A flash of color on the horizon seized my attention. Lightning crackled near the desert cliffs just beyond the city, sending spiderwebs of purple and gold through a churning, writhing mass. It pulsed with magic, raw, wild, and so strong that I could feel it across the distance.
My wolf stirred within me, almost basking in the savage energy as goosebumps sprouted across my flesh.
“That.” There was an undercurrent of fear in Mack’s voice that I’d never heard before. “Freaky-ass sandstorm.”
And it was heading in our direction. Coming fast.
“Hurry, you two,” Rust shouted from across the roof.
I slapped my empty thigh sheaths, aware that weapons could do nothing against the storm but needing them anyway. “Daggers?”
Mack pointed at my bag, and that was good enough for me. I scooped it up and ran for Rust, who was now waving wildly at us. He dropped to his ass on the ledge and then disappeared over the side. I peered after him. We were at least six stories up, but he scaled the building like a pro. When he was down about two floors, he yelled for me to follow.
The concrete felt worn beneath my fingertips, worked over by decades of extreme weather and neglect. Handholds crumbled beneath my weight, and portal fatigue dragged at my limbs, but fear drove me hard and fast. I half-climbed, half-fell down the side of the building. Mack joined our mad rush, and chunks of concrete and debris pelted me from above.
The storm gained speed. My attention stayed fixed on my descent, but the crackle of power grew louder and more intense. The hair on my arms rose, and the stench of magic cloyed the back of my throat, making breathing difficult. I jumped the last several feet and slid out of the way, making room for Mack.
He hit the ground right after I did. Rust was already running, shouting for us to follow. We broke into a sprint after him, earning a full-frontal view of the storm as we rounded a corner and raced toward it for a terrifying block and a half before turning again. Rust slammed through a door and into a building. We followed seconds before the storm swallowed us up.
The building shook.
“In here!” Rust called out, leading us down a stairwell.
Magic crackled all around us as the charge in the air intensified. An impossible darkness engulfed the stairwell, and I froze so I wouldn’t break my neck in my hasty descent.
A hand slid into mine and squeezed. Mack. The relief that bubbled up my throat couldn’t be contained, but at least the chaos of the storm was loud enough to cover my sigh.
A flashlight hummed to life ahead of us, and Mack released me. Rust angled the beam down the stairwell, leading us through another door. His light bounced off pale concrete as we entered an underground garage.
The alpha was already there, leaning against an abandoned truck with his own flashlight in hand. He took us all in and nodded. “Good. I was beginning to worry.”
“They were still asleep,” Rust said.
Dad nodded. “We’ll bed down here for the rest of the night.”
I was exhausted, yet the prospect of going back to sleep made me long for a pot of coffee and toothpicks to prop open my eyelids. I needed to tell him about the dragon, but not right then while I was still catching my breath.
“I’ll take the first watch,” I said instead.
The alpha nodded. “Get some sleep, Denael.”
Dad and Rust put their heads together while Mack situated his bedroll beside a rusted-out sedan that looked like it hadn’t run since before I was born.
Leaning against the sedan, I pulled my flashlight out of my bag and flicked it on to do a quick check around the garage before turning it off again. “We’re aways from thebarrier,” I said.
“You passed out as soon as you teleported.” Mack stretched out on the mat, looking up at me. “I carried you.”
“That’s becoming a habit.” One I wasn’t a fan of.
Mack’s dimple flashed. “I don’t mind.”
Considering how far we were from the boundary line, he should have. “You carried me all the way from the portal station?”
“No. The alpha paid some red-skinned guy with horns to give us a lift. We needed to be on the water, and none of us were up for walking.”
“I slept through being stuffed into a car?”
He yawned. “The back of a truck, actually. Then we used a bunch of curtains to hoist you onto the roof.”
