Page 43 of Bound to the Dragon
“For now. We were going to use them to make a trade… for you.” The leader’s expression hardens. “But that hardly seems necessary now, does it? Unless you prove your loyalty, I guess we can just kill them.”
“No! Wait! Why? Just send them home! You have me! You attacked to stop Silver Glade from gaining new alliances. If I am not the Luna, there is no alliance.” The threat of death shatters my thin charade.
“We don’t trust you!” She spits the words bitterly at me, and I stifle a sigh.
“What do you want me to do to prove my loyalty to you?” I instantly regret the question as it leaves my lips, and a cruel smile forms on her face.
“Kill one of the shifters in our holding.” She doesn’t hesitate, as if she had been anticipating the question.
I should have expected something like that, but it still takes me aback. How can they be this callous with life?
“Why?” I blurt out the question before I can stop myself.
Virginia nudges me roughly. “Just do it, Maddi. Don’t you want to help us get the land back?”
I straighten up, determined to show them that there’s another way. “They’re not a threat. They have nothing to do with the land theft. Let them go. You have me, and Shadow Pine isn’t a part of this anymore. Focus on reclaiming what’s actually yours.”
“You see?” The leader turns to Virginia. “She’s not one of us.”
“She is!” Virginia insists, elbowing me again. Blood drains out of her face, and I realize I’m putting my friend in jeopardy by defying the leader.
“I am,” I agree quickly, eager to diffuse the tension mounting in the room. “I just think we should focus our energy on the real enemies—the ones who are actually living on your stolen land. Give me someone worthy of justice, and I’ll do it. Find me someone responsible for the betrayal. No one from Shadow Pine deserves to pay for what Granger and my father did.”
Her eyes narrow as if she’s considering my proposition. “Fine,” she relents. “But if I bring you a real traitor, one who profited from our stolen territory, you can’t hesitate.”
I gulp. That won’t make things any easier, but I can’t very well refuse when everyone is staring at me. They were my terms, after all.
“Okay.” My voice is barely a whisper.
“The Shadow Pine Alpha is here!” The panicked cry comes from outside the packhouse, and my heart leaps into my throat.
How? How could he have known to come here?
The leader’s head whips toward me accusingly. “I knew it! I knew you couldn’t be trusted! Take her to the barracks with the rest of them!”
Several of the rogues move in to grab me, but there’s no time for the seizure as the door bursts open, and Blaze bursts through fully in his beast form, nostrils flaring with smoke. The other shifters can’t morph fast enough to escape his stream of fire.
Screams flood the air before an eerie silence ensues. Scuffling of feet meets my ears as the others rush for cover.
I barely manage to swoop out of harm’s way in my bird form as his blue-gray head swivels, looking for his pack members. He doesn’t need to say a word. Everyone in the room knows why he’s here.
“Where are they?” I know that tone, calm, cold, calculating. He’s ready to end them all if they don’t give them exactly what he wants.
For a moment, I think she might be stupid enough to defy his request, but I exhale through my beak when she points a shaking hand toward the back of the packhouse. “In the barracks.”
“They’d better be in one piece. Every last one of them.”
His eyes travel toward me, the hurt in them palpable, but I can’t explain it to him now. All I can do is relish in the relief that he found them and that the prisoners are about to be released. Explanations are for another time when Vigo and the rest are safe and far away from the Silver Glade packhouse.
The rogues start to follow him, readying for an attack, but I shift back and stop them. “Don’t. He won’t hesitate to end you all.”
Whatever they see in my face must make them believe me.
The leader nods, a grimace touching her face. “Let them go. She’s right. We don’t need them. We still have her.” She juts her chin toward me.
Blaze returns with the members of our pack that were taken. They all look a little worse for wear, but I’m relieved to see that they’re relatively unscathed otherwise. I hadn’t been a hundred percent convinced until right now.
I release a small breath of air.
