Chapter 10
AURA
Dragons.
I wouldn’t have believed it if the big one hadn’t shown me.
I stare at the shimmer of dark scales still tracing his forearms, and the heat rolling off him that seems to disturb the cool cave air around him, and my mind rebels.
Bears and wolves were already more than I could comprehend.
Dragons don’t belong in my world. They’re stories from creepy books I used to hide in my closet.
“You’re lying,” I say, though my speech lacks conviction.
“No,” he replies simply.
I shake my head, backing away until my shoulders hit the stone wall behind me. “This—this is some kind of trick. Another test. I don’t belong to anyone.” The words tear out of me sharp and frantic. “I won’t. I can’t.”
The thought of being claimed again makes my skin crawl. It’s teeth at your throat and hands on your wrists, and someone else deciding what your body is worth. I know exactly where that path leads, and I won’t walk it again.
My magic stirs weakly below my skin, a reflexive reverberation of my panic.
He stills immediately.
“You won’t cage me,” I whisper, breath shaking. “If you try—”
“We won’t,” says the one who helped me heal.
I look at him properly for the first time since waking. Golden hair, soft eyes too old for his face, exhaustion engraved into the lines around them. He looks… tired.
The other one stands with his arms crossed near the fire, scarred and solid and watchful, like a wall built hundreds of years ago, still standing despite the buffeting of foul weather. His gaze never leaves me, but there’s no hunger in it. Only watchfulness and wariness.
Tiredness rolls off them all in waves.
When I was unconscious, they washed the blood and filth from my skin without hurting me. They tended my wounds and built me a bed… more a comfortable, warm nest of furs. They fed me and encouraged me to heal. The big dark one even bowed to me.
No one has ever bowed to me before.
I drag a hand through my hair, overwhelmed by the bone-deep tiredness that threatens on the edges of my vision.
“You could have taken me,” I say hoarsely, the realization crashing into me all at once. “All of you. I was unconscious. Weak. You could have done whatever you wanted to me.”
None of them speaks immediately.
The quiet stretches.
“But we didn’t,” the silver-eyed one continues. “Because we’re not them.”
Not them.
I swallow hard, memories rising unbidden: wolves laughing, a bear watching with detached interest until it was his turn, Gregory’s hot breath against my ear as he told me what I was for.
Even through my fear and uncertainty, I know what they say is true. They’ve had too many chances to prove themselves monsters. Too many moments where I was weak and at their mercy, and each time, they chose restraint and patience. They chose to take care of me in a way no one has before.
I study them again, more carefully now. The way they’re spaced around the cave isn’t accidental. They purposely aren’t crowding me. They’re guarding the entrance and keeping their distance so they don’t scare me, positioned like sentries who would rather take the first blow than let it reach me.
This bed is big enough to make assumptions, but they haven’t once tried to claim it. They haven’t touched me without warning or demanded anything in return for whatever fate they believe links us.
For men who speak of mating and destiny, they are strangely… disciplined.
Strangely gentle.
“I don’t even know your names,” I realize aloud. The fact is grounding somehow, a reminder that they’re still strangers. Still, men, despite everything else.
The silver-eyed one bows again. “Kelan.”
“Ronyn,” the scarred one says.
“Darial,” the golden-haired man adds, offering a faint smile that doesn’t quite touch his eyes.
I repeat them silently, anchoring myself to the sound of them.
“I’m not agreeing to anything,” I say firmly. “I won’t be claimed. I won’t be owned. I won’t surrender my freedom again.”
Kelan nods once, solemn. “You feel that way now, Aura, and I understand why. All I ask is that you let us care for you, and protect you, and let us prove that we’re worthy of you.”
His measured response unsettles me more than resistance would have.
I glance at the massive bed behind me, at the furs layered thickly enough to trap warmth for days. The cave feels… safe. Enclosed. Quiet. For the first time in my life, there is nothing stalking me out of the darkness.
“I’m too tired to leave tonight.”
Relief flickers across Darial’s face before he masks it.
“You must be exhausted,” I blurt, heart beating fast.
They blink, startled.
The golden-haired one huffs a quiet laugh.
“If you’re going to stay here, you’ll sleep. All of you. Next to me.”
Ronyn stiffens. Darial’s brows lift. Kelan studies me intently.
“No touching,” I add sharply.
Kelan inclines his head. “As you wish.”
I don’t know why his calm agreement makes my throat ache.
I lie back slowly, curling inward on my side, watching them as my eyelids grow heavy.
They move carefully, settling on the far edges of the bed, respecting my demand for distance.
This is another opportunity for them to challenge my limits, or simply smash through them like Gregory and his minions, but they lie around me with deliberate care, as though they don’t want to disturb this bed they’ve created.
The furs shift beneath their weight, everything reshaping itself to accommodate their large bodies, even as they keep a respectable distance from me.
Kelan settles behind me, his heat radiating through the space between us. Ronyn’s broad back is to the cave wall, his presence solid and immovable. Darial lies across from me, turned on his side so I can see him if I open my eyes.
They form a triangle around me, which should feel like a trap, but inexplicably is like shelter.
The fire crackles low, its light throwing slow shadows across dark, cold stone, dancing alone in the dark. The cave smells like warmth now. Like safety. My body, traitor that it is, begins to relax.
Sleep presses at the margins of my mind, heavy and insistent, until Darial stirs.
“Where did you come from, Aura?” he asks quietly. “Where’s your family?”
He isn’t the first person to ask me, but it’s the first time I haven’t wanted to lie to cover the shameful truth.
“I don’t know,” I say finally. “They left me at a group home when I was an infant. There are no records of who they are. No last names. I’m just… Aura.” I swallow. “I learned early to keep my questions to myself. Questions make people uncomfortable. And uncomfortable people can turn mean.”
“Did they hurt you?” Ronyn asks, his voice bearing low menace, as though he’s holding something sharp behind his teeth.
“I learned how to be invisible.”
There’s a pause.
“You shouldn’t have had to learn that,” Darial says.
Kelan exhales slowly behind me, the sound deep and controlled. “No child should.”
Ronyn shifts slightly, careful not to brush against me. “And when your magic surfaced?”
I laugh under my breath; an unhappy sound. “It happened when I turned eighteen. And everything after that has been about survival.”
“You were alone?” Darial asks.
“Yes.”
“What about you?” I ask, needing to pull the focus away from myself before the memories form into points sharp enough to slice. “Where do dragons even come from?”
Ronyn huffs softly. “Eggs.”
I snort until I notice Darial’s face is serious.
“What about your family?”
“Dead,” Ronyn says.
“We were bound,” Kelan says quietly. “By the goddess. To keep magic from harming the world again.”
“To be watchers over the world,” Darial adds.
“That sounds lonely,” I murmur.
Darial’s smile is sad. “We have each other.”
“That’s something.” I try to imagine what it would be like to have friends or family who were with me through tough times. I can’t.
“Are you related?”
Darial laughs softly. “These guys wish they had my exceptional genes.”
“Be careful, Aura,” Ronyn warns. “His head has a habit of expanding to fit any space.
“How old are you?” I ask, wondering how dedicated they’ve been to each other.
Darial smiles and shrugs a shoulder lazily. “When you pass one hundred, the years don’t seem to count in the same way.”
“More than one hundred years?”
He shrugs again. “Dragons don’t age like humans. We will keep this form for millennia.”
“Millenia?” The prospect of being alive that long would fill me with dread. Then another thought strikes me. “Shouldn’t the goddess have provided you with a dragon mate. One who’d live as long as you?”
I crane my head to check the expressions of Kelan and Ronyn. Both are dark at the suggestion of my mortality.
“The goddess is wise,” is Kelan’s reply.
Wise? In her wisdom, she allowed me to go through hell, to suffer the worst at the hands of beasts, to break in ways I could never imagine, and still find a way to put myself back together. Why? To what end?
My fingers clasp the fur, gripping it lightly. “The world is an unfair place. I don’t believe in a goddess who would look past all the misery and suffering in the world and do nothing.”
My voice hitches over the last word, and Darial’s face responds with sympathy. He reaches out to me, but then thinks better, remembering my no-touching rule, once again proving that these dragon men are nothing like the beasts in Blackwood Forest.
“It is hard to reconcile,” he admits. “But through hardship, we learn lessons about others and ourselves. We build strength. We find ways to make the world better for others.”
His perspective forms a lump in my throat. Lessons? I’d rather I hadn’t learned the lessons I have about others: how easily they use and abuse, how thoughtless they can be to the suffering of others. These are lessons I’d have gone to my grave happily ignorant of.
And what of the lessons I’ve learned about myself? That I will beg and plead for my life and my safety, even when I know there is no point. That I would give up a child of my womb because I cannot face the unending reminder of the horror behind her creation.
“I learned I'm not a good person,” I tell him, through tightness in my throat that threatens tears.
“I don’t believe that,” Ronyn says.
“You don’t know the things I’ve done,” I whisper.
“You're our mate,” Kelan says, ignoring my no-touching rule by laying a hand on my shoulder. It’s so heavy, and the reassurance it provides is immediate. Our mate. He says it like that single fact could erase the worst of past sins and smooth over all future strife.
“I deserted my child,” I tell them, hoping it will disgust them and push them away. Then I could return to my simple life alone.
“Gregory, an alpha wolf shifter, forced me to get pregnant with a bear and a wolf. I knew they intended to use the child for their evil purposes, so I bided my time and used my magic to escape. I left her where I knew someone would find her.”
“Where is she now?” Darial asks.
“With a family of three wolves and their human mate. She is looked after and happy.”
“So, you protected her and ensured she’d be cared for?” Ronyn says.
“I left her,” I remind him.
“You did everything you could to make sure she was okay,” Darial says.
“Faced with impossible circumstances, barely able to stay alive yourself, you did the right thing,” Kelan agrees. “None of this makes you a bad person.”
I begin to cry softly, recalling her soft chattering voice as I backed away. Nothing will ever smell as sweet as her fluffy red hair. Nothing will ever hurt as much as the memories of her creation.
Darial shifts closer, his hand stretching out for mine. All around me, the furs rustle.
“No,” I say. “Please.” I can’t have them near me when I’m this raw.
“Okay,” Kelan murmurs, his already low husky voice taking on a gravelly tone.
“We’re here,” Ronyn says. “Tell us what you need.”
“I need these memories to be wiped away,” I admit. “I want to be clean.”
“You’re our queen,” Darial says. “You’re perfect in our eyes.”
I sniff, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. “Then maybe you need glasses.”
Kelan scoffs. “We have perfect vision and perfect perception.”
I cover my face with my hands, hiding in the safety of the darkness.
“Tomorrow, I’m leaving,” I whisper. “You should find another mate. Someone with less baggage. Someone who can be your perfect queen.”
“There is no one else,” Kelan growls. “No one.”
Ronyn rolls to his back. “The mate bond is only given once, Aura. If you don’t choose us, there will never be anyone else.”
Inexplicably, my heart aches for these strangers. One mate, and they’re given me? Broken, human me. It doesn’t seem fair.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’m sorry I’m not what you need. I’m sorry the goddess didn’t know better.”
“You’re perfect,” Kelan says. “You’re perfect for us.”
“I'm not. I can’t even trust myself to use my magic,” I admit, the confession slipping free before I can stop it. “I can’t even do that.”
“You don’t need your magic,” Ronyn says. “Not anymore.”
I stiffen slightly. “It’s the only thing that has kept me alive.”
“And the thing that has put you in danger.” Darial pulls his hair back from his face.
Ronyn’s voice is rougher when he says. “We’ll help you, Aura. That’s what we’re here for.”
“Sleep now,” Kelan murmurs. “In the morning, everything will be clearer.”
I shiver as the temperature in the cave seems to cool, and Darial tucks a fur around me. His hand is so warm that it radiates through the fur.
If I were a different woman with fewer sharp edges, I could curl into these men and finally find a place to rest in safety. I could leave my past behind and try to find a better future.
But I’m just me, and none of that seems possible.
Sleep eventually drags at me, pulling me under with gentle insistence. My breathing slows. My body sinks deeper into warmth and fur and the comforting presence of three beings who could have broken me and chose to do the opposite.
As nightfall gathers, I realize something quietly astonishing.
I'm not braced for pain or waiting for the moment this turns cruel.
For the first time in my life, I let myself rest without fear of what will happen if I close my eyes, and as sleep claims me, wrapped in heat and guarded silence, one fragile truth sinks deep inside my heart.
I'm safe, for now.