Chapter 30 #2
His eye contact was intense. The intimacy, the connection—it electrified all of my senses at once. The confidence of every step, every dip, it was all so erotic. It was vastly different than dancing with Cercies. Dancing with the High Lord of Flame felt like foreplay.
“I heard what you said—any male can fuck, but only a mate can dance,” he said in his deep, seductive voice.
“Okay… and?” I asked.
He whipped me into an aggressive outward spin. When I spun back, he took my full body weight and dipped me low. Leaning over me, he whispered, “Now you know I am the best at both.”
He rumbled in a deep, breathy tone that stole the air from my lungs. I melted into him as his eyes bore into mine. He positioned me back on my feet.
“Try not to do anything that would make me want to kill my second in command in a jealous rage, or it’s going to be a long day for me. Have fun riding dragons. I’ll see you this evening.”
He released me, and my body screamed at the loss of his touch, his warmth. He planted a slow, soft kiss on my hand before walking down the hall. There was one thing I knew for certain, Titus was indeed the best at both.
My heart was still pounding from dancing with Titus as I made my way to the dragon’s keep to meet Aurelius. I cursed the stairs for the third time that day. My skin still prickled from the places Titus had touched me. God, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on him tonight—but
I needed to focus. Because like Titus said, the better I was on dragon-back, the better chance I’d have at surviving this dangerous world.
The last time I had been near this creepy cave, it was night, and I had been escaping.
Seeing it in the day did not make it less unsettling, but I was more comfortable being around dragons now, so I wasn’t completely terrified like before.
I proceeded into the cave, reminding myself that it was just the dragon’s keep and not the Enchanted Mines, and that a giant Lithovore was not going to burst from the rock.
“Hello?” I called nervously. “In here,” a voice called back.
I rounded the corner to a dimly lit alcove where Aurelius was saddling Zephyros.
He stood, reminding me of his towering height.
He stepped in close—a little too close—and his eyes flicked to my lips, then back to my eyes.
Most Fire Fae had similar amber eyes, but something about his burned with the same intensity as Titus’s.
“I assumed you wanted to practice with Zephyros,” he said lightly.
There was a beat.
His jaw tightened slightly.
“Or would you prefer Draxxinar?” he said as he tipped his head.
Zephyros shifted behind him with a low chitter. Draxxinar’s name seemed to hang in the air between us like something sharp.
I swallowed.
Suddenly, I got the feeling we weren’t talking about dragons anymore. But I pretended to be clueless and simply replied, “Zephyros is fine,” with a smile.
Relief flickered across his face before he masked it. He grinned with one corner of his mouth. Zephyros bumped his shoulder as if satisfied.
“All right then. Get on,” he commanded.
I did as the Dragon Master said, and we took off into the sky. I practiced the manual commands for a while before managing a clumsy landing on a rocky plateau near Dragon’s Maw. Several dragons scattered at the abruptness of the landing. We dismounted, and my boots hit the unforgiving stone.
“What is this place?” I asked.
“A nesting ground outside Dragon’s Maw,” he replied pointedly.
I looked around at the variety of dragons—red, orange, brown, yellow—and then, tucked into the gaps in the rock… dragon eggs!
Gesturing to Zephyros, I asked, “Why aren’t there any more like her?”
“The Kingdom of Flame has five distinct species of dragon, and they all breathe fire, making them fire dragons. Browns are the most common—a standard issue for new riders—then small reds, then yellows, then oranges like Veyraxxies and Pirantix.”
“Who’s Pirantix?” I interrupted.
“You’ve met him. He’s the grumpy large orange—Rexius’s dragon,” he said. “Then there are the rarest—giant reds like Draxxinar.”
“So, which is Zephyros? None of these are blue-green like her.”
“None. She is an oddity—a hybrid that shouldn’t exist. She’s a crossbreed between a yellow and a water dragon, but she wields fire.
Dragons only breed within their species, but one day I found her near the border, and instead of killing me, she bonded to me,” he explained.
“I’ve always been an oddity myself,” he added, gesturing to his sleek silver hair.
“As Master of Dragons I could have chosen a large orange, but I chose her because of our bond.”
“Because you value the bond over power?” I asked.
He stroked her scales and she gave a reptilian purr. “Yes. Above all, the bond is most important. Come here, I’ll show you. Place your palm on her scales.”
I did as he said.
Immediately, the familiar tingling began, the same electric hum I felt with every dragon. A subtle vibration beneath my skin. A warmth that traveled from palm to wrist.
But then—
Aurelius’s hand covered mine. And everything changed.
The hum deepened.
Not just through my skin. Through my chest.
Through my ribs. Through my breath.
Zephyros’s pulse had synchronized with mine. I felt the steady rhythm of her heart, and beneath that, another rhythm.
Aurelius’s. For a heartbeat…or maybe three—I couldn’t tell which pulse was whose.
My inhale stuttered. Zephyros inhaled. Aurelius inhaled.
The air moved through all three of us at once.
I was no longer just a mortal with a dragon and a Fire Fae. I was a circuit. A current of magic vibrating through us, binding skin to scale, scale to bone, bone to breath.
And underneath it all— Emotion.
Raw. Unshielded. Exposed.
Zephyros’s presence was vast and ancient and terrifyingly intelligent. I could distinguish her—steady, powerful, sovereign in her awareness.
But Aurelius—
His emotion flooded the bond.
Not controlled. Not guarded. I felt his reverence, hope, fear, and longing.
God, the longing!
It burned through the connection like white fire, sharper than any blade. Not possessive. Not demanding but pleading. My throat tightened. Because I felt it the way he felt it.
The way he watched me.
The way he held his breath like if I broke this moment, something in him would fracture beyond repair.
The way he needed this interaction to matter.
He let me feel it. All of it. What it would be like to stand beside him instead of Titus’s shadow.
What it would be like to be his equal. To not submit to power. But to share it.
My knees nearly buckled, and his hand tightened over mine instinctively.
He felt everything. Every spike in my pulse.
Every crack in my resolve. Every flicker of doubt.
This wasn’t just a bond.
This was a choice; he was letting me feel what choosing him would mean.
“You feel it,” he murmured, but it wasn’t a question.
His voice sounded different, rougher. Lower. Like he was speaking from inside the bond instead of outside of it.
Aurelius’s hand lingered over mine a second longer than necessary.
“That,” he said quietly, almost reverently, “is the bond.”
The sensation of his bond with her through him was incredible. I smiled in wonder and looked at him, starry-eyed, as if he had just given me the moon.
He smiled. “That’s magic—and you feel it. I know you do. You may not be able to access it yet, but it’s there. I sense your power Delilah. It is ancient and chaotic, and so does she.” He gestured to Zephyros, who nodded her head and huffed out some steam.
The bond made it easy to blur lines and the intimacy of it left me breathless—but not for the reasons he hoped. The bond let me feel him—raw and unshielded.
And I couldn’t give him what he was offering. Not because it wasn’t beautiful.
But because it didn’t belong to him. It belonged to Danny.
What captivated me about the bond was not Aurelius, it was the power in the connection. The magic. The way the world sharpened when the bond opened.
I wanted to understand it. To own it. To know why Zephyros recognized something in me that I hadn’t yet named.
“When she communicates with you, is it with words or… emotions?” I asked.
“Mostly emotions. Only once with words." He turned to look at me. "It was the day I found you.”
My eyes widened with burning curiosity. “What did she say?”
“Rexius and I were flying near the Sacred Forest when we heard your screams for help. I hesitated—whether I should get involved and risk the heir’s safety—but then Zephyros spoke to me with words for the very first time. She said, ‘Save her. She is the one. Save her.’”
He looked at me steadily. “And I believe she was right. You
are the one. The one I want to spend my life with.”
His words crept over my skin like spiders. The certainty in his voice frightened me more than his fire magic ever could.
“Aurelius… I can’t. I’m going home to my husband soon,” I lied.
His face darkened, and when he spoke, his voice deepened. His head tipped to the side in that very fae manner, one that conveyed threat along with their beauty.
“Is that so? Then why do you fuck him? Why does your heart race around him when he treats you like shit? You deserve better, Delilah. We could fly away together right now—away from this place, this war. You wouldn’t have to go into Mount Orid. We could start a life together—a real one.”
“I… I know. I managed. It’s complicated.”
He let out a sharp laugh—humorless and wounded. “Complicated is what people call it when the truth makes them look ugly.” My chest hollowed as emotion rose like a tide.
“I… I love him, okay?” The confession burst out of me like a storm cloud finally breaking.
Silence hit. His silence was worse than his shouting. Aurelius went still, so still it was frightening.
I couldn’t tell him about the trigger. About the mate mark. About Danny. I couldn’t risk Titus losing his memories—or losing mine.
I could almost see his heart break. The golden shimmer of his skin dulled.
“It’s because of his power. His title. Isn’t it?” “No!” I argued.
He leaned in closer and spoke.
“Then explain why you would choose to be undervalued.” His voice dropped again, sharpened. “Explain why you would crawl toward a male who only wants you because you make him feel strong.”
“The why does not matter, Aurelius. I’m not running away and leaving my friends to perish when I have the power to potentially stop this war.”
His eyes flashed. “Your intentions are noble,” he said bitterly, “but stop pretending they aren’t convenient.”
“What are you talking about?” I demanded. “I’m risking my life for all of you. That is far from convenient for me!”
He stepped closer, heat tightening the space between us. “Because staying makes you important,” he said, each word precise, brutal. “Because staying makes you chosen. Because staying makes you his.”
My stomach dropped.
“You refuse to run away with me so you can save your friends— fine, I can live with that,” he said. “But you choosing to stay and be his mate?” He scoffed, and the sound was full of poison. “That’s to secure a throne and a title. I should have known. That’s all anyone has ever cared about.”
“Aurelius, I don’t care about—”
Blazing white fire rolled off his shoulders.
His amber eyes flared so bright they looked molten at the core.
“DO YOU KNOW HOW INFURIATING IT IS TO BE
NUMBER TWO?” he roared, and the sound rattled the stone beneath our feet. “ALWAYS SECOND TO A DISAPPOINTMENT OF A MALE?!”
The air around him shimmered with heat.
“I HAVE NEVER UNDERSTOOD WHY MY BLOOD
MAGIC LEVEL IS LOWER THAN HIS,” he shouted, voice breaking with rage and something worse. “WHEN I FEEL FROM MY BONES TO MY AURA THAT I AM MORE POWERFUL THAN HIM!”
I froze, fear pinning me in place.
This was the side of Aurelius I had seen after the SkyGuard feast. The raw, uncontained, unpredictable side of him that scared me more than Titus ever could.
His flames surged— Then they faltered.
His gaze flicked to my face, and he saw it: the fear I couldn’t hide.
He looked away, like he could no longer stand the sight of me.
My voice shook as I began to speak, but he cut me off.
“What a disappointment you turned out to be, I had thought better of you,” he said.
“We are done here, Lady Delilah.” Something dark flickered across his face.
He didn’t clarify what he meant. He didn’t have to.
Aurelius wanted all or nothing. And in that moment, I understood I had not only lost a mentor I admired, but a friendship I had foolishly believed was real.