Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ghreid
Ghreid stared at their eggs, nestled together next to them.
He reached out to touch their surfaces one at a time.
He wondered if he could tell who was who.
The largest, the second born, had more gold than anything on it; the purple more of an indigo wash in little brindled streaks. He wondered if it was Kineer?
The first, the most unexpected of them, a perfect mix of both, a beautiful swirl.
Was that his mo— Inessa? He reminded himself not to think of them as their souls, as the lives they were.
But as he moved his hand once more, he rested his hand on the top of an unexpected third egg.
The shape of it was slightly off, not a perfect specimen, as if the poor thing fought for space in his tract, but Graylan said it was healthy.
The soul within was quiet, though. The meekness of it wasn’t reminiscent of any soul Ghreid recognized.
“Who are you, little one?” He traced a single fingernail down the unwelcome crease in the egg’s side, where calcium had redoubled, creating more of the bean shape of it.
The shell, in its entirety, was a lovely lavender, and each ripple on the textured surface held a trace of gold, barely perceptible in the light.
As Ghreid had been told, he let his magic flow freely and reached from the eggs to Varis, letting everything he knew about healing magic flow through his hands. He caressed Varis’s swollen belly, every pass of his hands making the slightest difference.
Soothing touches couldn’t linger there, though, and Ghreid swore internally as he had to touch Varis in such an intimate place.
Ghreid slid his hand beneath Varis’s limp tail, fingers circling his tender backside.
There, he let magic flow, the area still bleeding freely over the towels placed there.
Every touch made Varis’s body twitch and flinch.
But with Graylan’s magic tapped, it was up to Ghreid to do what he could there for as long as he could.
And if Ghreid could heal Varis’s backside enough, Asha and Slath could step in for the rest.
“I blame myself. My desire for young, my nature of greed was too strong.” Ghreid had no idea how they’d handle three little ones at once.
They’d need more help, for certain. More help which had come…
Having Falustus there was a godse—fatesend.
They’d known. There, in the independent port nation of Sauria, the two would be Vassal King and Vassal King Consort, and the school that Falustus built would be so integral to their growing kingdom.
Varis whimpered and sighed under Ghreid’s touch. There was a new soul they’d need to identify. Galatan hadn’t come with the rest of them, and a burning fear in Ghreid’s belly wondered if their brother had taken sleep and passed.
So many children needed their uncles.
And as the last of Ghreid’s magic slipped away, he too fell into exhausted sleep.
Please let our brothers remain whole.
***
Ghreid woke to a shriek of shock, an elbow to his diaphragm and a tail slamming haphazardly between his legs in a rather rude—but well deserved—awakening. “Mh! Varis? Love?”
“Why are there three? Where did the— Why—” Varis threw Ghreid off of him in his haste to go to his young, hand reaching between each of them with a light touch and eyes full of amazement. “They’re beautiful. Three? I thought…”
“None of us suspected. They’re checking if there’s been any unaccounted deaths.” Ghreid’s voice came out an octave higher in pitch than he was comfortable with, his aching groin still bearing just punishment.
As he rubbed over his soreness, he thought, with admonishment to his genitals. How dare you do this to our mate!
Though, Ghreid was very pleased with the result. And, if his cock had its way, it’d be giving a smarmy little grin full of satisfaction.
We have done well. Our clutch is large, our mate very fertile, and we will have many more. Ghreid’s dragon purred with fat, happy contentment. Not since he’d eaten a full cow and lain out in the sun like a rug for a whole evening as a young man, had his beast been so proud and content.
Not for a long while, we will no, Ghreid snarled back at his dragon mentally and waited for his mate to speak again.
He stared and touched his eggs with such fascination, the moment unendingly intimate.
His backside, fully exposed, bore the bruises and swollen marks.
Streaks of blood still stained his flesh and his skin, swollen and slack at his midsection, solidified the gravity of what had happened.
And, despite the change in his form, Ghreid found him so much more beautiful than he had been.
Varis would recover. His body would mostly repair, leaving little evidence, but no matter what he looked like after, the marks were testaments to their love.
Despite all the healing Asha had done, his scales had taken on golden-tinged stripes at his side, like that of a jungle cat, and they’d not healed away, evidence of his body’s sacrifice.
Ghreid wondered if Varis would bear his own stripes.
“Are you sure nobody knew?” Varis huffed. “Because I only have two pillows made for them! They shouldn’t have to share! I need a third cushion.”
And there the avarice was. His eggs deserved the best. And despite the flawed nature of their third egg, Varis didn’t turn it to hide the crease, didn’t shy away from it.
He turned it the correct way and lifted it to his chest, taking deep breaths as draconic instinct had his scales prickling.
It was easy to see Varis bonding so fiercely with his eggs by his posture alone, bent forward, face darting around from one to the other.
His fingernails, bearing freshly shifted clawtips, curled with protective urges.
“My babies. Mine… Mine and yours. Ours.”
Ghreid didn’t say a word. There was such beauty in watching Varis tend them, rolling the eggs from one side to the other, clutching them to his chest. Muttered words made his lips flutter as he gathered blankets and pillows into a warm snuggle pile to position the eggs against his chest and belly to curl around—but Ghreid vacated the nest, understanding what Varis must not have.
“Love. Shift. Let your dragon bond with the eggs. That’s why your anxious.” Ghreid sat to the side as Varis struggled with one egg then the other, body shivering.
Varis wheeled his head around to face Ghreid, eyes wild.
If his dragon wasn’t there in form, it certainly was behind his eyes, territorial and desperate.
Terrified eyes flicked from the eggs to the nest then around, shoulders rounding.
Something in his gaze and calculating posture told Ghreid the issue.
So, cautiously, Ghreid approached their eggs and gathered the cushions, situating them farther away from Varis as his dragon took over.
With a salacious noise, Varis stretched his body, mouth open in a gaping yawn that stretched ever wider as teeth sharpened in his mouth, water of form pouring out of his human vessel into a new one.
Every click of bone and swell of flesh drew them closer to an end form, beautiful in nature.
Every pale spot lining his flesh shone in stark relief against the violet shifting scales, wide earfins pinned back beneath curled red horns, and eyes so beautifully amber and copper that Ghreid couldn’t look away.
Certainly copper was a less valuable metal, but the way Varis wore it was as if it were something truly precious.
It made Ghreid wonder if magic lay in copper, too.
When Varis’s great tail swept around and wings rustled, Ghreid struggled to push his own fine cushion, as well as the two custom-made for their eggs, into the nook of Varis’s belly.
There, on Ghreid’s fine pillow, the egg, even with its flaw, stood in sharp relief, dark silk highlighting the shape as if it were a natural pearl.
Varis studied each of them, nose tucking in to blow hot steam over each of the eggs in turn before circling up almost catlike, his body nearly filling the entirety of their nest. A wide berth around him left room for Ghreid if he so wished to fill the space in his greater dragon form. “Shifting will help with the healing.”
Varis only groaned in acknowledgment before lifting one wing and nudging his head up against Ghreid’s side.
An invitation to snuggle. Ghreid didn’t have to be asked twice, fond memories in his mind of being a child in the throes of his first human form’s features and limited to the shifts he could do in a day, tucked into his mother’s side, lapping up her very breath of affection, much to their father’s annoyance.
He was a jealous male, but he almost took pride in how much Inessa cared for them.
Ghreid understood, at that moment. It was as if his eggs were secondary only to him, but Ghreid couldn’t give the jealousy any real energy. He wanted it all, and in his nest, he had it.