Page 89 of Seduced By the Dragon Lord (Dragon Lords 2)

Instead of reminding Khalstorm it was none of his business, Orik spat, “You’re useless,” and began to walk away.

Khalstorm lurched to stand, draping his arm through the cell door in a casual, relaxed manner, but Orik sensed his desperation. “I can tell you where she went, for a price.”

He shot over his shoulder, “Why do dishonorable blokes like you always ask for money when they have a chance to do what is right?”

“When brought so low, bargaining is all one has left.”

“The result of your own misdeeds.”

“Says you.”

He knew what Khalstorm wanted. An exchange for a review of the charges against him. Orik had gone over his case countless times, innumerable hours spent zealously trying to prove Khalstorm’s innocence, his once brother in arms, if only for a short while.

The charges against him were insurmountable, and Orik wasn’t going to have this argument yet again. Continuing on his way, he tossed back, “I don’t need your help.”

Next he headed directly to his office, and with a few clicks on his console, he had all the surveillance footage from this evening pulled up in front of him. Jessie had left their room a little over two hours ago, sneaking through the castle like a woman up to no good.

Had his fears about her been right all along? Had she been working to infiltrate the castle after all, waiting for her moment to complete whatever mission she was on?

He watched her soundlessly slink down the hall, carefully avoiding witnesses. The castle was normally occupied by servants, but this evening, many had requested the night off to attend a birthing celebration. A rare child was soon to be brought into the clan.

He watched as Jessie descended the steps to the prison ward. In another shot, she strutted past the gauntlet of inmates whose attention she had drawn, her proud chin up. When she reached her cell—he hated thinking of it ashers—she only briefly glanced inside with a sullen look, then scanned the hall as though seeking something lost. When she faced Khalstorm, he noted her lips moving. She had indeed engaged him in conversation, but what had she said, and why?

Orik was surprised when a dark figure approached her. The angle of the camera made it impossible to see him clearly. Brows knit together, Orik switched to another shot. The visual was no better. The cameras hadn’t been positioned at bad angles; the figure was simply blotted out…as though by magic. All he saw was Jessie talking to a gray smudge. Then she followed it.

With a sinking feeling in his abdomen, Orik tracked Jessie and the stranger through the various feeds. He lost them at the southern outlet, near the forest.

But Khalstorm must have overheard their conversation.

Seething, he raced back down to the prison, reached into Khalstorm’s cell and gripped him by the collar with both fists, shaking with pure, unadulterated rage. “I’m going to give you a choice. Tell me everything, or I end you.”

33

The sun had slammed down behind the hills and a pervasive darkness was invading the forest. The double moons provided a small measure of light for Jessie to see by, but the majority of it was congested by the many leaves and boughs overhead. Prince Gideon led the way, holding a brightly lit flashlight that was shaped like a sphere chopped in half with a handle attached to the flat end. When he held it up, it emitted three hundred and sixty degrees of light. He currently pointed it out in front of him. Jessie followed on the heels of his yawning shadow, his long dark cloak fanning out behind him.

“How badly is Orik injured?” she asked, voice wobbly, wondering if Orik was worse off than last time. The idea made every corner of her stomach clench.

“He was unconscious when I left him,” the prince replied. He was a tall man, a little more slender than Orik, and his movements and speech were very proper. Not like Orik’s family, who seemed more relaxed by comparison. Even Edel.

“What happened? How was he injured?”

“Another group of witches attacked. They hexed him with a spell.”

Jessie frowned. How had Orik survived all this time as The Destroyer if he kept getting hexed so easily?

Something in the prince’s aura demanded her attention, but she couldn’t make it out. The nimbus of the torch shoving against the ever-encroaching darkness created a halo around him that distorted her vision, but even before they’d entered the woods, there had been a fuzziness to his aura, making it difficult to bring into focus.

“Are others injured?” She would feel terrible if others were on the verge of death and she could only save Orik. How could she live with that on her shoulders? She was the reason they were out here in the first place, risking their lives to eliminate that mysterious witch who had marked her hand.

“Nay, only him.”

That was a relief, at least. Though for Orik, it seemed like a streak of bad luck. Or had the witches targeted him on purpose? As Tristan had said, he had been the focus of the first attack; Orik had merely intercepted the spell. Were they out for revenge? Unable to get to the king, so take out his bodyguard? A shudder ricocheted through her. She wouldn’t let that happen.

“How much farther?”

“Not far.”

They pushed through bushes and limbs. In the distance, coming from the direction of the castle, a tremendous roar sliced through the night, the sound of an anguished beast filled with rage and grief. It made her stop and glance back. She and the prince must have been walking now for upward of twenty minutes, maybe more, their pace swift. How long ago had the castle vanished from her line of sight?

---