Page 15 of Forked Tongues Are Fun
Even if I did make it to Asa, the dragon fire inside me would kill me in less than twenty-four hours. It took three of the royal harem to undo the effects of dragon fire. I should’ve climbed on top of Vance when I had the chance. We’d had time. I should’ve done what they said and not have felt ashamed about what I wanted. Now, all of them were gone, and I was as good as dead.
And I definitely would be if I stayed here. Weeds and pebbles sliced into my hands and knees, emphasizing my bruised and shaken body, a sharp reminder that I was alive, that it was okay to fall as long as I got up again.
So I did.
A warm breeze touched my skin but did nothing to soothe me as I started the long hike back to the road. Each excruciating step assured me that I was still alive. As long as that didn’t change, I would never stop until I had Asa and the three dragon shifters back.
Count your blessings, Dad had said before he took off. Well, right now I only had one, and that was my will to keep surviving.
Chapter Six
My fingernails broke. My knuckles split when I stuck them into brutally jagged handholds back up the hill. Or cliff, more like. Sometimes if felt as though I were climbing straight up into the night, allowing the rising full moon to pull me higher. My feet slipped. I almost tumbled backward when my next grip missed, and if I fell, my head would never be the same, especially if it splatted against the rocks below.
I was still two hours out from Evenza and the full-moon ritual. Still too far away to bury my fingers between my legs and quench the pulsing ache there. Already, I could feel it gnawing at me like so many sharp teeth, dueling almost as ferociously with my need to rescue Asa. But I couldn’t stop now to take care of it.
Finally, there was nothing left to grab onto except the lip of the cliff, and with shaking limbs, I pulled my exhausted body onto flat land next to the road. A car zoomed by fast enough to whip my hair into my face and stick it to the sweat clinging there.
“Hey!” I shouted in an effort to stop them, but my voice came out like a dying whimper.
Because Iwasdying. Or I would, soon, if I didn’t mate with Vance to put out the burn of the dragon fire. How the hell was I supposed to find him, fuck him, and rescue Asa in time? Why hadn’t I just jumped on him when I’d had the chance? Who had taken the three dragon shifters in the first place?
“Fuck everything,” I rasped as I dragged myself to my feet. Though that summed everything up, I wasn’t about to be defeated by a little dragon fire spill. As long as I was standing, I wouldn’t let myself give up quite yet.
I started down the road toward Evenza with my thumb jutted out. I just about yelped with glee when I found my phone in my backpack and it still worked. The screen wouldn’t focus no matter how hard I blinked, until I realized I had a steady flow of blood dripping into my eye from a deep gash on my forehead. With my hand shaking badly, I wiped at the blood enough to see and then dialed.
“Bad Mama,” I said after she picked up. “The full-moon ritual is in Evenza at a building called the Vivix. I don’t know if I’ll make it. Please. I need help.”
“Child’s alive, is that you, Booklet?” she squeaked out.
No idea why she always called me Booklet. Because I was small and filled with information? She called everyone else a jackass, so Booklet was a definite improvement.
“You found the key?” she asked. “Are you all right? You sound like death itself.”
“Listen, Bad Mama, I need help.” I glanced up at the moon, rising fat and full, and immediately wished I hadn’t. It was nearly at its peak. “I can save Asa. I know I can, if I can just get to Evenza.”
“How far away are you?” Her voice hardened and thickened, and I knew she was thinking about the night her daughter had been sacrificed to the dragon shifters. Rather than relive that night again through me, she would do anything to help. I knew it and I loved her for it.
