Page 26 of Fae Reckoning

“By blistering sunshine, we’re out of time,” I cried out loudly. “Everyone, now. Run. Move. Connect.”

I remained right where I was, allowing everyone else to do their part to link every creature and person to me. My eyes were already closing. I was reaching for my bond to Rush. With him here with me, it was easy. Instantly, I felt him respond to my unspoken request. His energy melded with mine.

My skin warmed with a flash of pinpricks as the map prepared to trail along my skin?—

Faint shouts and thudding footfalls snaked down the stairwell.

“Fuck,” Rush grunted. “The guards. They got through the wall.”

“We’ll be gone before they reach us,” I said. “Is everyone touching?”

“Not yet,” Rush said. “The green dragon’s an ornery one.” The green dragon growled. Rush quickly added, “Understandably so. I’d be pissed too.”

A quick glance revealed Rush approaching the green dragon slowly—too damn slowly—with his hands in the air. But what else was Rush to do? The dragon was hissing and snarling.

“We gotta leave ‘im,” Roan said, and when Iopened my mouth to protest, he shook his head, his long beard shaking with the movement. “Don’t bother. I know everythin’ ya might say, lass. But it’s either all of us or him at this point. If we can, we’ll come back for ‘im.”

I stared at Roan, then at Rush and the green dragon. Rush was going as fast as he could. Any faster, and the dragonwouldtake a chunk out of him, if not char him to the bone.

Testing Einar’s assessment that he and I were connected even when we weren’t touching, I projected with my thoughts,

Moments passed. I prepared to move on when Einar finally answered.

In hushed tones intended not to spook the hunkering dragon, Rush spoke to me over his shoulder. “I didn’t mention it, but his chains are like the ones Ivar put on us in the throne room.”

Shadow magic of some sort, then, the kind that interfered with our powers.

“Will he still come with us with the chains on?” Rush continued. “‘Cause I don’t know how to get them off him.”

Feeling the queen so close it was as if she were breathing down my neck, I asked of the group at large, “Can anyone undo shadow chains?”

Severalnos arrived at once. Noayes.

Roan’s voice was gentler this time. “We must leave ‘im for now, lass. It’s the only way.”

I exhaled loudly and rubbed a soothing hand along Saffron’s arm. The dragonling was shaking yet again, responding to my own nerves.

The guards’ footsteps grew louder.

“Okay. Then we go,” I said. “Come back for him when we can.”

As Rush advanced, his lumoon illuminated more of the green dragon. He was so badly hurt, leaving him behind amounted to a death sentence. But Roan was right.

Screw the queen for this impossible decision!

“We can try,” Rush said. “I’ll touch him. There’s at least a chance he’ll come with us.”

There was, even if a small one.

The green dragon only hissed louder as Rush picked up the pace, now so close to the dragon that he wouldn’t be able to escape his fiery breath. There was no taking cover anymore.

“Rush,” West called. “Don’t.”

“I only need a few more seconds,” Rush answered.

“If not for you, then for Elowyn and Larissa and Ramana.”

---