The next morning, we left for the elven forest. Lyle and Dayanara insisted on coming with us. The dragons weren’t ready to leave yet and would need another day. There was no point sitting around and doing nothing, and Dayanara thought her powers might be helpful.
The world spun below—a blur of green valleys and the jagged blue teeth of rivers—while Squall’s dragon wings cut huge swaths of shadow over the earth. I was pinned between Darren’s chest and the obsidian curve of Squall’s back, his arms a cage around me, his breath burning a line behind my ear every time he exhaled.
I hadn’t let go of him since the moment he kicked down the palace doors. It wasn’t just the mate bond, though that felt like a current too wild to ever fully contain. It was the way his hands never stilled, always tr
