Page 98 of Wings of Shadow
Speechless, his eyes find mine. My heart stops.
Gold bleeds through the maroon like molten metal poured into wine. His pupils stretch into vertical slits, predatory and foreign, yet somehow still achingly familiar.
A low rumble builds in his chest—not a groan of pain, but something deeper, more primal. The sound vibrates through the floorboards, rattling the crystal on his nightstand.
“Oh gods.” The words tumble out as understanding crashes over me. “Oh gods, Kai.”
He frowns. “What’s happening?” he rasps, dazed and breathless.
“You’re shifting,” I manage, the words grazing against the rising panic in my throat.
Obsidian scales ripple across his shoulder blade, each one catching the candlelight like black glass. I can almost hear them, like stone scraping stone. Beautiful. Terrifying.
He looks down. Freezes. Then curses low under his breath.
I scramble backward, my bare feet tangling in the sheets. “You need to get out of the house,” I gasp, pointing toward the balcony. “Now! Before you?—”
He’s already moving, rolling from the bed with inhuman grace despite the tremors wracking his frame. His movements are jerky, uncontrolled, as if fighting against his own body. He drags on his boxers, muscles bulging beneath skin that grows too tight.
The air around him begins to warp, heat waves distorting his silhouette. Every candle flame in the room gutters and dances, casting wild shadows on the walls. The crystal decanter on his dresser develops a hairline crack.
I yank my dress over my head, fingers fumbling with the fabric as I watch him stagger toward the balcony doors. Each step leaves scorch marks on the Persian rug.
“Clarissa.” My name is barely recognizable, distorted by vocal cords that are changing, lengthening. “Get back.”
By the time he throws open the doors, he’s no longer just a man. He’s becoming something vast. Ancient. Myth made flesh.
The night wind rushes in, carrying the scent of rain and something else—sulfur, smoke, the electric taste of lightning.
I follow despite his warning, one hand pressed to the doorframe for support. The wind whips my hair across my face, but I can’t look away as he steps to the edge of the balcony.
The stone railing crumbles under his grip.
For a heartbeat, he pauses, silhouetted against the star-drunk sky. Then he looks back at me one last time, and I see the man I love trapped behind those shifter eyes—afraid, awed, apologetic.
And then, meeting no hesitation, he leaps.
A concussive blast of energy knocks the breath from my lungs. The force of his takeoff cracks the stone beneath his feet, fractures racing across the balcony like spiderwebs. Stone fragments pepper my arms as I throw them up to shield my face. The very air splits with a sound like the world tearing in half. Light erupts from where he fell—not the warm gold of candleflame, but something fierce and incandescent that sears my retinas even through my closed eyelids.
When I lower my hands and I dare to look below... he’s gone.
No—not gone.
Transformed.
A dragon crouches where a man once stood.
Black scales shimmer like oil on water, each one the size of my palm. Wings stretch wide enough to shadow half the courtyard, membrane stretched between bones that could snap a tree in half. Talons gouge trenches in the ancient cobblestones as he shifts his weight.
But it’s the eyes that steal my breath.
Still gold. Still his. Still looking at me with an expression I recognize, despite the foreign features—wonder, terror, and desperate love all warring in that draconian gaze.
Shouts erupt from the guards’ quarters. Boots thunder across stone. I hear the distinctive slide of weapons being drawn.
“Stop!” The scream tears from my throat, raw and commanding. “Don’t shoot!”
The dragon’s massive head swivels toward the sound of approaching footsteps, smoke curling from his nostrils. A warning growl rumbles through the courtyard, felt as much as heard.
