Devoted to the Dragon (The Last Shifters #1)

31. Randi

Chapter 31

Randi

T he fire in the hearth of my dragon’s nest crackles, and I stare at it in a daze. Gunnar and Fennik chat in the background as they try to scrounge together a snack in my bare kitchen. The gifts from the serpent feel dangerous in my hand, ticking bombs ready to go off.

I’m still reeling over today, shaken by the fact that my dragon flew my mates here instead of the lair. I’m pretty convinced she’s been body-snatched, even if today was a nice reprieve from all the shit going on. It felt good to relax and play, to let my dragon’s worries and thoughts overtake my own. Still strange body-snatching shit, but nice.

She huffs at me in exasperation and retreats to the recesses of my mind, tired but incredibly pleased with herself.

The clock is ticking. The full moon is less than a week away now. That means I’ve got to decide what to do about all this, and I don’t feel any closer to a decision. How ironic that the tables have turned and now that my dragon is ready, I’m not.

I take a deep breath and open the treaty first. It’s a legal contract, full of complicated language that amounts to a surprisingly generous offer. The serpents have pledged money for aid for the crisis facing the wolves, promises to stop trading weapons to the Alpha King’s successors or his territories, serpents for battle should we need them, trade routes through shifter territory, and business partnerships in the future. It even includes the aid of their shadows in helping to produce the magic for a Thunder, something it looks like they were planning to do with the King.

Too bad I don’t trust a word. What could a treaty mean for a people with no honor?

Gunnar carries a massive tray of food laden with fruits and honey, nuts, dried meats, and cheeses.

“Where did all this come from?” I ask as he sets the tray in front of the fire.

He looks at me quizzically. “Is that a trick question?”

Fennik peeks around the cavern wall. “Vandera stocked your kitchen. She left a note and some tea.”

I shake my head. Of course. My witchy friend always seems to know a little more than she lets on.

Gunnar grabs some of my nest blankets and pillows, making a soft pallet on the floor by the fire. I join him, pulling my blanket tighter around me. Gunnar holds out his fingers, giving me nibbles of sharp cheeses, salty meats, and sweet berries between his own bites.

Fennik hands us steaming cups of tea before he stretches out on the blankets. “What does it say?” He nods toward the treaty.I hand it to him, and he looks it over, his brow furrowing. “What do you think? This is one heck of a deal. They only ask that you allow serpents to petition to live in the territory.”

My mates eye me warily, and I shrug. “If it’s that good, it’s probably a trick.”

“If it’s true, would it be good for the territory? Good for wolves?” Gunnar asks. He shakes a handful of nuts in his palm, then tosses a few into his mouth.

When I hesitate, Fennik answers. “Yes, pup, but Randi is right. We don’t know if we can trust them at their word.”

The velvet bag is heavy in my hand, and its weight makes me want to scream.

“He said those were like the fang.” Fennik’s statement is a question.

“They’re laced with a spell. When I touch one, I’ll see what he’s encased in the stone.”

Gunnar cocks his head, and I can’t help but smile at the wolfy gesture. “Is that a serpent thing?”

I nod.

“What’s their deal anyway? With the smoke. Do they actually turn into serpents?”

“No, little wolf.” I indulge his curiosity, trying to explain what I remember. “The serpents were the last made, though it was well before I was born. Loki made them after he learned his father had tasked Thor with making the krakens. Unlike the great shifters, the serpents don’t have a true animal spirit. When they shift, it’s the embodiment of shadows that take a serpent-like form.”

Gunnar runs his fingers through his beard, shaking his head. He’s so damn cute the way he worries over the information. “Yeah, still don’t get what you mean by shadows. I swear, every time we talk about this stuff, I realize I don’t know anything about our world.”

Fennik chuckles and leans over me to grab a handful of snacks from the tray. “I’d never heard about any of it either. Not until Randi.”

Gunnar relaxes at that, looking at me to continue.

“People call them many names in the legends: sex demons, incubus or succubus, dream- or shadow-walkers. These are all references to the serpents,” I explain.

Fennik pauses, the wolf shining in his gaze. “Can he infiltrate your dreams?”

I shake my head in reassurance. “Theoretically, but it’s a difficult skill to master. I don’t know if he can or if any of the serpents have retained the power.”

Gunnar, always curious, asks a follow-up question, head cocked to the side. “How does it work?”

“They can walk between light and dark, move their form to travel great distances, and emerge somewhere else. Sometimes, the somewhere else is a dream. The sex demon part is actually not accurate. It’s not just sex. Their powers are in feeding off emotional energy and in using their smoke to create emotional atmospheres that influence people. As the spawn of a trickster, they also create illusions.”

Gunnar whistles.“So, really fucking powerful?”

I wince. “Yeah. Pretty much.”

“Am I allowed to say it’s also kind of badass?” he asks.

Fennik throws an almond at him, but Gunnar catches it in his mouth. He gives a toothy grin as he chews. They tease each other, but my gaze flicks to the bag in my hands.

Face him. Time is up.

I tug open the strings and spill the bag’s contents onto the blankets. The stones are like pebbles on a beach, a rainbow of memories or illusions for me to collect.

Do I want to collect them? That’s the question.

The stones are different shapes and sizes, some finished and some rough. I reach to pick up one that’s a grainy desert rose, but Fennik grabs my hand.

“Is it safe? Can either of us help?”

I kiss him, rubbing my nose against his. “You make a very cute daddy wolf. I’ll be fine.”

Before he can stop me, I touch the rough stone.

I’m the crow again, all-seeing and back in a forest. It's not the same one as before, but the landscape is familiar enough. There’s a party of some kind. The scene reminds me a little of a Thunder—bodies are writhing, music is playing, a campfire sparks. I don’t see the serpent, but as I weave through dancing bodies, I get an overwhelming feeling of loneliness and longing.

A wisp of smoke, black tendrils mixed with pink, urges me closer. I follow it to Knox at the party's edge, watching but not joining. He searches the crowd, looking for something.

Another serpent, this one buff and covered in tattoos, appears out of the shadows. “Your mother is looking for you.”

The serpent searches the crowd one last time and turns away. “I’m coming. I can’t hear it anymore anyway.”

Smoke clouds my vision, and when I blink again, I’m staring at the fireplace in my dragon’s nest.

Gunnar grabs me and puts me in his lap, visibly shaken. He cups my face. “Are you all right? Your eyes went white, and you were frozen for, like, five minutes. It was freaky.”

“I’m fine,” I promise.

Fennik, who has been around Vandera and me long enough, looks at the two of us, his gaze full of empathy. “Anything helpful?”

I shake my head, trying to make sense of what I saw. “It was nothing that seemed important.”

Why would he share this with me? I’m missing something that feels as if it’s on the tip of my tongue. I reach for another stone, and Gunnar grumbles.

Smoke clouds my vision, and I’m the crow again.

One after another, I touch the memory stones. They’re random. I watch Knox hang out with his sister as the two eat their weight in candy and hiss at the things happening on some TV show. In another, Knox and another serpent race on an old desert road, the thrill of it exhilarating.

Underscoring those happy memories is the sharp tang of longing. I learn he’s bored with running the strip clubs and brothels his family owns; he’s obsessed with spicy foods; and he used to write poetry, but he stopped after his brother Bash made fun of him when he found his notebook.

Many are like the first. Knox appears in the same forest over and over, following something only he can hear. In the memory, it sounds like tinkling bells on the wind. Each time he returns, it’s with the same loneliness and longing as the first.

Embedded in a piece of snowflake obsidian, I watch him as a youngling, shadow-walking with his mother. She teaches him how to center his energy so that he can find and follow what she calls “tethers.” Once she is satisfied, the beautiful raven-haired woman holds his hand, and the world becomes a dizzying current of rushing air. It is dark and silky, strange and swirling.

The pair emerges somewhere in a desert. She smiles at him, but it’s brittle. “Follow my light home, snakelet.”

Tears fill her eyes as she retreats into the shadows, but Knox doesn’t hesitate. Moments later, everyone is stunned when he emerges at his family’s estate. He was so scared to be left alone that he ran to the light, following his mother home in only seconds.

That one is a direct shot to my heart. It shakes something loose inside me, filling me with emotions I can’t quite name. He’s searching in each memory for a connection.

A gleaming red stone is last. In this one, I’m back in his bedroom, the air full of swirling colors while all three of my mates worship me. I can tell this one is a fantasy, maybe a dream. The serpent’s shadows restrain me. Their caress is so smooth even as they tighten. It makes my muscles go lax and my body buzz with the force of being taken—claimed.

Gunnar tongues my clit while Fennik’s deep voice calls out commands. Every time he calls me omega or baby girl , I squirm. I buck against Knox’s shadow bindings as Gunnar adds his thick fingers until I’m wailing to come. Knox laughs when Fennik tells me to take it, refusing to give me permission to orgasm. The veins on Knox’s forehead are a crimson red as he feeds off my anticipation and lust, sending tiny curling tendrils of pink smoke back into the air.

Their hands are everywhere, and after what feels like an eternity of edging, they finally fill me. My mouth. My pussy. My ass. I’m bound between the three of them, stuffed full, taking everything they give. The sense of ecstasy is so overwhelming that the vision almost makes me come.

I fall back to reality, panting, and that new citrus scent that appears when I’m around my mates fills the air.

“I don’t need to ask about that one,” Fennik grumbles.

“But I do.” Gunnar waggles his eyebrows. “You called our names.”

I laugh at his eager expression and push him to his back, straddling him and rubbing my soaked pussy along the bulge in the blanket. “That’s because you did very wicked things to me.”

“Fuck yeah, I did,” he says with a loose grin. “And I’m gonna do it again.”

I grind against Gunnar with every intention of leaving him a mess, knowing it will get both of us off. Leaning in to suck along his neck, I whisper in his ear, “Do you want to know what you did to make me so hot, little wolf?”

My hand skirts between the edges of the blanket, and I find his hard cock. I use his precum and stroke him. “You licked my pussy until I came on your face.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a glance of Fennik as his palm moves slowly down his hard shaft. “Then you took my ass while your daddy filled my pussy.”

Wiggling in the blankets until we’re skin-to-skin, I rub myself against Gunnar, grinding my hips when I get to his knot. I watch, my mouth watering as his dick spills precum onto his stomach. Gunnar licks his lips, his hands grabbing hold of my ass. My mouth takes his, slanting and sliding until we’re both panting. I pull back and pinch his nipple.

“But then I woke up,” I tease him, rolling off his chest.

Fennik lunges for me, tumbling with me on the floor, the two of us laughing. He lands over me, his heavy weight cradled between my thighs.

“I think you mean alpha .”

“She meant daddy ,” Gunnar says, joining our pile.

Fennik finishes what I started, stripping off Gunnar’s blanket and filling me in one go. I gasp at the way his thick cock makes me fill so full. His thrusts are harsh, a punishment for my teasing that feels like a reward. With his knot slapping against my clit, his lips laving at my nipples, and one of his big paws pinning me in place, he’s overwhelming. His scent. His taste. I can’t get enough.

“Fill our dragon’s pretty little throat, pup,” Fennik growls.

Gunnar obeys him with the eagerness of a puppy, kneeling by my head and rubbing the slick crown along my lips. I open for him, sucking him greedily into my mouth.

Fennik growls commands, but I get lost between his slamming hips and Gunnar’s weight. Someone pinches my nipple; another rubs my clit. I fly, clouds filling my head as an orgasm rushes over me.

They keep up the pace. Their cocks and hands take me apart until I’m surrounded by them.

“Give me another. Come for your wolves,” Fennik demands with a sharp smack to my pussy.

Gunnar pulls out as I shudder, moaning as my climax rushes through me. Fennik snarls. Cum floods my pussy and covers my breasts and throat.

The clouds take me, and I float on a sea of bliss. My brain is finally quiet, all those buzzing worries swept out to sea.

When I come to, I’m snuggled between my purring alphas, their hands gently rubbing my back. I pull Gunnar into a sweet kiss that Fennik joins.

When hands begin to wander, I pull back, trying to quiet my racing heart. Fennik pulls me against his chest, and I let their weight give me the courage to tell them the next part.

I need to face Knox, really face him.

I don’t know if I can get over the past, or if I’ll ever be able to trust the serpent, but I’m going to try for the wolves in this room—and for myself. I’ve waited lifetimes for these men to show up. I can’t reject Knox outright, not without trying.

“I’ve decided I’m going to take Knox up on his invitation to dinner.”

My wolves tense.

“The stones? They helped?” Fennik asks, voice full of understanding.

At the same time,Gunnar grinds his jaw. “Do you have to go?”

I worry my lip, trying to explain my decision. “No, the stones didn’t magically make me forgive him. And no, I don’t have to go. But I don’t think I’m going to get an answer about what to do, not until I understand more about who he is and what he wants.”

Fennik takes my face between his hands. “All right, baby girl. But we’re talking safety before you go.”

“Yes, Daddy,” Gunnar and I say at the same time, then dissolve into laughter.

It’s a pillow fight and a pile of giggles before we manage to fly back to my lair so I can prepare for the world’s most awkward dinner date.

It takes me forever to decide what to wear. What kind of armor do you wear when you’re trying to protect your heart? I stand in the bathroom, adrift. Fennik comes in without speaking, grabbing things from my closet and helping me step into lace panties and a dress. He zips me up, then bends, helping me into my favorite black heels.

“Now finish up, baby girl. You look beautiful, and he’s a fool.” He wraps his arms around my shoulders, pulling me back against him. His eyes meet mine in the bathroom mirror. “No matter what happens tonight with your newest mate, I want you to know I’m going to understand and support you.”

I swallow around that thick knot in my throat. His permission and his understanding are a huge weight lifted.

He pops my ass. “You’ve got fifteen minutes to finish getting ready, or I’m coming to get you again.”

When I’m dressed and armed with Vandera’s potion, my wolves insist on driving me out to the lake house.

Gunnar opens my door and tugs me into a hug. “You don’t gotta do one damn thing you don’t want to, okay?”

I trace his pec where I know, under his shirt, his dragon brand lives. “I know.”

He passes me off to Fennik, who scoops me into another hug. He doesn’t whisper though. He growls loudly enough for Knox, who is waiting on the other side of the wards, to hear, “If he hurts you, we’ll kill him. No questions.”

I can’t help but chuckle into his chest at their display. It’s sweet though and makes me love them more. On tippy-toes, I kiss his cheek.

The short trip between Fennik and Knox feels like an eternity, but I face it and step through the wards.