Page 11 of Fated to the Drakarn Commander (Drakarn Mates 4)

Kira stood near an air shaft, crystal-lined and narrow, her face a mask of calm that didn't fool me for a second. I knew that stillness. Knew the storm gathering beneath. "We need to stop just … going along," she said, her voice dangerously quiet. "What if my sister is with them? With the Ignarath?"

My stomach didn't just drop. It plummeted, a sickening lurch like hitting zero-G without warning. Cold dread blooming. "Kira?—"

"They mentioned other humans," she pressed, voice hardening into that detached planning mode that always preceded something drastic. "What if Larissa isthere? Held by them? And we're just sitting here? Waiting?"

Eden huddled near Kaiya, eyes wide, absorbing the rising panic. Reika kept pacing, offering nothing. Weeks there, and she still hadn't shared what she saw, what the Ignarath did to humans.

We were fracturing. I could feel the pressure building, hairline cracks spreading through our forced unity. The air felt charged, heavy with unspoken fear, a thing I could almost taste—metallic, like blood.

"Enough!" The word ripped from my throat, rougher than I intended, louder than I expected. Command presence, Academy training—all fraying at the edges.

Every head snapped toward me. Defiance, fear, desperate hope—reflected back, a weight pressing down, heavy as planetary gravity. Terra was gone, summoned by Darrokar. That meant that leadership defaulted to me.

I didn't ask for it. Didn't want it. But there we were.

"Look," I tried again, forcing my tone softer, gentler. "I get it. This sucks. More than sucks. But charging out half-cocked? That's chaos. Division. It's exactly what the Ignarath want." I met Vega's glare. "We have to be smarter."

"So we just sit here?" Vega challenged, though the fire in her voice had banked slightly, replaced by a weary frustration.

I shook my head, feeling the grit of Scalvaris dust in my hair. "We plan. We survive." My gaze found Kira's, desperate and intense. "And we don't give up on Larissa. Or anyone else. But we do thisright."

"And what's right?" Kira whispered, the question hanging, sharp and pointed.

Before I could even think to form an answer, the heavy stone door groaned open. Every muscle in the room went rigid. I moved automatically, stepping forward, putting myself between them and whatever was coming.

Khorlar was what was coming.

Filling the doorway like a living mountain carved from granite. His scales drank the dim light. Wings folded tight, but their sheer bulk dominated the space. His golden eyes swept the room in cold assessment before locking onto me.

An unwelcome jolt, sharp and electric, shot through me. Not just awareness. Something hotter. Something invasive that coiled low and tight in my belly, a sickening warmth I fought to ignore.

I hated it. Hated the feeling, hated the loss of control, hated thathecould evoke it.

"Sarah Hawkins," he rumbled. That voice. Deep, graveled, bypassing my ears to vibrate somewhere deep in my bones.

"It's Hawk," I snapped. My pulse hammered against my ribs like something was trying to bash its way out. "What now?"

His expression didn't change, but something flickered in those predator eyes—a flash of heat, instantly smothered. "You will come with me."

Dead silence. My own heartbeat roared in my ears.

"Like hell she will," Vega snarled, moving up beside me, hand dropping instinctively to her knife hilt.

Khorlar didn't glance her way. His gaze stayed pinned on me. Unwavering. Expectant. As if my agreement was inevitable.

As if I was already his.

Heat flared under my skin. Anger. It had to be anger. What else could it be? "Whatever you need to say, say it here." My voice was tight. "I'm not leaving them."

"This is not a request," he replied, each word carved from granite.

"And that's not an answer."

Something dangerous crossed his face then—not just anger, something older, more primal—gone as quickly as it appeared. "The Ignarath have taken a … particular interest in you. You require additional security measures."

Ice formed in my gut, twisting tighter. Plaktish. His oily stare sliding over me in the desert. The flick of his tongue tasting the air near my skin. My stomach churned at the memory.

But whyme?

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