Page 100 of Dragon Gods

The cenote was quiet and calm. Whatever prisoners they’d taken upon their first raid already gone to Suvi. He heard the footfalls of other soldiers in the back tunnels, likely raiding supplies. It was only when his attention was drawn back by his father’s cough that he noticed a few bodies left facedown on the edge of the underground lake. Red blood seeped into the ground, tinging the nearby water pink and Fox looked away before he could recognize the shape of anyone in particular. Not that he cared.

But Sofia would care.

And she wasn’t here. Not yet. She wouldn’t have arrived at the cenote that much earlier than he did; she wouldn’t have been with the earlier group of prisoners. Perhaps he’d been right to trust her instincts. She may have gotten into the tunnels and immediately sensed something was wrong. She was already gone and he was wasting his anxiety on nothing.

“I have too many questions, but now isn’t the time to ask them.” His father’s words drew his attention back to the present. The taller of the sergeants, a thin and wiry male with a shock of black hair against pasty white skin gave Fox a small salute.

“I hear that you’re to thank for our operation here.”

“Theoretically—” his father cut in, words cold, as if he doubted the entire thing, “it was hypothesized that you left the markings. We also assumed you’d been killed soon after. There were traces of a fight and blood left in the forest.”

“That probably was my blood, but as I’m sure you’re so very grateful, Father,” Fox said, “the scuffle didn’t kill me. It just delayed me a bit.”

Before his father could respond, the other sergeant spoke, a high sergeant he noticed from the two bronze stars on his breast. “Either way, thanks to your quick thinking, we’ve taken nearly a dozen resistance spies into custody. General Ocon is sure the leader is among them, though they have refused to speak.”

“Yet,” his father said, a spark of joy in his eyes that made Fox’s stomach twist. Such happiness was never a good thing when it came from his father.

He looked back over his shoulder at the darkened tunnels and wondered if he could convince his father to allow him to look around. If he could find Sofia before the others.

A cry from the shadows had Fox paling and the three men he stood with followed his own stare as a guard came stumbling out from the darkness.

He was cursing, a trickle of blood seeping from beneath the torn arm of his tunic. He held Sofia pressed firmly against his body, the iron grip of his forearm along her waist. She was hissing and fighting, but he looked to weigh two times Fox’s own weight at the same height, and despite the anger at the bite she’d clearly gotten in, keeping her subdued didn’t appear to be a struggle.

When he made it to where the four of them stood, he dropped her unceremoniously at their feet.

“Found this creature sneaking around in the back tunnels. She must have been hiding during the initial raid.”

“She looks feral,” the high sergeant said with a laugh behind the words.

Fox was too busy trying to keep his breathing even as he took in the sight of her. She didn’t look any different from when he’d last seen her, albeit a bit muddier. But her face was a bright scarlet and her eyes shone with a rage and hatred he hadn’t seen since their first few days together. She wasn’t even looking at him—she was looking directly at his father.

His father sneered down at the woman, as if she might jump up at any moment and bite him, as well. Perhaps he was afraid of rabies. And then Fox saw the shift in his father’s face, his eyes widening in something akin to fear.

When his father moved forward, grabbing Sofia by the arm and throwing her facedown into the dirt, Fox almost stopped him. He clenched his fists by his sides and counted his exhales, wiping his face blank of any emotion. He’d had practice. He knew how to do this. How tonot feel.It would be worse for both of them to react.

But even the sergeants and the specialist blanched as his father grabbed her tunic and tore it, nearly ripping it from her body to reveal her back. And Fox saw what she’d been hiding from him.

There wasn’t an inch of smooth skin to be seen. Ridges snaked across her back, painting her skin. Some scars were thin silver stripes, while others were raised and ugly puckers, dark red and purple.

It was a lashing that she would have been lucky to survive—that anyone would be lucky to survive—and his father was looking at it like a prized painting.

Acid crawled up Fox’s throat, choking him. He swallowed it down along with the sick twist of disgust and anger tightening his chest. He pulled his gaze away, knowing she wouldn’t want him to see this. The specialist that had brought her over stood, his own face blank, and Fox saw the small bag he held over his shoulder. Sofia’s bag.

The one with the dragon feather tucked inside.

“You,” his father’s voice drew his attention and he reluctantly looked back to where Sofia now kneeled, glaring up at his father. Her tunic was ripped at the shoulder, but it was covering her once more. Her cheeks were a bright red, but Fox could tell from the heat in her eyes it wasn’t from embarrassment or shame.

And then the look was turned on him and the blood drained from his face. She snarled and spit, a glob of it falling just short of him.

He met her glare with a sneer.

“This is your fault,” she said. There was no playacting in the words, and he didn’t blame her. This was his fault. No matter their truce or his intentions when they split that morning, he was the reason her friends lay dead behind them and why she was kneeling at his father’s feet now. He saw the hint of red along her collar where the other man had grabbed her. It would bruise by tonight.

He flinched as his father’s eyes flashed to him, ineffectual rage roaring through his blood.

“She knows you.” The look his father was giving him sent a chill up his spine.

“Meet the delay I faced,” he said, waving dismissively. “The bitch captured me. She and her resistance trash.”

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