Chapter 5
FIFTEEN YEARS OLD
Amos lay in bed, staring up at the canopy above him.
Everything about his room oozed royalty, and he hated it.
Maybe because it reminded him of the position he never wanted.
The responsibilities pressing down on him.
The father who marked him so badly he couldn’t take his shirt off in front of anyone.
“You don’t have to stay,” Amos said, turning to look at Alice. She sat in the corner chair, knitting something that looked like a scarf, the scar on her face tugging when she smiled up at him.
“This is an exciting moment, and I want to be here.” She glanced at the clock. “It’s almost midnight.”
At midnight, he turned fifteen and received his animal familiar mark from the gods.
Getting his mark didn’t excite him because he already knew it would be a dragon just like every other heir in his family.
Only royal heirs were born with familiars.
A royal’s mate didn’t receive a familiar since they weren’t born of royal blood.
He didn’t know if Amelia would get a familiar mark.
The bond was magic, and Charlotte told Alice that Amelia didn’t seem to have any.
Amos wondered if their world would be different if the other women in his family were granted familiars upon marriage.
Having a dragon gave a person immense power.
It was why the Desert Kingdom rarely suffered rebel attacks.
Dragon fire could kill several people at once.
Not to mention, they could easily kill a person with one bite.
So no, getting the mark didn’t excite him, but meeting his familiar did. The familiar would find him, usually within a week or less. Amos worried for his dragon. Did leaving the den for the first time scare it? He hoped not.
Amos hissed and sat up straight, clutching at his chest. Would Clover feel that?
He hadn’t been prepared for it to hurt. Hopefully the pain from a familiar mark didn’t go down the bond.
He didn’t know how it worked, and his father never bothered to tell him.
Why would the mighty king care if something hurt his mate?
Just as quickly as the searing pain had appeared, it faded, and Amos unbuttoned his shirt.
The world around him seemed to crumble as he stared at the tattoo of a fennec fox. He squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again, sure they were playing tricks on him.
But they hadn’t. The mark stood proud against his skin, covering the left side of his chest. Fennec foxes were tiny, with oversized ears. Barely the size of a small cat. This couldn’t be happening. His chest heaved.
His gaze snapped to Alice. She stared at his chest, but her face gave nothing away.
“What do I do?” he rasped. How would his father react? Not fucking well.
“The gods send the familiar you need, not the one you want,” she said gently. “They bonded you to that little thing for a reason.”
Little thing. The gods had never done him any favors before, and they wouldn’t start now.
Except Clover. Her emotions had soothed him in his darkest times. Sometimes he wondered if she sensed when he was slipping into the darkness and did what she could to bring him back. He didn’t know how; thought of happy memories maybe?
“It’s going to be okay,” Alice tried again. “Your father can’t blame you for the gods’ decision.”
Amos let out a humorless laugh. “Yes, he can.”
A few days later, Amos was out riding to clear his head, when something in his head stopped him. “Will you stop already? My legs don’t move that fast.” It wasn’t so much a voice as it was a sense of knowing someone’s thoughts. He couldn’t explain it.
Amos jerked, spooking his horse, and pulled the mare to a stop. What the hell was that? he thought, bewildered.
“I’m your familiar, and I’ve been chasing you for the last thirty minutes,” the voice panted.
Amos’s eyes widened and he twisted in the saddle to peer behind him. “I don’t see you.”
Dismounting, he walked around his horse and placed his hand on her flank to let her know everything was fine.
“I see you.”
Amos squinted, noticing a tiny speck moving toward him in the distance.
He’d thought about this moment a million times since receiving his mark, but nothing prepared him for the moment he saw the tiny fox sprinting toward him.
The fox’s ears were comically large compared to his small body.
Dust coated his light fawn fur as he ran, and when he skidded to a stop at Amos’ feet, he panted hard.
Amos begrudgingly admitted the fox was cute. “Can I pick you up?”
The fox yipped. “Please. I’m tired.”
Scooping up the little beast, Amos held him close. “You’re not a dragon.”
The fennec fox cocked its head. “I see your education has paid off.”
Amos scowled. “You don’t have to be a dick. I expected a dragon.”
“Why? Royals don’t know what their familiar is until their mark appears. A familiar doesn’t know anything until the bond forms. Then we change from a regular animal into a familiar.” He stopped. “It’s nice. We get unlimited knowledge.”
Amos’ brows rose. “Really? Like what?”
“Do you know what unlimited means? It means it’s too much to just spout off. If you ask me a specific question, I can give you an answer. Like letting you know you can speak to me out loud if I’m within hearing distance. You won’t have to get that glazed over look.”
“Okay, then why aren’t you a dragon?” Amos grumbled aloud. “Hey!”
The little beast bit his arm. “You’re starting to hurt my feelings.”
“Sorry, but I’m the first Desert heir to not have a dragon.” He blew out an exhausted breath. “I don’t know what my father will do to me.”
“The gods send you what you need. There’s a reason it’s me.” He rested his head on Amos’ arm.
“So I’ve heard,” Amos muttered.
“What did you mean about your father?” the fox looked up at him again.
Amos ignored his question and moved the fox to one arm so he could grab his horse’s reins with the other. He led them to a nearby brush and sat on the ground near a tall plant for a little shade.
“My father is a dictator who presents himself as a king. If I’m not exactly what he wants, he punishes me.” Amos knew he was not to blame for his father’s behavior, but his inability to stop his father’s abuse humiliated him.
The little fox growled and Amos tried not to laugh. “I’ll stop him. I can call the other animals to attack him.”
Amos’ smile dropped. “You can’t. He’ll kill you. He has a dragon.”
“We can’t kill another familiar or our bonded,” the fox explained. “His dragon wouldn’t kill me.”
“It’s too dangerous,” Amos insisted. “Promise me you’ll stay away from my father.”
The little creature stared at him for the longest time before nodding its head. “Alright, but if you change your mind, let me know.”
Amos repositioned on the hard ground and scratched the fox’s head. “What’s your name?”
“I don’t have one yet,” the familiar replied. “You can give me one.”
Amos rubbed his hand down the fox’s back as he thought. “What about Roland?”
The tiny beast yipped. “I like it.”
Amos unfolded his legs and stretched them out, adjusting Roland in his arms. “There’s something else you should know.”
Roland wiggled around until Amos let him down then turned and sat, staring at him expectantly. “Well?”
Amos blew out a breath and told him everything about Amelia, Clover, Rainer, and his plans to kill his father. After what felt like the longest story in history, Roland inched forward and rested his head on Amos’ leg.
“You’re not alone anymore,” the familiar murmured. “Even if I’m not physically here, you can talk to me anytime.”
A knot clogged Amos’ throat. He couldn’t reply, but as Roland burrowed closer to his leg, he realized he didn’t have to.
A FEW WEEKS LATER
The king stared at Amos’ chest with equal parts outrage and disgust. “This is a disgrace,” Phillip spat. “Even the gods know you’re weak!”
Amos refused to cower or show any emotion that would give his father the satisfaction. He’d already started shutting down his mind to numb himself from the pain to come, refusing to let it reach Clover.
As expected, his father punched him in the side hard enough to break a rib. Amos had become all too familiar with that particular crack. His only saving grace was that his father preferred the whip or cane over his fists, allowing the bones to heal in between assaults.
Fighting back was futile. Amos’ strength was no match for the king, and it gave his father a sick sort of pleasure when he fought back. He hoped when the time came to kill his father he’d fight back so Amos could beat him to death.
Once Amos could barely move, his father stopped to pace.
“The kingdom will never accept you with a weak familiar. They’ll think you’re weak.
” He paused just long enough to spit on Amos.
“You are, but they needn’t know that.” Stopping again, he looked back down at Amos.
“You will not take the throne until I’m dead. I can’t allow it.”
Over my dead body. His father’s reign of terror would end as soon as Amos’ magic fully manifested. Amos would train day and night to strengthen his body and become the best fighter in the kingdom.
“Yes, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll rule until I’m gone,” his father decided. “You are not to show anyone your mark. Understood?”
Amos barely managed a nod.
“And if I see your familiar, I’ll keep him in a cage,” the king sneered. “If I could kill him, I would.”
A familiar couldn’t die as long as their bonded was still alive. It didn’t work the other way around, but even if it could, Amos could never—would never—hurt Sasha.
Hearing his father’s threat to Roland only solidified his decision to send the fox to the Human Kingdom to watch over Amelia and Clover.
Without looking back, his father strode from the room, leaving Amos barely breathing on the ground.
SASHA
“Why isn’t Amos’ familiar a dragon,” Phillip snarled down the familiar bond.
When Sasha received the bond, she’d been honored and excited until she met her bonded. The king was a vile man with hatred in his heart and an arrogance that didn’t belong in a position of power.
She despised him and how he treated his own son.
It had surprised her that the gods did not bond Amos to a dragon. At midnight on the boy’s true fifteenth birthday, she had linked the other dragons of the den, asking who it was.
No one responded, and she knew Phillip would make Amos wish he were dead. She’d had a few weeks to formulate a plan to save the boy. It didn’t take much to see the boy was breaking, and she didn’t know how much more he could endure.
Sasha stopped the king’s assaults when she could, telling him that beating the future heir would make the others view him as weak. A lie. Anyone who survived what the king bestowed upon that boy would gain respect in their eyes.
Phillip then started punishing Amos in the palace, where Sasha couldn’t reach him, or he’d wait until she returned to the den.
One thing that worked in her favor was that Phillip put too much stock in the dragons. He knew a single dragon could destroy his precious capital and every village in his kingdom, and he feared upsetting them–a common theme in a long line of heirs.
What he didn’t know was the dragons would never hurt innocents, and to destroy the villages would mean to kill everyone in them.
If Sasha could kill her bonded, she would, but the magic prevented it. She’d tried once and it was as if an invisible barrier protected him. Ember refused, knowing what killing another’s bonded meant.
“I don’t know,” she replied to Phillip. “It is unheard of.”
“His familiar is a fucking fennec fox,” the king spat.
Another surprise and disappointment. Sasha had hoped Amos would bond to something that could protect him. A fennec fox couldn’t hurt an ankle.
“This does not sit well with the dragons,” she lied. “They know none of ours bonded with him, and our council has come to a decision.” The dragons didn’t even have a council.
The rage searing their bond tasted like poison, but then again, everything from the king did.
“What is their decision? Do I need to kill him and remarry to try for a new heir?”
Sasha froze. “No,” she replied quickly, shocked that he had no qualms about killing his only heir.
“The gods will not grant you another heir. They will pass the power on to someone of a different bloodline.” Another lie, but Phillip had no way of knowing that.
“You must send him to Dragon Village and have him deliver the sacrifices.” She hesitated.
“Every month. They demand them every month to make up for this blunder.”
She’d spoken with the other dragons, explained the situation, and they’d agreed. All they needed was for Phillip to agree.
He scoffed. “How am I supposed to keep the capital in check from Dragon Village?”
The capital held the majority of highborns and had the largest battalion. With the exception of the four oases, the other communities throughout the kingdom were quite small.
“You cannot accompany him,” she replied coolly. “The dragons will not respect him if he requires his father’s supervision. He must do this alone. The Dragon Village highborn can oversee his duties.”
“Very well,” Phillip conceded. “I will send him immediately with a fresh round of sacrifices this month.”
“Good.” Sasha fought to keep her relief from traveling down the bond. “The sooner the better.”