The men who tracked him, instead of wiping her parents’ memories, had burned them alive. She’d never been able to figure out why. A sign to others, Qara had said, a warning to keep humans out of it.
Bile rose inside Hadyn, stinging her throat like it had that night.
Slowly, she managed to raise a hand and clamp it over her mouth.
“Hadyn,” Rune’s voice was louder now.
But the images playing in her head weren’t over. One of the men had glanced up at her open window where her white curtains floated in the breeze.
Hadyn ducked and scrambled away, choking down whimpers of terror, to hide under her bed.
The familiar creak of the third stair from the top had her covering her mouth, like she was now, trying to hold in her screams.
“Hadyn!” Rune was yelling in her mind now.
Vaguely, she was aware that he risked moving, turning her so that she was cradled in his arms.
“Open your eyes,” he demanded, voice louder in her mind now. Drowning out the footfall of the man who was coming to kill her in her memories.
Somehow, grasping on to the raw power in that voice, the total command, she peeled her eyes open. In the darkness, she couldn’t see his face, but she knew he was there. He was all around her, solid and real.
“Easy,” he said, the word soothing. “I won’t let them take you.”
She gave her head the tiniest shake. Because the men after them now suddenly weren’t nearly as terrifying as the memories cloying to her like cobwebs. She knew that was ridiculous. The dragon shifters here could do her harm now. But, hell, she was shaking.
The dragons after them would hear her, sense her, any second.
But she couldn’t control the cries that were building inside her, trying to burst from her throat raw and frantic.
“Fuck,” the word wasn’t angry, the tone more desperate than that. “Forgive me for this.”
For what?
His hands moved to either side of her face, fingers digging into her hair. “This will all be over in a second, little mortal.”
A tiny blaze of twin silver-tipped black flames flared then blinked out. As though he’d brought his fire forward and closed his eyes to hide the light. Then heat. Beautiful heat flowed from his touch, from those strong hands holding her steady. Warmth invaded her mind and then seeped into her muscles, like liquid courage, and suddenly Hadyn was here in the cave with him.
No longer in her head. Her memories, gone.
Logically, she knew what he was doing. Stealing her memories. Not the original ones. Her dragon parents had tried to do that already to stop nightmares and panic attacks. This was different. Almost like he was erasing the memory of her fear in this moment.
Every muscle in her body went languid. Lusciously loose.
She sucked in and opened her mouth to say something probably pretty damn stupid. Something like golly gee. Or oh wow.
Which was how she found herself kissing Rune Abaddon.
Warm lips pressed to hers gently, the action a part of the warmth still cocooning her that she didn’t even protest. She just sort of…sank into him.
…
Holy shit, what am I doing?
Rune still wasn’t entirely sure what had happened with Hadyn. One second, she’d been sitting beside him, tense and alert, but quiet, clearly sensing the danger they were in and trying to make herself a hole in the rock. She’d even managed to slow her heart rate, a neat little trick that he’d offered up a whisper of gratefulness to her dragon parents for.
The next second, she’d spiraled into a silent version of what had appeared to him to be a full-blown fight or flight instinct.
Only he couldn’t have her moving or making sounds. Those bastards were closing in on them without knowing yet.
The one coming from the outside had finally been forced to stop and shift to human to make his way toward them. Slowly from either end of the tunnel. At the same time, two had come from inside the mountain. They were in the chamber near the lake.
Close. So fucking close.
He’d been a little too good with that memory removal trick, relaxing her into talking. He’d felt it in the way she’d gathered herself to speak. Kissing her had been the only way he could think to quiet her quickly.
What he hadn’t expected was how touching her would tilt him off his axis.
Hadyn pressed into him, her hands fisting in his shirt, opening her mouth under his in a way that sent him over the edge. The dragon inside him unfurled and pressed outward as an eons-old instinct to claim took hold.
“Mine,” the beast rumbled in his head.
“Oi,” a voice called out and Rune froze, his lips still pressed to Hadyn’s.
Gods help him, he’d lost sight of the threat. For a blink of an instant, but fuck, that made her treacherous to be near.
The effects of his calming her must’ve still held her in thrall, because Hadyn’s tongue tip sneaked out, tracing the seam of his lips, and his muscles clenched against the urge to lose himself again. One of them had to keep his head and get them the hell out of here.
Shifting his eyes, which he kept closed, he sent a thought to her.
“Stay still and quiet. They’re here.”
Hadyn tensed against him as his words penetrated and damned if his cock didn’t throb at the realization that she knew better than to move or make a sound, even in this moment. Despite his taking away her sense of fear.
The dragon coming from outside passed by their hiding spot with excruciating slowness. The tiny sounds of rocks sliding and boots scuffing the ground told Rune exactly where the asshole was. He moved around the bend in the tunnel, but Rune held himself in check.
“Oi,” the man called again. “Nothing from this end.”
Rune allowed himself one small smile of satisfaction. They weren’t out of jeopardy yet, but if that asshat could pass within twenty-five feet of them without sensing their presence, he wasn’t a tracker.
The fates seemed to be on Rune’s side, in this at least.
The throbbing desire still bombarding his body, all for a woman who belonged to a dead man…that was a complication he could have done without.
“When I say move, we go as quickly as we can while being dead silent toward the outside. Nod if you understand.”
Hadyn nodded against him, her fists curling more into his already crushed shirt. It appeared the relaxation from earlier was wearing off already. Rune ignored her and listened, waiting for the lone shifter to reach his two companions. Hopefully, they moved back into the mountain. He had to assume, though, that they’d come back to exit the mountain this way.