Chapter 15 #3
“My Goddess, I am sorry.” I vanish the barrier. “You once asked if there was anyone who wasn’t my enemy, and I answered you. That will always be true. Hate me for my plots but trust me that I will always love you.”
Freya takes slow steps towards me.
I hardly dare breathe.
When Freya reaches out her hand to touch my sensitive horn — the most intimate place for a dragon — it is like she is both claiming me and proposing to me afresh.
I lean into her hand, touch starved, too frightened that if I say anything else, I will fuck this up.
My cock presses against my tight breeches, as if Freya is stroking it.
My nerves sing.
I grit my teeth, clenching my hands not to come in my pants, untouched.
I am close to tipping into rut. I’ve been feeling it for days.
Without my Omega, when that happens, will I finally become feral?
Will I turn into the winged, shadowed death that everyone has taught me was always destined?
Freya strokes from the tip of my sparking horn to the base, before carding her fingers through my hair, pushing it back from my eyes. “You look like shit.”
Daire chuckles.
“A deeply romantic moment,” I drawl. “I am moved.”
“You really haven’t been sleeping.” Freya runs her thumb over the deep shadows beneath my eyes. “Did you know that you’d be this fucked up by not having me close?”
I don’t answer, and that’s answer enough.
“Idiot dragon,” Daire mutters.
See? No respect for my position.
Freya gently pushes on my shoulder, urging me out of my kneeling position, until I am sitting. Then she settles herself on my lap. She claws at my tunic, ripping it away to rest herself against my naked skin.
The combination of her touch and pheromones instantly makes me feel better than I have since she left with Lanlin.
Is this real? Do I truly have my Omega caring for me again?
Daire swaggers to lean against the wall. “Sweet as this moment is, you know who I am, aye? If you risk our Omega again, then I will kill you.”
I’m proud of him for saying that.
I tighten my arms around Freya’s waist, wishing that this Dream Bond could last forever, yet already feeling the pull in my stomach that means the connection will soon be lost. “I know who you are. It’s why I trusted you both to cope in Blood Kingdom.
You’re a warrior, rebel, and assassin. Also, a cadet and trained courtesan.
And my Omega isn’t some pampered elite. It’s why you were always perfect for me, Spark.
You’re a wild, cunning wolf, who was ready to snap off my hand for even suggesting that I cage you.
You’re a thief, killer, and trained spy.
A dragon is possessive and protective of their treasure.
If you’re both to sit on thrones alongside me, however, as kings and queens, I must trust you too and let you spread your own wings to fly. ”
“By the Shadow Devils,” Daire whistles, “that was hot.”
“Yet another romantic moment.”
Ruined.
This is why I don’t do emotions. It’s hard enough to understand my own and even harder to get someone else to understand mine.
Yet I love the way that Freya laughs, which vibrates against the skin of my neck as she nuzzles me.
Freya leans up, pressing her soft lips against mine. I curl my fist into her hair, tightening my hold.
Then I twist her hair, tugging her into a deeper kiss.
As our tongues entwine, I finally feel the tension and fear that my fated mate is nothing but ash in a foreign kingdom bleed from me.
I kiss Freya passionately, as if I can not only claim her and hold onto this moment, but mark her with my touch and taste, until she’ll feel me when she wakes up and not forget me.
She’ll be as addicted to me, as I am to her.
My knot aches.
When Freya raises her hand to cup my cheek, however, I see something on her wrist that makes my blood run cold.
Instantly, my knot is the last thing that I am thinking about.
I break the kiss with a snarl. “What’s this?”
I grab Freya’s wrist, staring down at the black Ankh symbol, which is above the silver snowflake.
It can’t be…
It just can’t be…
This isn’t part of the plan. It wasn’t meant to happen.
My stomach drops.
No…
Freya tries to wrest herself free from me, but I don’t let her go. “It’s Lanlin’s bond mark.”
“What…?” Daire instantly darts across the cavern to drop to the floor next to me. I allow him to wrestle Freya’s wrist from me. He holds it up to his face, peering at the mark, before tracing it over with his finger. “Hmm, it’s pretty.”
“Pretty?” I growl, pushing Freya off my knee.
I launch myself to my feet. “Is that all you have to say? The monster has bonded with her. He was never meant to. This thing was only supposed to be fake, before you captured Lan and brought him back to me. Then we were meant to be crowned, remember? If you’re officially bonded to Lan now, then that means the golden threads are bound around all of us.
You’ll need Lan in your next heat and…don’t you understand? ”
“It was an accident.” Freya pushes herself up, her eyes flashing. “But I’m not sorry. Lan feels like pack. And stop calling him monster.”
Bewildered, I glance between the two of them. “He’s your enemy. Vampires massacred your court. You wanted this revenge.”
Daire is suspiciously quiet. His head is ducked, and he’s avoiding looking at either of us.
“Well, I don’t anymore.” Freya’s eyes are wet. “I want us to work out a way that we can all survive this, as Golden fated mates.”
I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut.
She can’t mean that. Is she being compelled? Under a spell?
I once loved Lanlin. In fact, he was my best friend. I know that it’s possible to be taken in by his act.
But it is an act.
I am finally clear-eyed about that.
Freya must understand what the stakes are for all of us, both what we will gain and lose if we either capture…or don’t…Lanlin.
What has happened between the two of them that she can suggest helping him?
Suddenly, I stagger.
The edges of the cavern melt, as if in the white-hot heat at the heart of a volcano.
I am losing control of the dreamscape.
Do I have minutes left?
Seconds?
It’s not long enough.
My Omega bonded with the Shadow Vampire King.
I feel like I am the one who is a volcano, so hot inside with rage that Hadrian is ready to explode and rain down fire and ash over the realms.
Embers fall from my horns.
“Your eyes are doing that swirling thing,” Freya warns.
I ignore her, storming to tower over Daire. “Where the fuck were you when Lan was bonding our Omega?”
Daire hides behind his curls. I kick him with my foot.
He curls his wings around himself. “May the crows peck out your eyes, bastard. I would have been there if I could. Your idiot uncle taught me a load of bollocks about the Shadow Vampire King. About how easy he’d be to manipulate and…he isn’t. He’s bloody smarter than anyone I know.”
Freya becomes ashen. “Oh, fuck. Is that why he separated us?”
Daire nods.
My pulse speeds up; I’m surprised how worried I am for the fae. “Has he worked out who you are?”
“I don’t know.” Daire pushes his curls roughly out of his face. “I don’t think that I’d still be breathing if he did. But he does know that I’m not some sweet Dove. It’s bloody funny that he thinks he’s protecting his Omega from me, which is why he’s kicked me out of the royal nest.”
“He has done what?” Freya says with a quiet, deadly fury.
My lips curl up with satisfaction.
Newly bonded or not, it makes me happy that it doesn’t bode well for Lanlin’s balls.
Freya is protective of her fae soulmate. I should remember that.
“He has sent me to be trained in the Blood Lover’s Guild.” Daire points to the stag emblem. “He means me to be chosen in this Hunt thing by some other Blood. But the High Priestess bitch who runs it has decided to use it as a chance to kill me.”
Freya stares at Daire with wide, fearful eyes.
A sudden terror shoots through the bond, and I’m not certain how much of the emotion is my own.
Daire is my future King and dragon rider.
Nobody gets to hurt him but me.
Some High Priestess trying to have Daire’s neck torn apart in a Hunt? Freya accidentally bonding the Shadow Vampire King?
There is trusting my soulmates, and then there is letting the only opportunity to save the realms spiral out of control.
“I’m flying to Sheut.” I grit out. “Don’t die before I arrive.”
“Woah.” Daire dives to his feet with a flap of his wings. “Thanks for the advice, but you don’t need to do that. You may as well offer your wings up on a silver platter to the fanged bastards.”
“Please, don’t…” Freya begs.
She is fading already, however, just like the dreamscape.
“Listen out for me,” I call, hoping that my mates can still hear me, as I can hear their frantic pleading.
“When I am in dragon form, I will be able to communicate with you as my riders via telepathy. But only when I am close enough. I don’t intend to be caught.
I will fucking kill you, however, if you die before I arrive to save you. ”