Page 50 of Bound to the Orc Warlord

“Let’s get to shelter.” I need to get my bride dry and warm. I scoop up my sword and point toward the rock formation. “Midnight told me of a cave.”

“It was a favorite play spot when I was a filly. Too bad I’m too large to fit these days.” Midnight shakes her head, flinging extra drops at me as I pass her.

“You’re made for weather.” I clap her on the neck, her water resistant coat making the rain drops bead on the surface.

“Doesn’t mean I like it.”

“Didn’t you grow up on these plains?” Ashley waves toward the open meadow.

“Yes, but we sheltered under the trees.”

“You can go as soon as I take all your tack off,” I say.

The rain intensifies, and thunder rumbles overhead. As if to hurry us along, a gust of wind splashes a sheet of raindropsover our backs. My steps begin to squelch, the ground unable to absorb the water as quickly as it falls.

The rock formation looms out of the deepening gloom of the day. I trot around the base, searching for the opening Midnight told me about, the stone dark and slick with rain. There! A dark crack widens as it approaches the ground. I hunch over and step inside, my eyes adapting quickly to the reduced light. It’s as she said, a small cavern just tall enough for me to stand in.

I hurry back outside, doing as promised and stripping the saddlebags and saddle from Midnight and depositing them in the cave. “Go, my friend. Find shelter.”

With an agreeing nicker, she sets off.

Drakonisrevener flaps to a landing in front of us. “I couldn’t get them.” He throws a wing up, the tip pointed to the sky and the flock of black birds that now hang beside the ones that follow me.

“You did all anyone could,” I say. “Thank you for protecting Ashley when I could not.”

“We have shelter.” Ashley points to the dark opening. “Midnight found us a cave.”

He laughs and bobs his head. “Dragons don’t fear storms! I’m going to go and play with lightning!” With that, he launches into the air.

My bride turns shocked eyes on me. “He doesn’t mean that, right? Lightning can kill!”

“Don’t worry about him. From everything I’ve heard, dragons are immune.”

I make a come hither gesture, and Ashley flies over to me so I can grab her broomstick and lower her to right above the ground to maneuver her inside the opening.

Once in the cave, I rummage in a saddlebag for my glow stones and strike them against each other to start their magic. The large crystals flare to life, brightening the small space with agolden light that sparkles off the flecks of mica in the rock like a million tiny diamonds.

“Oh, it’s so pretty!” Even wet and injured, an expression of delight covers her face.

The dark walls rise around us, their surfaces rippling as if woven from numerous streams of frozen black water. The cave’s dry and out of the elements, but only my sunny bride could find it lovely. What did I ever do to deserve her?

A flutter of wings at the opening.

I lunge for the bird, capturing it in my hands and breaking its neck in one swift move. The body fades into nothingness. The mass of them retreat, but they’ll try again. Wrestling the tent free of the pack, I unfurl it and drape it over the opening, wedging it into cracks and weighing the bottom with loose stones to hold it in place.

Now nothing will keep me from my bride.

I pivot and reach for Ashley.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Ashley

Dravarr’s hands clasp my shoulders, big and warm and strong, and a little sob shakes from my lips before I can swallow it down. He pulls me from the broomstick, and I let it clatter to the stone floor so I can grab him.

My hands fist in his shirt, pulling me to his chest. My legs wrap around his waist, and I mash my face into his shoulder. I tremble, desperate to get closer to the solid strength of him.

His lips brush against my temple, his beard and tusks adding an extra shiver of sensation. “It’s okay,” he growls, and the deep sound that should be scary is instead a comfort, because it’shim. It’s my Dravarr, and that’s simply how he sounds.

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