Page 84 of Dragon King’s Duty Bride

Sia’s heart clenched painfully. “I’m here, sweetheart.”

Voilear shoved her forward. Sia spun toward him, her anger burning brighter now that she could see the girls.

“You really think this will end well for you?”

He tilted his head slightly and studied her. “That depends.”

One of Voilear’s men entered and distracted him. Sia took the opportunity to move quickly to the girls, and she crouched as Celeste threw herself into her arms. Sia wrapped her tightly against her chest.

“It’s okay,” she whispered softly, though her mind was racing far too fast for comfort.

But the situation was worse than she had hoped.

The girls weren’t tied up because they didn’t need to be. Voilear stood calmly between them and the only path that led out.

Celeste clung to her.

Sia stood slowly, positioning herself between Voilear and the girls.

Her mind churned through every possibility. Voilear gave the man an order before he watched her closely, a curious expression settling across his face.

“You’re calculating,” he observed.

“Of course I am.”

“You won’t win.”

Sia lifted her chin. “You clearly don’t know me very well.”

His smile deepened slightly. “Oh, I think I’m beginning to.”

A powerful rush of wind roared overhead. It sounded like a bad storm was blowing in. The girls gasped and Voilear’s eyes flicked upward. He hollered for two others to guard Sia and the girls, and he rushed outside.

Sia knew it wasn’t Mother Nature that caused the roar.

Lucas had found them.

Chapter 29

Lucas

The valley where the old quarry lay cradled between the jagged spines of the mountains beyond Crystafalls, a remote area that Lucas knew well. It was the perfect place to meet Voilear because whatever devastation followed would scorch only barren rock and empty fields.

His dragon blood answered the challenge as Voilear descended from the clouds in a spiral of chaos and evil, and his eyes bright with confidence and anticipation that Lucas understood even as he prepared to oppose it.

Voilear did not roar immediately, and that restraint was more terrifying than fury, because it spoke of discipline and purpose, and when at last his voice thundered across the valley it carried not hatred but conviction, declaring that the kingdom demanded strength unclouded by sentiment, that rule required sacrifice, that the past must bow to the future.

Lucas answered not with words but with fire.

He launched upward in a surge of flame and wind, his wings tearing through the air with a sound like splitting timber. The collision between them shook loose stones from the cliff faces as claw met claw and flame met flame.

Voilear fought with the precision of a general defending a throne, Lucas fought with something far more dangerous. The ferocity of a man who refused to lose his family.

A tail strike with the force of a battering ram sent Lucas crashing into the valley wall. The stone splintered beneath his weight and pain flashed through his body.

“You would risk it all for one woman,” Voilear’s voice boomed across the clash of wings.

“For my family,” Lucas answered, and the word carried more power than flame.