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I raised my eyebrow at his unexpected support. The Fire King appeared to have aged ten years overnight. His usually perfectly styled dark red hair lay in a thick mat on his head, and deep bags ran under his eyes. Unlike the Air King, the Fire King only wore his scales, several eaten through by fluorescent-green acid.
“We have her every movement on video.” King Ryker clenched his fist. “You showed me your surveillance. I took your word that Lux was safe… I didn’t give it a second thought.”
Jay shook her head before putting one hand on her hip. “Something’s wrong with the world, and the mightiest shifters in existence would rather lock up and diddle their sons than open their fucking eyes.”
King Leberecht sneered. “I would not touch something so broken.”
A heavy silence filled the air.
I glanced at Lux, grateful he was still unconscious. I was sure he’d grown up hearing worse. Rude comments about my dick ran through my head. I’d changed the way I lived becauseof others’ judgment, and my cock was something I could hide. Nothing like Lux’s handicap. My little girl and her insecurities came next. She was already going through the same thing, and nothing I did or said could fix it. The problem was built into the fabric of our society.
Somewhere in our isolation, we’d lost touch with what it meant to be dragon shifters. And with nothing on the island but other dragons, we’d turned on each other.
I looked around the landing, seeing the weight of Lux’s chains settle on the shoulders of every elemental. Even King Leberecht’s guards backed away from him.
The first colors of sunrise kissed the skyline.
Jay let out a frustrated scream.
“Fucking demons! Malevolent spirits given bodies by magic and emotions which twist the very nature of good and evil.” She shook her fists. “If you won’t see beyond yourselves, then kick me off this fucking island. We know nothing. Is this an isolated event? Was the world just attacked? Are the Ley Lines intact? I don’t know. You don’t know. Stop fucking around and fix it.”
She squatted down and wiggled her arms under Lux. My earth magic bloomed at her fingertips, growing the stone under Lux until he was high enough for her to pick him up the rest of the way. With a grunt, she heaved the now groaning air prince over her shoulders like a sack of potatoes, gripping his ass with one hand to keep him in place.
My pulse raced, and I had to pinch myself to stay focused. The situation was bad, but Jay’s confidence made my blood rush in all the right ways. With her hand on Lux’s ass, surrounded by Rehan and Tyson’s half-naked strength, molten desire I hadn’t known existed turned my inside into mush.
“Fall in,” Jay said, her voice ringing with command.
As if we’d practiced, which we definitely had not, the three of us stepped to her back, forming an honor guard.
“Lux is under my protection, which includes my mate’s protection.” Jay looked hard at each ruler.
I puffed out my chest. Rehan and Tyson did the same as we put our weight behind our mate’s words. Our mate. I wanted this more than anything in my life.
“You’re dragon shifters. All of you.” Jay’s voice, though still strong, calmed. “If I need to be the enemy who brings you together, fine.” She turned to Rehan and made a flapping gesture with her free hand.
As the sun rose in earnest, Rehan stepped away from us. Water drops from his shift filled the air, each reflecting the half circle of red and orange welcoming a new day. The sky filled with colors—worlds within worlds. The droplets condensed around Rehan, making his transformation ripple and shine with hot reds and golds.
My gaze dropped to Jay. She must have chosen him to shift because she knew what his transformation would reflect and double the sunrise. How fast her mind worked blew me away.
Despite Rehan’s shift from dragon to man and back again, which should have healed him twice over, patches of his dark blue scales were still missing. Strips of tendon and partially eaten flesh covered his shoulder and dotted his back.
Maybe Jay hadn’t chosen him for the sunrise. Perhaps it was this. To show how damaging the demons really were. Could I heal something a shift couldn’t?
Jay stepped back into Rehan’s waiting claws and frowned. “Come together fast, dragon council.”
Tyson’s wings sprouted from his back, and I followed suit.
I had no idea where we were going, but it didn’t matter. I was where I needed to be, I was where I wanted to be, and most importantly, the five of us were on the same page.
CHAPTER NINE
JAIYANA
My dramatic exit wasn’t really that dramatic.
The sunrise was a nice touch.
Yeah, we got lucky there.
