Page 59 of Magic Claimed
And yet, someone had clearly been trying to convince those watching or listening that it was Callum-ro-Deverin. That the dragon who had just attacked humans and destroyed a building was actually the king of the shapeshifters—an enormous threat with unimaginable power behind him should he ever choose to go rogue.
Which meant that I knew exactly who was responsible.
There was no longer any need to guess who had sent the dragon here, or what they were trying to accomplish. Blake Masterson had finally shown his hand, and he’d hit us hard, in exactly the way that would hurt most.
And as for his goals?
He was trying to start a war. Not between courts, but between Idrians and humans, and his people had just fired the opening shot in Callum’s name.
Now all we could do was pick up the pieces, and find a way to respond before the humans decided we were too great a threat to ignore.
FOURTEEN
As I scrambledover the piles of broken bricks and crumbled concrete, I was almost thankful that Callum was currently lying unconscious. He would have no way of knowing what atrocities had just been committed in his name. No way of knowing that the sirens I could hear approaching were coming here—where we searched for his friends and family, hoping not to find them beneath the rubble.
Behind me, I could hear Logan trying desperately to muffle his sobs. Tairen’s gruff tones as she tried to convince him that all was well. Beside me, Kira clambered over the piles of debris, her bronze scales covered in ash and her ears pinned tight to her head.
If I was upset, she had to be terrified. This was her literal family. Her home. If Faris hadn’t escaped the blast…
We finally reached the kitchen door and stumbled through it to find no signs of life. No Irene snarling at whoever had disrupted her routine or messed with her cookware. No Seamusbemoaning the broken glassware or the shambles of his perfectly organized liquor collection. So we kept going. Into the back hallway, where shafts of daylight now illuminated the shadows.
“Up or down?” I asked Kira.
Her head tilted. “Down. The basement offers the most protection, and Faris probably guessed the dragon might come hunting them.”
We had no choice but to hope, so we headed that way, and had almost reached the door to the basement stairs when it literally burst off its hinges, flying across the hall and hitting the wall so hard they both cracked.
The power was out, so there was no light from the basement itself, but the stairwell was partially illuminated by a malevolent green glow—so bright that I almost cringed backward even though I knew what I was seeing.
Faris Lansgrave emerged into the hallway with magic in his eyes and murder on his face. Considering that he was able to walk and had literally punched the door off its hinges, I decided he was probably not injured enough to matter.
The moment she saw him, Kira let out a cry of relief and bounded forward to butt her head against his chest over and over again.
“You’re okay.” Her voice was muffled and shaking. “I was so afraid you weren’t okay.”
And Faris?
His eyes closed. His chin dropped, and I could see him murmuring words of thankfulness and relief despite the draconic onslaught that rocked him back on his heels.
“I’m fine,” he grumbled at last. “You can stop trying to push me back down the stairs.”
Kira sniffed and sat back on her haunches, wincing a little as she folded her right wing.
Of course, that set Faris off again. “Are you hurt?” he growled menacingly. “Did that”—here he dissolved into a string of unflattering names that would have made me clap my hands over Ari’s tender ears—“dragon try to hurt you?”
“You know I’m tougher than that,” Kira scolded. “I chased him off with a warning not to mess with me again. Where’s everyone else? Did they make it to the basement in time?”
“We’re fine!” Seamus called up from somewhere behind Faris. “Irene is threatening to kill us all if her knives are ruined, but no one is bleeding!”
Relief, pure and clear, washed over me. They were okay. All of my people were okay.
But The Portal… This place that meant so much to all of us had been utterly destroyed. It hurt my heart, and I had only been here for a few months, so I knew it had to be devastating for everyone else who had made it a part of their lives for years.
And even worse—for me—was the realization that some unknown person had brought about all this destruction in the name of the man I loved.
Faris let out a sigh that was nearly a groan. “I guess… it’s time to see what’s left.” With one last pat on Kira’s shoulder, he stepped past her and moved towards the kitchen, his stride measured and his jaw set, as if this were just another ordinary day. Just a bit of a dustup with a rowdy customer. I almost couldn’t bear to watch his face when he saw the damage.
But we followed him anyway, through the kitchen, into the main room of the bar that was no longer a bar at all, but open to the sky. Charred and dripping. Full of the shattered remains of the business he’d built when he first came here from the ruins of his home world.
