24. Ogden

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

OGDEN

T he moment I jumped through the manhole, magic tingled across my skin. An unmistakable barrier, too much like the one we put around our island, hesitated to let me through. I hovered, before an odd popping sensation made the pressure in my ears squeeze, and I dropped.

As I fell, my connection to Jay diminished. Terror shot through me, and I flailed like a fledgling. I could do nothing to fix it. I had no control. My scales instinctually covered my body to protect me from whatever was at the bottom.

I badly wanted to open my wings, but before I could decide how vast the darkness around me was, I hit a rock and dirt scattered floor, feet first. My legs jarred, and my joints creaked. I rolled to spread out the impact. Seconds later, Lux, also covered in scales, landed in a heap, letting out a painful bark.

I pulled him out of the way and prepared to catch Jay. But when I looked up, only the solid ceiling of a cave, covered in thick white webbing, filled my vision. Whatever hole I fell down was gone. My connection to Jay was barely a thread now. Bile rose in my throat.

I jumped first. I separated us.

Precious seconds ticked by and Jay didn’t fall into my arms. An odd, mournful moan came from my left, and a thick slapping followed by a hissing chitter forced me to take in my surroundings.

I’d expected to be in some tunnel system, either a sewer or a passageway from the underground public transportation that crisscrossed London. Instead, the textured walls looked like a cave. Moss clung to the sides, and little waterfalls dripped, hidden under more spider webbing. The smell hit me next: some mixture of rotting meat and oil.

The chittering came again, and what I thought was a low-hanging rock in the ceiling moved. Distinct legs stretched, each one covered in spikes and goopy balls of orange slime. The massive spider dropped a foot and slightly swung on a rope of webbing as thick as my fist.

“Whatsss do wwwe havvvesss here,” it hissed, the sound echoing around the cavern.

Lux pushed to his feet and pressed into my backside. Some of my terror receded. Lux. Someone I trusted, someone who loved Jay. As long as we worked together, we could fix this. But we hadn’t worked together. Not since I spend the night sucking his dick. We hadn’t even talked about it.

Tyson’s roar split the air. Unlike Lux and I, the fire dragon landed with one leg bent and one arm down. It looked cool as hell. He stood, still covered in Orc blood, and his wings sprouted from his back. With a massive leap, the fire dragon shot into the air, only to hit a solid ceiling. Instead of bouncing off of it. One of his wings caught in the spider web. He thrashed, and the entire web shook.

Before he tangled his wings further in the sticky web, Rehan’s massive scaled body materialized exactly where Tyson hung, and the two crashed to the ground, leaving a small crater and a cloud of dust in their wake.

“Sssssss, four of you,” the voice hissed, clearly unhappy. “And covvvvvered in scccalesssss. My ssssbeautiful websss.”

Jay wasn’t with us.

An emptiness filled the spot Jay’s mate mark occupied. The same realization must have hit the others. Instead of exchanging sharp words, Rehan stood and offered Tyson a hand, which the fire prince took while shifting his massive, useless wings back into his human body.

“She knew.” Rehan clenched his clawed fist. “There’s a second London under London. Scales on, claws out. Trust no one but find a mage.”

My fear turned to anger, and a ragged breath tore out of my chest. “You let our mate go last?” I yelled at Rehan. “She’s trying to keep her distance from us. You can’t keep supporting her every whim. She’s trying to prove we only want her because of the curse.”

“She jumped after Lux, you fecking Cricket,” Tyson growled. “I watched her go down.”

Rehan side-eyed the fire dragon suddenly defending him but nodded.

Still at my back, Lux reached down and squeezed my thigh. The gesture probably wasn’t meant to be intimate and most likely the only part of me he could easily reach. But my body still responded to his support in all the wrong ways.

“Jay’s smart,” Lux said. “We know she’s alive and not in the cave with our new friend.” His muscles shifted against my back as if he looked up. “I’m worried too. But we can’t ignore our situation.”

I flushed and forced myself to take a breath. “But we left her. I promised her we wouldn’t leave her. I separated us.”

“You didn’t know,” Lux said roughly. “And they say if you love something, you should let it go. If this is more than just a curse, we’ll find each other again. You have to believe that.”

I bit my lips together and forced myself to breathe. The spider chittered, watching us with too many beady eyes. Lux squeezed my thigh again, and my anger and fear rushed below my belt. Although I had nothing to compare it to, last night was incredible. My dick had nestled into Jay like it was made for her. The sweet heat. The pressure. Every fiber of my being had worshiped her. And this had only been my first time. With more experienced dragons to teach me… the pleasure we could bring each other had no limits.

But only if we were together.

I forced another calming breath in and out before peering at the spider.

“Your sssscard of messsss?” The spider asked. It tilted to the side, increasing the width of its swing. A ripple of motion ran through the connecting webs, making them shake all the way down three connecting tunnels.

I was scared. I had to own it and control it. But my fear wasn’t from the creature dangling above us.

Suddenly, the spider dropped. Rotating in midair, it landed on its too many legs in the middle of all of us and stabbed out at Lux with a sticky limb. Lux’s scaled foot dug into the ground while his metal one slid back, forcing me to adjust. But the air dragon didn’t grunt in pain or even blink.

Behind the spider, Tyson and Rehan’s claws extended.

Lux stepped forward again without a single sign of fear and held a hand up, clearly wanting Tyson and Rehan to stand down. They didn’t, but they didn’t move to attack either. Lux took another step toward the spider. I rushed to stay at his back, trusting the air prince but unwilling to leave him exposed.

“Ssssccalessss,” the spider moaned. “No Cricket for Jagger.” It covered its eyes with two of its legs as if holding back tears.

Lux stepped forward and put a hand on one of the spider's many joints. “There there, you’ll find someone else to eat. Are all these webs yours?”

I eyed Lux, unsure if I should laugh or attempt to pick up on his sympathy.

The spider took his paws off his eyes. “Sssssomeone elssssse to eatsss.” It bobbed its entire body. “Yesss. I found a sssssnack. One didn’t havvvve sccalesss, but then did.” It moaned. “And the other tried to burn my webssss. Cuntssss. Ageing them, I am. Ssscaless will leavvve!”

Its words bounced around the space, and the webbing vibrated again. A bad feeling ran down my back. If the fall hadn’t triggered my scaled armor, I would have landed in my human form, and this spider would have been on me instantly.

“See, it sounds like you already have a plan,” Lux said, patting the thing again. “Do you know how to get out of here?”

“There issss no outssss.” The spider’s legs lengthened, making it seem to grow.

My chest squeezed, remembering the barrier before my fall.

The spider let out another mournful wail, climbed back into its webbing, and vanished into the far-left passage.

I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding.

“Could the other scaled person it has trapped be a dragon shifter?” Lux asked.

I shrugged. “I don’t see how that’s possible. But maybe?”

Lux pursed his lips and wrinkled his nose. “I don’t like leaving anyone to be that thing’s dinner.”

“Feck the people, we need to find Wiggles.” Tyson spat a fireball into the ground. A bit of webbing caught fire and doubled in size. Rehan stomped it out before we trapped ourselves in an inferno.

“Jay said, ‘Find a mage,’” Rehan repeated. “The spider isn’t one, but it sounds like it’s caught two people who know more than we do.”

Rehan tried to pull out his ponytail, which resulted in him almost braining himself on his claws. I wanted to laugh, cry, and rage all at the same time.

Lux squeezed my arm as if he felt my conflict. “Jay’s strong. Too strong. There’s nothing we can do to help her now. We have to help ourselves.”

“By befriending a spider?” Rehan asked skeptically.

Lux winked. “Sometimes, you need to hold your cards close to your chest and play a different hand.”

Rehan let out a long breath. “It’s either going toward the known.” He gestured to the same tunnel the spider scuttled through. “Or wandering the unknown, knowing what could sneak up on our backs.”

“I fecking hate the second option,” Tyson scrubbed his spiky hair. “Let’s go rescue the people or feed them to the spider, whatever we need to get to Wiggles.”

Lux nodded and turned, taking the lead. I looked up at the space Jay should have fallen through a final time before stumbling after the others.