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“I’ll go with you, then head out on another search after sunset.” Marli gulped down the rest of her coffee.
As they rose from their seats, their phones buzzed.
Marli pulled her cell from her pocket.
Odson snatched his phone from the table, breath hissing through his teeth as he read the screen.
Marli’s heart tripped as she read the message from Jori aloud. “The king is dead. Elora is alive. Bring Jonathan to the mountain.” The coordinates followed in the next message.
“What the hell happened?” Heidi shot to her feet, looking from Odson to Marli. “Elora’s alive? After all this time? That’s—that’s good. I’m so glad she’s reunited with her son,” she breathed, blinking away the tears that suddenly welled in her eyes.
“That’s all it says, but I’m going to find out what’s going on.” Marli shoved her phone into her pocket.
Odson growled, pulling the keys to his Mustang Shelby from his jeans. “We. My sister is alive. We’re going to find out. Let’s go.”
Relief that they were all alive warred with the gut churning knowledge that she was about to go into her enemy’s domain with little more information than that.
Every Aeleftherian’s worst nightmare.
Chapter 3
Heart pounding, Marli leaned as the small plane eased around the mountain peak.
Through the windshield, the mountain peaks were phantoms in the mist, and the forest below was a thick carpet in various hues of green shot with silvered rivers, creeks and waterfalls.
She wasn’t anxious because she was a dragon forced into a Cessna—she’d become acclimated to human air transportation over the years. As an Aeleftherian guardian heading for the maw of her long-time enemy’s lair, she was anxious to unleash her claws and get scaly.
The one thing that her colony had fought tooth and claw to avoid was being dragged back into this male-controlled mountain.
And she was going willingly. Mostly.
Jonathan Mountainside, the human male that Jori had known as his father, piloted the small plane, aligning it with the open cavern containing the runway, embedded in the mountain’s side.
Returning her gaze to the open flight strip, her pulse calmed seeing that Kymri waited for them. The bunched muscles in her shoulders relaxed and she drew a deep breath, easing it out through her nose. It had occurred to her since they’d read the message from Jori that they could be flying straight into a trap. Despite Odson’s agreement, neither of them were deterred.
Jonathan gasped as the figures waiting for them came into focus for his human eyes a moment later.
His wife stood next to Kymri.
He blinked away gathering tears as he brought the plane into the cavern. Elora had been missing for two decades.
As soon as the plane stopped, he cut the engine, shut everything down, and was shoving the door open before either Marli or Odson could rise from their seats.
Exchanging glances, they followed him out.
Marli’s gaze swept the massive cavern that served as an airstrip, large enough to accommodate a cargo plane. Or dragons preparing to launch an attack. She shivered, setting aside that thought as she turned her attention to the individuals gathered to meet them.
She smiled.
Kymri Steelscale smiled back.
Jori Mountainside stood behind her, expression grim as he watched his parents’ reunion.
“Thank the dragon goddess, you are unharmed.” Marli gripped her closest friend in a fierce hug. “Jori looks like shit.”
“It’s been a really rough few days, Mar.” Kymri squeezed her back.
Beside her, Jonathan held his wife, Elora, in a similar embrace. They would have much to catch up on, after two decades of forced separation.
