The Protector (Fire's Edge #4) - Abigail Owen Page 0,63

her across a swath of empty sky. “Trust me.”

His thought pressed into her, just for her she knew, the same way she knew when any dragon was speaking to her directly. She just did. But this felt as though he’d added weight to the words, the heaviness of an emotion she couldn’t, or maybe didn’t want to, identify.

Lyndi nodded, not trusting herself to say more.

Still hovering before her, he turned his head, focusing on Finn. “You tell the Alliance that we took Tineen’s suggestion as an order and are escorting the boys to their individual clans for re-entry, personally.”

“But we don’t go to the clans?” she asked.

He trained copper-gold eyes on her, anger still glimmering at her like a wildfire in a distant field. “No. You disappear.”

You. Not we. Because he wouldn’t be here. He was leaving in the morning. A fact that, if she let it in right now, might tip her over into the abyss of utter emotional meltdown. “But the team. When the Alliance realizes we’re gone, it puts you back in the crosshairs—”

Levi gave a shake that almost appeared as though he was shimmying water off his scales. “With more than fifteen boys from every one of the six clans, it’s a trip that will take months. Even years, depending on how long you remain with each clan.”

“They’ll check with the White Clan to make sure we’ve gone there. With their headquarters so close to the land bridge, it only makes sense.”

“We say you’ve gone to the Red Clan first. It’s your clan, and with the High King there, plus the political tensions at this time, you wanted his blessing to cross boundaries with the boys.”

It made sense, taking advantage of the chaos the clans were in currently. Communications were rare from the Red Clan, from most of the clans really—the kings seeming to focus on their war and leaving the colonies to themselves—so the Alliance’s ability to follow her progress would be interrupted.

“But what about my—” She couldn’t even think the word.

Kanta spoke up now. “Of course you expected your mate to understand that you needed to settle your orphans first, and you wanted that done as quickly as possible, so you got started.”

“Good,” Finn said. “We’ll assure him that the mating can happen once you return.”

I’m going to spend the rest of my life running, and the boys with me. What kind of life is that?

But she couldn’t come up with any alternatives. This was it. It’s all she had.

“Lyndi?” Levi asked, his voice gentle inside her head. But he, maybe more than anyone else, even more than her brother, knew how much she’d dreaded this day.

“It’s the best idea I’ve heard,” she said. “Disappearing might be harder, with so many of us. Maybe if we split up—” She detested the idea of not being with every single one of those boys, but they didn’t have a choice here. “Mike, Attor, and Coahoma could each take a group maybe.”

“Actually…we want to stay here.” Coahoma’s voice entered the mix. Suddenly, all three of her boys on the team dropped down to face her.

Lyndi swallowed, likely her expression turning fierce. Along with Aidan, these men were the first she’d taken in. “Are you sure?”

“We’re part of the team now,” Attor said. “They need us.”

“It’s a risk,” she warned.

“We know.”

Damn Tineen. Damn the Alliance. Damn the High King and every single thing that had led her to this moment.

After a second, her heart shriveling even as pride in her boys kept it from turning into a dried-out husk, Lyndi nodded her agreement. They were old enough to make their own decisions now. No matter how it hurt to let them stay. “We’ll figure out the where and how as we go,” she said. “It’ll take days to get up to Alaska anyway.”

Buying her time to think, to plan.

“We’d better leave now. We don’t want to risk Mathai coming early or Tineen returning on some trumped-up reason.”

“Agreed,” Finn said.

“Not fucking agreed,” Drake snapped.

Her brother landed smoothly, incredible to see when only months before he’d been on death’s door. Mating truly was a miracle for their kind. One more thing she would never get to have.

Lyndi spiraled down to where he waited, landing just as smoothly. “You’re not going to talk me out of this,” she insisted as she stalked toward him.

Drake’s spikes rose straight up along his spine, a sure sign of his ire. “The hell I’m not. You don’t have to do this. The boys are old