Chapter 55
RAINE
I’m nervous. Which I suppose is natural.
I don’t have to go through with it. They’ve all told me that several times.
The lightning could happen even if we didn’t do the ceremony.
Most dragon mates’ lightning happens without a ceremony.
Would it happen to me? Do I want it to happen?
Do I want to be linked, mated to the guys for the rest of my life, no matter what happens?
Because it’s not something you can easily get out of.
It’s not like a human marriage where you can get a divorce.
Shifters are in it forever. At least, that’s what the magazine said.
Leo left a simple light blue shift dress and a dark blue velvet robe with a large emerald clasp hanging in my room. The fabric is so soft I want to curl up in it.
I want to talk to Wren about this, but I can’t. Sure, after her visit, she knows more than I thought she would. Probably more than I was supposed to tell her. But not everything.
The silky dress hugs my curves. I slide the robe on and cover my head. I’m shaking. Is this what I want? Is it?
My feet leave the floor at the knock on the door.
“Raine? Are you ready?” Evander asks.
“Almost?”
“Can I come in?”
“Yeah, it’s unlocked. Come in.” My voice wobbles like a prepubescent boy’s.
“Hey,” Evander says, coming straight to me. He’s wearing a robe like mine but in a dark green, with a pair of pants that look like pajama bottoms. His six-pack of firm abs are on full display. “Hey. You’re okay.”
“But what if I have the lightning? Then I’m sealed into this . . . marriage . . . mating with all of you.”
“Right. You know, we’ve done things so out of order this time that we’ve missed some steps.
No, you’re not. If you have the lightning, you have it.
You don’t have to be part of our thunder.
I’ve heard of a few cases where someone in the thunder hated another thunder mate so much they didn’t actually make it a true mating.
They were Nordlyx clan and Rivulet—they just couldn’t make it work. They went their own ways.”
I’m biting my lip.
“Raine?” Evander drags out my name. “Is there something else?”
“Yes. What if I’m not your thunder mate? What if this connection is just . . . heartburn?”
“Heartburn?”
“Like too much spicy chocolate?” I shake my head. This is crazy. “I shouldn’t be worrying over something I have no control over. But I’m really darn good at it.”
Evander laughs and sinks onto the bed. He pulls me onto his lap and plays with a lock of my hair. “You have nothing to worry about. I’ve never felt this way about someone before. Roark and Kieren feel the same way too.”
I make a face at Kieren’s name but try to still my face as quickly as I made it. Roark, I know he cares for me. The way he touches me with such caring? But Kieren?
“Yes, Raine. Kieren too.”
“Maybe?”
“No doubt—there is no maybe. It’s killing him to have to wait for today.
He wants to do this more than anything.” Evander runs his fingers down the side of my cheek.
And his lips hit mine. Softly, gently, his kiss deepens.
His hand is on the back of my head. My fingers dig into his shoulder.
When he pulls back, his eyes are dilated.
I cock my head, trying to catch my breath.
“Raine, Kieren is . . . complex. Serious. He cares about Crest Wing and his family, but staying away from you these last weeks, waiting for the perfect time? For today? It’s been killing him.
And then there’s all the problems with protecting his sister.
It’s horrible what their parents are doing, but it does give him a great distraction, keeping him over there. ”
“Protecting his sister?”
“The king and queen are nervous that we won’t be a match. They’ve made up some nonsense to keep Aisling out of the academy, saying it’s too dangerous for her to be there. But if she’s not there . . .”
“He was fighting to get his sister back in school?” My stomach twists. “Wait, is it too dangerous for her to be there?”
“Our realm hasn’t been safe for a long time. There’s no real reason for her not to be there. The academy is a safe place.” Evander smooths my hair back and then locks his fingers with mine. “Have I helped your nerves any?”
I hold my other hand up. It’s stopped shaking. “Yes, you have. It means a lot to know that I still have choices.”
“Yes, we always have choices.” Evander kisses the side of my head. “Any other questions?”
Kieren explained it to me yesterday over chocolate mousse—which tastes even better surrounded by three guys who are enjoying watching you savor it as much as you are enjoying eating it.
“I think I have it. You’ll pull back the curtain, Kieren will open the portal, and the three of you will chant in your native tongue.
I take my hood off, and Kieren puts his hands on my cheeks and neck, and then we wait.
” They also said that normally they keep the curtain closed.
That I’m the first candidate they’ve let see the Thessari.
“Or we don’t,” Evander says.
“Or we don’t, right? I’m ready.”
I’m gripping the banister with one hand like I’m as unsteady as a newborn foal, and the other is holding up the robe. Falling down the stairs isn’t in my plan.
Kieren and Roark are already on the landing, or two other tall, broad-shouldered, hooded males are. I shake with a laugh to myself.
“You okay?” Evander asks.
“No, yes, maybe . . . I’ll be okay.”
Roark and Kieren are wearing light blue robes that match mine.
Roark glances up, his blue eyes reflected in the hood.
And it calms me. Another half laugh comes out, and Kieren lifts his blue eyes to me.
He’s so handsome––handsome and serious. I’m glad Evander filled me in about things in Crest Wing.
It makes more sense now, why he’s so intense.
I still don’t know what I hope happens when this is all over. Most of all, I’m looking forward to being able to talk to Kieren more. Touch him. That’s so weird, thinking about three guys like this at the same time. But I am.
I’m slowly coming down the stairs with my robe trailing behind me, and it’s hard to not think of it as a wedding dress.
Evander says I have a choice, but my heart is pumping faster than it ever has, and it’s pumped pretty fast in the past. Too fast. My rapid, beating heart jumps into my throat.
When I step onto the tiled floor, near the eye of the dragon, it’s cool beneath my bare feet.
“Stand here,” Roark says. And not for the first time, I get the feeling that the guys just have a connection. They move and flow together.
Kieren’s next to me, his head bowed. Evander pulls back the curtain. Iron grate doors are in the open position. Beyond them is a stone wall.
“Are you ready?” Kieren asks.
“Yes.”
Between the gate and the wall, there’s an iron nail poking out of the stone.
Kieren places his palm on it. Then he places his hand on the center of the wall.
When he lifts his hand, there’s part of a red handprint.
I’m shaking again. He bled on the wall. But it’s not a stone wall anymore.
It’s vibrating, and the stones fade away into black inky nothingness. When I stare into it, there’s nothing.
Kieren clenches his hand and steps back. Roark produces a towel from his robe, like it’s no big deal that his friend, his thunder mate, has just stabbed a hole in his hand big enough to draw serious blood.
Kieren glares at Evander. Evander moves me from the side to the center of the dragon’s eye on the floor.
The hairs on my arms tingle. There’s no wind from the portal, but there’s a pull on me. A tug. I want to step into the darkness.
Evander’s voice rings out in a chant. A chant the other two join in on.
Roark steps to the side, and they all slowly move around me in a circle.
I don’t recognize the language of the chant.
The rhythm of their words has my body shaking.
Uncertainty bubbles up inside me. And my mom’s voice chatters in the back of my head, “Are you sure you’re not making a mistake? ”