Ashborn Chapter 11
Sealed in the Aerie. Explosives hidden in the walls. A family waiting to die. Will Dareya’s be able to say goodbye to Veyrakh?
I remained still on my perch. Waiting.
I did not sleep. I waited for a sun I could no longer see, for the sky had been closed. I waited for the soft tremor of wings.
My mate had been curled around our clutch of eggs when I’d left home the morning the doors had been sealed. Our first clutch. Four eggs. Each smaller than a shield, speckled like stone, and warm with promise.
I had not seen my mate since I had been imprisoned. Had not heard her voice. Had not smelled her or the fire-musk of our young.
The air shifted as the doors opened. Barely. Not wide as they should to sun and flight. But wide enough for a human to walk through.
I watched as a group of humans were herded into the central chamber of the Aerie.
Three males. No. Two men. But obviously father and son. The third, although taller than the first two, still had the scent of youth clinging to him.
Two more boys followed behind, still on the verge of becoming men.
And three women. One I recognized. The only person in the group I recognized. Veyrakh’s bonded Rider.
Another of the women was an older version of Veyrakh’s Rider. A third woman carried an infant in her arms.
As soon as the woman carrying the infant stepped across the threshold, the Soldiers who had escorted them pulled the doors shut,
Sealing the family inside.
The silence in the chamber was deafening. Their rapid heartbeats thundered.
The younger of the men embraced the woman with the infant. The elder embraced the older woman and the three boys.
Veyrakh’s rider, wearing a silk dress instead of the uniform I was accustomed to seeing her in, stood off to the side.
Then a sharp wail pierced the gloom.
It struck through the stillness. My head turned before I meant it to. Neck muscles coiling, eyes narrowing.
The infant wailed again. Louder. Not with anger. Not with fright. She was too young to understand what was happening. The wails were those of need. I smelled fresh milk as wet spots bloomed on the chest of the woman holding her.
The young mother frantically tried to calm the infant as she watched me, fear and fire in her eyes, as though she was saying that if I wanted to harm the baby, I’d have to go through her.
And I remembered the scent of my mate. The heat of the eggs beneath her. The fire-musk of new life. And the hope that if she believed our young to be threatened, she’d have the same fire in her eyes.
Veyrakh’s Rider had lifted her head, scanning the room. Counting. Calculating. Fear masking her features.
I walked over to the camera, looking straight into it. Inspecting it.
It was just high enough to be out of Kyran’s reach.
No stools. No chairs. Nothing that could be pulled over to step on to reach it to spread something on the lens to obscure its view.
Even if there had been, the floor, normally covered in soft peat and hay, had been swept bare. Not even a pebble remained.
The sharp smell of fuel danced almost imperceptibly around my nose.
“Darey,” Kaelin’s voice was quietly stern. Not my brother’s voice. Lieutenant Calderin’s.
“Do you smell that?” He had stepped away from Tamsin and Alira.
“What is it? It’s odd.”
“Jet fuel.” He scanned the stone floor. “Military grade. High flashpoint. Accelerates slow but burns hot and long.” His eyes lifted towards the rafters, scanning the shadowed ledges and stone perches as our father joined us. “You don’t use it unless you’re trying to melt something. They don’t just want us dead. They want a mass cremation.”
The older Calderin also scanned the room, following his son’s line of sight. “See that?” He pointed to a rock jutting out from a wall, the color slightly lighter than the surrounding area. “That isn’t stone.”
He brushed his hand above the patch. “Painted polymer casing,” he muttered. “C4. Shaped and painted to blend. Someone just got the color a little off.”
“Remote detonation?” Kaelin frowned.
Father nodded. “Definitely. The place is wired for collapse.” He grimly pointed to several places around the Aerie. “They packed it into structural points. There’s one on that ledge above the entry ramp. They want to drop the ceiling. Bring down the upper walkways. Crater the floor. Exactly the way I’d set it up if I wanted a structural wipe.”
Kaelin’s mouth set in a hard line. “Mass cremation and structural wipe. Nothing left to bury.”
The few spoonfuls of the stew I’d choked down threatened to come back up. “They weren’t just hoping for the dragons to kill us. They planned for it to not matter.”
I looked back over my shoulder at Tamsin and Alira. At Mother, Kyran, Orin, and Sethus. They were now sat huddled together, on the floor, as Alira ate.
My eyes swept the Aerie again. The ledges. The shadows. The high perches. I told myself I was scanning for threats.
But I wasn’t.
I was looking for him.
And Veyrakh was obviously not here.
I steadied my breathing and closed my eyes, reaching through the bond.
To say goodbye. Even if he doesn’t respond.
The space was cold. Still. Blocked. I continued reaching anyway.
Not with words.
Just presence. The feeling of I’m here. The ache of I won’t be much longer.
And then I felt it.
Heat. Undeniable. Like a breath before a roar.
Not panic. Not fear. Fury.
The bond flared. Sudden. Searing. Alive.
I felt something landing gently beside me, claws barely tapping the floor. Much more controlled then Veyrakh ever was.
I kept my eyes shut. The bond pulsed like a heartbeat through my chest.
I felt his breath, heard the way his wings rustled.
His head rested on top of mine.
Behind me, I heard a sharp intake of breath. “No!” Mother’s voice cracked. “Please, no!”
She’d been calm this entire time. But now she saw everything. The sealed doors. The camera. The scent of jet fuel. Her husband, son, and daughter – all warriors – conversing in low tones with worried glances. The way the dragon had landed by me and claimed me intimately.
“They sent us here to die!” Her voice was a whisper. Her arms tightened around the boys. Around Orin. Around Sethus. Her eyes locked onto Kyran. Alira. Tamsin.
“We need to get out!”
“We will, Mother.” I spoke calmly, although my heart pounded. The breath above me changed.
Then, the heat of Veyrakh’s breath pulled away. A shimmer of pressure. The scent of smoke, split by steel and ash. Where Veyrakh had been standing behind me, a man now stood. Broad-shouldered. Tall. Dark hair with thunderstorm gray eyes. Warm. His hands embracing my arms protectively.
“Enough.” His voice was deep. Raw. Like the first word spoken.
I leaned back against him, closing my eyes, wishing we weren’t about to die, imagining a million things I’d do to him.
His breath blew gently, intimately, over my ear, “I still intend to fulfill my promise to make you scream.”
He pulled his head away from me, a slight predatory grin at my furious blushing as his hand now rested on my waist, his thumb drawing small circles on my lower back. “So, about the situation.”
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