But Rune was depending on her. So were her parents.
There was no warning movement or sound, not a blink of the blank camera lens, nothing to warn her that the door was going to whoosh open to reveal two very tall men. Difficult to pinpoint eye color in the darkness, but she guessed maybe blue and green.
Neither one said a word. They stared at her with impassible expressions that didn’t give much away. Not as intimidating as Rune’s could be, though.
Slowly, trying to appear shaky, she got to her feet. “I was told that I am a dragon mate—whatever that is—and dropped off here,” she said, putting a deliberate wobble in her voice, keeping her expression and stance wary. Prey on the verge of running.
Don’t run, though, Rune had warned her. Because you’ll trigger instincts you don’t want to trigger. Things Chaghan and Qara had warned her about her entire life.
Terrific.
“Who?” Blue—or maybe green?—eyes asked.
“I don’t know. Some guy. Said he wasn’t getting involved. He made no sense.”
The two men exchanged a glance.
Hadyn wrapped her arms around her middle again, pretending to be in shock, sort of rocking her body. “Look. If you don’t know what he was talking about, can you at least help me get to a gas station or somewhere I can call a friend to come get me? I don’t even know where I am.”
“Where did this person pick you up?”
“Estes Park. Last thing I remember, I was walking around the lake there, then poof, I’m in the woods with some guy.”
Green Eyes lifted his head, sniffing the air in a way that reminded her of a fastidious little dog. “Doesn’t smell like a mate.”
“That’s what he said,” she muttered under her breath, as though she had no idea their advanced hearing would pick it up.
“Did you set a fire?” Blue Eyes demanded.
“What?” Hadyn straightened, pulling a frightened expression, or hoping it came off that way. “No. Why would you ask that?”
“She must’ve shifted?” green said to blue.
“Shifted?” She grimaced, trying for confused. “Look, you sound as crazy as he did. Just point me in the direction of a road. I’ll figure it out.”
“Better take her in and let the boss decide what to do with her.”
The boss? She did her best not to jerk in reaction to that. Who could possibly be in charge here now?
Blue Eyes stalked toward her, and, even expecting it, Hadyn had to fight down the sudden visceral reaction to run, the sensation trying to claw its way out of her gut. Instead, she froze, total cliché of the deer in the headlights. Deer got a bad rap for that. She totally got it now.
“Don’t worry,” Green Eyes said over his companion’s shoulder. “We can help you find your home.”
Interesting word choice. Enough to try to make a human woman relax while not exactly lying to her. Because, in the dragon’s mind, to be with his kind was taking her home. Her true home.
Blue Eyes grasped her arm with a surprising gentleness. “Let’s get you warm first. Are you hungry?”
The sudden switch from aggressively suspicious to solicitous would not have made her feel any better, were she a human woman without a clue as to what was going on. Neither would going into that dark hole of a cave. Most likely, humans would panic and try to jerk away, but Hadyn wanted them to lead her to her parents. That was the point. Rune would follow close behind, then get them all out.
Most mates were kept in the cells at first, he’d explained, until they calmed down and showed they believed what was happening. Usually by then, arrangements to take them to the Mating Council in France had been made.
She and Rune had discussed how to play this. As though her memory had been wiped by that previous “guy” who’d dropped her here. Making her voice thready and light, she went along peaceably, but also questioning. “How can you see in here? Is this a tunnel to another road? I’m not going to get hit by an oncoming train or anything right? Fellas?”
“This one talks a lot,” Blue Eyes, who still had her by the arm, shot at his friend.
Careful to keep her expression suitably confused, Hadyn didn’t argue. Instead, she let them tug her toward a growing light in the distance. Soft light, tinted more yellow, that moved and danced on the walls of the tunnel as they got closer.
A lantern. She’d seen a few similar ones in Rune’s mountain, come to think of it.
Huh. Looks like some dragons keep a bit of the old and new.
Not the most helpful of thoughts, she stuffed it down and focused as they reached the first corridor where they would turn to take her to the dungeons…only they passed it up.
From there, they made a series of turns which she repeated in her head. Second left, first right, third right, around the curve, up a single staircase, second left. What they didn’t do was take her where they were supposed to—across the skybridge to lock her up with her parents.
She shot a quick glance over her shoulder, seeing nothing but rock and darkness.
“I’m not leaving you,” Rune said.
Where was he anyway? She wanted to tell him to go, to find her parents, but she couldn’t say anything.
Fuck, as Rune would say.
Chapter Sixteen
Bloody hell. What am I supposed to do now?
As he followed Hadyn through the shadows, her face a pale beacon in the dim halls, he had to focus harder to keep hidden than he ever had before, physically holding his dragon back from rushing the two shifters who had her.
Rune mentally kicked his own ass for not realizing where they were taking Hadyn until too late. He’d thought perhaps they were going a different route to the dungeons. After all, his visits to this mountain had been limited, even when he’d been Finn’s beta. The second they’d entered the area of the mountain, clearly designed as living quarters deeper inside, his mistake had bitch slapped him in the face.
He had two choices.
Leave her with dragon shifters he didn’t know or remotely trust while he got her parents out on his own. Or…rescue Hadyn and reveal his presence here too soon, guaranteeing the need to drag their allies into the fight.
If he remotely trusted dragon shifters with unclaimed mates, he would’ve gone with option one. But he damn well didn’t. Those two could be wrestling over who got to try to claim her, taking her to a bedroom to force the change on her.
She would burn to ash.
One of them might hesitate when her faint marking showed. The loss of a piece of his soul, or the knowledge that he’d be taking a precious life, and stealing from one of his brethren, would hold back a good man.