Page 44 of Dragons Of Shadow and Sea

But it's no use.

"Fuck this," Rafe growls. "I'm trying the windows."

He pulls off his shirt and wraps it around his fist. Without even hesitating, he punches the glass of the first window he finds. He swallows a howl of pain, but the glass doesn't so much as crack.

The doors are barred, the windows impenetrable. Our magic and our dragons are inaccessible.

Ember's voice in my head lets out a terrified shriek that chills me to my bones.

And then it goes silent. My eyes fly wide, and Rafe drops his fist to fling his gaze in my direction.

Cold horror drips down my spine. But I close my eyes, listening with my entire heart.

"She's alive," I grit out. Our connection hasn't been extinguished--not completely.

But suddenly being unable to hear her like this leaves a hollow, clawing, panicked ache in my chest.

I didn't love being able to feel her being intimate with Prince Malik last night. But I'd take anything over this mute emptiness.

Rafe nods. His eyes are black as he adds, "For now."

The bottom falls out of my stomach. He turns away and starts battering himself against the doors and windows again. I'm tempted to do the same. I look around. The house is comfortable, but it's been stripped bare. There's nothing that could be used as a weapon.

But maybe it isn't a weapon I need.

I start opening drawers and turning over cabinets, tossing their contents. Finally, I find what I'm looking for. A half dozen paperclips in a desk drawer. I unbend them and shove Rafe aside.

He starts to protest, but I drop to my knees and fit the end of one of the paperclips to the lock. This is a magical lock; I won't be able to pick it the way I would a normal one. But I know my way around this sort of contraption. My magic may be suppressed, but I'm a stone dragon. Rock, metal, all of it--it listens to me. And I will make myself heard.

Focusing on my breath and on the minute sounds of the innards of the lock, I feel out the tumblers and the whispers of spellwork that have enchanted them. It's slow, tedious work, and Rafe clearly has no patience for it. He tries more windows and even bashes himself into the wall itself, but I tune him out.

One tumbler slides into place.

I breathe out roughly and begin to tease at the next one.

But before I can find my way through the intricate magic, the entire mechanism suddenly seizes up.

I breathe out, "Shit--"

But it wasn't my error. A torrent of water floods the lock and seeps under the door.

"Rafe," I call.

He's there in an instant--just quickly enough for me to have to shove him aside. The door explodes, and a wave washes in, and then that asshole Prince Malik is standing in the shattered remains.

"You," Rafe growls.

But with the destruction of the door, the dampening spell is pierced. My dragon roars, and the stone beneath our feet quakes.

"Stop," Prince Malik orders, but I don't fucking care.

"Ember," I start.

Malik shakes his head. "She's gone." His glowing blue eyes flash dark. "We were betrayed. I couldn't stop it."

Rafe is on him in an instant, grabbing him by the throat and raising his fist. "You let her get captured."

"I didn't know--"

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