every blow. After an hour of that, Lucas had begun to cry, more from humiliation than from pain.
His great-uncle had said, “Those tears do more to prove you unworthy of your name than any amount of poor technique. Dragons do not weep, so you must not be a true dragon. I doubt that you will ever be able to transform.”
Lucas spent the next two years terrified that he really would be one of those rare, tragic people who were born into dragon families but never managed to shift. And he had never wept again.
Now, in that cool, distant part of his mind, he wondered if Grand Duke Vaclav was the watching mastermind. He hoped so. His great-uncle would find a tearful breakdown very convincing.
For a moment, Lucas thought his ploy had worked. Then the masked man slapped him across the face.
The blow was nothing, given the pain he was already in. It was the knowledge of what it meant that made his heart sink.
“Liar,” his captor snapped. “We already searched Castle Balaur.”
“Then she’s already fled.” But Lucas knew they could hear the lie in his voice.
The masked man picked up the bottle of dragonsbane.
In his entire life, Lucas h
ad never known such dread. His heart felt like a lump of ice in his chest. But now that he had no further use for tears, they stopped as if he’d turned off a tap.
Lucas closed his eyes. For Journey, he would endure.
Chapter Nine
Journey
Journey watched Lucas soar into the sky, his scales the gold of sunlight against the deep blue sky, until he vanished between one blink and the next.
She lay on her back on the grass, looking up into the sky. After the dullness of her first twenty-two years, her life had become such a rollercoaster. Europe. Brandusa. Assassins. Dragons. Lucas. She’d gotten everything she’d ever dreamed of and more. And if she lost it— if she lost him— her heart would break and never mend.
“He’s a dragon,” she said aloud, trying to convince herself. “He’ll be perfectly safe. If anyone tries to hurt him, he can bite their head off or stab them with his sword or punch them and break their nose.”
She wasn’t normally a violent person, but the thought consoled her. She just wanted Lucas to return safe and sound.
Journey lay for a while in the sun, thinking of Lucas and watching butterflies flit about the garden. She was so still that a huge butterfly with a black body and shocking pink wings landed on her chest. It rested there a while, while she hardly dared to breathe, and then flew off to resume its quest for nectar.
She stood up with a sigh, gathered up the breakfast tray, and headed back for the kitchen. Since she had no other way to make herself useful, at least she’d wash the dishes.
Help Lucas!
The breakfast tray fell from her hands. Journey spun around, looking for the source of the voice. But no one was there.
Lucas needs you!
This time she recognized the voice as coming from within her, not from outside. It was her own thought, but so urgent and fierce that she hadn’t recognized it at first.
Go! Journey’s inner voice shouted. Go now!
Her heart was pounding, and her breath came fast. She felt as she had on the riverbank, when her gut had told her she was in danger. And her gut had been right.