Page 72 of Centaur Bolt

“Pretty damn sure.”

He ground his teeth. It echoed dully through the cave. “Your four-legged form can carry this?” He gestured to himself.

“I have no idea.”

He snorted. “Great plan.”

It wasn’t my plan. But pointing that out likely wasn’t in the best interest of his acceptance.

He stood up. “I will curse,” he stated as his body began to writhe to beast.

“What?”

“Ifs I rides,” he said through his lengthening muzzle, “I wills be cursing.”

“You can do whatever you freking well want,” I stated. At this point, I’d say anything to get him to agree.

He didn’t reply as he completed his shift.

I picked up our wrapped leaves of steamed meat and the smaller packages of crystal dust as the enormous talons reached to close around my torso.

His wings carried us aloft until we were nearly at the cave’s ceiling. It hadn’t occurred to me that we would have to gain altitude to do this. My enthusiasm for the plan suddenly reached a new low.

“Takes a deeps breath,” he advised.

I gulped air, and lost it again as he folded his wings, and dove.

I closed my eyes right before we hit the water. The impact drove the last bit of air out of me, and I almost inhaled, my eyes opening and arms flailing. The talons tightened, and all I saw were bubbles and foam.

By the time we broke surface and Havoc’s mighty wings beat at the water, I was the one cursing. Loudly and creatively. He swung to hug the cliff face, hiding his outline from any possible watchers above.

He might be a behemoth and a thug, but he wasn’t dumb.

The night was, fortunately, overcast. It meant we blended well with the dark rock as he crested the cliffs, sailed along the side of a mountain, and dropped into the valley below. I felt ridiculous and vulnerable dangling from his claws, but managed to keep my cursing to a minimum.

Not as minimum as you might think,Iskar complained.Get us down into the forest before we are spotted.

I possessed even less enthusiasm for the next phase of this crazy plan, but the longer we spent on the wing, the greater the chance of Isobel’s lackeys finding us.

“Take us down,” I shouted to Havoc.

The huge head angled toward me, but it was a few minutes more until he banked. We passed over a clearing, and I saw a few outbuildings as darker shadows against the ground. A farm? Then we were over forest again, and moments later he slowed to a hover, before folding his wings and doing a stomach-roiling drop into the trees.

23

Havoc

I dropped fifty feet straight down into the forest.

Branches cracked and snapped, but I managed to refrain from skewering the bloody noisy do-gooder I carried. Almost as soon as I landed with a resounding thump, Marcus squirmed in my claws.

Fair enough. I didn’t want to carry him for one iota longer than necessary. I opened my talons and let him drop the last few feet.

He landed in a scramble as if his legs wouldn’t obey him. But then he rolled to his feet with the fluidity of a man who knew his body. Didn’t even spill the eel.

Which pretty much summed the man up. Fucking confusing. Had the Isobitch done that to him? Or was it his natural state? When he didn’t seem in immediate danger of sprouting wings and teeth, I embraced my human. The mountains surrounding the valley were rich enough in crystal deposits that Brock’s pinions couldn’t use our collars to track us. But even so, a giant red Dragon was easy to spot from the air. A giant human, not so much.

“So,” I said. “Me riding you isn’t going to work as a disguise so long as they see my scales.” I was holding out hope that he’d give up on that idea, and tried not to think about riding him at all as I pointed off into the trees. “Which is why I landed us near that farm. I should be able to steal myself a cloak.”

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