Dragons Realm (24 page)

She moaned in con­tent­ment, and he began to ex­plore her body with his con­fid­ent hands: first, her back, then her shoulders, then her arms; next, her waist, then her hips, and her thighs; fi­nally, her but­tocks, then her stom­ach…and her breasts. His ex­plor­a­tion was both gentle and strong; his mouth was both hungry and sweet; his body was equal parts dom­in­ant and ac­qui­es­cent—tak­ing, giv­ing, ex­chan­ging—un­til she found her­self vir­tu­ally grop­ing at his mas­cu­line form, stunned by the strength of her need.

Sens­ing her grow­ing de­sire, he growled in her ear, rolled them both over, and pinned her be­neath him.

Mine.
He mouthed the word, and Mina shuddered.

Tug­ging at the laces of her bod­ice, he at last freed her breasts and drew a taut pink are­ola deep into the cav­ern of his mouth, where he began to suckle, taste, and tease, tan­tal­iz­ing each and every nerve she pos­sessed with the skill of a phil­an­derer and the mas­tery of a god.

The heel of his hand found her heat, and he ro­tated it in mad­den­ing circles, caus­ing her to cry out in as­ton­ish­ment, shock, and awe. She writhed be­neath him and arched her back in of­fer­ing:
Sweet god­dess of mercy
, the dragon had set her on fire, and he’d yet to breathe a single flame.

“Oh, gods, Dante…”
She let the cry of pas­sion slip, and the en­treaty called his beast. His eyes flamed red; his head fell back; and his man­hood jerked against her stom­ach, grow­ing massive and en­gorged. Be­fore she could re­act to the strange sen­sa­tion, he was bunch­ing up her skirts, tug­ging at the ties of his breeches, and slid­ing out of his trousers.

She blinked three times, and her un­der­gar­ments were be­ing tossed to the ground, even as he rose above her and locked his gaze with hers. “Mine,” he growled again, send­ing her en­tire body up in flames. “I want to hear you say it.”

Mina gasped in fear and an­ti­cip­a­tion as he rocked for­ward, po­si­tioned his hips between her thighs, and nestled the head of his de­sire against her core. She panted, try­ing to keep from groan­ing, and her eyes latched onto his, like a moth to a flame.

“Say it.” He froze: wait­ing…watch­ing…trem­bling with need.

“Yours,” she whispered softly, and from the very depths of her heart, she meant what she said.

A wisp of smoke waf­ted from his nos­trils, and he looked pos­it­ively mag­ni­fi­cent in his raw, primal need, cloaked in pure, prim­or­dial hun­ger. And then to her stark sur­prise and won­der, a pair of pitch-black leath­ery wings punched through his back, en­fol­ded her in a mid­night em­brace, a satin co­coon, and he thrust his power­ful hips for­ward, mak­ing them one.

With pa­tience and ad­ept per­cep­tion, Dante led her bey­ond the pain, tak­ing her to new heights and sen­sa­tions, un­til at last, they rose to­gether to the Land of En­chant­ment, climb­ing greater and greater peaks un­til they hurtled over the edge—
to­gether
—and slowly drif­ted back to the Dragons Realm.

Part Three:

Dragons Lair

“Un­less a ser­pent de­vour a ser­pent it will not be­come a dragon. Un­less one power ab­sorb an­other, it will not be­come great.”

~ PRO­VERBS QUOTES

Chapter Twenty-two

I
t was around
five AM when Mina thanked the trader-camp guards for their es­cort, ducked into the tent of Um­bras, and quickly hur­ried to her bed­cham­ber. It had been a simple and ef­fort­less feat for Dante to enter the traders’ minds, con­vince them that the Sk­la­vos Ahavi from Um­bras had been sleep-walk­ing in the night, and com­pel them to re­turn her safely—
and quickly
—to the tent of Um­bras, where she would re­main se­curely tucked away un­til the end of the battle. They had even traveled by horse­back in or­der to make up for lost time.

A sly smile tugged at the corners of Mina’s mouth, and she pursed her lips to keep it from show­ing: While the story may have been im­plaus­ible—in fact, it was a bit ludicrous to be­lieve a sleep­ing wo­man could’ve traveled such a dis­tance—mind con­trol was an amaz­ing thing. The three traders had bought Dante’s lie hook, line, and sinker; and in their con­vic­tion, they had con­vinced Damian’s guards of the same, us­ing a very per­suas­ive ar­gu­ment. It didn’t hurt mat­ters
at all
that the Um­brasian guards were ter­ri­fied of Damian. In fact, they had been so hor­ri­fied upon learn­ing that their mis­tress had slipped away into the night, so fear­ful of Prince Damian’s re­prisal, that they were more than eager to settle the en­tire af­fair, swiftly, and in secrecy, without ever alert­ing their prince. Now, as Mina dis­missed her maid­ser­vant and her preg­nant sis­ter, Anna, she truly only wanted one thing…

Sleep.

She was men­tally ex­hausted and phys­ic­ally spent, com­pletely over­whelmed by an in­ner cauldron of con­flict­ing emo­tions, and totally drained by the grav­ity of what had tran­spired between her and Dante. She ab­sently pressed her hand to her lower belly and shivered, head­ing to­ward her bed…to­ward
Damian’s
bed.

She shook her head to dis­miss the mor­ose thought.

She would think about that later.

Dim­ming the wick on the lan­tern atop the bed­side table, she crawled be­neath the cov­ers, snuggled against the soft feather-stuffed pil­low, and was just about to close her eyes when she saw some­thing move in the shad­ows, a fig­ure, crouched low, be­hind a heavy wooden trunk.

She gasped and sat up straight.

The guards knew bet­ter than to enter her cham­ber without first an­noun­cing their pres­ence.

“Who’s there?” she called into the dark­ness, and just like be­fore, the faint hoot­ing of an owl echoed three times out­side the ap­ron of the tent, and the hairs stood up on the back of her neck.

Three owls.

Three ap­pear­ances.

Three omens?

First, when she real­ized that Raylea was in Um­bras; then, when Dante de­cided to give her a child; and now…
what
?

The lean, pread­oles­cent fig­ure of a young boy hastened for­ward, scur­ry­ing from be­hind the trunk like a startled mouse. “It’s just me, mis­tress. Thomas. Thomas the squire.”

Mina rubbed her eyes, reached for the lan­tern to turn up the wick, and strained to get a closer look. “Thomas?” She pulled the cov­ers up to her chin. “Whatever are you do­ing here?”

The young­ster sighed. “Apo­lo­gies, mis­tress Ahavi. I…I have…news.”

Mina slid from be­neath the sheets, tucked her toes into a pair of wait­ing slip­pers, and donned a nearby robe. She stood anxiously at the side of the bed. “What kind of news?”

Thomas aver­ted his eyes. “It might be easier to just show you.” With that, he waved his hand to­ward the deep­est pocket of shad­ows, a tri­an­gu­lar cav­ity be­hind a heavy ar­m­oire, and a tall, fa­mil­iar form stepped out.

Mina jol­ted. “Mat­thias!” At first, she could hardly be­lieve her eyes, but after scru­tin­iz­ing the male a half-dozen times—his wavy blond hair fastened in a leather thong; his lean but mus­cu­lar frame, car­ried with in­formal con­fid­ence; his deep blue eyes spark­ling in the lan­tern light—she knew without a doubt it was her dear friend and child­hood play­mate, Mat­thias Gentry.

But how?

“Dearest god­dess of mercy,” she mumbled ab­sently, “is it really you?” She brought her hand up to her mouth. “I thought you were dead. I thought the king…ex­ecuted you.”

Mat­thias stepped fur­ther into the heart of the light and nod­ded his head. “He did,” he said in a calm, steady voice. “But…I didn’t stay dead.”

Mina shivered. She pad­ded to the edge of the bed, wrapped her trem­bling arms around his shoulders, and hugged him with all of her might. And then, as a sud­den wave of dizzi­ness came over her, she sat down on the edge of the mat­tress and just stared blankly ahead, her mouth gap­ing open in shock.

Mat­thias smiled. “I as­sume, be­cause you are a Sk­la­vos Ahavi, you were taught everything of im­port at the Keep?” Mina nod­ded war­ily, and Mat­thias con­tin­ued. “So you must know that when a dragon is born, his father
awakens
his powers through the ex­change of saliva and blood—it is called the dragons’ kiss—and it is in that mo­ment that he be­comes an im­mor­tal be­ing.”

Mina cocked her head to the side in con­fu­sion, much like a be­wildered can­ine, and stared blankly at Mat­thias, wait­ing for his words to make sense.

“King De­mitri
fed
from all the pris­on­ers. He drained us as he ex­ecuted us, con­sum­ing the core of our es­sence, and it des­troyed every­one…but me.” He let out a slow, de­lib­er­ate breath, wait­ing for her to fully com­pre­hend his words.

Com­pre­hen­sion didn’t come.

Mina looked quiz­zically at Thomas, and then she cocked her eye­brows, feel­ing more than just a little sense of dread. “I don’t un­der­stand,” she whispered, still try­ing to pro­cess the cryptic words. “Why didn’t it des­troy you?”

Thomas the squire cleared his throat and dove into the con­ver­sa­tion with blunt ob­jectiv­ity. “Be­cause Mat­thias is the king’s own son.”

Mina swayed back­ward, catch­ing her­self on the bed with both arms anchored like tent spikes be­hind her. She pushed for­ward again and cocked her head to the other side. “Come again?”

This time, Mat­thias spoke plainly. “King De­mitri is my father.”

She wet her lips with her tongue and fur­rowed her brow. “You’re…De­mitri’s son?” she echoed, nod­ding her head dumbly as if she were will­ing to play along for a time. “But…how can that be? I mean, I’ve known you all my life. You’re the child of Penelope Fair­fax and Cal­lum Gentry—I know your father, and the two of you walk…and talk…alike.”

Mat­thias sighed, un­der­stand­ing. “That may be true. After all, he raised me, but my mother was already preg­nant when my father mar­ried her.” He began to share the story about the lost Sk­la­vos Ahavi, ex­plain­ing how the beau­ti­ful young maiden be­came a sub­ject of con­tro­versy between the high priest, the witch, and the king. He went on to de­scribe Penelope’s time at Castle Dragon, the scru­tiny she was un­der for three days and nights, and why they sus­pec­ted King De­mitri of tak­ing her as a lover, how she had ul­ti­mately es­caped…or the king had let her go.

And then he waited quietly for Mina’s reply.

Mina let out a nervous chortle, feel­ing like a fool. She was still hav­ing trouble mak­ing sense of the truth. “I’m sorry,” she ex­plained, “but it’s just…I’ve known you all my life. You are a gif­ted hunter and a skilled fighter, to be sure, but a dragon? Mat­thias, I’ve never seen you say or do any­thing that might im­ply—”

Just then, the boy she had known all of her life stepped back from the edge of the bed, held out his hands, turned them palms up, and began to ex­tend his claws, ten per­fectly ser­rated talons. He sniffed in de­fi­ance, and a faint hint of smoke filled the room, even as his deep blue eyes began to glow a dark, fiery red. And then he re­trac­ted his claws, re­leased a cav­ernous breath, and watched as a small or­ange flame trailed in the wake of his ex­hal­a­tion.

Mina gasped. She opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it, com­pletely at a loss for words.

And that’s when Thomas the squire stepped in. “Mis­tress Ahavi, we need your help.” He glanced at Mat­thias and in­clined his head. “We need your pro­tec­tion. If the king finds out…if he no­tices Mat­thias’s body miss­ing, he might put two and two to­gether. At the least, he’ll hunt him down and kill him.”

Mina prac­tic­ally re­coiled—at both the danger and the re­quest. “My pro­tec­tion?” she scoffed, not mean­ing any dis­respect. “You want some kind of pro­tec­tion
from me
?” Her heart sank as she reached out to take Mat­thias by the hand. “I have no power in Dragons Realm. None, what­so­ever. In fact, I am hardly safe my­self.” She turned to re­gard the squire dir­ectly. “And you of all people should know this. I be­long to Damian now—do you re­mem­ber what happened to Ta­tiana?”

The boy nod­ded. “I do. Of course, I do
.
But I also have eyes, and I know that someone healed her.” He began to fid­get with his hands, for the first time show­ing his youth. “I know that the eld­est prince fa­vors you, Prince Dante. And I also know that Mis­tress Cas­sidy can­not be trus­ted, but per­haps if you ap­pealed dir­ectly—”

Mina held out her hand to si­lence him.

This was a dan­ger­ous game they were play­ing.

All of them.

And the stakes had just grown higher.

How would she get to Dante…
again
? When? Where? And what would she tell him?

What could she tell
him?

And why would he be in­clined to help a half-brother—a bas­tard son of the king—whom his father would likely de­test?

Dante also had a pre­cari­ous role to play in the Realm, more so now than ever, and all of them were bal­an­cing on a razor’s edge.

She un­wit­tingly placed her hand on her stom­ach and sighed. “I don’t un­der­stand what you think I can do…or say,” she ar­gued, feel­ing her heart con­strict at the un­true words, “but even if I did, why would Dante get in­volved?”

The squire lowered his lashes and aver­ted his eyes, glan­cing at the floor. “Be­cause…be­cause he is my friend.”

Mina leaned for­ward with ex­pect­a­tion, even as Mat­thias re­garded Thomas side­ways.

“Ex­plain,” Mina promp­ted. She didn’t mean to sound so ab­rupt, but the three of them were lit­er­ally play­ing with fire, and if there were any un­known or per­tin­ent de­tails, then she needed to know them all.

The squire raised his chin and drew back his shoulders, as if don­ning a cloak made of man­u­fac­tured pride; he swal­lowed some­thing akin to fear—
or maybe shame?
—and then he began to speak in a soft, rote man­ner, al­most as if he were re­cit­ing from a scroll. “Many years ago, when I was only six sum­mers old, the king asked me to ac­com­pany him and his sons on a pheas­ant-hunt­ing trip—they were to prac­tice their arch­ery, and I was to carry their bows, their ar­rows, and his ale.” He shrugged. “I can’t ex­plain it: the king en­joys his petty tor­tures, mock­ing those he thinks are weak.”

Mina star­ted to squirm, and she had to force her­self to sit still.

At six years old?

Thomas clenched and re­laxed his fists in a barely no­tice­able ef­fort to con­trol his emo­tions and pressed on. “Any­how, we walked many miles into the woods, and need­less to say, I grew tired, too tired. The weight of all that gear was just…too much.” He gulped sev­eral times, and Mina wanted to say some­thing to com­fort him, but she re­strained the im­pulse, held her tongue, and re­mained deathly quiet, in­stead. “We came to a fairly deep stream, and the king com­manded me to get the princes a drink of wa­ter and him some ale, but he wouldn’t let me set the hunt­ing gear down.” He bit his lower lip, and his eyes clouded with mois­ture, but other than that, he showed little emo­tion. “I dropped Prince Damian’s bow, and it broke—so the king told Damian to teach me a les­son.” The squire could no longer look Mina or Mat­thias in the eyes, and he slowly turned away. “I thought he would beat me with the bow, but he found a piece of wood, like a club, and he just…he wouldn’t stop un­til I was nearly un­con­scious.” He smiled then, and it was the most in­con­gru­ent, para­dox­ical grin Mina had ever seen. “But he didn’t stop there. He tossed me in the river, and I was too badly in­jured to swim. I would’ve drowned, but Prince Dante dove in and saved me.” A single tear es­caped his eye, and he brushed it away with an angry swipe, clearly up­set that he had let it fall. “I don’t re­mem­ber any­thing else that happened that day; ex­cept, I learned later on that the king was so en­raged that he broke both of Dante’s arms, and then he made him carry me—and all the equip­ment—back to the castle. And ap­par­ently, Dante did it without a single whim­per.”

Mina brought both hands to her face and cupped them over her mouth, try­ing to choke back a sob—that was the last thing this brave little squire wanted or de­served—and she wasn’t about to di­min­ish his cour­age with pity. Still, she knew there was some­thing else churn­ing in her gut, some­thing she could no longer deny: She was both grate­ful
for
and proud
of
the new life she was car­ry­ing in­side her. And she would cher­ish this child with all of her heart, al­most as much as she would de­light in de­fy­ing the king and Damian. Thomas had been an in­no­cent, help­less little boy, and Dante, well, he had been a lion. A brave and de­fi­ant dragon.

He still was…

He still was.

“So, you see…” Thomas’s words snapped her out of her mus­ings. “Prince Dante has al­ways been more than my lord. To me, he is a friend, and he knows that he has my un­dy­ing loy­alty…even unto death.”

Mina sat taller. She stiffened her spine and nod­ded her head, even as her heart still wept from the story. “I see,” she mumbled softly. She was just about to add that she would do whatever she could to help both Thomas and Mat­thias, even if it meant try­ing to talk to Dante, when a gale-force wind swept through the bar­racks, battered the posts be­neath the high arches, and sent the heavy ar­m­oire slid­ing three feet back. A sound, so furi­ous and fe­ro­cious that it pierced the ears, rocked the ground be­neath them, and she jumped up from the bed. “What was that!” she cried as a chorus of voices began to rise out­side on the beach:
The king! The king! The dragon is
com­ing!