Chapter Twenty-Four
Ghreid
The first light of dawn invaded his window.
The full moon the night before, a blinding thing that made Ghreid very aware of his mate, but the passion wasn’t there.
With the news they’d gotten the days before, it was no surprise that the lust and urgency didn’t come.
Instead, they spent the night cuddled together, hand on his belly, wondering what the future would hold as Draenvir went on his way with Graylan the night before.
“Graylan seemed in a rush to leave, didn’t he?” Ghreid frowned. “Juicy gossip to spread among the elite?”
“Mnn, nooooo.” Varis rolled over in bed and nuzzled up under Ghreid’s chin. “It was a full moon last night.”
“Surely…” Ghreid glanced at Varis with brows raised in surprise.
Varis shrugged. “Graylan’s anything but careful. He cares for Slath. Relentlessly.”
Ghreid grumbled. “He’s older than dirt and was there for Slath’s hatching.”
Varis’s face twisted. “That part is…unsettling. Sure. Nobody wants to tell me why Kineer had words against the two being together, though.”
Ghreid frowned. “It’s hard to tell who is a bearer at birth sometimes. With Slath, he was a bearer quite obviously, and Father was very protective. There was a laundry list of males banned from Slath’s presence.”
“Seems fitting. Slath had the same to say. Graylan was a single male in his council, and Kineer was protective. Especially seeing as Graylan lost his first mate.” Varis picked at a loose thread on their covers.
“That’s an exaggeration. His first mate rejected him. Graylan’s terrifying to humans. He looks like a demon.” Ghreid shrugged. “And he’s not aesthetically pleasing by dragon standards. I’m surprised Slath wants him at all, seeing how he reveres visual beauty.”
“Seems more like Pryd’s territory, that. Slath seems to find beauty in everything. Gods know I’m a mishmash of colors and strangeness.”
“But you’re gorgeous. You’ve no idea how beautiful you truly are.
” Ghreid pinned Varis to the bed, letting his tail free to swish it about playfully.
The sinking cushions of feathers preceded a sparkle of dust in the rays of light, glittering about his mate’s face.
With a gentle twist of his lips, Varis caught those sparkles and was beautiful.
They danced in his amber eyes, and Ghreid found it more appealing than any treasure. “My love.”
They leaned in to kiss, when a sharp rapping on their door paused the display of affection. As a snarl balled up in his throat, Ghreid snapped, “Yes, Rydel?”
“Ordinarily I’d not interrupt your morning coitals, my lord, but we have dignitaries from Rammolia here and they do not seem friendly.” Rydel’s polite voice strained on the other side of the door, and he cleared his throat nervously.
Varis grumbled, and Ghreid slid from bed, summoning Rydel in as he tossed aside his nightshirt and strode into his closet to pick clothing out.
For his mate’s part, however, dressing was far easier with a smaller selection. He slid into one of his flowing tunics, so complementary of his form and accommodating for the swell of his belly to come.
They donned the adornments for their horns and sought out to meet their guests, Varis still rubbing the sleep from his eyes and lamenting their lost mood. “I wish our guests could have paid their respects at a more seemly hour.”
“The sun is up, so business commences,” Rydel said, his voice petering out in an annoyed fashion before gesturing toward the sitting parlor. “In here.”
The room hadn’t been fully furnished yet, only the bare minimum, a room waiting for Varis’s keen eye and Ghreid’s things from the castle to fill every wall with a gaudy amount of finery. After all, Ghreid could be rather magpie-like.
In the parlor sat a stone-faced emissary, several guards of a lackluster display, and an aging male with an appearance bearing passing resemblance to Asha.
Perhaps it was the chin or the shape of the face.
His dark-brown hair bore streaks of gray that kissed his temples, one of which gnarled into a rather unseemly scar.
He turned his gaze upon them without so much as an ounce of respect, palest blue eyes so eerily empty as he stared.
“We’ve been waiting for eleven minutes.”
Ghreid, grateful he wasn’t one for witty banter, gave a nod of acknowledgment. “I do apologize for you feeling disrespected.”
“I am disrespected. Waiting is the least of my problems. Where is my nephew?” A sneer twisted the king’s face.
“King Tauf, I suppose you mean Asha?” Varis cleared his throat and earned a sneer.
“And who is this meager servant addressing me?” King Tauf gestured at Varis, who tensed and quite visibly bit his tongue to keep from lashing out.
“First prince to the first Rashiz, Dal Varis.” Ghreid’s mate gave a gentle bow of his head. “And no servant am I, but a dragon, mate to a prince of Sauria. Your nephew is mated to King Mezerath and they are currently in Sauria.”
King Tauf gave a snort of disdain. “What sort of dowry did you pay for this one that you couldn’t offer for this…
Asha. My brother had already intended for a son and had set aside a name.
Asha is a lowly sneer of a title. He would have been a duke, first house of Rammolia, named for our father, Artelius. ”
“That’s all well and good, but you sent his mother away and she became a ward of Monsmount and as such, her child was unclaimed. Homage has been paid to King Reigh.”
“But we had no way of knowing there was a child so soon. No missive was written to us and even when we knew, her father spoke of the matter as infidelity. It’s clear the boy is Rammolian royalty.” Tauf slammed his hand on an end table.
“Then that matter is best negotiated with his mate. I’m in no position to—” Ghreid spoke, but Tauf spoke over him.
“Thrice ten and two casks of gold.” Tauf stared Ghreid down.
What he asked for was a king’s ransom. The amount of gold could well have purchased the very ports they sat at. Ghreid stared at Tauf as something akin to cunning flashed in his eyes.
Cunning in the eyes of the dim-witted, often came off as entitlement, smugness, and something worse. Smarm.
“You want control of the ports as payment for your brother’s dowry?” Ghreid stared the male down, and Varis took a seat nearby, crossing his slender legs in a slow and methodical way, practiced with all the grace and poise Ghreid often overlooked in him.
“I want Monsmount as payment, but the ports are a good start.” Tauf crossed his arms, his guards tensing, ready to take a grip on their swords. If they did, it would be the last they ever did so.
“I have a question. When’s the last time Rammolia sent an ashen to Sauria?” Varis trailed a single clawed finger over the end table by his chair, the pointed tip squeaking against the glass.
“It’s not too terribly often. Once a few months or so, they find one.” This time, it was a male at Tauf’s side, someone official who hadn’t introduced himself.
“And what do we pay Rammolia for each find?”
“Fifty silver to the crown, ten silver to the lord, and twenty silver to the family. Eighty total.” The male gave a nod of respect to Varis.
Varis traced his nail over the glass again. The screech it made, not a frequency that bothered dragons but one that made all the humans in the room visibly tense.
“And what exports do we source from Rammolia? To Sauria? And what will we need trade for in the future? It seems we control trade for half of the continent with our positions. We have positive relations with those you aren’t allied with to control another 20 percent.
Can you afford to lose that?” Varis inched his nail once more.
Silence stretched on for an uncomfortable moment.
“I didn’t think so.” Varis didn’t move his nail again.
“We could also stop sending them.” King Tauf paled as Varis and Ghreid both turned their gazes on to him. The focus prickled through the link in his heart shared with his mate as he inched his nail once more, causing that flinch to pass through the men.
“I have a counterproposal.” Varis leaned back and switched the cross of his legs; the gentle creak of the chair filled the near-breathless silence.
A carriage clock ticked with ominous intent somewhere in the room, each second tolling something more terrible than the last. “How many children do you have?”
Ghreid froze.
“Is that a threat?” Tauf stood abruptly, sending his chair scooting back with a clatter, dulled by the impeccable rug Ghreid had chosen for the room.
Varis inched his finger on the glass again and despite Tauf’s strong posture, he flinched once more. “Is it? Daughters. Do you have them?”
That shriek of nail on glass again. Another flinch. He’d broken the king’s nerve. His attendant and guards were flustered.
“What does that have to do with anything?” King Tauf flinched as Varis brought another finger into place and scratched them both, the noise amplified and, from their reactions, worse. “Two.”
“Ages?” Varis tensed his fingers, and they collectively flinched. Breath halted as the carriage clock ticked.
“Twenty-two and eighteen. Esmerelda is to be wed this summer, and Nenna is searching for her husband and taking offers.” Visibly shaken, Tauf took a deep breath, glued to the spot as Ghreid tasted magic in the air.
His mate had a gift, truly. The way it snaked through the air, almost as if it rode the sound in his scratch, breaking their nerves.
“And sons?” Varis tapped his nails, bringing a note of relief, almost as if they deserved the reprieve for honesty.
“Five.” The whisper in his voice trembled.
“Any of them of the floral persuasion?” Varis tapped his fingers again.
“M-my second youngest. I cannot force a wife upon him.” Tauf cleared his throat, relaxing slightly, his shoulders dropping. “Verence. Nineteen.”
“Searching for a partner for him will be difficult, with Monsmount having the opinions they have.” Tauf cleared his throat.