Panting hard, Artem ignored the pain of the mesh reforming to his new shape and shook head, forcing one of the barbs out of his cheek by scraping it against the road. He ignored the way the asphalt bit into his naked skin. He even ignored the guns. Nothing but Paloma mattered.
“You,” he growled through the gap in the mesh around his mouth and nose. “Fucking listen to me!”
A gloved hand grasped his jaw, pinching until the insides of his cheeks bit into his teeth. Black claws dug into the skin as the captain turned Artem’s head more fully toward him. “Never known a rogue to shift and start making demands before.” The modulated voice might have been amused, if only it didn’t sound so infuriatingly robotic.
Speaking through the discomfort, Artem spat out, “There’s an m-storm brewing right over your head. I’m not a rogue. Not anymore. I’m just trying to save my mate! You need to call a Spot Unit!”
The helmeted elf tilted his head to one side. Another flash of lighting reflected on the smoky glass hiding his face. “There are no registered dragon residents in this area, but there is a m-weather research station. We haven’t received any word of a spontaneous ev—”
“Paloma’s relays lost signal during the blizzard!” Artem jerked against his bonds, too frenzied to do more than attempt brute force. “There’s a cluster right over your fucking heads and if I don’t get help or get her out, she and everyone in town are going to die!”
The captain turned his head to the soldier standing next to him, bolt gun raised. Artem got the feeling that they were communicating, but their helmets were probably programmed to keep inter-unit conversation muted.
After an infuriatingly long few seconds, the captain turned back to Artem. “You know Doctor Paloma Contreras, the arrant assigned to the Pineridge research station?”
Artem lifted his lip to snarl at the elf. “That’s my mate. My mate, who is going to die if you don’t let me go!”
The captain sat back on his heels once more. Withdrawing his hand from biting range, he lifted it to touch the underside of his helmet, just below his chin. There was a low, hydraulic hiss as a latch released. Using a clawed thumb, the captain lifted the helmet up and off of his head.
A deep cobalt face stared down at him. Shiny locks of the darkest blue, shaved close on the sides and mussed from his helmet, sprang from the top of his head. A silvery scar bisected his forehead, left eyebrow, and the top of his cheek. Artem knew the tremendous force it would take to scar an elf like that — and what it meant that the captain didn’t bother having a healer see to its removal.
The captain’s eyes were a flinty, vivid blue that gave nothing away. Artem’s instant impression was that this man was a seasoned soldier who wouldn’t think twice about putting him down if he deemed it necessary.
“Now, we can’t have that,” the elf drawled. Artem blinked, momentarily surprised by the twang he detected in the elf’s unmodulated voice. “You’re trespassing in elvish territory, dragon, but I’ll give you a temporary pass if you explain what in Glory’s name is going on here.”
“Let me go,” he grunted. “Let me go and I’ll explain.”
The elf raised his scarred eyebrow. “No.”
Artem slammed his shoulder against the asphalt and bellowed, “Look! Look at the sky! Can’t you see it? Smell it? Fucking anything?”
The captain glanced up, but if he saw anything unusual, he didn’t show it in his expression. “Weird weather, but not unusual for this area.”
“Godsdamned weak-eyed elves.” Artem glared through a hole in the mesh. “There’s a cluster right here, right now, captain. If we don’t move, you and everyone in that town are going to be blown to pieces.”
And he’d die before he just let that happen.
As Artem struggled against the mesh, the captain stood up and walked a few paces away to speak to another soldier. One of the squadron nudged his shoulder with the tip of a boot. “Stop squirming, dragon,” a new modulated voice commanded. “You’ll only cause yourself discomfort.”
Artem shifted until he lay partially on his side and glared up at the soldier. Lean and tall, they stared back at him from over the barrel of their gun. “I’m not going to stop. Not until you let me get my mate. Don’t you elves understand matehood? Don’t you know?”
Truthfully, Artem didn’t have the faintest clue if the elf could possibly understand what it felt like to have a mate, to know that they were in mortal danger while he remained helpless. Rumors were that elves had a compulsion just like many of the races that lived and ruled the UTA, but the damn tight-lipped bastards never would confirm or deny it.
But going by the way the elf standing in front of him stiffened, he thought the rumors weren’t far off.
“Once we assess the threat, we will investigate—”
“Investigate? Investigate?” Artem let loose a rattling hiss of pure blue fire. If his tail was free, it would have lashed back and forth with barely subdued violence. “My mate will be dead by the time you finish your investigation! And so will you!”
“Doubtful. It takes a lot more than bad weather to kill an elf.”
Gods save me from the arrogance of elves! Artem glared, hissing, “Wanna test that theory?”
He watched a gloved hand tighten on the butt of the gun. “Dragon, do not—”
A sharp whistle cut the elf off. Instantly on alert, the soldier took one precise step back as the captain came striding back. Casting the soldier a sharp, reproachful look, he said, “We can’t reach Dr. Contreras by phone or by relay to confirm your information, dragon.”
Artem felt like he couldn’t breathe for the panic that was quickly overtaking him. Every second he spent on the ground, every minute he argued with these elvish soldiers instead of getting help or just flying off with his mate in his claws, was another moment lost. A dragon was supposed to protect his mate above all things. To fail so soon after Choosing her, after being Chosen by her…
The thought damn near choked the life out of him.
In a voice that was all broken fury, he begged, “Please, I don’t care what you do to me after — just let me save my mate. Nothing else matters to me. Please.”
There was no flicker of compassion in the captain’s eyes. There was no sympathy or understanding. He was too well-trained to show any reaction to a proud dragon’s begging, save for an almost imperceptible shift in his body language.
“The safety of our citizens comes first,” he crisply replied. “We can deal with you after—”
A huge crack of unnatural lightning, lit blue and green and vivid magenta, sliced through the darkened sky to strike the rocky floor of the gorge. Every soldier on the bridge turned as one to level their guns on a threat they couldn’t fight. Artem gasped and turned his head as much as he was able to peer over his shoulder, his dread a solid knot in his stomach.
Behind him, the lightning bolt hovered, frozen mid-strike. All around it, dozens of other, smaller bolts sizzled in the air, casting a terrible glow over the bridge. And beyond that awful, astounding sight, a single white truck barreled down the road and onto the opposite side of the bridge — a dragon, wings pulled up high and one clawed hand dug into the metal roof, standing in the bed.