And slowly, slowly, Vyr furled his wings and drew them back into his body. The look of pain on his face was heartbreaking. The crimson color left his skin, the scales faded, and as he gritted his teeth in pain, they lost their razor sharpness and turned to blunt human teeth once again. His face softened from the harsh angles and, body shaking, he heaved an exhausted sigh, relaxed back on his bent legs, opened his eyes, and looked down his nose at her. “You need to go home. I’m here, Riyah. You’re gonna get sick from those meds. You need to go. Drink as much water as you can. Call my mom. Get some help at your house. I want someone there with you until this is done.”
“Until what’s done?” she whispered.
But the guards rushed Vyr so he couldn’t answer her. They yanked his arms behind his back and dragged him away. And then they took her away, too. Away from the man who made her feel safe. From the man who cared enough about her to stop the Red Dragon mid-Change.
“Until what’s done?” she asked louder.
Vyr’s eyes were haunted as he watched her until she was pulled through the door. He never answered, not even in her head.
And as another dizzy spell took her, she couldn’t feel him in her head at all.
Baffled, she watched the guards running this way and that, guns shouldered, focus on their faces. Her blood was boiling, chilling, boiling then chilling, and she swallowed over and over so she wouldn’t retch. Vyr was right. She needed to go home. Right now.
“Excuse me,” she murmured, attempting to yank her arm out of a guard’s unforgiving grasp.
When she looked up, it was that shifter Vyr had told her to stay away from. Hank Butte. He was staring at her inner bicep with a frown. “Smells like blood,” he said in an empty voice. “Looks like it, too.”
Indeed, there was a single red drop on the sleeve of her white silk blouse where she’d stabbed herself with the syringe. “Let go of me, asshole,” she said as she jerked out of his grasp. She glared over her shoulder as she walked away, just to make sure he wasn’t following her. He stood there in the middle of the mayhem watching her leave with a suspicious frown and his head cocked to the side. His eyes were narrowed to glowing blue slits, and chills rippled up her arms. Oh, he knew.
Forcing herself to watch where she was going, she gave that animal her back and quickened her pace. God, she wished she could rip these shoes off and run. She bolted for a trashcan and got sick. She felt awful, could barely think straight, and her head was pounding, but not because Vyr was in there. But because of the medicine running through her veins. She had spells for this. She hadn’t practiced them in years, but desperate times and measures. She just needed to get home to those spell books.
But with each step she took trying to escape the prison, nodding to the guards, trying to look like she wasn’t in severe pain, it became crystal clear that she wasn’t safe to drive home. She made her way through all the security stations, but the last two stopped her and asked if she was all right, probably because she was swaying and had broken out in a sweat. The medicine was to kill a shifter animal, but she was human, so she had no idea what it was doing to her.
She forced a smile, nodded to the guards in the parking lot, and then scrambled into her SUV and fumbled for the burner phone in her glove compartment. She dialed the phone number and groaned as she sped out of the parking lot.
“Are they there?” Clara asked.
“Wh-who?” Riyah stammered weakly.
“Nox and Torren. Riyah, are you okay?”
“No. No, I’m not. I took this medicine I was supposed to give to Vyr, but I couldn’t hurt him. I couldn’t hurt him, and now I don’t feel… Clara I’m gonna pass out soon.” She wasn’t going to make it much farther. On the long stretch of road outside of the prison grounds, she pulled over in a rush as her skin went clammy and her stomach rolled with another wave of nausea.
“Riyah, put your car in park.”
She fumbled to think clear enough to put it in park, but her hand wasn’t working right. “I can’t.”
“Riyah, yes you can, hon. Put it in park, and then it’s okay to go to sleep. I’m getting help to you right now.” There was static on the phone and in a muffled voice, Clara told someone to, “Send the girls in. Riyah needs help right now. Right now. I don’t give a shit. Send them in right now.” More static and then in a clear voice, Clara said, “Riyah, are you parked?”
“I think I am,” she whispered, melting against the seat. “Tell Vyr I’m sorry. Tell Vyr I’m sorry.”
“You did nothing wrong, and you can tell him anything you want tomorrow. Everything is going to be okay.”
“He left.” Riyah’s shoulders sagged, and a sob worked its way up her throat. “I can’t feel him.”
Clara was still talking, but Riyah couldn’t understand what she was saying. And as the edges of her vision shattered inward, she heaved a long sigh, and then Riyah was in the dark, once again.
Chapter Ten
“She sure is sweating a lot,” an unfamiliar woman’s voice muttered.
“It must be the medicine. I don’t think this crap is made for humans.”
There was a humorless snort. “You really think she’s human? She stinks of magic.”
“What?”
“Yeah, can’t you smell that bitter scent? Can’t you feel it coming off her? That’s like…an assload of magic, and she’s freaking sleeping. Imagine what she’d be like when she’s awake. Beast witch.”
“She looks dead.”
“Give her more water. Clara said we need to be flushing that shit out of her.”
“Well she already puked like a dozen times, so there’s that. I feel like I’m in one of those movies, you know? Like the college ones where the girlfriends are holding their hair back while they drunk-puke—”
“Okay, let’s talk about anything else. You’re making me nauseous.”
“That would be the baby making you nauseous, not me. Gotta little gorilla making you green. Eeee! I can’t wait to hold him.”
Another snort. “It’s a her. I’m sure of it. And stop jinxing me. I don’t even think I could handle a little Kong. Her father is already both-hands-full.”
“And he’s in prison.”
“So is Nox!”
“Yeah, I was really proud of him for all the dicks he managed to paint all over town in one night. If there is a record for dick paintings, Nox holds it. I drove around counting them. I found eighty-four. Eighty-four, Candace. And those were just the ones I could track down. I’m oddly proud. God, our lives are weird.”
“Yep!”
“I wish I’d been successful.”
“At being arrested? All you did was drink a bottle of cheap wine and skinny dip in the public pool. That was never going to get you more than a night in the drunk tank.”
“I felt really badass when I did it, though.”
There was a pause, and then twin peals of laughter. One of them said, “Check her pulse again. We’re almost there, but she looks really bad.”
Warm fingertips pressed against Riyah’s neck. “She’s still with us.” As Riyah tried and failed to open her eyes, the stranger murmured in a kind voice, “Poor thing.”
“Nevada, don’t go all negative on me. She’ll be okay.”
“I don’t just mean about the meds, Candace. I mean, she’s the one, right?”
There was a sad sigh. “Yeah. Beaston says she’s the one, so she must be.”
“I think we should be her friends then. I think she’ll need us.”
There was a long pause.
Why couldn’t Riyah open her eyes? Why couldn’t she move? Someone brushed her hair from her face and cradled her head like she was coveted and fragile.
In a hushed murmur, the other stranger said, “I think she’ll need us, too.”
And then Riyah was in the dark once again.
Chapter Eleven
Vyr couldn’t feel her.
“Riyah?” he asked for the fiftieth time, at least.
Silence
.
He couldn’t reach her. There was only emptiness where their bond used to be, and now he was truly alone, down here in a cage called The Dungeon. This place had been built with dragons in mind. No one knew about it but Vyr and the guards. This was the prison’s well-kept secret. While life went on far above, as the inmates worked, ate, exercised, had time in the yard, fought, showered, visited the commissary, slept…Vyr had just died. Again.
He’d been lying here for hours after Changing back from the dragon, unable to even sit up. Every three weeks for six months, he’d been dragged down to the lowest level of the prison and forced to Change, and it was always the same afterward. He had to burn off the gallon of meds they’d filled him with. His blood was on fire as he lay curled on his side in the middle of the concrete floor. This place was cavernous, much bigger than his cell, to give the Red Dragon space to move, but it was narrow one way and long the other so he could never have enough room to stretch out comfortably and spread his wings. So there he sat for hours on end, blowing fire and magma, unable to move, feeling trapped, feeling claustrophobic, and missing the sky. And by missing the sky he meant that bone-deep, marrow-deep, soul-deep yearning for something he would never see or touch again. Instead, the Red Dragon sat in a steal and cement cage, burning himself with his own fire until he got sick, or gave up and disappeared into Vyr’s skin. And for longer and longer periods of time, the dragon would leave completely, and it was just the man named Vyr left. The media called him the Son of the Dragon, but Damon’s legacy would end the day the Red Dragon failed to return to Vyr after a Change.
This one was bad. It was the worst one yet. Too many meds, too little time Changed, and the dragon had given up faster than ever. And now, he’d been lying here for three hours at least, and he still couldn’t feel the dragon.
And there was the scrape. He’d landed hard when he Changed back and the side of his forearm was covered in road rash. It seeped still, hours later, and hadn’t healed even a little bit. It was a really bad sign.
Body burning from the inside out, Vyr slammed the side of his head on the cement three times and gritted his teeth, wishing to God the dragon would push a pissed-off rumble up his throat, but there was only silence.
There was scratching noises above him. Rats maybe. The dragon hadn’t eaten any ashes since Chad, but not even the rats were waking up the monster. Emmitt and the New IESA knew exactly what they were doing. They’d stunted the Red Dragon. Beat him into submission. He’d been defeated, and in this moment, he hated the world he’d been born into. He hated that he was Damon’s son. Hated that he’d failed to control the dragon better. Dad always said he didn’t try hard enough, but he was far from right. Vyr had devoted his life to training himself to only Change every three weeks. To stop Changes when he was angry. Dad didn’t understand. He never had. The Red Dragon wasn’t like Damon’s monster. Vyr’s dragon was completely separate.
And now the New IESA was in some mad-scientist lab above him creating another Red Dragon. Goodbye world if that ever got injected into someone. They had the devil in a syringe, and they didn’t even realize it.
“Riyah?”
Silence.
God, he wished she was here with him. Vyr’s body convulsed again, and another wave of fire burned through his veins. What if she was dead? What if those meds she’d taken into herself had killed her? She was human. Fuck. Fuck. He wrapped his arms around his stomach and curled into a tighter ball to ease the pain.
Maybe that’s why he couldn’t feel her.
Maybe she was really gone, and if Riyah, that beautiful beacon of hope, was gone, he didn’t want to fight anymore.
The whole world said it was better off without him, so at what point did he decide to listen to them? Everyone thought he was bad, so maybe it was time to accept that he was bad. Maybe he was evil.
The scratching above was getting louder. Vyr tossed the tall ceiling a tired look and then forced himself up on his hands and knees. At least the rats meant he wasn’t alone when he did what he had to do next.
Three heaved breaths, and he stumbled to his feet and made his way over to the single observation room with two-way glass because he should see what he suspected.
He stared at the ground as he approached. There was a single light on the other side of the room, a blue one, and it cast the room in dim shadows that looked like moonlight. Always in the dark. The creature of darkness. Everyone was wrong about him. He loved sunlight. He loved flying above the clouds in daylight best. The dragon felt free there, felt good, felt whole.
“Riyah?”
Silence.
He came to a stop in front of the mirror glass, and with a steadying breath, he looked up at his haggard face. His stomach dropped to the floor. He would never forget this moment—it was the one where the crack in his stone heart was complete.
Both dragon eyes were frozen in his face now. The Red Dragon was dead. Riyah had tried to save him by taking that medicine, and look what happened anyway.
Vyr inhaled and released an agonized scream as long and loud as he could. Such an ugly, completely human scream. And when it tapered in his throat, he closed his fist and slammed it against the mirror, right at his reflection. The glass shattered outward like a spider web, distorting his hideous face. Good. He would never look in another mirror again. He couldn’t, because there was death in his eyes now.
Vyr turned and leaned against the stone wall, cold and damp against his back as he slid down. He slammed his head against it and wondered what it would feel like to cry. He’d never done that before, but if there was ever a time to express that emotion, it was now as he mourned the death of the most important part of himself.
Now, he was nothing at all.
The sound of metal on metal was grating, and Vyr looked up at where the sound was coming from. The rats were really fucking determined in these walls. He reached out but couldn’t feel any guards in the observation room. They usually left him alone when he was recovering. What danger was he now? Sure, he still had his powers from his mom, but they didn’t know that. All they knew was the dragon was weakest right after a forced Change.
Something huge fell out of the ceiling, sliding too fast down a rope, and Vyr stared in shock as a familiar face muttered, “Mother fuck-cakes,” as he landed hard on his feet on the concrete floor.
Oh, good. The Sickening was giving Vyr visions now. Not just voices in his head or a flash of something that wasn’t there. He was having a full-on psychopath moment right now.
Blond hair, blue eyes, twenty pounds of muscle bigger than the last time Vyr had seen him and, “Where the fuck is your beard?” he asked Imaginary Nox.
“Asshole guards made me shave it to make sure I wasn’t sneaking in a shank or, I don’t know, drugs or something. I look like a twelve year old. I need to grow that shit out quick because Nevada is all about the beard against her poontang. You look like a three-week-old shit.”
Imaginary Nox, clad in orange prison garb, approached slowly. Vyr averted his gaze. Even though this wasn’t real, he wasn’t ready to share what had just happened to him. It was nice to pretend he wasn’t alone, though. “How did you get down here?”
“First thing’s first. I’ve been reading a book about how to be a better friend and chapter two said hugs are important.”
“Pass.”
“Bring it in.”
“Nox, I don’t want to hug you right now.”
“Right now? Okay, so then later we’ll hug, after we bond.”
Imaginary Nox sat beside him and looked at a stopwatch in his hand. “I have five minutes before I have to get back. Torren is up there fighting like five silverbacks to give me time. Did you know, getting in here without being arrested is impossible? I researched this place for months and couldn’t find a single way in, but once you’re in? This place is not a well-oiled machine. We have like four people on the inside, two are guards, and your therapist? She’s a fuckin’ MVP. A goddamn witch. Natural born, too. Your mom found he
r and started all of this.”
“All of what?”
“Project Rescue the Red Dragon.”
“Too late.” Vyr’s voice echoed hollowly around the room with those two words. He wanted to retch.
“What do you mean?” Imaginary Nox asked softly.
With a sigh, Vyr blinked slowly and rolled his head against the rock, gave Imaginary Nox a clear view of his eyes.
Imaginary Nox’s eyes went round, and his lips parted like he wanted to say something, but nothing came out. Red crept up his neck and his face turned to that of fury. “I’m calling this.”
“Calling what?”
“This is a goddamn-nough. I fuckin’ told them we needed to be doing extraction, not trying to keep you steady while they fuckin’ torture you.” Imaginary Nox’s voice bounced off the walls with the force of his angry words. He flashed a pissed-off glance to the stopwatch in his fist again. “Tell me it’s not over. Tell me your eyes don’t mean what I think they mean.”
“The therapist,” Vyr murmured tiredly. “I need to know if she’s okay. She took a dose of meds to protect me. I can’t feel her anymore. Riyah.”
“Okay, the way you just said her name…” Imaginary Nox arched his eyebrows. “Is she yours?”
“Nothing is mine, Nox. That wasn’t the life I was born to. I just need to know she’s safe.”
“Done. I’ll find out. Nevada and Candace are on the outside—”
“Why aren’t they locked up with us?” Vyr rested his elbows on his bent knees and stared at the blue light across the room. The questions he asked didn’t matter because he was making this all up, but damn, it felt good to pretend he was here with one of his crew. He missed Nox.
“Well, because Candace has a little baby Kong in her. I read a book on fetuses. It’s like the size of a grain of rice right now. I drew a picture of a tiny gorilla in my dream journal and Nevada thought it was cute as fuck and now I want to put like seventy-three babies in her because she gets all mushy when she talks about them. Plus an army of Noxs would be awesome. Kong and Candace started trying for a little baby for the crew a few months ago. They want a girl, but I’m praying for a boy just to watch them have to raise a mini-Torren. I’m gonna train him to shoot his dad with a crossbow and vandalize shit. Gonna make that little monkey love me more. Anyway, the plan was for us to come in here so you could be close to us, but Torren put his foot down on Candace coming in here pregnant. And my girl…well…she’s not the best criminal. She did hang out in the drunk tank in Foxburg for a night though, and I was really fuckin’ proud of her.” His voice went thoughtful. “If we had more time, I would try to sneak her in for a conjugal visit. I love the challenge of this place. I know the timing of all the guards, all their habits. I know your exact schedule. Fuckin’ A-Team. I keep trying to explain I’m the MVP of this crew, and y’all don’t believe me. After this, everyone has to stop treating me like the village idiot. I’m way smarter than all of you. Except Nevada. She’s a super-hot nerd. Gotta jet, Alpha.”