Chapter 5
Thorn
Losing the royal couple was a tragedy. No one with a soul would say otherwise.
But the drama it unleashed was also a fucking tragedy and I was annoyed I had to be involved in it. I was annoyed it was all anyone was focused on, especially when I had such harsh feelings for the king and royal family.
And that was before I learned my uncle had tried to mate me off to the future queen by some backhanded deal with corrupt elders. I was damn sure he lied through his teeth that I would help them or… All he knew how to do was lie.
I knew that better than anyone.
I knew better than anyone how deep his betrayal and thirst for power were. He saw this as the next step in his greed. Not only had he stolen my position as next to be Alpha when I was too young to understand what was going on, but he saw all the perks of having me stand next to the queen.
Hell, he was so deluded he probably thought I would basically be king and let him be the boss of me as my Alpha.
We really need to just kill him already, Thorn.
As much as I agreed with my dragon, nothing was that simple, and a big part of me blamed the king for not helping me. But I hadn’t wanted him or the queen dead.
No, I wanted them to do their fucking jobs and lead.
Now we were stuck with a princess no one had faith in. She was spoiled—fine, she was a princess. However, her parents never wanted her around. At least mine had loved me even if they hadn’t protected me better in the event they died.
Princess Sagan was sent away to so much schooling and education that everyone I knew thought something was wrong with her. She was a dud. Her dragon was embarrassing—some reason to explain why they never had their only child at court.
The really dark whispers were that they hoped she would die in a foreign land and they would be free of having her as an heir. That one actually made me pity her because too many believed that.
And I would have as well if I was in her shoes.
But no one could deny she was beyond gorgeous.
No one with eyes.
Dragons all had dark, dark pewter/silver hair with tones of our dragons. Mine were darker blue for my water dragon. If I’d been given an ice dragon, there would be shimmers of baby blue.
As we aged, our hair lightened and those colors showed through. It was the only way to tell a dragon’s age since we didn’t show it physically like other species. I would forever look mid-twenties to early thirties if compared to other species, especially humans.
So elders normally had light silver hair with shimmers of their dragon’s colors and the rare ancients were basically white. Their hair was beyond gorgeous and it was somehow always flattering, male or female.
Princess Sagan’s was that dark pewter with shimmers of orange for her fire dragon. It was actually the shading I thought least flattering, but… She had the deep red eyes of the royal bloodline and it was stunning.
She was.
No dragon was small, but women tended to be smaller than males.
In human form. Their dragons tended to actually be bigger, which was the balance.
For a dragon, Princess Sagan was on the shorter side, only about six feet. Which fed into the rumors something was wrong with her, especially since her mother was tall for a dragon female. Both of her parents were over six and a half feet and she was probably only at six feet in the right shoes.
I was seven feet, so it amused me that I would look down on her… If we weren’t dealing with such a somber occasion.
Most were impressed she handled it with grace. She was flawless at the main temple gathering to wrap up her parents’ laying to rest there. Funerals were always on the full moon for dragons. Bodies could be preserved with magic and more, but our beliefs on this were set.
Not sending off our departed on the full moon was akin to spitting on them.
She was flawless at the funeral service besides two tiny cracks I saw. One of the royal wards who seemed to overstay her welcome from what I’d heard, Elira, was laying on the dramatics and I saw Sagan’s face twitch.
That was it. Not even… Maybe her eye or jaw? It was just an instant, but I saw it.
The other was Elder Hardin trying to insert himself into the role of family and that twitch came back as her uncle easily deflected it all. But the look of death Sagan shot the elder after would have made a wiser man afraid.
It fucking terrified my dragon and me, and I wasn’t that close, nor was it aimed at me.
I think the rumors about her are wrong. We should—
I shut my dragon down. We weren’t getting involved with her or any other royal mess. My uncle could choke on his plans, and I was going to take back my area and rightful place.
Oh, how those thoughts and determination bit me in the ass not hours later.
I couldn’t take any more of my uncle’s antics at the post-funeral somber feasts and decided to head up to the assigned room I had. Most didn’t have any in the castle besides the Alpha couples and I found that suspicious.
And made me want to get out of the castle as fast as possible. Elder tricks were definitely going on and some deal with my uncle.
I thought what I found was more of that and I almost walked away. I almost did. I took one look at the state of Princess Sagan and almost walked away from the obvious trap.
Until she flinched and glanced over her shoulder.
Then fear filled me and my protective instincts as a dragon and Alpha kicked in. I helped her to stand fully, a million questions racing through my mind even as I tried to ignore her beauty and scent when she was this close to me.
“Poison?” I asked, having worried things weren’t as they seemed with the royal couple’s deaths and how quickly everything was closed down. I went to feel her pulse and did a double take when she softly groaned at the touch. Her face was flushed and her eyes glazed over. “You’re in heat?”
She didn’t reply, leaning into my touch more, and my body moved on its own to get closer, pressing my thigh between hers.
I tried to snap out of it, but I was a single male dragon—completely unattached, and her scent—I was a goner when her dragon released more pheromones.
Except she wasn’t unattached. “I’ll get you to Kole.”
“No, please,” she begged as she weakly fisted my shirt.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “You should have prepared and—”
A whimper slipped out of her lush lips when I tried to pull away. “Never been like this. Not until today.”
Pity filled me. The stress of so much on her and her grief made her heat go nuts, and—it probably wasn’t even time for her heat, but the worry of so much set her dragon off. It seemed stupid, but dragons were beings of instinct.
And what was great stress relief?
Yeah, sex. No matter the time or what else we were dealing with.
I opened my mouth to say I would get her to her lover but froze when I heard soft giggling from down the hall… And the princess flinched again.
My eyes went too wide as I put the pieces together and figured out why she’d been coming from the direction of his room. She hadn’t gotten turned around. She’d gone to find him for relief and instead found something he could lose his head over.
“Please,” she begged, understanding I’d figured it out. “Please, help me.”
I heard a noise and decided for right then it meant to get her out of there. Swooping her up in my arms, I ducked down the other hallway until a few people passed. Then we actually had to go past Kole’s room to get to mine.
“Tuck your head down and be quiet,” I breathed in her ear, glad when she nodded. I moved fast but couldn’t help myself from being nosy… And saw what she probably had.
Namely, her self-appointed “adopted sister” touching Princess Sagan’s lover. They were dressed and the door was partially open.
However, the fact they were both sitting on Kole’s bed and Elira was playing with his hair was over the line. Especially when he was leaning into her instead of pushing her away.
Especially when his lover had buried her fucking parents that day and he wasn’t with her.
He really wants out of the relationship or has a death wish.
Funny because a lot of Alphas were furious that his area would get a leg up at the chance to mate the future queen.
Luckily, the security of the castle was top-notch, so I only had to use my thumbprint to unlock the door. I managed that easily with her in my arms and got us inside.
“Thank you,” she panted when we were safely inside.
I nodded and set her on her feet… Only to watch her not have the strength to stay standing. I hadn’t been ready for it and it wasn’t like she fell hard. It was more like she just sank and couldn’t deal with standing anymore?
Either way, I didn’t catch her, and I knew it was mostly because I was a dirty, dirty man.
I enjoyed watching her sink to her knees in front of me way more than I should. I couldn’t even hide it, and she blinked up at me with lust-filled, glazed-over eyes as she probably scented my desire. “It will only get worse until you’re sated.”
She whimpered. “I’ve been able to ignore it before. It’s never been like this.”
Pity filled me again. “Grief and pain will do that.” Knowing that allowed me to keep my head. “I’ll get you back to your room.”
“No,” she said so quietly that I barely heard her.
I was quiet for a full minute, her panting and soft noises the only thing to be heard in the room. “I need you to be crystal clear on this, Princess. I’m not being beheaded later for any misunderstandings.”
She rubbed her face and then moaned, probably the touch setting her off even if it was from herself. She stared up at me with those gorgeous, deep red eyes. “Please, please, help me through my heat.”
I licked my lips. “Sate you. Say it.”
She whimpered. “Yes, please sate me. I can’t ignore it this time.”
I chuffed, thrilled she begged for me to sate her but also annoyed she was only doing it because she couldn’t hold out. “Undress. There are things I will want too.”
Sagan gave me a worried look. “Nothing over the line.”