“My brother wants to use Dani as bait to lure out Rindek.”
The Satyr’s eyes widened. “Your mother was looking for a way to save her. But this doesn’t sound like her idea.”
“Not likely, no. I don’t trust that Taran won’t try to get her killed as part of the bargain. I have gained permission to be there as her bodyguard.”
Jacques’s mouth straightened. “You are putting a lot on the line for this woman, my friend. I hope you know what you’re doing.”
Tyrez didn’t answer as he accepted the three new sandwiches from Cara and dug in. Salmon, this time. Must have cleaned out her stock of meat by now. Maybe he could earn some cash by doing odd jobs. Like grocery shopping.
Like he knew anything about shopping for groceries.
He sighed. And conceded that the Satyr had a point.
27
Dani blinked.
Another damned unfamiliar ceiling. Why did she keep waking up in strange places? This one had ornate plaster along the top of the walls and decorative features on the ceiling itself, but it was different from the Dragon’s architecture. Theirs had depictions of living creatures. These consisted of stylized flowers.
She was alone in the bed, but not in the room. The large, dark silhouette against the window turned out to be Tyrez.
“Good morning,” he offered. “Or rather, evening.”
She rubbed her face. “Which evening?”
“What do you remember?”
Dani frowned as she sifted through the fog. “Sirki and I went looking for you.”
The Dragon leaned back. “Well, you found me. Except Rindek beat you to it. Whatever possessed you to come looking for me? You should have sent a Legion soldier.”
“Well, we just wanted to question Jacques. Once we were there, we figured we’d see if you ran into trouble.”
“You and my sister came to help me.” It was a statement, not a question, as he raised a dark brow.
The inference fanned a spark of outrage. “Were you in trouble?”
His mouth twitched. “I guess that depends on your interpretation. But my trouble really started when you arrived.”
“Sirki said she had combat training. And I’m not exactly helpless, as you very well know.”
“Sirki sailed straight into a slave compound security grid without any attempt to disguise her arrival.”
Dani stared at him. “Was that what zapped us? Some kind of security system?”
The Dragon hesitated. “The grid was down by the time I got there. So no. What zapped Sirki was an energy pulse.”
“A weapon?”
He hesitated. “An energy blast.”
The Dragon seemed reluctant to discuss it. “So it didn’t matter that we sailed into the security grid.”
“No. Except your lack of stealth meant you also were spotted by Rindek.”
He was being an arrogant prick. Dani didn’t bother to squelch her surge of annoyance. She and Sirki had come after him because he’d been stupid enough to go haring off on his own. “Where the hell were you?”
He sighed. “I was buried beneath the rubble of that fortress.”
