23. Kai

Kai closed his eyes as pain radiated throughout his entire body, but it paled in comparison to the shame trying to choke him.

The queen’s guards shackled him to the ground.

A metal ring surrounded his throat, and a short chain ran from it to several spikes driven deep into the earth. The collar was so tight, he couldn’t swallow. He could barely draw in a breath.

A spike pierced his long tail, spearing him to the ground so he couldn’t fly off or use it as a weapon to beat the elves away from him, as they now drew close.

He was a dragon—near godlike in his powers—and they’d trapped him like a rodent. The heart of his hoard she possessed blocked his magic. There wasn’t a single spell he could cast against her or the fae gathered near him. He’d been limited to physical attacks, and those had done as much damage to his body as they’d done to the elves.

When he’d arrived at the castle, he’d attacked any living creature he could find. He’d worn himself out in his ferocious moves, ready to counter anything Queen Belladonna threw at him. He’d burst through the main wall surrounding their fortress, knocking it down. With a swing of his tail, a tower had toppled into a heap of stones. Thunder and lightning had raged overhead, while the ensuing downpour had turned the ground into a muddy swamp, soaking the bodies of the dead and creating rivers of blood. His mane had stuck to his scales that shifted from shimmering gold to pale blue, and he’d roared with everything he had.

Except the queen hadn’t stopped him.

At least, not until he was exhausted from his tantrum. With a smug smirk, she’d lifted one hand and the wall he’d destroyed rebuilt itself brick by brick. The toppled tower flew back into place. In a matter of minutes, she’d erased all the damage he’d created. The only thing she couldn’t undo was the dead. Those lifeless bodies remained scattered on the grounds. Sacrifices she was more than happy to make in the name of breaking him.

After she was finished fixing the castle, she’d ordered him again and again to kill Xiang. He’d roared and fought the urge to follow the command until he could no longer make a sound. Until he’d collapsed onto the ground, unable to lift his head.

That was the moment her soldiers had moved. It had all been part of her plan to capture him, and he’d stupidly stumbled right into it.

Now he couldn’t move. Agony and exhaustion saturated his every thought. If she released him and commanded that he harm any of the Zhang clan, he was afraid he would no longer have the strength to fight her. If he broke loose now, he would create a new cave to hide in. Away from the Zhang clan where he could die curled up with his happy memories of Xiang.

The one good thing about all this was that he wasn’t alone in his suffering. The queen stepped from the shadows of her castle, now scarred by his claws, to reveal she had aged tremendously in the past weeks. Her blond hair was now streaked with white and bits of gray. Flawless skin was now stretched with lines reaching out from her eyes while more dug deep furrows along her mouth that was now just a pair thin lips pressed into a permanent frown. Her long, graceful body had thinned, so that she was barely more than skin and bones, while her back had taken on a hunched quality, as if the weight of the power she was trying to pull in now kept her permanently bowed.

Gone was the majestic young woman in the spring of life, and before him stood winter’s crone desperate to drag him into death with her. There was no question that she was powerful and could crush any of the fae who might dare to stand against her. It was that the wear of that magic on her had taken a visible physical effect.

“Bloody beast!” Belladonna snarled as she walked closer. He opened his eyes to see several soldiers surrounding her, their swords drawn and bows knocked with arrows. They were ready to kill him if he so much as bared a fang at her. “You think you can disobey me? I own you. If you don’t learn to follow my commands, I will have you cut down for parts and stewed up for potions. There will be nothing left of you. Not even bones. I’ll throw out the Twilight Throne and have a new throne made of your bones. That is all that will be left of you.”

Kai closed his eyes, content to ignore her ravings. Let her kill him and use his bones for a throne. At least in his death, he’d make sure she was never comfortable sitting on that throne. All that mattered was that he never harmed Xiang, or those he counted as his family.

It was a shame he was going to die here in this foreign forest without getting to look at Xiang’s smiling face one last time. They’d had so few weeks together. So many games they never got to play. So many snuggles he never got to enjoy. There was nothing like the feeling of having Xiang wrapped in his arms. The feel of his body pressed to every inch of his own, the smell of him mixing with his own scent to make something new and theirs.

“Cut off the dragon’s horns!” Belladonna ordered, breaking through Kai’s melancholy thoughts.

His eyes snapped open, and he tried to lift his head, but the chain stopped him after less than a meter. Fresh stabs of pain answered any attempts to thrash. Even so, there was no way in hell he was going to lie still while the fae cut pieces off him. He was going to fight until his very last breath.

The soldiers darted in front of Belladonna and coerced her to move a safe distance away, while more elves and other creatures with bulbous noses and spindly limbs crawled closer. He fought as hard as he could, but fatigue and pain drained away what little strength he had. Too soon, he couldn’t even lift his head.

Overhead, lightning flashed across the sky, followed by a boom of thunder. The rain that had slowed now pummeled the ground in fat drops. He wished he could wash them all away, but he didn’t even have the strength to summon up a good storm.

Another boom tore through the sky and shook the ground, but this one wasn’t thunder. Panicked screams followed the explosion and Kai opened his eyes to see one of the castle’s walls on his right had been reduced to smoldering rubble. A fire devoured the remains of furniture and bits of blasted timber. The army that had surrounded him had scattered in every direction. Some of them were working to put out the fire, while others were trying to locate the perpetrators.

Chaos still gripped the square where he was being held when a second explosion took out another part of the wall, but this time, it was on his left. Whoever was attacking the fae stronghold had them surrounded.

Could this be Xiang?

But the sun was still up. The rest of his clan couldn’t accompany him. He would be here alone. No! Xiang couldn’t come for him. As much as he wanted to get back to his vampire, he couldn’t allow him to risk his life like this. He had to get away.

Something touched him!

No! Someone!

The sensation of someone climbing on his body tore him from his frantic worries about Xiang. Kai snarled and tried to thrash about. Those fucking elves were still trying to obey Belladonna and cut off his horns.

“Shhhh, baobei, it’s just me.” Xiang’s whispered words cut through his panic and his throat clogged for a new reason. “Don’t move. I’m hiding in all your pretty hair while I inspect this shackle. Rei is busy blowing shit up as a distraction.”

Kai froze, not wanting to do anything that might reveal that his precious vampire was crawling over him, his hands moving on the shackle while cursing the fae with some horrific things. Really, his sweet vampire had a twisted mind when it came to torture. Not that he disagreed with anything he was saying.

“All right. Looks like I’ll have to cut through the chain on your neck. We’ll get this fucking thing off when we get home. The second it’s broken, you need to take to the sky and get out of here. On the count of three?—”

Wait! My tail!

As he sent the thought to Xiang, he tugged at the spike through his tail and nearly cried out from the pain. He could try ripping it out, but he was afraid he wouldn’t have enough strength left to make it into the air.

“What?”

Spike…through my tail. I can’t fly.

Xiang’s hands twisted in his mane and his face pressed against his scales. He could feel his lips moving more than he could hear his words. “I’m going to kill them all for what they’ve done to you. Between torturing Yichen and now you, they all deserve to die.”

His lover’s bloodthirsty words warmed his heart, making it easier to breathe and think.

Do you think you can remove the spike?

Another explosion punctuated the lengthy silence from Xiang. Rei was likely having fun, but there was no doubt he was on borrowed time. The fae would be scrambling for only so long before they organized and located him. He needed to get free now.

“I can, but it’s going to hurt,” Xiang warned.

The pain won’t matter if I can return home with you, Kai promised. Give the chain a single hard strike to weaken it and then turn all your strength to pulling out the spike. I can break the chain the rest of the way.

“Ready?” Xiang whispered.

Go! Hurry! Kai begged. Rei’s distractions wouldn’t keep them busy for much longer. There wasn’t much he’d be able to do to help Xiang if the fae spotted him.

Xiang pushed away from Kai and from the corner of his eye, he could see his lover raise his sword high over his head. Flicking firelight caught on the saber, caressing the heavy blade. He’d brought Chain Breaker—one of the weapons he’d added to the Zhang collection. Such a wonderful saber. Kai had never thought it would be used to save his own life.

The vampire brought the blade down on the chain with amazing force, creating a bright flash with an impact to rival even his best bolts of lightning. One link broke in half. Just enough for Kai to pull free.

Xiang ran along Kai’s body while he shoved the saber into the sheath. With both hands, he grabbed the spike while bracing a foot on Kai’s tail. Blinding pain shot through his entire body. There was no holding in his roar, but he could feel the spike sliding free of his flesh. The world turned blurry, and a creeping blackness crowded the edges of his vision. Pain and blood loss were making it hard to remain conscious. Metal clanged on hard stone, helping Kai to find his way back to the surrounding chaos. He was free. His sweet Xiang freed him.

A shout went up from the fae army. They’d spotted Xiang at last. Time had run out for them. Kai picked up his vampire in one hand and launched himself into the air. It was not a graceful flight. Part of his body slammed into a castle wall, toppling it over again. But he hugged Xiang close to him, protecting him as best he could with his own body.

“Rei! We need to get Rei!” Xiang shouted over the thunder and howling wind. “He’s there.”

Kai squinted to where Xiang pointed, but he hadn’t really needed to. The elf was easy to spot, since twenty heavily armed elves with their bows drawn had circled him. There was no way Rei was getting out of that mess without help.

With more force than finesse, Kai wove his way between the trees, plowed through the circle of elves, and snatched up Rei in his other hand before shooting toward the clouds. The elf screamed in his hand, his fingers nearly biting into his scales.

“Too high! Too high! We are way too high!” Rei shouted.

“What’s wrong? Don’t like flying?” Xiang teased, his laughter swept away by the buffeting wind.

“Falling! My problem is falling from this height!”

“It’s fine!”

“It’s not fine! Your dragon is bleeding and not flying straight!”

Rei was right. Kai was struggling to stay in the air. His vision was blurry and every flick of his tail to propel himself was absolute agony. Even the sun was too bright here above the clouds and the pleasant wind that usually caressed his scales was like a thousand blades scraping along his flesh. He wanted nothing more than to curl up in a dark place and not move.

“Kai?”

I’m okay. I’ll get you home.

Xiang shouted something else at him, but the wind stole the words away.

With his eyes closed, Kai turned what little magic remained in him to the task of getting him back to his hoard. No matter where he was or how weak he was, he could always find his hoard.

Thankfully, his hoard now rested under the Zhang clan’s home. If he could get at least close to his hoard, Xiang and Rei could return to the safety of their clan. That was all that mattered now. Xiang had to be safe.