Page 173 of Her Tortured Beasts

Xander’s face fills my vision, of the light going out in his eyes and his world going dark as his father hurt him.

I scream and let my power go.

Like a slingshot being released, there is a mighty sound that snaps at the ears and we are catapulted through space. There is silence for three scary heartbeats as we hurtle towards Drakos Estate. The wind might have cut us into pieces if it wasn’t for the power I’d bound around my friends and their combined powers assisting mine.

Only when dark opens up to tiny lights, do I release my speed back to normal.

Everyone swears in their own way, loudly and proudly, except Scythe, who silently looks up at me to see if I’m okay.

“Your ass is going to be so sore for this,”he threatens.

I sure hope so.

Gaining a bit more height so that Yeti’s feet don’t hit the top of the black stone wall around the estate, I sail beak first over the grounds. Drakos Estate lets me in. I defended her once, saved one of her hatchlings when she could not, and she seems to remember it.

Everyone lets go in a wave after that. Yeti takes Minnie, rolling onto the grass, followed by Marduk. I lose height, letting Scythe and Savage drop off next. Lyle lets me go and lands on his feet in a crouch, leaving me to land smoothly on the grass.

My mates sprint towards me as I shift into human form, Scythe handing me my PJ shorts and tank top.

“Are you alright?” Lyle asks quietly.

“Are you mad?” Savage exclaims.

“Yes to both,” I pant. In fact, I’m pumped.

That flight should have taken everything out of me. Instead, my vision is acute, my muscles taut like springs, and there is a power in me that still demands to claw and maim.

I lead the way into Drakos Estate without another word.

“We’re completely out of our depth in a dragon fight,” Lyle says.

Savage barks, skipping merrily to catch up to me. “Those are fighting words, lion.”

“Wolves don’t bark.”

“I’m a special wolf.

“I suppose you are.”

As I stumble up the steps to the castle, I glance over my shoulder to see Savage grinning in delight as he picks me up around the waist and runs up the stairs. “My regina says so too.”

I growl in my chest, nothing more than a deep rumble, and Savage growls back. Scythe and Lyle flank us with Marduk, Yeti and Minnie bring up the rear.

It’s at this moment we hear a mighty, earth-shatteringroarfollowed by the explosion of brick and mortar.

Chapter 97

Savage

“Oh no,” Minnie says as we freeze.

I pick my baby girl up as we run back the way we came. She’s stiff in my arms, rigid with that Godzilla-sized power in her body. It smells like a bushfire. It smells like my Aurelia.

We pass through a shower of rubble, my regina putting up one of her shields like a giant beach umbrella, making the tiny rocks and dust slide down around us. Overhead, a dragon bursts out of the castle like a circus cannon.

“Who is that?” Yeti cries. “That’s not Xander, but?—”

But she is huge and black like Xander, and where Xander’s scales are tinged with blue, hers are tinged with gold.

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