Page 56 of The Aurora Marelup Complete Saga Omnibus

I listen to the doorknob turn, and a little ray of light comes into the room. Slowly, my brother pokes his head in and looks around. As silently as possible, Jayce closes the door and locks it, then comes into bed and crawls on Aurora’s opposite side. At least this way, we could possibly sleep in shifts to make sure both of us get some semblance of sleep. I nod to Jayce and allow him to curl up and slumber first. I feel a bit stalkerish watching them. Let’s face it, taking these kinds of precautions isn’t normal. But then again, our situation is anything but typical.

~Several hourslater~

Dawn breaks over the horizon, painting the sky in blues and purples. As the morning progresses, the colors change to hues of oranges and reds until finally, the sun nears its apex and changes the sky to blue. I leave the room early and grab breakfast for the three of us. Nico and Dimitri are organizing our caravan and letting them know what transpired last night.

I return to our room to find Aurora and Jayce screaming from their climaxes. Well, at least someone is having a great morning. I wiggle the bag full of breakfast sandwiches. The first to turn around is Aurora, and she’s off Jayce before he even has a chance to look at me. Aurora takes the bag from me and pulls out what she wants, then sits at the table to eat.

Jayce is the first to speak as he grabs his breakfast. “What’s the plan?” I hop up to sit on the tabletop and look between Aurora and Jayce.

“That’s a great question. Unfortunately, I don’t know. After yesterday’s debacle with Sebastian and his mother, Nico isn’t telling anyone shit. He’s going to take point when the caravan gets rolling. Nico is concerned that there might still be spies.” I shrug my shoulders and dig into my breakfast sandwich. There’s almost an uncomfortable silence that I have to break.

“All I know is they bailed after Dimitri launched them last night.” I ponder that for several minutes. “Now I know why Great Bears are beasts of legend. Fuck, remind me to never piss Dimitri off.” My brother and I nod in agreement, and Aurora shrugs her shoulders. She lowers her head and sets her sandwich down. I’ve never seen Aurora look so broken. I don’t know whatchanged in her internal monologue, but I notice the minute that fire sparks back to life within her.

“I’m going to fucking destroy them all. I will tear them limb from limb and put their heads on spikes in my yard.” Her voice is mostly the growl of her beast. Her mercury eyes have an eerie glow, and her hair is blanketed in frost. We can feel her rage building. Quickly, she jumps off the bed and runs out the front door. Nico meets her halfway in the middle of the parking lot.

“Father,” Aurora says in a rather hollow tone. “They have stolen so much from me.” Aurora’s hands shift into armored scales, her long white talons lightly dusted with frost. “They will die by my hands. I will make their entire bloodline extinct.” She bares her canines at everyone who gathered. Aurora is so enraged that she’s not calming down for anything.

My phone rings, and it’s an unknown number. I stare at it for several seconds before I answer it. It’s Ellis, and apparently, Aurora’s mood is sending Alaric’s dragon off the deep end. Ellis instructs me to go near Aurora and put it on speaker.

I do as instructed, then I shout, “Okay, NOW!” Alaric’s dragon bellows and forces Aurora’s shift. Her beast whines and whimpers before she shifts back to her human form. I give Aurora my hoodie, and then she snatches my phone from me and goes to sit in her truck. I look back at Nico; the cocky fucker is just smiling. Nico looks at the truck then back to us.

“Alaric’s dragon just forced Aurora’s beast to submit.” He shrugs his shoulders like it was nothing.

“How in the Nine Hells is that possible?” Dimitri’s Russian accent is definitely more pronounced when he’s angry. Nico huffs like we just asked him to perform a miracle.

“Male dragons only choose powerful females. Aurora is probably the most powerful female born in generations. His dragon basically said,if I am worthy, you will stop. Her shift and whining was her beast’s way of telling him he was.” Dimitri,Jayce, and I look between each other. Something is definitely missing in translation. It looked more painful than a romantic conversation. Nico huffs again. “Load up! We need to get rolling; we’re burning daylight.” My brother and I head back to Aurora’s truck, and Klaus is right behind us.

When we get back to her truck, we find her in the backseat with her headphones on, still talking to Alaric. Jayce grabs the keys off of the center console and fires up Black Betty. Nico reaches over in front of Dimitri and honks the horn. Off we go again. This time, I sit in the back with Aurora and position her so her head lays in my lap. I’ve always hated road trips because my wolf hates being trapped in a vehicle. Every five to six hours we stop and refuel, switch drivers, then move on. We’ve been traveling like this for almost a week already. Our food is passed around while we continue our journey.

Something must have happened that spooked Nico because we suddenly take a hard right. We all snap to attention as we watch what unfolds around us. A truck comes out of nowhere and sideswipes the truck behind us, the one holding all of Klaus’s men. Two more come from opposite directions as they try to box us in. Klaus cuts the wheel hard and turns our vehicle around. The rest of our caravan stops to assist. We are within one hundred yards of the impact zone when we all jump out. The shift takes us all quickly as we move as a single unit.

Klaus’s Lycan is definitely heavier built than Sebastian’s. His fur is grey and black, and he looks like the devil himself. He roars into the night and charges toward his pack’s truck. A van speeds into the scene out of nowhere and twenty unknown Lycans pour out of the back. They head straight for the other truck and begin their attack. Klaus springs into action, clawing the back of their necks and severing their heads.

A great, white mass leaps into the fray, joining in on the action. Aurora’s beast is larger and faster than Klaus, and herrage is palpable in the air. More Lycans file out of the trucks, but we outnumber them two to one. In the back of my mind, I realize this is a setup.

We fight valiantly and obliterate the opposing forces. Nico stands on the tailgate of his truck like a brigadier general. I can see him scanning the horizon for any more enemies. After we all shift back to our human forms and get dressed, we head back to Nico. He looks at all of us as we gather around. Not a single loss on our side and every one of our attackers have been killed.

“They are testing us, trying to find a weakness.” Nico begins to pace before speaking again, “Check all the trucks and look for anything that may give away our position.” Dimitri taps Nico on the calf, and he bends down to listen to what Dimitri has to say. “Dimitri says it’s called a tracker or a GPS thing. Find it and destroy it.”

We return to Aurora’s truck and Jayce, who already shifted back to his wolf, walks beside Aurora as she inspects her vehicle. Jayce stops by the left side of her bumper. Quickly, Aurora slips under the vehicle and we hear something snap. She slides out and holds up a small, black box. Nico and Dimitri come over with three other trackers in their hands.

“We need to send a decoy with the trackers in it,” Dimitri says in a very calm tone. I pull out my phone and look at the map program I have. There’s a rather large truck stop up ahead. I show Klaus and Aurora, and she nods before taking my phone from me.

“Dad, Dom found a truck stop about fifteen miles ahead. We can hide the trackers on trucks preparing to leave to send them in different directions.” Aurora shows her dad what she’s talking about, and he smiles.

Nico approaches me and gives me a hug. “I am proud to call you one of my daughter’s mates.” He gives me a brief nod beforehe turns to address the others. “Roll out! We stop at the next rest area!”

Jayce, Klaus, Aurora, and I look at each other before running back to the truck. Aurora grabs a pair of leggings and a sweatshirt, then hops into the driver’s seat. Several moments later, we arrive at the rest stop. Nico sends everyone out in different directions to look for trucks that seem to be ready to depart. Everyone moves quickly, hiding the little black boxes on unsuspecting tractor-trailers. Aurora sits on the roof of her truck’s cab, eating a smorgasbord of tacos. Her mercury orbs scan the surrounding area, watching everything that comes and goes from the yard. It’s moments like this where I feel the loss of Andre the most. Usually, he would be the one on the lookout, but it looks like Aurora tasked herself with remaining vigilant.

Nico and Dimitri are having a heated debate as they lean over a map that’s spread out over the tailgate of Dimitri’s truck. Neither one is speaking English, and I can only assume it’s Romanian. Earlier this week, I learned that Dimitri’s people were one of the proud Romani tribes of Gypsies. I clear my throat so as not to startle either of them.

“Ah, son, perhaps you can settle this for us. I want to take this route, which is about fifty miles longer. Dimitri wants to take this one because he’s concerned about snow. Which do you think is better?” Shit on a shingle. Now I’m being pitted between my father-in-law and Aurora’s possible new mate. I’m so fucked, and not in the good sense. Lucky for me, mother nature makes the decision easier because large snowflakes begin to fall. I look up to the sky and silently thank the wolf goddess for saving my tail.

“In light of the most recent developments, I believe the shorter route will be to our benefit. We’re over three-quarters of the way to our port. We need to get as close to that land bridge as we can before we have to shift and travel by foot.” Dimitri andNico both look up at the sky. I want to tell them staring at the snow isn’t going to stop it.

“He’s right, my king, we may not have that much time left. We’ve been traveling for what seems like forever. Only four hundred miles to go and we are at the Wales port.” Dimitri is trying his hardest to get the king to see reason. Our animals are getting restless from being caged in the trucks. I can only imagine what his dragon is feeling. Nico shakes his head and smirks.

“Ok, the snow wins; we take the short route. Get everyone loaded and ready to roll in twenty minutes. We don’t stop until we hit the port.” Nico heads back to the passenger side of the truck and gets in to wait. Dimitri and I shake our heads before heading off in different directions. I make it back to the truck to find Aurora asleep and curled up in a little ball. I furrow my brow and look at Klaus, who is standing watch over her and the truck.

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