Chapter 18
EIGHTEEN
DRAVEN
Draven was buttoning his shirt when Lila’s scream tore through the morning air outside. The sound hit him with devastating force, and her raw terror mixed with panic blazed through their mate bond so intensely it nearly drove him to his knees.
Where is Lila?
His dragon roared, fire flooding his veins as he bolted through the cabin and burst through the back door. The sight that greeted him ignited every predatory instinct he possessed. A blue dragon lifted off into the sky, his massive claws wrapped around his mate’s waist.
“Oh, hell no.”
His shift began before his feet left the porch.
His bones cracked and reformed, his muscles expanded exponentially, and his consciousness merged with his dragon’s primal fury.
Within seconds, his massive obsidian dragon form launched skyward, his wings beating with devastating power as he gave chase.
The blue dragon was fast—younger and more agile—but Draven’s rage fueled him beyond normal limits. Through their strong bond, he felt Lila’s terror transform into fierce determination, and pride swelled within him even as murderous intent consumed his thoughts.
That’s my fierce mate. Fight, Lila. I’m coming for you.
The chase led toward the volcanic ridge where a small cabin nestled among the volcanic rocks. As they descended, Draven watched Lila twist in her captor’s grip. She drove her elbow into sensitive spots between the dragon’s claws, making him loosen his hold.
She dropped from the dragon’s grasp, hitting the ground hard enough to make Draven’s heart stop. Even from his aerial position, he could see her favoring her left ankle, but she was alive and moving.
The blue dragon landed and shifted back to human form, revealing Marvin—Veyra’s ambitious nephew whose arrogance had always grated on Draven’s nerves.
“You made a grave mistake, boy,” Draven’s voice thundered telepathically as he circled overhead like a predator sizing up prey.
Marvin’s human form looked up, his expression shifting from cocky confidence to dawning fear. “King Draven! I was just—”
“Just what? Kidnapping my mate?” Draven’s mental voice crackled with barely contained fury. “Explain yourself before I incinerate you where you stand.”
“Aunt Veyra sent me!” Marvin called out, his voice cracking. “She said to scare the human, make her want to leave Nova Aurora. Nothing deadly, just—”
Draven’s roar of fury echoed across the ridges as he dove toward Marvin, shifting mid-flight. His human form hit the ground, and within three strides, he’d tackled the younger dragon shifter to the rocky ground.
“You don’t touch her ever again,” Draven snarled, his hands wrapping around Marvin’s throat.
Marvin struggled beneath him, his own shift beginning in panic. “It wasn’t my idea! Veyra said—”
“I don’t care what that scheming bitch told you.” Draven’s grip tightened as his inner fire blazed just beneath his skin. “The moment you laid hands on my mate, you signed your death warrant.”
Marvin’s partial shift made him larger and stronger, but Draven’s fury was beyond anything the younger dragon had ever faced. They rolled across the rocky ground, claws and fists flying, until Draven landed a devastating blow that sent Marvin crashing into the volcanic ridge’s face.
The impact left Marvin unconscious and bleeding, his body crumpled against the stones.
Draven spun toward Lila, ready to shift and carry her to safety, when movement from the cabin caught his attention. A man emerged heading straight for Lila.
“Corin.” The name left his lips like a curse.
His mate was already in motion. Despite her injured ankle, Lila pivoted on her good foot and drove her knee into Corin’s groin with enough force to double him over.
As he gasped and staggered, she grabbed his wrist and twisted, ripping his communicator free before delivering a perfectly aimed kick that sent him sprawling unconscious beside the cabin.
Holy hell. Draven stared at his mate with a mixture of awe and blazing arousal. She just took down a trained operative like it was nothing.
Lila looked up at him, breathing hard but triumphant. “Self-defense classes in Santa Monica,” she said with a shaky grin. “Apparently they translate well on Nova Aurora.”
Draven laughed, then shifted back to his dragon form and approached Lila carefully, his claws closing gently around Lila’s waist. She didn’t flinch—instead, she leaned into his touch, trusting him completely despite having just been terrorized by another dragon moments before.
As they lifted off toward his cabin, Draven’s mind was already racing through the implications. Veyra had made her move, using her nephew and Corin to target Lila directly. The gloves were officially off.
But watching his mate fight back with such fierce courage had shown him something crucial. Lila wasn’t just his emotional anchor. She was a warrior in her own right, capable of standing beside him as an equal partner in whatever battles lay ahead.
My queen, he thought as they soared through the morning sky. My fierce, brilliant queen.
Draven’s dragon soon touched down outside his cabin with gentleness despite the urgency coursing through his veins to tend to his mate’s injury. His massive claws released Lila with infinite care before he shifted back to his human state, the transformation swift and fluid.
Without hesitation, he scooped her into his arms, ignoring her immediate protests.
“I can walk, you know. It’s just a little sprain. Nothing ice can’t fix,” she said, though her voice carried a breathless quality that made his protective instincts flare even hotter.
Draven examined her ankle as he carried her toward the cabin, noting the purple bruising and alarming swelling that had already begun. His jaw tightened. “That’s not a sprain, Lila. It’s broken.”
She glanced down as they entered the cabin, her face falling slightly. “Oh. Well, that’s just fantastic.”
“Tomorrow before the funeral, I’ll have the castle healer assess it properly and treat you,” he said, setting her down gently on the bed.
His hands lingered on her waist, the need to touch her and reassure himself she was safe overwhelming his usual restraint.
“Right now though, I’ll wrap it with what I have in the first aid kit. ”
“Draven, thank you for saving my life,” she said softly, her eyes holding his with an intensity that made his chest tighten.
He knelt beside the bed, his hands gentle as he examined her injury. “You saved your own life. You were brave, fierce, and incredibly sexy taking down Corin like that.”
Her laugh was light despite the pain. “Your dragon was pretty sexy too, fighting and protecting me like that. Very alpha of you.”
If she only knew how close I came to tearing Marvin apart.
The memory of another dragon’s claws wrapped around his mate still made his inner fire burn with rage.
Lila reached into her pocket and pulled out Corin’s communicator, her expression shifting to something darker as she began scrolling through the messages. “Now I have the concrete proof we need.”
“What are you talking about?” Draven paused in his bandaging, sensing the sudden tension radiating from her.
“I haven’t been completely honest with you these past three days.” She looked up at him, guilt flickering across her features. “I’ve been working with Nyra to uncover the truth behind Veyra. What she told me today while you were in the shower was sick.”
Draven’s hands stilled completely on the bandage.
She’s been investigating without me?
Part of him bristled at being kept in the dark, but a larger part swelled with pride at her initiative and cunning.
“The antidote was fake,” Lila continued, her voice growing harder with each word.
“It was really poison meant to kill you after you agreed to give Veyra your mate mark. You would die, and she would be queen.” She paused as she locked eyes with him.
“She has some twisted revenge plot against your family because your father humiliated and rejected her mother when he met your mother.”
The bandage fell from Draven’s hands as fury unlike anything he’d ever experienced blazed through him. His inner fire roared to life, but instead of the chaotic madness he’d battled for years, it felt controlled, focused—deadly.
She would have murdered me and claimed my crown.
“Nyra suspects Veyra killed your father when she was eighteen, as revenge for her mother,” Lila said, her voice even despite the explosive tension radiating from him.
“And she killed your mother to isolate you and make your grief spiral, so you’d be vulnerable and easily manipulated for the poison scheme. ”
Draven stood abruptly, his hands clenching into fists. “That bitch has been playing the long game for eighteen years.” His voice was dangerously low, the kind of tone that had sent grown dragons scrambling for cover. “She murdered my parents.”
“The proof is all here in the messages between Corin and Veyra,” Lila said, holding up the communicator. “She admits everything—her mother’s humiliation, the murders, the poison plot. All of it in her quest to become queen.”
Every primal instinct wanted him to shift, to hunt Veyra down and end her where she stood.
She took everything from me. My father, my mother, nearly took my mate, nearly killed me.
His dragon snarled for blood and vengeance.
“I want her arrested immediately,” he growled, pacing to the window like a caged predator.
“How about we wait and expose her in front of everybody so she can get a taste of humiliation herself?” Lila’s voice carried a note of satisfied vindictiveness that made his dragon purr with approval. “Give her the same public shame her mother experienced.”
Draven turned back to her, a slow, predatory smile spreading across his face.
“That’s a brilliant plan. She deserves to face the same disgrace she’s spent eighteen years plotting to avenge.”
“I have another brilliant plan,” Lila said, her voice dropping to a sultry whisper that made his pulse spike.
“Tell me.”
Her green eyes blazed with determination and something deeper—something that made him forget to breathe. “I’m ready for you to give me your mate mark and complete our mate bond.”
Every cell in his body ignited with euphoric disbelief.
She’s ready. My mate is finally ready.
Before he could form words, she continued. “Watching you fight for me today, seeing your dragon protect me so fiercely—I know this is right. We’re right. I don’t want to wait anymore.”
Draven was across the room in two strides, his hands framing her face as he crashed his mouth to hers. The kiss was hungry and desperate, filled with eighteen years of deep longing and the promise of forever. When they finally broke apart, both breathing hard, he rested his forehead against hers.
“Even though my mother’s funeral is tomorrow, this feels like a rebirth,” he whispered against her lips. “Of my soul, of my kingdom, knowing my true queen will be by my side forever.”
Tomorrow, we’ll expose Veyra and get justice for my parents. Today, I claim my queen.