Chapter Seven
For Iz, the realityof the situation didn’t creep back in until late that first night.
When Randolph Sebastian had steered her into this cage with a basilisk-wyvern fang at her back, Iz had been all too aware of her position. When the bars of the cage had stolen her power over her own body and shift form away from her, she had felt small and weak and confused.
Not to mentioninfuriated. Turning into a dragon was supposed to mean embracing herself and the strength buried inside her, and Sebastian had corrupted it to emphasize that she was powerless.
But all of those awful feelings had receded while she’d been talking to Logan.
He had distracted her from the crushing weight of all this. In the middle of the worst and most terrifying day of her life, he had made her smile.
But when it came to time to fall asleep ... that was when she remembered all this was a nightmare.
She was in a tiny cell at the heart of a stone labyrinth. She was now the crown jewel in the hoard of a dragon everyone had expectedherto catch.
They had almost been right. She had gotten closer to Randolph Sebastian than almost anyone—anyone since Logan.
She couldn’t avoid the uncomfortable truth that the only two people who had been able to find Sebastian had been swept right into his trap.
What if, as good as Cooper and his team were, they weren’t goodenough? Worse, what if they found her the same way she had found Logan—by getting thrown into the cage next door?
Those were the thoughts that had been swirling around in her head as she’d tried to sleep. Unsurprisingly, it hadn’t been the best night.
She wished she could talk to Logan about it, but hewassound asleep, and Iz considered it a majorfaux pasto wake anyone up when you didn’t absolutely have to—especially when you were waking them up tothis. She settled for listening to the sound of his breathing, which was soothing enough to lull her into a kind of free-floating inner peace even if it didn’t get her all the way to sleep.
It felt like she had only just dozed off when Sebastian came back.
“Good morning, Isabelle.”
Heclearly didn’t mind the inexcusable rudeness of waking people up. And at first glance, he even looked like he’d had a perfect night’s sleep, the bastard. His cruel, self-satisfied expression looked hale and healthy, and she could smell the delicate, tastefully chosen fragrances of his aftershave and cologne. He was wearing a silk ascot. Not even Iz’s corrupt fortune-hunting father had worn a silk ascot with this much ... attitude.
“I hope you had a pleasant first night at Casa de Randolph,” Sebastian said, his voice luxuriously smug.
Iz decided to hit him with another pointless-but-satisfying blast of dragonfire.
Shehatedthat she could understand everything he was saying but she couldn’t say anything back. It made her his unwilling, literally captive audience, and not even attempting to burn him to a crisp could make up for that.
Especially since he was completely unruffled by it.
“Such ingratitude when all I’ve done is bring you breakfast.”
Sebastian went to the door and retrieved a silver cart, pushing it in her direction.
The cart was loaded down with slabs of meat, so it moved slowly and creakily. There were steaks there that looked as thick as her arm.