The Warrior King (Inferno Rising) by Owen, Abigail (reading a book txt) 📕

find rest for the night. To the west, and at a lower elevation, a royal condor dived off a rock, its heavy body dropping, most likely having sighted carrion in the open spaces below. Lower and farther out still, winds gently stirred the leaves of the trees, and a pine cone dropped from its branch to the forest floor. However, no threat came near that he could detect.

A wail of sirens, coming from inside the mountain, pierced the calm like a needle popping a balloon.

Samael bobbled in the air as his dragon’s first instinct was to protect his mate, jerking them around to return as quickly as possible. The human side, the trained warrior in him, had to course correct, staying where he was, senses tuned to any possible hint of danger from outside.

“What the fuck is that?” He directed the telepathic thought to Rune, whom he hadn’t seen but knew was out here.

“Fire,” came the grim response. “That’s the alarm for dragon fire big enough to hit our sensors.”

He didn’t need to explain more. Samael already knew. Rune was an enforcer, whether or not he still acted as one. As the policing arm of the clans in the colonies, one of the enforcers’ main duties was to put out dragon-caused fires. Dragon fire burned hotter, longer, spread faster, and was yet another way for humans to discover supernatural creatures existed in the world. No doubt Rune tracked them for different reasons. He wouldn’t want unknown dragons anywhere near his base.

Dragon fire on his sensors had to mean dragons were close.

Urgency held Samael taut as a drawn bow, ready for what came next, but he held his course. “I assume we remain at our posts.”

“They’ll contact us if the threat is in the immediate area or if we have to send out a team.”

“To investigate or put out?”

Rune was silent long enough that Samael assumed he wouldn’t answer. The guy never had been big on explaining. The fact that Rune had trained him might explain why Meira was always telling him to use more words.

“A small band of dragon shifters, unaware of us as far as I know, have moved into the area,” Rune came back.

But the tone in his voice didn’t sound angry. More focused. An enforcer never stopped enforcing, it seemed. After everything Samael had been told tonight—about Rune leaving his team and risking his own death to protect mates who weren’t even his—he believed that was true. But not the only truth. “You still protect the shifters in your region, from the Alliance now, whether they are aware or not. Am I right?”

Silence did greet that statement.

“Yeah. I’m right.”

“You always were a smug asshole,” Rune growled. “Keep your senses tuned. The fire could be a diversion.”

“No shit.” As if Samael would make a rookie mistake like that. Through this entire conversation, he’d been sweeping the area, attuned to any possible threat. He didn’t bother to point out that he outranked Rune these days.

Especially if they didn’t find Gorgon.

King Samael Veles. What the seven hells?

Though, if they didn’t find Gorgon, king or not, there was a high chance he wouldn’t be accepted back into the fold of the clan. The truth of that moved like a wrecking ball through him. His entire identity was wrapped up in who he was, the rank he’d fought with everything he had to rise to. To return to being…nobody.

The earth suddenly hushed, the sirens going silent, but so did every creature in the area.

“Something’s wrong.” He shot the thought to Rune.

“I know. Hold.”

Samael knew his duty. They were the first line of defense against an attack from the outside. “Any communications?”

“Radio silence. I trust my men.”

Except Meira was in there. A phoenix. Unmated, technically. His mate. Good men had made bad decisions with less enticement, and Rune’s men were all rogues. He had to suck in a roar of challenge to any creature who dared, like stoppering a bottle.

A sudden blast sent shock waves through the air.

Samael wasn’t waiting anymore. That explosion came from inside the mountain. Pulling his wings in close, he dived at the ground below, aiming for that back entrance he’d come out of, already turning over what he’d do once he was inside. That fucking tunnel would take forever to navigate down, especially once he was forced to shift and walk through the collapsed parts. The large hangar would’ve been closed off by the heavy dragon-steel door Rune assured him was there the second the alarms sounded.

He had no other way in.

Another boom and green flames erupted from the hidden gateway, a bright flash of light in the darkness. Green. One of Rune’s men? Or a different dragon shifter?

The explosion blasted out from the back side of the mountain, throwing dirt, boulders, and grasses now aflame outward a kilometer, the debris field taking out a swath of land. The ominous rumbling of collapsing rock sounded a few moments later, and another blast, this one of dust and dirt, shot from the maw of the tunnel entrance.

The tunnel must’ve collapsed fully.

Fuck.

Desperation had him diving at such a rate, he’d probably have trouble pulling out of it, but no way was he slowing up. Not with Meira in there. He’d damn well dig her out.

The image of her body, crushed and bloody, only drove him harder, panic poison in his blood and in his mind.

Suddenly, a black dragon dropped from above, aligning with him in the dive. Rune. “That was my man, Jiǎ, closing the tunnel. Follow me.”

Except Rune tilted his wings away from the mountain.

Samael didn’t follow. “I’m not going anywhere without Meira.”

“You have to. Jiǎ will have also closed the main entrance. He’s taking everyone out the secret way we’ve been digging since holing up in there.”

Meeting them there would only lead whoever Rune’s people were protecting them from right to them. Still, nothing pinged on Samael’s own personal radar around the outside of the mountain itself. Not a sign of another single paranormal creature, let alone dragon