Hidden Embers (16 page)

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there when Michael died.”

Every muscle in Quinn’s body tensed to the point of pain, but then he forced himself to relax. Ty wasn’t going to be the only person who wanted to talk to him about Michael in the next few weeks and months. Better to get used to it now than freak out every time it happened. But it still hurt. God, did it hurt.

“Quinn? Did you hear me?”

“I heard you.” His voice came out a lot more clipped than he’d intended, and he could feel Ty wince in the backseat. Struggling for something to say, he finally came up with, “You couldn’t have done anything. It was better for you to stay away instead of risking infection.”

“Is that what you think?” Ty’s voice was indignant.

Quinn glanced in the rearview mirror, watching as his patient struggled into a sitting position. “You should lie back down. You’re not completely healed yet.”

“You think I stayed away from Michael because I was scared of getting sick?”

“I think you stayed away because you couldn’t stand to watch him die. I understand that, even respect it. Believe me, if I could have been anywhere else but that hospital room, I would have been.” He kept his tone matter-of-fact, not wanting to antagonize Ty any further. The last thing he needed was for the guy to tear open his wounds.

“Oh.” There was a long silence. “Do you mean that? That you don’t blame me for not being there?”

“Why would I blame you?”

Ty shook his head, but didn’t say anything else for a long while. When he finally did speak, his words were so low that they were almost inaudible—even with the dragon’s superior hearing. “Because I blame myself.”

“Oh, Ty, don’t.”

“He was my best friend for over three hundred years. We were family. Don’t you think he wondered where I was? Don’t you think it hurt him to realize I wasn’t there?”

“Most of the time he was so out of it he didn’t know who he was, let alone who I was. In the end, I don’t think he even had the faculties to miss you.”

There was another long silence. Then Ty said, “That’s it? That’s the best you’ve got? Don’t worry about it, he was too insane to miss you, anyway? You think that’s supposed to cheer me up?”

Quinn smiled a little at Ty’s incredulous tone. “Why not? You said you felt bad for not being there for him. I told you he didn’t even notice that you punked out.”

“You know, your bedside manner sucks ass. Did anyone ever tell you that?”

“It’s been mentioned a time or two.”

Ty snorted. “I can only imagine.”

Convinced that he’d made his point regarding Ty’s guilt, Quinn didn’t say anything else as the cave’s entrance finally loomed in front of them.

Pulling his SUV to a stop several yards away from a small, dark hole rising out of the ground, Quinn turned off the ignition and hopped out. Before he could make it around to the passenger side back door, Logan was there to help—along with Ian and Riley, two more of Dylan’s sentries.

“I’m not an invalid,” Ty grumbled as he pushed himself up and out of the car. “I can get down there myself.”

“Yeah, well, consider us a little extra insurance,” Logan said with a grin. “You don’t want to fall on your ass and mess up all of Quinn’s hard work, do you?”

Ty flipped him off. “I’ve never fallen on my ass in my life.”

“Are you kidding me? I saw you do just that a few hours ago. You fell hard enough to put a dent in your head and your ass.”

“I don’t think you can really blame me for that. It was kind of hard to stay upright when my internal organs were spilling out of my abdomen.”

“Exactly,” said Riley, as he slid one of Ty’s arms around his shoulders. “And since it’s only been about two hours since you nearly expired in front of poor Logan, don’t you think you should cut the poor guy a break? I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to see that again.”

“True that,” Logan muttered, taking up a spot on Ty’s other side. Riley was one of the strongest dragons in the clan, and Quinn knew he didn’t need any help, but he didn’t stop Logan. The look on the other man’s face said clearer than words that he needed to be doing something to help, even if it was only getting Ty down into the cave. “I don’t know how the hell you do what you do, Quinn. I’d lose my fucking mind—not to mention my lunch—if I had to do that every day.”

“Yeah, well, what can I say? When you’ve got it, flaunt it.”

“Hey, shouldn’t that be Ty’s line?” Riley joked. “He was the one playing show and tell with his intestines a little while ago.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Ty said, but Quinn noted that his color was a little better and that he’d stopped protesting about the help. Logan and Riley’s Frick and Frack routine was obviously doing the trick, just as they’d intended.

The five of them made their way slowly into the cave that was Dylan and Phoebe’s real home—despite the house they kept in town—with Quinn walking a couple of steps behind the other three in case Ty slipped.

As they wound their way through the long, dark labyrinth-like hallways, Quinn used an old incantation to light the way. Not that they needed the light—they’d all spent hundreds of years negotiating the twists and turns down here. But with Ty so badly injured, Quinn wanted to make sure none of the men got tripped up on the various stalagmites and gypsum chandeliers that lined the hallways and most of the rooms in the cave.

Thankfully, they made it to the War Room with no incidents, and the second he entered the huge cavern, Quinn felt himself relax slightly. It was the largest room in Dylan’s cave, and the walls were embedded with precious jewels of sapphire and emerald, whose chemical properties lent a calming influence to everything that went on there. Throughout the room, Dylan had arranged a huge bar and lots of comfortable chairs and sofas, but true to form, most of the sentries who were already there were perched on the various rock and gypsum formations that dotted the cavern. Even in their human forms, they preferred the natural to the man-made.

Dylan himself was sitting in a huge chair at the front of the room, talking intently to Gabe, who was perched on a huge, flat stalagmite. Shawn and Caitlyn, two of the newest sentries but also two of the most powerful, were leaning against a wall and squabbling, as usual, while Travis, Paige, Jase and Shawn were deep in conversation as they lounged against a huge rock formation in the center of the room.

As they were the most tech savvy of the dragons—and the ones responsible for much of the clan’s security—he imagined they were probably trying to figure out how the Wyvernmoons had managed to breach the many technical and magical security safeguards they’d put into place in order to attack Ty.

Only Callie was by herself as she squatted next to the stream that ran along the back wall, rinsing her hands and face.

Quinn helped Logan and Riley get Ty settled on a cot Dylan must have had brought in for just that purpose, then followed Ian to the bar in the center of the room. Figuring he’d had more than enough tequila the night before—and tormented by the memory of how it had tasted warm from Jazz’s skin—he passed on the half-empty bottle of Patrón and went for a cold bottle of water instead.

He’d barely gotten himself settled at the front, near Dylan and Gabe, when the king’s voice rang out, filling every corner of the cavern. “There’s a traitor in Dragonstar.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

D
ead silence followed Dylan’s announcement, which was then replaced by complete pandemonium as ten of the dragons in the room started talking at the same time.

Quinn turned in his seat so that no one could see the “what the fuck” look he shot the king. Dylan’s answering smile was grim, his silver eyes ice cold. It was a look echoed on Gabe’s face, and the other sentry shook his head when Quinn started to ask who the traitor was.

After a couple minutes of listening to his sentries’ confusion, Dylan held up a hand. “I know that it’s hard for any of you to imagine someone betraying Dragonstar. It’s hard for me to imagine such a thing too. But Gabe and I have been aware of the possibility for a while. This latest incident just confirms what we already suspected.”

He stood up, and walked to the center of the room. “Someone is betraying us. At the very least, this person is giving the Wyvernmoons information about us, information that is being used to infiltrate our safeguards and hurt our people. At the worst, he or she is actively conspiring to hurt us and is, in fact, acting as an agent for the Wyvernmoons. Either way, this person must be stopped.”

“Do you know who it is?” demanded Jase, who looked ready and willing to be judge, jury and executioner. As the youngest sentry, he was still something of a hothead—but he was also hell on wings in a fight. More than once, he’d saved Quinn’s ass when a battle went to shit.

“If we did, he’d already be dead,” Gabe answered, and Quinn couldn’t help admiring Dylan’s shrewdness in letting Gabe be the one to make that announcement.

Kings were meant to lead and to protect. When they found the traitor, Dylan would be the one who dealt with him, but until that time was upon them, he needed to avoid speaking about the killing of one of his people so casually. Much better to let Gabe be the one to keep the idea front and foremost in the sentries’ minds.

“It’s someone relatively high up,” Dylan said. “Someone who knows which safeguards we’ve used to protect ourselves—and someone who knows exactly how to break them.”

“But that’s impossible,” protested Caitlyn. “The only people who know that information are sitting in this room. Surely you’re not accusing one of us—”

“Don’t be stupid,” Shawn growled. “Dylan knows better than to think we would betray the clan.”

“Does he?” Callie asked, jumping to her roommate’s defense as she straightened from her spot near the stream. “Because from where I’m sitting, he doesn’t look nearly so sure.”

“Well, then, you’re stupid,” chimed in Ian, his gold eyes glowing brightly in the dim room. “Dylan knows other people know the safeguards. He doesn’t think we would turn on him or the clan. Especially not now.”

“Don’t be so sure,” stated Riley, his huge hands clenched into fists. “I think it makes sense for him to be suspicious. Someone is selling us out to the enemy, someone who has freedom of movement. Someone whose actions won’t be called into question, even if they show up at the wrong place at the wrong time. Who else but one of us has that privilege?”

The tension in the room soared as the sentries all turned to Dylan. Quinn didn’t like the looks on their faces—everything from anger to betrayal to outright disbelief that their king would think they were capable of such a thing. He wasn’t crazy about the accusation himself, but he knew Dylan well enough to know that if his friend was thinking along those lines it was because he had a very good reason.

Instinctively wanting to soothe everyone before things reached the breaking point, Quinn sent out a healing wave meant to calm tempers and bring clarity. He kept it subtle—very subtle—not wanting anyone to pick up on what he was doing, but from the look Logan shot him, it was obvious his touch wasn’t as light as he’d hoped.

But no one said anything, and he watched as, one by one, fists unclenched, claws retracted and tense shoulders relaxed. They were still angry, still demanding an explanation, but none of the dragons looked like they wanted blood anymore. At least not yet.

“Clan doesn’t betray clan,” Dylan’s voice rang out. “Isn’t that the code we live by? Your clan is your family. They’re who you lean on, who you fight with—who you fight for. They’re who has your back when no one else does.”

He stood up, strode to the middle of the room, using the power of his huge frame and mighty charisma to command every eye in the place. “That’s the code I stand for, the code I know you stand for as well. We’ve lived that way for thousands of years, and for thousands of years, it’s worked.

“But just because we believe it, just because we would die to keep our clan and our people safe, doesn’t mean that everyone feels the same way.

“Do you think I stand here and accuse one of my own people of being a traitor lightly? Do you think I want to even imagine that someone is working with our sworn enemies to defeat us?

“This clan is everything to me.
My people are everything to me
. I have lost my parents to the enemy. I have lost my brother, who was meant to be king before me. In the last three months I have also lost my sister, my niece and three of my sentries to this enemy.

“In the last three months,” his voice boomed across the cave, bouncing off walls and filling every nook and cranny, “I have lost one hundred and twenty-seven of my people to this enemy. I know the names of every single one of them. I have been to each of their funerals, visited with every single one of their families. Can any of you, besides Quinn, say the same?

“Do you think, for one second, that I want to imagine that one of my own has been a party to this? That someone I have trusted, someone in whose hands I have rested my entire clan’s fate, has betrayed me? Betrayed us? If you believe that, then you are not the men and women that I have worked and fought beside for centuries, and I am not the king you have chosen to serve.

“I do not appreciate the accusations, any more than I appreciate the lack of faith some of you are showing in me. So I will make this offer and I will make it only once—you know the way out. If you want, feel free to use it now.”

No one spoke, no one moved, and for a few seconds, Quinn didn’t think they even breathed. When no one started for the door, Dylan’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Know this, if you stay. If you listen to the evidence Gabe and I have accrued and still believe that we are wrong, you will not be allowed to leave later. Not until the traitor is caught. Not until our enemy is vanquished.

“It is my duty—and my right—to protect my people to the best of my ability. I would die for them, would die for you. I am lenient on many things, but I will not tolerate betrayal, not when it risks the very fabric of this clan. So make your decision now—get the hell out or stay and help me find the person, or people, who have sold their souls to our enemy.”

When he finished speaking, Dylan waited a few moments to see if anyone was going to take him up on his offer. When no one immediately headed for the door, Dylan inclined his head, then walked through it himself.