Arysteon’s heart stuttered. The fifth human was unmistakable, though her coppery hair was wet and dirty.
Leyloni.
Keeping one arm around Serek, he dropped a hand to the ground, sinking his claws deep into the dirt. Lightning coursed down his arm and dissipated in the earth, but it did not diminish the still building power inside him.
He’d wasted too much time already. He would not allow his clan to be broken, would not allow anyone or anything to take his mate away.
A second group of bone clad females emerged from the foliage near the first—four more of them.
“Where are the males?” demanded Tekal, stepping toward the newcomers. She was the only bone clad human with no mask.
“Fled. The adult…he is not human,” replied one of the newly arrived women.
Arysteon turned away from them, scanning his surroundings. Serek reached up with a sticky hand to take hold of one of Arysteon’s horns, keeping the other hand—and the mostly mushed sunfruit in its grasp—at his mouth.
Arysteon’s chest tightened, and electric heat skittered along his back scales. Something buried deep within him railed against taking his eyes off Leyloni, especially now.
“We will kill her now and go on the hunt,” Tekal said. “She will only slow us down, and the males are the true prize. You know this, Aklai.”
A flash of pain pierced Arysteon’s chest—Leyloni’s pain. His body trembled with the exertion of preventing himself from going to her, his every muscle screaming in agony.
Aklai—the female who Tekal had been arguing with—said, “And what of Onu? She will slow us down on the hunt. Are we to leave her here, as well?”
“We will leave one behind to tend her,” Tekal replied tightly.
“The poison will not last much longer regardless,” said Onu, her voice even more diminished than before. “Bind the lamb or kill her, but either way be done with it.”
“Call your males, lamb,” said Aklai. “Call them home.”
Arysteon’s eyes fell upon a deep depression ahead that was flanked on both sides by thick, exposed roots. The thumping of his heart and buzzing of his spark were growing overwhelmingly loud as he hurried toward the depression. His heart ached for what he had to do, but it would have shattered had he not done it.
Because he knew somehow, at the core of his soul, that Leyloni’s death would mean his own. His spark would fail if hers were snuffed out.
“If you will not call them, let your screams be the lure,” Tekal snarled.
“They are out of your reach,” said Leyloni, her words strained but bristling with defiance.
Clenching his teeth so tightly they felt on the verge of breaking, Arysteon dropped to a knee at the edge of the depression. He inspected it quickly, ensuring it wasn’t part of a larger burrow or otherwise occupied, and carefully lowered Serek into it.
Serek looked up at Arysteon with his big, dark eyes, lowered the sunfruit from his mouth, and cooed some of his meaningless words as though in question.
Despite Arysteon’s thundering heartbeat and crackling spark, he clearly heard the dull thump of flesh striking flesh at the riverside and felt a new flash of pain from Leyloni. His chest constricted. He withdrew his hands from Serek just as the first sparks of lightning arced over his scales.
“Just for a few moments, little dragon.” Arysteon’s voice trembled with barely contained fury. The lightning inside him sizzled and expanded, threatening to tear him apart from within. Just as he’d seen Leyloni do several times, he lifted a finger to his lips. “Shh.”
Serek grinned and lifted his empty hand to his own mouth, slapping it over his lips, and tried to mimic the sound—managing mainly to spray spittle and fruit juice. He promptly returned the sunfruit to his lips and resumed eating.
Arysteon’s breaths were ragged as he stood up and hastily dragged some large, leafy branches across the depression, creating a natural looking cover that hid Serek. It took a significant amount of willpower to keep his lightning from coursing through his hands and into the wood.
To his surprise, he felt his spark pushing back against his restraint—almost as though it possessed a will of its own. He turned toward Leyloni, and his spark surged with new intensity, surpassing anything he could ever have imagined.
It wanted to get out, needed to get out.
It needed to get to her.
Arysteon ran forward, eschewing all attempts at stealth. His spark crackled to the surface of his scales and coursed over him, building and building, threatening to overwhelm him and shatter his mind, to obliterate his consciousness, to annihilate his body.
He burst from the brush at the top of the riverbank. The humans, one and all, turned their gazes toward him. He saw their confusion, their startlement, their fear—and he felt Leyloni’s fear and shock, her flicker of hope, her fiery love.
The bone-clad females shouted, and one of them lifted a long, straight, hollow stick to her lips, aiming it at Arysteon. Her cheeks puffed out briefly before she blew into the stick.
He saw the small, feathered projectile speed toward him, felt it strike the scales of his chest and bounce off. In that same instant, a bolt of lightning as thick as a thousand-year-old tree struck Arysteon.
No, that wasn’t right—it hadn’t hit him, it had burst out of him. The light it produced was blinding, the boom of thunder that followed was deafening, and the heat was unbearable. It consumed Arysteon, blasted him apart, reduced his body to ash—to less than ash, less than dust. The agony should have undone his mind. He was acutely aware of each infinitesimal part of himself, aware of the pain each of those parts suffered in being violently undone. And he knew through that pain that he had become lightning. He had become his spark.
Whether that sensation lasted a single moment or an eon, he could not say. Only his will remained, clutching a singular purpose that was fully in alignment with his spark.
Save Leyloni.
Though he had no mouth, he roared, and the sound was like rumbling thunder shaking a rocky valley. His jaws formed around that roar, elongated and lined with pointed teeth. His snout materialized from the lightning next, and it led to his eyes, his backswept horns, his wicked spines, his long, powerful neck. His armored scales hardened around his large, powerful body and tail.
Draconic muscles flexed beneath those scales, bulging with unbridled strength. His mighty heart thumped. His chest swelled with rage as ancient as these woods, with love as boundless as the heavens.
Leyloni.
Arysteon opened his eyes and looked down upon the little humans. They all stared at him with shock save Leyloni—her surprise was mingled with her renewed hope. Smoke curled in the air around him, which bore that crisp lightning scent.
In the woods behind Arysteon, Serek cried, likely startled by the noise.
Arysteon huffed through his nostrils, making the thin smoke swirl wildly. His gaze fell upon his nearest foe—Tekal. She stared up at him, trembling, and the bones of her necklace rattled.
Several days ago, Arysteon had empathized with two scared, exhausted humans, and had gladly helped them. He had no empathy for these humans—and he had no mercy to spare for anyone or anything that dared threaten his mate.
He leapt forward, releasing another roar, and brought his front claws down upon Tekal. She was dead before she could so much as utter a sound, her warm blood spattering Arysteon’s scales. Her companions scrambled into sudden motion.
They thrust their spears at him, and one fired an arrow, their attacks imbued with a desperation born of terror. Their weapons glanced off Arysteon’s natural armor—he barely felt their impacts.
He snapped his head down and clamped his jaws over the female with the deer skull who had been standing over Leyloni, catching her from the midsection up. Blood ran over his tongue, bitter with a tang of iron. He growled with intensified fury.
If his mate required a beast to destroy her enemies and keep her safe, Arysteon would be that beast. He would be whatever she need
ed—anything, everything.
Arysteon lifted his head and swung it to the side to fling the bone-clad female into the woods. Her body crashed through the foliage, already forgotten. He lashed out at his remaining enemies, tearing more flesh, breaking more bones, shedding more blood. Soon, that blood was the dominant scent on the air.
Only two of the eight enemies remained standing, and they fell back from Arysteon, back from their fallen companions. That was two too many. He positioned himself over Leyloni, making his body her shield, her sanctuary, and rent the sky with another roar.
The survivors fled into the brush.
Instinct drove Arysteon to follow, but it also halted him before he could give chase. The bone-clad females were a threat to his Leyloni, to Serek, so long as they drew breath. They could not be spared. Yet there was something more important to attend to in that moment.
Arysteon eased himself backward and bent his neck to look down at his mate. Arms trembling, she was struggling to push herself up from her prone position. He gently hooked the claws of one hand beneath her torso and supported her.
Her hair was damp and tangled, spotted with bits of grass and fallen leaves. Her skin was paler than usual but for the frantic red splotches on her cheeks, and she was smeared with dirt and mud from head to toe. Her arms were covered in shallow scratches, and crimson gleamed at her temple—blood from a fresh wound.
His chest tightened, squeezing his heart and making it difficult for him to draw breath.
He should not have let her come here alone. He should have remained at her side, protecting her, as was his duty.
Leaning on his fingers, Leyloni got her feet beneath her and stood up, albeit with tenuous balance. “Arysteon,” she rasped. “What…”
“Hush,” he rumbled, leaning his head down to carefully nuzzle her shoulder. “You are safe.”
“Serek. Where’s Serek?”
Though they’d eased somewhat, the baby’s cries continued sounding from the woods behind Arysteon.
“He is also safe, my heartsong.”
Our enemies are fleeing. Escaping.
Arysteon’s spark thrummed. He clenched his jaw and held it in, inadvertently pressing the blood taste to the roof of his mouth. He nearly shuddered. There was yet more blood to be spilled.
“Come,” he said, allowing Leyloni to hold his claw as he slowly turned and moved toward Serek.
She leaned on him heavily but kept herself upright. When she reached the slope leading up from the river—an insignificant slope from his current perspective—he curled his fingers and used them to scoop up his little mate. She braced herself with a steadying hand on his thumb but did not panic or cry out.
Serek’s cries were far clearer from this close.
Arysteon set Leyloni down at the top of the rise. He lowered his head so his eyes were level with hers. “Go to him, dear one. I will return to you shortly.”
Wordlessly, Leyloni turned and hugged Arysteon’s snout, pressing her cheek against his scales. Despite the myriad of sensations coursing through him, he clearly felt the flow of her warm breath and the feathery tickle of her curly hair. He leaned into her embrace gratefully until, too soon, she withdrew.
Leyloni turned and walked toward Serek, supporting herself by placing her hands against the nearby trees as she passed.
“Shh. You are all right, little one,” she whispered soothingly.
Arysteon pivoted and hurried in the opposite direction, his spark intensifying with his every step—because he was moving away from Leyloni, because there was work yet to be done, a hunt to conclude.
He plunged into the forest, tongue flicking out repeatedly to seek any trace of his fleeing enemies. There was a hint of human sweat on the air—just enough to follow.
Something skittered down his spine, something hot and unsettlingly familiar. That insidious heat pooled uncomfortably in his loins and pulsed through his veins with each thump of his heart.
Gritting his teeth, he shoved the sensation aside and quickened his pace.
He needed to complete this hunt and return to his mate with all possible haste. Leyloni required tending. There was no time yet to contemplate what had happened, to wonder at his second change, to determine whether this lingering flash of heat was a phantom or a memory.
15
Leyloni cradled Serek against her chest, smoothing his hair back with her palm and rocking him gently. His cries had subsided shortly after Arysteon had left and she’d pulled him from the hole, but she found herself unable to cease her ministrations—they were more to calm herself now than the baby. She couldn’t stop trembling.
I nearly lost them.
Even as she’d lain upon the ground with the Bone Wraiths surrounding her, she had thought only of Serek and Arysteon.
Arysteon.
He…he changed back.
She closed her eyes, pressed her face into Serek’s hair, and breathed in his scent. His smell had become so familiar in her time with him—it seemed in some ways to be the only reminder she had of home. But he also smelled of sunfruit, earth, and Arysteon.
My mate.
Leyloni squeezed her eyes tighter shut against the sting of her tears. Her heart clenched. It was far more painful than anything the Bone Wraiths had done to her, though that pain was growing as the poison’s effects faded and feeling returned throughout her body.
Serek wriggled, seeming to have had enough of her coddling, and Leyloni loosened her hold on him. Drawing back, she opened her eyes and looked down at his sweet little face. It was streaked with dirt and tears, as was the rest of him. She wiped at his cheek with her finger, but the dirt there was mixed with sticky sunfruit juice and refused to come off easily.
“You were so brave, little one,” she said softly.
He grabbed her fingers and attempted to bring them to his mouth. She gently tugged them out of his grasp and smiled.
Her smile died and her heart skipped a beat when she heard distant branches breaking. Instinctively, she tightened her arms around Serek and twisted her torso to shield him. More branches cracked, and foliage rustled, the sounds drawing steadily nearer.
Her initial fear should’ve held, but she felt that little crackle of lightning in her chest—her gift from her mate, her bond with him—leap and dance. Arysteon was returning. His presence was drawing nearer.
Serek announced his displeasure with a frustrated cry and a fresh bout of squirming, pushing at Leyloni’s arms.
Leyloni relaxed her hold on him a little, dipped her head to kiss his hair, and slowly stood up. Her side ached, and her legs wobbled. For a few moments, it seemed her own weight was too much to support, even without taking Serek’s into account—and his continued struggles certainly didn’t help.
Fortunately, she found new strength through that dancing spark. Arysteon’s strength.
She turned toward the sounds of his approach, toward his lightning charged presence, and her stomach fluttered with a blend of anticipation and relief.
Despite the large trees, uneven terrain, and wild undergrowth, despite much of his body being blocked from her view by those obstacles, Leyloni’s eyes fell immediately upon Arysteon.
Serek finally stilled, and he made a happy coo. Leyloni knew without looking that the baby was also staring at Arysteon.
She was in awe of Arysteon despite having been around him for days while he’d been in his natural state. She would’ve been in awe of him even had he not changed from dragon to man and back again.
Of course, he was massive, dwarfing even the largest creatures she’d ever encountered, but he moved with a powerful, predatory grace that should’ve been as threatening as it was beautiful. His scales changed as he moved, their color subtly shifting to match his surroundings. Those color changes were more pronounced when he passed through the shafts of sunlight pouring through the canopy. The effect of those rippling hues was almost hypnotic.
His violet eyes were vibrant even from a few dozen paces away, and the depth of the emo
tion within them was readily apparent.
Arysteon closed that remaining distance swiftly and smoothly, making barely a sound as he moved. Those noises he’d made before had to have been deliberate—his means of alerting Leyloni to his arrival without fully exposing either of them just in case there were more Bone Wraiths lurking nearby.
He lowered his head, bringing his eyes down to Leyloni’s level, and hummed the first few notes of the song he’d made for her. They were far deeper and more powerful than what he could produce in his human form, but they were just as lovely, just as heartwarming.
His long, forked tongue slipped out, and his hum took on a troubled tone before fading. “Tell me you are well,” he rumbled. “Tell me they have done you no lasting harm.”
Arysteon’s nostrils flared with a heavy exhalation, drawing Leyloni’s attention down slightly. The scales around his mouth and the front of his snout were spattered with drying blood. But Leyloni didn’t care. The tears that had stung her eyes earlier returned swiftly, spilling down her cheeks as she reached for him. She grasped one of his horns as she hugged his head, pressing her forehead against his scales.
Serek giggled and leaned forward, patting Arysteon’s snout with both hands. Arysteon closed his eyes and chuckled. The low, rolling sound vibrated into Leyloni, and somehow it chased away some of the pain in her heart and dulled some of the scars on her mind—but it did not stop her from crying.
I almost lost them.
“Leyloni? My heartsong?” Arysteon asked, a hint of lingering worry in his voice.
She sniffled and pulled back to meet his gaze. “I am fine,” she said, her voice husky as she tried to stem the flow of tears. “Only some bruising and scrapes, nothing lasting. And the poison is wearing off.”
Arysteon’s slitted pupils expanded and contracted as he narrowed his eyes. “You are certain?”
To Love A Dragon; Venys Needs Men Page 14