“Please,” Brandt whispered. He prayed for time to pass swiftly as he clung to Manning.Odin! Gods! Anyone? Dracco?“Please bring Kay home.”
Manning
How could Fate be so cruel as to put them in the same situation again?
Right before his eyes, Manning watched his husband break, his own heart crumbling in despair. What could he say? He’ll be fine? We’ll find him? Don’t worry? None of that would make him feel better, and so Manning said nothing.
His mother held him as Orm in his hulking green drakken form tore through the atrium. Men screamed. Men died. For nothing but pettiness and speciesism. A blue and a red drakken charged past their huddle. Manning stared over his guards' heads, trying to figure out who they were. When a purple drakken joined the fray, along with Ivar’s fierce shout of “Lian!” Manning connected the dots. Father Lyurn and Father Tailyn had become fierce protectors of Manning and Brandt since they’d joined with Kayluth as sobroke and especially after the birth of their grandbabies. It made sense they’d shift to protect their sons-by-marriage.
“I yield!” Dagr shouted and the sounds of fighting dimmed. Bjorn pushed at the Drakken guards, and they reluctantly parted, giving Manning a direct view of his father trapped beneath the blue-scaled, clawed foot of Father Tai.
“You’re a fool, Father,” Bjorn spat, striding toward Dagr. Manning slipped away from Svandis to follow, Brandt on his heels. The Drakken swiftly formed a protective phalanx around them.
“Me?” Dagr chuckled, pushing ineffectually against Tai’s foot. “I don’t think so. I got what I wanted.”
“And what was that?” Bjorn stood over their father. “Because from where I’m standing, I only see a dark dungeon ahead for you. You can kiss that sweet room of yours goodbye.”
“Revenge on Svandis.”
Behind Manning, Svandis gasped. She shuffled past Manning and stared down in horror. “What? Why? I gave you our sson to raisse.”
Dagr sneered. “And because you did, he and Bjorn usurped my throne. Had you kept him far away from here, none of this would have happened? I would still be king, and Tore would succeed me in time.”
Father Kel laughed. “A fool, indeed. Odin and Dracco would have sseen to your de-mize.”
“Doubtful,” Dagr scoffed, unrepentant, not that Manning expected he would be. His father had always hated him, he just hadn’t known why until recently. He’d always thought it was because his arrival had upset the tentative peace he’d established with his councilors after the death of his consort. Dagr hadn’t known Manning was half-Drakken, he’d simply been furious he’d had a bastard to raise as speculation rose about who Manning’s mother was and whether they’d have a chance to push their own daughters into the king’s purview.
“What do the gods care about us mere mortals? Nothing.” Dagr pushed at Tai’s claw cage. “Let me up.”
Bjorn motioned for the Drakken guards to grab Dagr as Tailyn lifted his foot. They lifted Dagr under the arms, clear off the ground. “Take him down to the dungeon and then inspect his room.”
“I’ll see it done, Your Majesty,” Ivar said, stepping forward. He bowed to Bjorn then Manning and Brandt. “My Vidar.”
“Thank you, General, and…” Manning sighed, “I’m sorry we caused Lian’s early turn.” Manning squeezed Ivar’s shoulder, looking over everyone’s head at Lian’s striking iridescent purple form. Drakken usually remain in human form for the first month before taking their drakken forms for the next two months, during which they would bear the egg containing their offspring. Because Lian shifted now, she wouldn’t be able to shift back. The same had happened to Kayluth when Manning had been kidnapped. Manning really wasn’t liking how history was repeating itself.
“I wouldn’t have stopped her.” Lian’s purple snout bumped Ivar’s back and he stumbled forward. Ivar turned and rubbed her snout. “She’s protective of her family, as Vidar Kayluth was—is!—as your Drakken family is. We’ll find them.”
Brandt sidled up next to Manning, and he leaned against his husband. “We know you will.”
The guards parted and Sekvyn made his way to them. “The gardens, my kings. Our men were stunned and left where they fell. Only Kayluth and Tyr were taken. We found the ground disturbed outside a small shed and inside discovered a ladder leading down into an underground tunnel. I’m assembling a team now to follow.”
“I’ll accompany you,” Seraphina said, shoving Drakken aside to reach them. They bowed to her in a depth Manning hadn’t seen before, only then did he notice her bloodied blade, crimson streaks staining the steel. He too, bowed slightly in deference to her service.
Though Dagr and those following him meant to do harm, knowing that some of them would never see another dawn chilled his core. Bloodshed was just one of the many reasons why he knew he could never be King of Volé. He lacked the ruthlessness Dagr and Tore had, nor did he have the willingness to bring justice in whatever form needed that Bjorn had. Manning had complete faith in his brother, believing Bjorn could dispense justice with a fair hand.
Brandt straightened as he took in Seraphina’s blood splattered clothes. “I’ll go, too.”
Though those around him shouted their refusal, and Manning longed to add his voice to theirs, he held his tongue. Brandt had confided in them, curled in the birthing nest after the babes’ birth, pillowed between Kayluth’s forelegs as they watched their children sleep, how he grated at a perceived confinement when Manning had been taken. He’d known his duty—he couldn’t leave Kayluth alone, pregnant and stuck in his drakken form.
Manning faced Brandt, taking his hands and raising them between their chests. He stared into the green-gold depths of Brandt’s eyes, hoping he’d see reason without Manning having to say anything. However, his husband gazed steadily at him, mouth set in a firm line.
“Let me go,” Brandt begged in a near whisper. “Please.”
“What of me and your children?”
Brandt’s eyes closed, then he scrunched his face and groaned. “Let me go.” Green-gold flashed as he snapped open his eyes. “Give me your blessing.”
A hard lump formed in Manning’s throat; tears misted his vision. He wanted to say no, to scream it. Kayluth had been the one taken, but if Brandt left, Manning would be the one alone. Again. When Tore had him kidnapped and he’d been without his husbands, family or friends, he’d fought to stay alive. Locked in that cell, the despair of never seeing his sobroke or children had almost annihilated him. He’d sworn to Odin that if they were reunited, he’d never allow anything to part them.
