Page 59 of Been There Dragon That
You could shoot it, but she didn’t have a gun. And the last thing she wanted was a rifle in the baby nursery. The door was solid.
Another roar echoed from outside, bigger than the others, and Rylee edged toward the window on the side of the house. There was a flash of copper wings, and she saw a giant lizard creature, the size of an eighteen-wheeler.
A dragon or a dinosaur.
There were no words other than dragon to describe what she’d seen.
A second later, a lion bigger than anything she’d ever seen in a zoo ran around the corner. His face was stained red, and unlike the African lions she’d seen in zoos, this one had tusks or saber-teeth. It was a cross between a regular lion and a prehistoric one.
I’m crazy. I’m hallucinating. I’m in fucking Jurassic Park.
She sunk to the floor and hugged her knees tight to her chest. The kids were screaming and crying, and she couldn’t do anything. She couldn’t tell them it would be okay. She couldn’t tell them their parents would be okay, not when there were mythological monsters and prehistoric animals fighting a war right outside.
What the fuck had she landed in the middle of?
More roars. Screams of animals in pain. Gunshots. All of it echoed around and around in her head. It couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be real.
Another huge roar rumbled, shaking the entire cabin.
Rylee tucked in tighter, trying to find some comfort in the chaos. She couldn’t stop thinking about Wrath and how much she wished he was there with her. She missed the feel of his arms around her, the warmth of his body against hers. The sound of his voice telling her everything would be okay.
She jumped up from the floor and ran to the center of the group of cribs. Several of the babies were sharing. She pulled one of the smallest out of her crib and hugged her tight.
“We’re going to be okay. Your mamas are tough. Your daddies are tough. They know what they’re doing.” She kissed the baby’s forehead and made rounds from crib to crib, hugging and kissing and cooing.
The sounds of the fighting died off, and the children also calmed. They’d needed the same thing she did–comfort, reassurance. It’d taken her a minute to realize she was the one who needed to give it. They were depending on her. Penny and Naomi had trusted her with their children.
She might feel helpless on the inside, but she could be the comfort the babies needed. She could do that for them and pray it was enough to get through whatever was happening outside.
Eventually, she was able to focus on the kids and tune out the horrific sounds outside. She sang a song her mom had sung to her every night when she was a kid and kept singing, no matter what she heard outside.
All that existed right now for her were these kids. They were her responsibility. They were what mattered, and she would fight for them if it came to it.
* * *
Wrath
Col climbedout of the vehicle before Wrath could park in front of the cabin. He ran to the side where a fire had been started in a small clearing. The smell of burning fur was quite clear on the breeze–wolves had died.
But had anyone else been a casualty?
“Naomi!” Col’s shout reverberated through the empty space.
A long copper-scaled dragon head popped around the corner of the cabin they were both running toward. Wrath was right on Col’s heels.
The dragon’s mouth opened, and a keening cry of relief was released. A moment later the dragon was gone, and Naomi was running toward Col.
She leapt into her mate’s arms with another more human cry of joy. “Shuarra. Forgive me for not being here.” Wrath watched the reunion for a few seconds before turning his attention back to the scene of slaughter before him.
Wrath scanned the area. “Rylee?” He shouted her name. No response.
The smell of blood was everywhere. Wolf. Lion. Naomi’s dragon had broken a few trees and burned some others. The charred stumps smelled of her magick and fire.
He wanted to find Rylee. He wanted to hold Rylee and smell her hair and taste her skin. He needed to know she was safe. He couldn’t smell her, and his heart was racing.
“Hey!” Kann’s voice carried from the edge of the trees. He was dragging a limp reddish-colored wolf. “Wrath.”
Wrath hurried to his friend’s side and grabbed a leg of the wolf to help carry the body to the fire. “What happened? Was it Tai? Where’s Rylee?”
