Lion Conquers All by Krystal Shannan

27

AARAV

It’d taken over an hour of Col’s dragon digging for the mountain to stop falling. But as soon as Col had shifted into a man, the tribe had returned to his side.

The tree Callum and the other wolves said stood close to the mouth of the cave was all but uncovered. The trunk was battered and gashed, branches had been stripped off, but the marker still stood and it gave them hope they were getting closer.

“Can you hear anything yet?” Owen asked, shoving a large hunk of granite away from the cave.

“No.” Col’s face was grim. The unspoken truth none of them wanted to face was written in his expression—that they might be too late.

“This is the mouth, we’ve made it.” Callum dug at smaller bits of rock at the very top of the heap until his arm disappeared between the stones. “If we can get this opening just a bit wider I can get in and look around for them.”

Col climbed up the jagged pile of rocks and pulled at the ones nearest Callum. Aarav waited at the bottom. His heart climbed up into his throat. His pulse pounded so loud in his head he couldn’t hear anything else.

They had to be alive. Please let them be alive. After all this time.

Shenn put a hand on Aarav’s shoulder.

Veer leaned against his other shoulder.

The others stood close too.

They all just waited.

And waited.

“I can fit now. Let me me try.” Callum slithered past Col, past the rocks, into the darkness. “Does anyone have a light?”

Col whirled to look at them and Aarav reached for one of the zippered pockets on his pants. He had a flashlight. He remembered putting it there from the patrol car.

Owen beat him to it. The big grizzly pulled a flashlight out of a backpack and scrambled up the rock pile to Col.

It was handed off to Callum and Col directed Owen to help him continue to move rocks, but not wildly. They strategically pulled them down and tossed them off to the side of the pile. The dark hole at the top widened further and further.

“They’re here. I found them.” Callum’s voice called from inside the cave. He was close enough to be heard, but deep enough that his voice was small.

Thank Fate.

Aarav breathed just a little easier.

“Stay out here.” Col looked at them and then climbed through the opening after Callum.

“Get up here and help me.” Owen waved them up the rock pile. Aarav was first at Owen’s side. Col was just on the other side of the opening. He had a female’s body in his arms, Gretchen Hardisty, and was feeding her through the hole to them.

Owen took her shoulders and Aarav reach up to support them next. Hand to hand, she was ferried down from the rocks to the ground. They repeated the process with the boy, Sam Roberts.

It was them.

Aarav recognized them from their photos.

The teenagers were alive, but just barely. Their pulses were weak and their breathing was ragged. Both of them were wrapped in silver sleeping bags that looked like aluminum foil, the kind that survivalists pack to stay safe from freezing temperatures. And it was likely that had saved their lives through the storm.

“The air was thin in the cave. They should do better now that they are outside.” Col crawled through the opening and then turned around, offering his hand to Callum who took it and scrambled out behind him.

“No blood.” Owen stated as if that meant they were perfectly fine.

Aarav and his brothers and the other wolves laid the kids out flat on a bit of softer ground. They checked for broken bones. Swelling. Anything that would indicate a serious injury. There was nothing.

“They’re cold, but we can’t find any injuries.”

“Good. That’s good.” Col hurried to their side and knelt between them, putting a hand on each of the kids’ chests. His hands brightened with the power of his dragon’s flame and heat radiated out like a roaring wood stove.

“The girl has some pink coming back to her cheeks. It’s working.” Aarav looked over at the boy. His skin was still so pale. “Not Sam.”

Col closed his eyes and brought more flame to the surface. The whole area where they knelt around the kids melted. A twenty-foot clearing without a single snowflake. The heat even dried the earth beneath their feet. It felt like home. The dry heat of the desert rolled against Aarav’s face in gentle waves. It even smelled a little like home.

“I didn’t know how much I missed that intense heat. The dryness of the Reylean desert just isn’t in the Alaskan weather routine.”

Col looked up and met Aarav’s gaze. He smiled, a sad smile that spoke of shared loss and memories.

The others murmured sounds of agreement.

“They’re rousing. Breathing is better.” Veer spoke, his tone filled with hope. “Pulse is improving for both now, not just the girl.”

“I will shift and take them back. Sam’s mother is at our cabin waiting.”

“Gavin is at the community center. But Connie and I can take Gretchen into town once we’re back to the cabins.”

“Very good.” Col stood and walked away from the group. At a safe distance he shifted back into his dragon form.

They stood and backed away from the children so Col could pick them up.

Col’s dragon was so gentle and careful with their bodies. Until today, when Col had taken his brother and that hunter, Aarav had never realized how gentle the dragon form could be.

Col’s dragon held out and cupped one front claw, scooping up each child. When they were situated safely, he closed his talons a little more on that foot, creating a cage, and pulled the claw to his chest before spreading his wings and launching himself into the sky.

“Let’s go, shall we?” Knox rolled his neck, cracking a few vertebrae before shifting into his giant white wolf.

Aarav’s lion pushed. It wanted to get back to Connie. There was a kiss she needed. The reminder sent Aarav into his beast without a second thought. He leapt past Knox and took off.

The others weren’t far behind. They weren’t being quiet or stealthy. Not this time. This time they were headed home and they were crashing through the brush and snow banks and down the side of the mountain like they owned it—right now they did.

They had owned this mountain. They’d found the kids. They’d been alive. It was a win.

Except that hard pit had returned to his stomach. And his heart was clawing its way back into his throat. Every second that ticked by sent them closer to having to deal with the town and the secrets the Reyleans had been trying desperately to keep hidden.

Aarav worried that today’s win might lead to a loss tomorrow he wouldn’t be able to survive.