Page 17 of Storm Dragon
“Hey, hold on just one minute there, Missy. Don’t make me…”
Not missing a beat and needing to head off her alter ego before yet another tirade ensued and she seriously had to put Bridgette on mute, Tamsyn laughed, “Holy crap! Wait just one second. Did I hear you correctly? Did you say in all your years? Well, Hell’s fire, that’s a whole lotta of years there, Sis. Did they even have bungee cords when you were my age, or did you have to tie shit down with vines you’d woven into ropes?”
“Ha, Ha, Ha,” Bridgette scoffed. “You are so funny.”
“You know it,” Tamsyn chuckled.
“Please don’t quit your day job. We would starve in less than a week.”
“Oh, darlin’, you just never know what I’ve got up my sleeve. I might take this act out on the road. Even bring daddy’s guitar and add a song or two to the act.” Making a show of clearing her throat, Tamsyn Elizabeth Ryder, Bobcat Queen and Leader of the Ryder Pounce, overemphasized her already predominant southern accent as she pretended to be a comedian from one of the Saturday night reruns her parents always watched on Family Night. “Thanks for coming to the show. I’ll be here all week.” Pretending to strum a guitar, she sang, “Don’t forget to tip your waitresses. Try the veal. It’s damn good.”
“Oh, my Great Goddess, please stop. What do I have to do to make you stop? One more note, and my ears are gonna start bleeding.”
“You better watch out, Bridge. I see Peaches heading this way.”
“Oh, shit! Hide me! Hide me!”
6
Whether it had been hours or days, Ruairí had not a clue. All he could be certain of was that the silver and lead coffin that had been his prison for so very long was moving upward- and the Black Magic and Sorcery that had been a part of every minute of his captivity was increasing exponentially with every inch it moved.
Opening his mind to his Mate, he was sure there was no way to penetrate the thicker, murkier, more heinous, and blacker than sin wall of Devilry, but he had to try. If he didn’t, he would never know. There would be regrets-and that was something the Guardsman could never condone, especially not from himself.
Focusing on the only spot of Light left in his soul, the Bond he shared with Tamsyn, Ruairí was just about to call to her when gut-wrenching pain attacked his body. Blanketing him like wet wool, it was everywhere- outside, inside, millions upon millions of the tiniest and sharpest teeth, like that of the piranha bit and tore, trying to rip him into millions of pieces.
Unable to hold still, needing to move even though he knew that would tighten the silver shackles around his neck, wrists, and ankles, he jerked and pulled against the invisible enemy, cursing the Elven bitch and everyone who came after. Searing agony, worse than anything he’d ever experienced, convinced Ruairí that he was being shoved into the Pits of Hell rather than the serenity of his Mate’s arms, as he had been promised by the Ancients.
“But I am rising…”
The thought flashed in his mind as his jaw dropped open to scream, and another wave of torture rolled over his brutally battered body. Stealing the breath from his lungs and the words from his lips, it was relentless in its assault, feeling as if the flesh was slowly and brutally being flayed from every part of his body.
Struggling with wild abandon against his bonds, the reality of his situation eluded his consciousness. There had to be something he was missing, but he couldn’t focus, couldn’t find even a split second of relief to allow his mind to clear. He was being bombarded by so much evil Sorcery that every cell of his existence was wracked with utter anguish.
Why at this moment in time was the Black Magic multiplying? It had never done so any of the other times he and his prison had moved or been moved. What was different?
“NO!” They roared in the confines of his mind.
Did his captors know about his Mate? Had they seen him trying to reach the woman made for him by the Universe? Was Tamsyn in trouble? Was she being tortured?
“No-no-no-no…” His denial played on a loop, the only thing cutting through the pain. “The Powers That Be would not let that happen.”
The words lacked confidence, but he held onto the thought even as the darker side of his soul taunted, “They have given up on you, Storm.” His nickname was sneered at and spat. “They wasted enough time on you. You couldn’t or wouldn’t help yourself, so they have left you to the machinations of those of the Dark Order.”
“NO! They would…”
“YES! You are nothing but a worthless waste of Their time. Enjoy languishing in the deepest Pits of Hell. Your chains, shackles, and silver coffin as your only companions.”
“It is not real. It cannot be real. Fate and the Universe would not have allowed me to find my Mate only to abandon me.”
Shutting out the dark voice and the self-doubt it brought along with it, Ruairí reached for the only solace he had known since that fateful day all those centuries ago. Cobbling together the precious images of his Mate, he allowed the tiny Light within his heart and soul to slide them together. A single glimpse of Tamsyn’s lovely face created the tiniest buffer between his flesh and the throbbing, biting attack. All he could do was pray to the Heavens and the Ancients that he had not doomed his beautiful Bobcat to the same fate.
A blinding assault of bright light and thick, black smoke assaulted his sensitive eyes from the inside out. It was filling his mind’s eye, his soul, every fiber of his being. Deep red flames, tinged with opaque black- nothing like any fire he had ever seen, stole what little breath he had left and seared the flesh of his throat.
Dorman roared, the sound more beastly than kingly. Slashing through the bewitched Devilry and the chaos of Ruairi’s overloaded and agonizing mind, the Winged Warrior fought the unseen enemy with the fiery fury of his kind. Reaching for the Dragon King, praying Dorman had risen from his Healing Sleep, the Guardsman only found more darkness and discordant silence.
The fit of anger, the roar of the Dragon, had not been real. It couldn’t have been. Had King Dorman been alert enough to bellow with such ferocity, he could not have fallen back into his Healing Sleep so quickly. It had merely been a figment of his Ruairí’s Sorcery-poisoned psyche. An attempt of his unconscious to offer him hope where there was none and soften the blow that his existence was about to become utterly unbearable.
Unable to use the enhanced senses he’d been blessed with to find anything that would tell him who or what had launched the attack against him, Ruairí attempted to turn his head. From one beat of his heart to the next, his head fell forward. His chin touched his chest. His forehead had not banged into the closure of his coffin. It had been removed. How had he missed that? When had it happened?
