Hidden Dragon (The Treasure of Paragon Book 7) by Genevieve Jack (best book club books .txt) 📕

The silver vessel tipped, and blood spilled onto the symbol. Pain flared through his body as purple fire engulfed him. He opened his mouth to scream, but the intensity gripped him in a crushing fist, all his air contained within it. The magic tore through his flesh, tugged at his heart and his internal organs. Sharp, slicing agony followed, and then his hand was yanked toward the edge of the symbol.

He wanted to curl into a ball, anything to ease the suffering the spell had ignited. It rattled his teeth and slithered through his skull. It pounded his bowels, tore through his liver. He could feel it nibbling, ratlike, on his bones.

But the magic held him in place. He watched in horror as his mother slipped his ring from his finger. A dragon’s ring was far more than a piece of jewelry. The ring formed around his finger the first time he shifted as a child and held the inherent magic that allowed him to be both dragon and man. All his natural abilities resided in that ring: to ward his treasure, to become invisible, to shift, to fly. It was as much a part of him as his heart.

Now he watched the deep red garnet leave him, clutched in his mother’s clawlike fingers. With it went a piece of his soul. Air rushed into his lungs. Finally he could scream, and scream he did. He screamed until his throat was raw. She’d taken his ring. His riiiing.

The fire died and he slumped to the floor, his cheek pressed against the smooth stone. She pushed him with the toe of her boot. He watched her place the ring inside a box and then slide it behind a book, The Saddle of Arythmetes.

“Do you remember being forced to read this drivel as a child?” she asked. “Arythmetes felt much as you did after traveling the five kingdoms. He called for peace, cooperative independence, democracy. He, too, wanted to preserve the cultures he witnessed. He found them beautiful. What an apt place to keep your soul. He died you know, a tragic and lonely death.”

He stared up at her as she towered above him, as helpless as a wingless bird, and hated her with every fiber of his being.

“Guards, take him to the dungeon. By decree, no one shall speak of him again.”

Hands gripped his shoulders… shaking… shaking him.

Sylas woke with a start to find Dianthe hovering above him, her hands on his upper arms.

“You were screaming in your sleep.” The unadulterated concern on his mate’s face brought him fully into the moment.

It took him a few breaths to realize where he was. He’d fallen asleep in the chair in their suite in Nightfall. He sat up and glanced toward Tobias’s room.

“I don’t think they heard you.” She placed a hand on her throat. “Your voice was muffled, more breath than scream. I only heard you when I came out of the room.”

Thank the Mountain for small favors. All he needed was for Tobias to know he was still having nightmares about his time as a prisoner in Paragon. The dragon would likely want to put on his doctor’s hat and try to analyze him.

He sat up straighter. “You look nice.” Dianthe practically glowed in a midnight-purple dress with diamond beading. “Where did you get that?”

“Our hosts provided it. You have an outfit too.” She pointed toward the room where she’d dressed. “With any luck, we’ll actually get to have the conversation we came to have later tonight. I wanted to look presentable. You should maybe get changed as well. There’s mud on your boots, and it shouldn’t be long now.”

He ran a hand through his hair and nodded.

“What were you dreaming about?” She rested her hands on his chest as he stood in front of her.

He sidestepped around her and snagged his bag from the floor. “I don’t remember.” He didn’t sound convincing even to himself.

“I think you do. You said today in the arena that you now understand that there are fates worse than death. I’ve never heard you talk like that before.”

He shrugged. “War changes a person. That’s what this is—war. It’s the silent part. The unseen bubbles before the pot boils over and we line up troops on the battlefield.” He rubbed his chest. “With any luck, we’ll find all five orbs and the witches will end this.”

“I pray so… if the goddess of the mountain is on our side.”

He looked down at his hands. “I’m not sure the goddess of the mountain exists, and if she does, I’m certain she’s unwilling to intervene on our behalf. Circe told us as much. The gods can’t get involved. If we want change, it’s up to us.”

Dianthe frowned. “We’re here, Sylas. We are doing what needs to be done.”

He nodded once and slipped into the room, unable to face her a moment more with the lingering memory of his dream burning like acid in his brain.

Chapter Twenty

Everything Dianthe had experienced with her mate the past couple of days churned in her brain. She narrowed her eyes at the closed door between them, a persistent thought niggling in the back of her mind. How much had they really talked about anything since she’d collected him from the Obsidian Palace? He’d spent weeks in the dungeon and months before that traveling the five kingdoms for the rebellion, yet when he came home, every discussion they’d shared had revolved around Aborella.

They’d made love. They’d participated in things together as part of their community. But had they ever really talked since he’d been back?

No, she decided. He’d never shared what had happened to him in that cell other than to tell him about Raven and his siblings. He’d told her plenty about Raven’s suffering, about how Nathaniel had rescued him, but the more she thought about it, she knew absolutely nothing about what had happened to him while he was there.

All this time, she’d never even thought