“There are a lot of things we need to do something about, but not out here,” I said with regret. I wanted her in this moment, but more than that, I didn’t want anyone else to see more of my mate than they should be allowed.

  She wiggled over my lap, a wicked grin on her perfect face. “Are you sure? I can be quiet.”

  She was fucking killing me. “Even if that’s true, Lykem would have already told people we found you, and I doubt they’ll give us enough time for me to enjoy you like I want to and like you deserve.”

  “And people say chivalry is dead.” She tsked. “We’ll make time soon, though. Really fucking soon.”

  My dragon swirled inside me. The need to claim her was damn near overwhelming, but until the bond she had to…Knox was broken, that wasn’t going to be possible.

  “You’ll need to convince your grandmother to help us first,” I said, gripping her chin between my fingers. “I want you mine in every way, Dawsyn Chase.”

  “And you’ll have me,” she promised, kissing me once more.

  I held on tightly to her, hoping like hell that was true.

  Chapter Twelve

  DAWSYN

  Between my wolf’s wants and my own hormones, I’d have fucked Cillian right on that rock with no regrets. At least, not at that moment.

  As much as I hated to admit it, he was right to tell me no. He wasn’t just some guy I was letting off steam with. He was the only mate I should have ever had. I’d wasted time thinking I needed to be on my own, and now I was paying for that.

  Seeing how hurt he’d been over what I’d told him nearly killed me. The pain he’d easily turned into rage was palpable. I’d practically tasted the fire inside him.

  Though, there was a deeper part of him that I could sense had been irrevocably changed by everything he’d had to endure this last week—losing our bond, learning he had a brother, his grandmother was a traitor, and his father was alive…

  I had a feeling he wouldn’t quite be himself for a while, and understandably so, but I wasn’t going anywhere. I’d be the strength he needed right now, bond or not. We were in this together.

  At least I’d been able to ease the worst of it with my version of a distraction. Even if we hadn’t really gotten to do anything. Though, if we’d continued much longer, I would have happily dry-humped him into an orgasm. That was how desperately I’d missed and needed him.

  Admitting it now was freeing. It felt odd to think that needing someone so much could release me, but it was the truth. I’d fought it but wouldn’t any longer.

  I slid off his lap and stood up, reaching a hand to him. “What now?”

  His fingers easily slipped between mine and tugged me toward his chest. “Now, I think thoughts about baby scapese, so that Lykem doesn’t get the joy of commenting on my current situation.”

  “First, I told you I’d have remedied that,” I teased. “Secondly, what the hell are baby scapese?”

  His head jerked slightly back. “You don’t have those on Earth?”

  “Not that I’m aware of.”

  He seemed overly confused by that statement. “They’re white fluffy things about the size of a watermelon. Big floppy ears and they jump around a lot. No tail, just a little ball of fur.”

  I gaped at him. “Do you mean a bunny? Or rabbit?”

  “What is that?”

  I slapped my hand to my forehead. And here I’d thought our worlds were practically parallel.

  “I’m rather positive it’s your version of a scapese,” I answered. “Now, I feel like I should question everything.” I pointed behind me. “Is that a rock?”

  “Yes,” he deadpanned, clearly not as shocked by this revelation as I was. “I did survive in your realm for four weeks without not knowing the proper name of something. I think this could be a one-off.”

  I hummed. “We’ll see.”

  He led us toward the cave entrance, and I was surprised by how dark it was. “People have been living in here?”

  “Yes, but further back,” he said. “There’s another opening on the other side. They set up in the middle so they could escape from either end if there was an attack on the mountain.”

  Smart dragons. Given what I’d seen of their town, I was surprised there hadn’t been an ambush out here yet.

  “How many people are here?” I asked.

  He grimaced. “Only a couple hundred. There used to be several thousand that lived in the village you saw back there.”

  My chest ached for their people. So many lives pointlessly lost. There’d been no purpose in the attacks. At least, not that I could see. I almost wished I’d had more time with Knox so I could have figured out why he was doing these things, but at the same time, I was grateful he’d wanted little to do with me until the end.

  Cillian threaded his fingers through mine and led the way inside the cave. My vision adjusted within seconds, thanks to the ambient light. While it wasn’t bright, I could see well enough. Though, there wasn’t much to see at first besides a dirt path and slate grey rock walls.

  “What can you do?” I asked him, thinking about how I’d had no idea what he was capable of as a dragon shifter.

  “Huh?”

  “Can you breathe fire? See in the dark? Scent things from long distances? Run super fast?”

  “Oh,” he replied. “Well, I can see inside these caves just as clearly as if we were outside still, but if I was somewhere like you’d described the cell, I probably wouldn’t be able to. I run faster than a human, but not like a vampire. Fire is touchy. Every dragon can produce enough heat to make smoke and embers, but we don’t necessarily breathe it like the fables would have you believe. Though, there are some dragons who can create fire with their dragon energy like I can with lightning.”

  I jerked him to a stop. “I’m sorry, what? Lightning?”

  He grimaced. “I thought I told you about that.”

  “Um, nope. Pretty sure I would have remembered that.” I was tempted to ask him to show me, but that probably wasn’t a good idea in such a confined space.

  “What about you?” he asked. “I’ve never seen a glowing wolf before.”

  He tried to guide us forward again, but I couldn’t move. Somehow, with all the fear and adrenaline and hurt pumping through my veins, I’d completely forgotten that my wolf had become something entirely new as we’d run for our lives.

  Cillian must have sensed the shift in my mood, because in the next second, his hands were cupping my face and his eyes were level with mine. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’ve never done that before today,” I admitted. “I’d always wondered if I had inherited powers from my mother, but nobody could tell me if it was even possible.”

  “Powers? What can your mother do?”

  “She’s Luna Marked,” I said, as if that should make sense to him. “It’s a longer story than we should get into right now, but her wolf is stronger than nearly any other. At least when she’s in danger. The power doesn’t seem to always stay with her.”

  “And the glow around you earlier is something she can also do?” he asked hesitantly.

  I shrugged. “Yes and no. Her wolf is sometimes this stunning purple color, but it was less the glow of earlier than the rush of energy I’d felt.”

  My wolf had been rather quiet on the subject, but since I’d been so distracted with Cillian, I assumed she’d been distracted by his dragon as well.

  We need to update the dragons before we worry about us, she finally said.

  At least she wasn’t completely ignoring me in favor of our mate.

  Fair enough, I said to her then nudged Cillian forward. “I’m good. I promise. It was just a surprise and I’ll need to talk to my mom about it tomorrow when we see them.”

  Thankfully, he dropped the subject, and we continued through the narrow path until it opened up into a smaller room with more pathways.

  Lykem was standing there with another man about his height. Both of them were grinning. “Penn fixed the portal,” Lykem said.

  I tilted my head and looked at Cillian. “What was wrong with it?”

  “Technically, nothing,” he answered. “But we told your family that we’d try to figure out a way to get them into Drago without having to be bonded to a dragon. Though, they don’t really have a reason to come here now.”

  “They absolutely do,” I said. “The fight here is far from over. You’re going to need help, and they can do that.”

  “I can’t ask your family to fight for our people,” he replied just as Lykem said, “That’s the best idea anyone has had yet.”

  The two friends stared each other down, and the other dragon approached me. He looked about the same age as Lykem and Cillian, somewhere in their twenties. He had light-brown hair that was shaved short at the sides and green eyes that seemed to shimmer with a layer of blue under the flickering light of the fire torches on the walls around us.

  “I’m Penn.” He reached a hand to me. “You must be Dawsyn.”

  “Yep. Nice to meet you.” My stare held his, but he quickly looked away and released my hand as Cillian towered over me from behind.

  “Who knows that the portal has been opened to more than dragons?” Cillian asked.

  “I only just told Lykem,” Penn answered.

  “Keep it that way,” Cillian said gruffly. “We won’t be bringing anyone else here unless we have to, and we don’t need others thinking they can come and go as they please with new guests until we sort this mess out.”

  Mentioning others had me second-guessing the portal being open at all. “Knox was working with a warlock. I don’t know what his plans are, but if he figures out that he can bring others here, you might have an even bigger fight on your hands.”

  Cillian glared at Lykem. “Do you understand now?”

  The other dragon turned to Penn. “Can you put a blocker over it that only we can open and close?”

  “Possibly. It was a complicated spell to undo,” he answered. “I’ll need to head back out there to try a few things.”

  “Go with him,” Cillian said to Lykem. “We don’t know how quickly there might be another attack now that we have Dawsyn. Nobody should be going out alone.”

  It was interesting to see the dynamic here. Not once had Cillian given me the idea that he was any sort of leader, but Lykem nodded without further question and the two dragons headed toward a different tunnel than we’d come from.

  “What now?” I asked him once we were alone.

  “Now, I introduce you to a few more dragons and we tell them what you learned while you were locked up.” His shoulders tensed and jaw twitched.

  “We don’t have to right now,” I said. “Everything I learned directly affects you and your family. That can’t be easy.”

  “Not much about life is easy. Might as well get it over with.”

  This sullen version of Cillian wasn’t something I was used to. The events of the past week were hurting him more than he was letting on.

  I wanted to help ease his pain, but this was on Cillian to process. I couldn’t force him to do something he wasn’t ready for yet.

  He lowered his head and rubbed his hands over my arms. “I wish we could have met under different circumstances.”

  “I’m not going to lie or pretend I don’t agree with that, but—” I pressed my lips to his. “—maybe this was exactly what we both needed.”

  I didn’t know all of Cillian’s wants or desires. All I really knew was that he cared deeply for his home and wanted to stop its untimely destruction. Yet, he couldn’t do that on his own.

  I’d been driven to figure out who I was when I wasn’t the alpha’s daughter.

  Together, even if it wasn’t all sunshine and roses, I felt confident we were both going to get what we wanted.

  Chapter Thirteen

  CILLIAN

  Having Dawsyn at my side eased a lot of my inner turmoil, but still, my mind couldn’t stop thinking about everything she’d told me. Worse, I had no fucking clue what I was going to do about it.

  The idea that my Nannio had turned on us in favor of a brother I’d never known existed burned. Why hadn’t I been given a choice in the matter? To meet him and know why he was furious enough to kill thousands of people.

  Knowing I wasn’t going to get the answers I seeked anytime soon, I had to force those thoughts out of my mind. There was no changing the past. We had to figure out a way to stop whatever they were planning and keep future body counts to a minimum.

  I took Dawsyn to meet with a few of the people I’d known Uncle Jerome trusted. The conversation was painful, but quick. I recapped everything. They asked Dawsyn questions about Earth and a few clarifying things about her time with Knox, then the conversation switched drastically.

  Sereph, a childhood friend of my mother’s, pointed toward the tunnels. “We don’t have enough supplies to last us the next few days while we figure out our next steps.” Her bright red hair made her fair skin stand out starkly in the dimly lit room.

  “We should go now,” Daron, Sereph’s mate, said. “Before you came back and the attacks were at their worst, nights were the riskiest time to leave the cave.”

  “I can take Lykem and go,” I said, hating the thought of leaving Dawsyn so soon, but at least she’d be safe here.

  She laughed. “You think you’re leaving me here while you go have all the fun?”

  My brows pinched. “I wouldn’t call what we need to do fun.”

  Dawsyn glanced at Sereph. “How did you get supplies before?”

  My mate’s confidence at speaking with the others amazed me. She wasn’t afraid of this place or anything she’d experience. Besides her earlier breakdown, I’d seen nothing other than strength from the wolf shifter.

  “We went out in groups of four or five,” Sereph answered. “Two people would stay in their dragon forms, and we’d load them up with items to carry back.”

  “Perfect.” Dawsyn grinned, looking over at me. “I can help load and you can be the pack mule.”

  “The what?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “Clearly, animals between our two worlds don’t cross over that much. When should we leave?”

  Sereph and Daron shared a look, then glanced back at Mantha who had been rather quiet for most of the meeting.

  She was one of the elders who had helped make decisions alongside Uncle Jerome. She was well over a hundred years old, but her mind was still as sharp as ever.

  Her back was to us, but she knew we were waiting on her opinion. Her grey hair fell to her clasped hands at the base of her spine, and her shoulders remained straight, but she didn’t turn to us as she spoke.

  “Go now, but only come back with what you can find within a half hour,” she said, voice filled with concern. “We can’t risk losing anyone else now that we know who we’re dealing with.”

  The way she said “who” made me wonder if she knew more about this so-called brother of mine than she’d yet to say.

  I’d been attempting to put the pieces of information together since Dawsyn told me what she knew. The only solution that made sense was that he had been my mother’s child before I came along.

  Her lineage was where my lightning energy came from. It seemed as if he’d acquired the same trait and was using my father’s fire power to increase the destruction.

  I had so many questions, ones Mantha might be able to answer, but it didn’t seem as if she was in the mood to chat. She’d kept her back to us while inching closer to the exit of the room.

  My other hope in getting answers was to rescue my father, assuming he was the same Darius that Dawsyn had mentioned, but taking care of the people here and making sure Dawsyn was safe had to take priority for the time being.

  My eyes cast back to my mate. I wanted to tell her that she couldn’t come with us, but if I was being honest, I knew she could handle herself. Having her close would actually make this easier.

  “We’ll take two groups,” I said. “I’ll still bring Lykem to help Dawsyn know what to help load, while Sereph and Daron grab what they can. Anything besides food and clothes needed?”

  “That will be sufficient for now,” Mantha said, then surprised at least me when she finally turned around, directing her silver eyes right to me. “What your grandmother chose to do has no reflection on you. I hope you know that.”

  I’d thought I did, but the relief that coursed through me once she said the words was something I hadn’t known I needed.

  I bowed my head briefly in respect. “Thank you.”

  She exited the room without another word, and it was just the four of us. Daron ran a hand over his jet-black hair. “We’ll get the nets and meet you outside the caves?”

  “That works. Lykem is near the portal, but I’ll shift and call for him.” I stood and grabbed Dawsyn’s hand.

  She followed without saying anything until we were in the tunnels again and going the opposite way as the others. “You’re sure you can trust these people?”

  “Why? Did something seem off to you?” I’d always thought I had good intuition, but seeing as my own grandmother had turned on us…

  “No, but I don’t understand the dynamic here, so I wanted to be sure,” she said. “It’s odd that there’s no clear leader.”

  “We’ve never needed one, but then again, we’ve never faced something like this,” I replied. “I can see how having one before now might have prevented some of this shit from happening.”

  She squeezed my hand. “Bad things happen all the time, even when there’s a good leader.”

  We continued toward the cave exit that we’d come through previously, and I didn’t stop until we came to a clearing big enough for me to shift.

  Dawsyn stayed further back, her eyes on me and alight with curiosity. Her questions earlier about what I was capable of made me realize there was a lot we didn’t know about each other, but that would change soon.

  I quickly called my dragon forward and was careful not to stretch my wings or tail too far, knowing our mate was close.