Page 83 of Reign of the Beast

I’d been so taken in with Ryker leaving and my anxiousness of him running headlong into danger that I hadn’t been paying attention to my surroundings.

I looked up to find Jaxon walking into the room. I gestured for him to have a seat in one of the armchairs in the small seating area in the corner.

He smiled and took the offer.

With a heavy sigh I joined him, slumping down into the remaining one.

“He knows the stakes. He’s not the reckless fool heonce was,” Jaxon reminded me. “He wouldn’t go there if he didn’t think he could handle it.”

“Handle what?”

We both swung our heads toward the door.

Mia stood there emanating her usual sophistication in a pair of sleek black leather pants paired with a vibrant-blue lacy blouse that matched the streaks in her hair. Her heels clacked on the hardwood as she shifted her weight, looking on worriedly as she took in the state of us, the tension filling the room.

“Where is Ryker?” she pressed.

Jaxon and I exchanged a look.

She wouldn’t be happy.

In fact, I was concerned about her reaction.

I tensed, my muscles going taut, instinctively preparing to respond if she made the wrong and very dangerous decision of going after Ryker.

Ryker would never forgive me if I allowed it.

At this point, with the way I’d grown to care for her, I wouldn’t forgive myself.

“Well?” she pressed. “Where the hell is he?”

Time for some tried and true stalling tactics.

18

~Ryker~

What a clusterfuck.

I pitied each and every one of them as I scanned the Great Hall situated in the center of the Guardian Compound.

We were all scattered around the circular amphitheater-style seating area. The current speaker giving his two-cents was in the center, turning around as he spoke to ensure he was addressing everyone.

So many of the members were ridiculously hung up on bureaucratic bullshit.

The rules and regulations that we were all used to abiding by didn’t have relevance now, though. We were at war and in a goddamn state of emergency.

Plus, with the six-hundred odd members I’d counted, we only had about sixty-percent of our members present. We couldn’t operate how we normally did when we had a skeleton staff.

We needed to take action now, instead of getting bogged down in procedural details.

They were even taking fucking meeting minutes like weusually did when issues were raised during these stupid hoity-toity gatherings.

Merek seemed to think he was in charge. He’d been one of Cornelius’ first Guardian recruits. A five-hundred-year-old magic-wielder who always wore his hooded robe, even when not in the field on mission. He was basically a living wizard stereotype, with his flowing long hair, the almost equally long beard, his holier-than-thou attitude.

His shock of white shoulder-length hair flew about his face as he gestured wildly about another load of inconsequential bullshit that I’d stopped paying attention to. I was just waiting for a break in his monologue, so I could sort this shit out.

Althalos was up next, an Ancient, just a century shy of Lucian’s age. His appearance was as opposite as could be of Lucian’s though. He had the whole biker look going on, with leather pants, a rock band t-shirt and a worn leather jacket. His hair was short and dirty-blond. And he was a massive hulk of a guy, like a damn bodybuilder.

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