**This is the third book in the Elemental Dragon series. While it can be read as a standalone, references will be made to previous events that occurred in those books. It is recommended that you read The Arena and The Dark Protector before reading this book..........“Momma! I don’t want to eat, I want to fly!”“Ancalagon, if you don’t eat, eventually you won’t be able to fly. You’re a dragon, you have to eat.”It’s a constant fight to get my son to eat. You’d think as a growing dragon that he’d eat everything and maybe he will when he’s a little bit older, but ever since he flew with his father a few months ago, he’s wanted to get stronger.Ancalagon’s father, Avani, the last earth dragon, is not my mate. He found his mate after Ancalagon was conceived. I wasn’t around at the time. I had flown out to the desert to lay my egg and sit on it until Ancalagon hatched. Then, we stayed another month until Ancalagon was strong enough to fly. It had taken us a long time to get back here, to

I would hate my mate if I could. I want to blame him. I do blame him, but I know that it’s not all his fault that Ancalagon is gone. The probability that the hunters stumbled across my son, killed a herd of shifters and were prepared to transport a baby dragon while I was away for one night, is highly unlikely. So, I’m angry at myself for not realizing that I was being watched but I’m putting that blame unfairly on Ishir.When he comes for me, I can’t be with him. The pain in my heart, the agony of knowing that those hunters have my son, makes me unable to listen to Ishir. And why would he want me anyway. I’m a dragon. I’m supposed to be the strongest of the supernaturals. I’m supposed to be the protector of the supernaturals and I can’t even protect my own son. What man or shifter would want a mate that can’t protect their own child?No one, that's who.So rather than wait for his verdict that I’m not good enough for him, I leave. Okay, I knocked him off the mountain first. I couldn’

I think the owl had been a test. Oliver, that’s the guy’s name, wanted to see if I would actually do it. I did, I killed him with my bare hands, then I took a picture of his dead body, before racing off and vomiting on a mountain. The force of my dry heaves started an avalanche which thankfully covered what little I had vomited up.I send the picture to Oliver before deleting it from my phone. Then I stay on top of the mountain and begin a lament for the owl. He had been a kind shifter, and he had trusted me as all shifters will because I’m a dragon. I betrayed that trust and I hate myself for it. I can only hope that one of us can find Ancalagon quickly so I can stop this before I completely lose myself.The look on that owl’s face and his desperate “Why?” as I killed him, will haunt me the rest of my life.When I finish my lament, I shift back, waiting for instructions. It took me two weeks to finally be able to kill the owl and I haven’t seen my son in that amount of time. I have n

I can’t get the smell of blood off of me, the blood of the innocents that I’ve killed. I scrub and scrub, but their blood is still on my hands. I hate it, and I hate myself.None of them, not one, worried about being in my presence. Why would they, dragons have always been the protectors of the shifters, the strongest and most fierce of us all. And yet, as much as I hate myself, as much as I know I’ll be tormented for the rest of my life, I would do it all again, and I know I will have to, in order to ensure my son stays alive.Oliver had finally let me see him. He looked drugged when I saw him, but at least he was breathing. In the short time that I got to see him, I could see the sores around his mouth where he’s been fighting against the muzzle, see the bruises and patches of spots where the scales have worn away or been ripped out from the restraints that are holding him down.Afterward, I came back to the penthouse. It’s become my central point. So far, I’ve been lucky and haven’

I’m not sure I’ve ever broken down like I did with Ishir last night. And I know I’ve never let someone hold me, seeking them out to hold me while I cried. He thinks my sadness is due to my missing son, and most of it is. But the rest is about having to kill these shifters. Their pain and their cries are haunting my dreams. It seems that only Ishir can quiet them down, helping to bring me peace again. I had to leave early this morning, before Ishir woke up. I heard my phone ping with a text, and I knew who it was. Oliver. He gave me a new address to meet him at. I’m not sure what that means, but I have to assume that Ishir is closing in on him and he’s moving. It was news to me that he’s moving Ancalagon, and that Ishir has found a couple different places with his scent. I figured he’d brought him to the warehouse to get him in the city and then was housing him somewhere, although I’ve never been able to find out where. If he’s moving him, why doesn’t the video image of where they ha