Page 82 of The Heart of the Dragon

"She'll adapt and overcome. Magnus will take care of her. She is his omega. He'll burn the entire realm before he'll let anyone hurt her."

"And who's going to protect her from him?"

"You said yourself that we couldn't take care of this ourselves. That they both had to see this through. What would be the pointof you having all that power, if you simply ignored your visions? Besides, we know my nephews and niece need me now. I owe that much to Ian, and I'm not going to let him down."

"You should have said goodbye to Magnus."

"Don't—" I warned, not wanting to think about how I'd just lost another brother. They both had their own lives to live, but it was still weird that one did so in the past and the other would do it in the future.

"Let's go home, then."

"This is our home for the foreseeable future. We have to be prepared, in case this all blows up in our face."

"Oh it will. I'm not sure how yet, but we both know that karma is a bitch and there will be consequences for our actions."

I shook my head at my mate. While I didn't necessarily disagree with her assessment, her obsession with balance threatened to drive me mad.

"Karma can kiss my ass."

Chapter

Thirty-One

Rose

My head spun fasterthan the world around me. The freefall felt like it would never end. As the wind tried to rip me from Magnus's back, my hands tightened on the ridges protruding from his scales until they ached.

Suddenly he banked left, and half my body slid from his back before he was able to right us again.

"What the hell?" I screamed into the violently whipping wind. It was like being beaten to death by the air. My shoulders screamed from the effort to hold on, my exposed skin stung, and it felt like the muscles in my arms were being shredded into tiny bits. I wasn't sure I could take much more.

Get ready.

Magnus's strong voice boomed through my head and I jerked to attention.

"For what?" I screamed.

I didn't get an answer in my head. Only a rumble underneath my body before he banked right, then left, and then I was freefalling through the air again.

"No!" I screamed, barely getting the word out before I hit water and sunk beneath the surface. I tried not to inhale, but I wasn't prepared, and water stung my nose and burned into my lungs. I sputtered to the surface.

"Rose!" Magnus yelled from the nearby bank. Apparently, he'd made it to dry land.

"I'm here," I croaked out, loud enough so he hopefully heard.

"Good Gods. You scared the life out of me." He splashed into the murky water and hauled me free. His strength never failed to amaze me. Every time he picked me up as if I weighed nothing, it was another reminder that he wasn't human.

"Where are we?" I coughed, trying to spit some of the thick, muddy water out of my mouth. I refused to think of how much I'd swallowed and what might be in there. We were alive and that's all that mattered.

"The dark forest," he replied.

"Okay, that's good right? It means we made it."

"Considering we've already been attacked, I'm not celebrating yet."

"What do you mean attacked?" I tried to whip around and see behind me.

"Fucking sprites."

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