“Okay,” Danny whispered, sounding very small and scared. “I have to put the phone down. You won’t go away, will you?”
“I promise, I’ll be here. I’ll won’t leave you, ever.”
Distantly, he was aware of curling into a ball, fur and feathers ripping from his skin, joints snapping and contorting. But as long as he could still speak, everything else was irrelevant. He ignored the pain, ignored his beasts, ignored whatever was happening to his tortured body. Nothing mattered except Danny.
Even though Reiner had broken their pride-bond, he could still feel an echo of it, like a phantom limb. Griff focused on it fiercely, blocking out everything except that faint, tenuous link. He sent all his own strength, all his pride, all his courage down that slender connection.
*We can see the house.* Ash’s mental voice sounded faintly in his head. *We are nearly there, Griff. Tell him to hold on just a few moments longer.*
“I did it!” Danny’s voice came back, much stronger than before. “The smoke’s not coming in so fast any more.”
“Well done, lad,” Griff gasped. “My friends are nearly there. Just hold on.”
“Mr. Griff, are you okay? You sound funny.”
“Don’t worry about me.” A primal fire was roaring through his blood, devouring his consciousness. He fought for just a few more seconds of lucidity. “Crawl over to the window. Can you
see my friends yet?”
“Umm…no. Just—” Without warning, Danny shrieked.
“Danny?” The line had gone dead. “Danny!”
*I’ve got him!* Dai’s triumphant telepathic roar echoed around Griff’s shattering mind. *We’ve got him, Griff. He’s safe.*
That was all Griff needed to hear.
Danny’s safe. I can let go now.
His beasts rose up, and devoured him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Danny
No one was listening to Danny.
He tried again. “Please, Dr. Hugh. I just want-”
“Don’t try to talk yet.” Dr. Hugh’s white hair kept changing color, red-blue-red-blue, in the whirling lights of the fire engines. His hands felt nice on Danny’s neck, a tingly sort of warmth driving away all the soreness. “You’ve breathed in a lot of smoke. Just hold still while I fix it.”
“He needs to get to hospital!” Daddy snarled at Dr. Hugh. “Where’s the damn ambulance?”
“How should I know?” Mr. Hugh snapped, glaring right back as if he wasn’t scared of Daddy’s lion at all. “For the last time, move away. You’re giving me a migraine, hovering so close. I can’t work with you breathing down the back of my neck.”
Daddy didn’t budge one bit. He’d run out of the woods right as Mr. Dai was putting Danny back down on the ground, and he hadn’t let go of Danny’s hand ever since. Danny didn’t mind, not now that Daddy was back to being just Daddy again. Daddy was much nicer when he wasn’t pretending to be an alpha. He didn’t even seem mad about Danny burning up his house.
Danny hoped he wouldn’t be mad about Mr. Dai knocking down the wall, either. Turned out that dragons were real strong.
Danny kicked his feet impatiently, willing Dr. Hugh to hurry so that he could talk. He stared out the back door of the fire engine, watching all the firefighters run around through the smoke and rain. Danny wasn’t quite sure why so many of them had decided to turn up, when Mr. Griff’s friends had already rescued him.
He also didn’t understand why they were all rushing around so excitedly. Mr. Ash and Sir John were doing all the real work, after all. They weren’t making any fuss about it, either. Well, Sir John was singing, but that was a nice noise, not like all the yelling the other firefighters were doing.
Danny wished they would all quiet down so that he could hear Sir John better. Maybe if he could learn the words, he’d be able to make it rain by singing to the clouds too. He’d have to ask Sir John to teach him, some other time.
“Danny!”
Danny’s stomach flipped over at Mommy’s scream. She sounded as scared as if she was trapped in a fire.