The shadows before them moved. For a heartbeat, he saw a dragon's wing spread—then the wing tensed, and the shadow was ripped apart. Instead, from the corner of his eye, he saw the shadow of a writhing serpent's tail appear.
“Come closer,” the chimera growled. “Let me taste the shadow within you. I have found the answer to what Steele has done—and if it is true, we are all in greater danger than I'd thought possible.”
Braeden pressed Alyx's hand, then released it.
Don't worry, he sent through the mate bond.
She was pale but gave him an encouraging nod. She'd lived through an entire lair of fire dragons. She could deal with this, too; he knew that.
He knew that she wanted to be here, with him.
But he still couldn't help but feel guilty for drawing her into this.
Braeden watched the shadows flicker as he stepped forward. He'd never seen the chimera. He'd only ever seen the twisting shadows.
Now, for the very first time, Braeden found himself drawn further forward. He moved closer and closer, until he stood right inside the flickering shadows that had always cloaked the chimera's appearance.
Suddenly, out of the darkness, a head came forward.
Braeden forced himself to stand still as he faced the chimera’s true form.
It was a dragon's head, eyes gleaming. The aura of power was so intense that Braeden had to grit his teeth against the sensation.
It wasn't like the power of his own element. The chimera’s power felt like lightning, sizzling along his skin, bursting with little shocks every time he took a breath.
He'd always known that the chimera was immensely powerful, but he'd never seen it. Now he was experiencing it firsthand.
The legend said that the chimera had once b
een a dragon as well. He hadn't found a mate, and his power had grown to a point when any normal dragon would've gone mad.
But for some reason, the chimera had managed to cling to his sanity.
It hadn't been his body that broke. It had been his soul. The dragon within him had splintered into a thousand shards, never to be made whole again.
And now, for the first time face to face with Gareth, Braeden could see just what that meant.
The chimera's body couldn't settle on an animal. The dragon's head before him shimmered only a heartbeat later and vanished. Instead, it was a lion's head that glared at him.
Then that was gone as well, and for a moment, Braeden saw the large, scaly body of a giant serpent.
Gareth shifted and shifted and shifted, his body never settling on a form for longer than a heartbeat or two. It was disorienting. At last, Braeden had to close his eyes, the dragon within him groaning in terror at the sight.
Could Gareth still feel the dragon within him? Or did it feel like a giant wound, his body broken again and again, never able to cling to his dragon for more than a second?
“I can feel it,” the chimera hissed. “Now hold still. This will hurt.”
Braeden clenched his jaw, determined not to show any pain. It didn't feel right—not in the face of the suffering of Gareth's soul.
But the chimera didn't show a sign of what the rapid shifting did to him. Instead, he reached out with his power. Even with his eyes closed, Braeden could feel it.
Gareth's power surrounded him, probing at him again. The sensation of lightning against his skin was nearly unbearable—and then it stabbed him like a knife.
Braeden bit back a cry, arching back as Gareth’s lightning-like power struck straight into his chest. At the back of his mind he could hear Alyx cry out at the agony pulsing through the mate bond.
Gritting his teeth, Braeden clenched down on the pain to shield Alyx from it. The fire within him flared up in instinctive reaction, trying to protect him from the chimera's power. Braeden forced the fire back down. He left himself utterly open and defenseless to the chimera.
And there, in his chest, he could now feel the shadow twist. The darkness that wasn't part of him—the taint of Steele, who'd managed to poison him with his shadows.