Page 95 of Renegade Kings

“Sorry, I just got stuck in my head for a moment. I’m okay. You’re right, I know you are. I just worry about… all of them,” I admitted.

“Because you’re a good person,” Dean told me as he smiled and quickly kissed my forehead. “And you’re a good leader, too. They know it as much as I do. The fact that you care seems to be more than these people have had in a long time. I don’t think you realise how much that means to someone.”

I did realise. I’d been without it for so long that it had felt strange at first. But now that I had these men, my mates, I didn’t think I’d survive without them. Support meant so much more than I’d realised. That feeling of not being alone was priceless. And once I realised that, I saw just how right Dean was.

I hugged him quickly. “Thank you.”

“Get your butt up there,” he said in response, nodding towards the ladder he was still holding with one hand.

I quickly scaled the rope ladder and climbed over the ship’s railing as Ryder held out his hand to help me. I should have known from the grin on his face that something else was going on and it was only when I caught sight of Maddox slumped against the ship’s mast that I realised what it was.

Moving to his side, I squatted down and tried to suppress the smile from my face. “You doing okay?”

He looked at me like he couldn’t decide if he was going to throw up or if death would just be easier. “My lion… does not like this.”

Ryder snorted in amusement behind me, and I gave up trying not to grin. “I’m sure he’ll get used to it. You should head down into the hold and find a spot in the middle. You won’t feel the sway as much down there and it should help settle your stomach.”

He nodded in misery as he let me help him to his feet.

“Where’s Tank?” I asked, looking around and not seeing the massive bear shifter anywhere.

There was no way I’d risk any of us getting split up for the duration of this journey, not that it was going to take long. A few days at most.

“He’s down with Damon. It wasn’t easy to get him to settle and some of the others were nervous about him getting loose. The big guy watching over him seems to have helped,” Ryder told me.

Honestly, I was surprised that Rhidian didn’t have an entire regiment of guards around Damon. Or that Fizzle wasn’t advocating for it. Now that I was thinking about it, I was actually suspicious about what that could mean.

“Fucking prophecies,” I grumbled as I followed the guys towards the access to the ship’s hold where Damon was being held. “How does he seem?” I followed up with.

I’d never known Damon before whatever it was he’d been through here in Nymeria. I’d never have the picture of the man he used to be in my mind. Maybe that put me at an advantage, but I still wanted to get him back. I wanted my mates to have the brother they loved and respected back.

“He seems to be fighting it. There are times when he’s himself and others when he’s… I don’t even fucking know,” Maddox admitted as he paused at the top of the steps.

I could hear the frustration in his voice and I couldn’t imagine what they were all going through right now. This was supposed to be the end. This was what we’d come here for and now that we had Damon back with us, he might as well have still been in Arik’s grasp. Because the man locked in the cell below decks wasn’t the man they knew. He wasn’t the brother they needed back. And I had no idea if we’d ever be able to get him back.

“Do you think you can break the link with Arik?” Ryder asked quietly.

There was a hint of hope in his question. If anything, it seemed like he’d already resigned himself to the fact that Damon was lost.

It killed me to shake my head in response. “I don’t know. Whatever is going on with Damon doesn’t feel the same as it did with The Endless. I don’t understand the magic I can feel inside him. But I promise you I’ll do absolutely everything I can think of.”

I could tell by their faces that it didn’t make them feel better, and it killed me that I couldn’t promise them what they wanted.

Dean’s hand clasped my shoulder, and I felt his reassuring presence at my back. As Maddox and Ryder reached out for me too, I sighed. I didn’t realise how worried I’d been about not being able to fix this problem for them. How much the pressure had been weighing on me. And it had. How could it not?

I hadn’t done this to Damon, but I felt so responsible to fix it. It was my world that had tried to break him, to warp him into something he didn’t want or agree to. So it should be our responsibility to fix it. He’d been dragged into a fight he had no choice in, and I was so fucking tired of Arik’s need for power hurting every single person he came into contact with.

There had to be an end to it all, and I wanted it to start right here.

Chapter 36

Damon

Iheard their footsteps on the wooden stairs before I saw them. The giant beast of a man standing in the corner had been there when I’d come back to my senses, but the others had left. I couldn’t blame them. If anything, I was surprised they came back. Maddox needed to let me go. They all did.

I could see the pain in his eyes when he looked at me, and it killed me that I was putting my brothers through this.

A wave of pain blasted through my head and I gritted my teeth to keep the groan inside. I wouldn’t let them know how much pain I was in, and I wouldn’t stop fighting the worm in my head, either.