He pressed his forefinger against her lips to silence her, and then he bent to the top of her stunning scarlet bodice and traced the arc of her breast with his tongue. “So this is what troubles you?” he murmured, sounding like satin and midnight and sin wrapped in one. “The decisions that face me, my duty to the Realm?”
Princess Gaia closed her eyes, trying to block out the distracting sensations—the searing fire and the bitter ice—the dragon had left in his wake. “It does trouble me, my lord. Can you not understand this?”
Prince Dario sighed. “You are not of this kingdom, Princess Gaia.”
As his words washed over her, she blinked her eyes open and stared at a fixed point on the alabaster wall, noticing a small hair-sized fissure in the calcified, aged clay. “No, I am not.”
He grasped her jaw and turned her head back in his direction, forcing her to face his scrutiny. “Together, we can never have children, sons who will one day be heads of state,” Dario whispered.
Her eyes filled with moisture, and she blinked, yet again. This time, to dispel the pressing teardrops. “I cannot even feed you properly, at least not until I am trained.”
“Mm,” he droned, as if contemplating the subject deeply. “And yet, since the very first time I met you—just a fourteen-year-old girl flirting dangerously with a dragon prince—until that night beneath the moonlight on the starboard deck of a Lycanian ship, you have never failed to enchant me. Your soul as beguiling as that endless sea, your heart as vast at that starlit sky. In truth, I have hungered for little else. I have wanted…little else. And now, I have a very difficult decision to make.”
Princess Gaia gulped.
It was all happening too soon…
The succession of kings, her mounting feelings for Dario, the choice he could make any moment.
She felt like she needed more time.
Should she throw herself at the dragon—body, heart, and soul—in an effort to win his love? Should she retreat into the shadows of the Ahavi’s Keep, learning all that she must in order to serve him as her father intended…as one of Prince Dario’s many consorts, all with different roles? Or should she beg him to take his time, weigh his options carefully, and pray to any god that would listen to intervene on her behalf? “You don’t have to make a decision right now,” she whispered, terrified that he might say something he could never take back. “I just…I just don’t know if I can carry on like this with everything so uncertain.”
Prince Dario stared into her eyes as if he were seeking the origins of her very soul. “If I ask you to go to the Keep, to learn how to feed my dragon, will you do as I bid?”
Princess Gaia bit her bottom lip. “Yes, my lord. I will.”
He brushed the backs of his fingers over her jaw, lingering at the corner of her lips. “And if I ask you to remain at Castle Warlochia, to remain at my side as my lover, to continue to take me into your bed, will you give yourself to me of your free will?”
Princess Gaia hesitated, but only for a moment.
Her goose was well and truly cooked.
She could play coy, pretend to resent it—and perhaps she would begrudge every moment—but in truth, there was nothing she could deny the dragon prince. He already had her heart. “I would…I will.” The words were hardly a whisper.
Prince Dario Dragona dropped to one knee and took Gaia’s hand in his, kissing each of her knuckles in turn. “It is that service, that loyalty, and that honesty, Princess Gaia, that draws my heart to yours. That, and my burgeoning love.”
Princess Gaia held her breath.
Had she heard him correctly?
“You say I have a very difficult decision to make, and I agree there would be much to weigh if I had any real choice in the matter—but the choice was made for me the first night you came into my arms. You became my sun, my moon, my castle, and my heart. You are wise, beautiful—singular—and there isn’t a harem of consorts on either side of the ocean that could ever fill your shoes. If you can live with the fact that we cannot have children; if you can live with the fact that I must feed to live; if you can live with my dragon—his fiery needs and his primitive temperament—then I would have you, Princess Gaia, and you, alone. What say you, my sweet Lycanian shifter? Can you pledge yourself to me…forever?”
Princess Gaia knew she should wait to answer in the affirmative, allow Prince Dario to rise, and meet his embrace with dignity, honor, and at least a semblance of reticence…
But to hell with all of that.
She sank to her knees, threw her arms around him, and buried her head in his neck. “I will love you until there are no suns, moons, or castles, my prince. Yes, I will have you. Yes.”
He claimed her words with a kiss, and sealed her promise with a passion worthy of a dragon.
Chapter Thirty
The Southern District of Arns ~ One week later
Callum Gentry leaned on his digging fork and stared at the unruly garden. While a blacksmith by trade, he was getting up in years and could no longer forge the weapons, helmets, and shields he was renowned for. These days, his oven and his anvil produced simpler tools: mostly axes, nails, and arrowheads. And that meant he’d taken to growing his own food.
It was true that every month on the first new moon, a modest purse, filled with silver and copper, arrived mysteriously on his doorstep, but Callum knew neither the purpose, origin, nor benefactor of the gift, and he was hesitant to spend it, lest it be a trap.
One never knew.
It had been thirty-one years since the Castle Guard had captured his only son, Matthias, since his boy had been executed for unknown crimes against the king—whatever that meant—and the purses had started arriving. To Callum’s way of thinking, it was a trick: Castle Dragon was testing his loyalty, seeing if he was foolish enough to spend it. And so each new moon, he turned the coins over to the local constable, who had no trouble finding ways to use them. And while that had always irked him, not nearly as much as the news that had recently come from the greedy constable: Prince Dante Dragona had usurped King Demitri on the throne of Castle Dragon, and out of his first decrees, he had renamed his brother Damian, anointing him Prince Matthias.
That rankled Callum’s gut.
He’d hardly been able to eat for a week.
A harsh band of sunlight glinted in Callum’s eyes, even as the long, narrow dirt road leading to the cottage filled with plumes of dust, and he squinted to see who was coming. Perhaps it was Leif Danneville, a cabinetmaker who lived two counties over. Leif had recently ordered a box of twenty nails from the aging blacksmith…
As the horses and riders drew closer, Callum dropped his digging fork.
What in the name of all the gods!
These weren’t ordinary horses, and they were leading a small caravan: men dressed in armor, with swords at their sides, escorting an exquisitely made coach. One rider was carrying a banner—the flag of Castle Umbras!—and beside the coach, a tall, dark rider sat atop a powerful, regal mount that literally pranced as it walked.
Callum leaned forward, zeroing in on the proud, imposing figure.
The rider’s golden hair was the color of wheat at harvest, and it was tied back in a leather thong. Although Callum couldn’t make out the color of the rider’s eyes from such a distance, they were slanted in an almost harsh, narrow slope. And there seemed to be something on his right temple: perhaps a tattoo or a scar.
As the caravan rounded the last curve in the bend and made its way toward Callum’s front porch, the aging blacksmith began to tremble. Mother of Mercy, the male on that proud, strutting horse had the emblem of Castle Umbras emblazoned on the top left corner of his tailored silk shirt.
Surely, it could not be…
Why would the prince of Umbras travel to the commonlands, to the southernmost district of Arns, no less, and to visit Callum Gentry?
What could he want?
There were far finer blacksmiths in Umbras.
As the prince dismounted his fine, arrogant st
eed, Callum fell to his knees in the dirt, linked his hands together, and offered a prayer to the goddess of mercy, asking her to receive his soul. Why, after all these years, one of the dragon princes would come for Matthias’ elderly dad, he couldn’t begin to conceive of…but come, he had.
Callum Gentry was staring at Prince Damian Dragona, now approaching Callum in the flesh.
He immediately averted his eyes, while still regarding the rest of the caravan through his peripheral vision, waiting to see which soldier would draw his steel.
But no one drew a weapon.
Rather, one of the accompanying soldiers climbed down from his mount, rounded the coach, and opened the handsome carriage door. And a stunningly beautiful woman, in an exquisite pale-blue gown, climbed down from the regal chaise.
Callum Gentry gasped.
He would know that lovely maiden anywhere.
It was Raylea Louvet, Soren and Margareta’s youngest daughter.
The girls had grown up with Matthias…
Wetting his dry bottom lip with the tip of his tongue, he considered the odd situation: So it was true—what he’d heard—that Raylea Louvet had been given to Prince Dam—Prince Matthias—but he didn’t understand it, and he didn’t want to believe it, the fact that Soren and Margareta had lost both their daughters to the savage—and selfish—passions of the Realm’s imperial dragons.
Nonetheless, it might work to his benefit in this terrifying moment.
“Raylea,” he called in a desperate bark, even as the prince strolled toward him. “Raylea, please help me. Please tell the prince that I haven’t broken any laws, that I never spent any coins that weren’t my own, that I didn’t know, all those years back, what my boy was planning…or doing.” He sounded crazed and desperate, even to his own ears. He had no idea why Raylea had chosen to travel with the prince of Umbras—or the caravan—nor did he know if she had any pull with the fearsome dragon, but he didn’t have time to reason it out.
Men could be beheaded in mere seconds.
The prince of Umbras surveyed Callum’s land in a matter of heartbeats, sweeping his gaze from the rickety house to the peeling, dilapidated barn, and he snarled beneath his breath as if disgusted by the state of Callum’s holdings.
Callum’s teeth began to chatter in fear. “My lord,” he greeted the prince in a trembling voice, pressing his forehead to the ground, even though it strained his aging back.
“Get up!” the prince growled, his voice thick with anger.
As Callum struggled to his feet, he noticed the dragon’s hands were clenched into fists, and his breathing was almost labored. Holy lords of fire, the prince of Umbras was incensed by something. Callum clasped his hands together and simpered. “My prince, what brings you to Arns? To an old man’s homestead?” His desperate gaze flicked to Raylea, who was swiftly approaching behind him. “Mistress…can you help me?”
“What did you do with all the money?” the prince of Umbras asked him in a voice as chilling as night.
Callum froze for the space of several heartbeats, and then he struggled to find his voice. “I swear to you on the soul of my departed wife, if you’re referring to the monthly purse full of silver and coppers, I never touched it, milord. I turned it over to the constable: every speck, every nugget, every coin. I have always been a faithful—”
“Stop!” the prince thundered, as if he could no longer bear to hear Callum’s voice. “Please, stop begging, stop explaining, stop simpering.”
The blacksmith bit his tongue.
And that’s when Raylea Louvet strolled up to the prince, as familiar as a fish approaching water, and placed a soft, soothing hand on the dragon’s arm. “My prince,” she whispered softly, “take a few deep breaths. We will get through this together.” She turned her sweet, dark brown gaze on Callum. “Mr. Gentry, it’s okay. No one has come to harm you.” She stepped away from Prince Dam—Prince Matthias—and guided Callum’s elbow, ushering him in the direction of the house. “Let’s step onto the porch where we can all speak privately.”
Callum knew his eyes were as wide as saucers.
He had no idea what the hell was going on, but as he shuffled reluctantly next to Raylea, in the direction of the dilapidated wooden porch, he watched the prince of Umbras usher a soldier forward with the angry crook of two fingers.
The soldier scampered at his master’s behest. “Yes, my prince.”
“Take Captain Renard with you, and ride to the township. Ask the clerk of the county to send a missive to Castle Commons, alerting them that they need to replace their district’s sheriff. Then bring me the constable’s head.”
The soldier didn’t flinch.
He absently thumbed his scabbard and lowered his head in deference. “As you wish, my prince.” He turned on his heel and headed back toward his mount, muttering something to another soldier.
Five minutes later, having consumed a jug of water, taken a seat in an old rocking chair, Callum Gentry stared blankly at Raylea Louvet and the prince of Umbras as the visitors—nay, the couple—whispered to one another on the porch.
And then the prince of Umbras strolled to the farthest end of the platform, squatted down, and ran his forefinger over a crooked nail that was barely still lodged in the wood. “When I was seven years old, my father let me use his hammer and anvil to forge a nail for this porch. I wasted a week’s worth of metal before fashioning this piteous tack.” He rose to his feet and pointed to a tall, leaning willow tree. “I had a swing that hung from that tree, but I preferred to stand on it, rather than sit. And one evening, late in autumn, I lost my footing, fell from the seat, and struck my head on a rock—the wound must’ve bled for three hours.” He swallowed convulsively and met Callum’s gaze. “My father tended it for me”—he took a long, deep breath—“because I never knew my mother. She died bringing me into the world.” He placed his regal hands on his hips and stared out at the fallow pasture. “The garden used to be over there.” He pointed at a small clearing behind what was left of a haystack. “Long ago, when we had a goat…but I swear to the gods, there was no wood, wire, or even stone fencing that could keep that possessed billy out of the vegetables.” He shrugged. “Besides, there was too much shade. The corn wouldn’t grow as it should.”
Callum’s jaw dropped open, and something fragile, buried, and long-since broken stirred in his mortal heart. He stared fixedly at the prince of Umbras, trying to make sense of what he was hearing, trying to understand how the dragon son of King Demitri was sharing his own Matthias’ private memories. “How do you know all this?” he whispered cautiously, as if in a hazy dream state.
The prince traversed the length of the porch and squatted before the old man. “I remember,” he said softly. “Everything.” He reached forward to grasp Callum’s hands in his own. “I remember my first crossbow—you sold that stupid goat to buy it for me, even though we couldn’t afford to let him go.” He chuckled softly. “And I promptly shot myself in the foot.”
Callum jerked back.
He stared at the hands that held his, trying to recognize something…anything…a scar, a discolored nail, a small freckled birthmark. He didn’t understand. His bottom lip trembled as he cleared his throat. “Nobody knew that…no one but me and my boy. Matt was so embarrassed, so ashamed—his pride was so wounded—he swore me to secrecy.”
Raylea Louvet stepped forward, placed her hands on the prince’s shoulders, and regarded Callum with undiluted love in her eyes. “Mr. Gentry, I need to tell you a story—we need to tell you a story—and all we ask is that you listen.”
Callum sat back in the rocking chair, allowing the prince’s hands to fall from his own, feeling immediately bereft. “I’m listening,” he murmured.
Raylea smiled. “Thirty-one years ago, I was abducted from Forest Dragon, and outside of my father and his friends, no one was really trying to recover me. A boy I grew up with, a boy who was once promised to my sister, Mina, in marriage, set out for Castle Dragon to try to change this. You see
, my sister was a Sklavos Ahavi, and she had just been taken to the castle to prepare for the Autumn Mating…” Her voice rose and fell like whispers on the wind as Raylea Louvet spun her tale, a fanciful, almost unbelievable story about dragons and feasting and the battle of Dracos Cove. A nightmarish account of a warlock and a shade doing the prince of Warlochia’s bidding in a clandestine tent of Umbras—shadowmancy, necromancy, and resurrection—replacing one soul for another.
“So you see,” she finally said, “we couldn’t tell a soul. We couldn’t risk it—”
“And the choice to keep the secret almost killed me,” the prince of Umbras cut in. “But I thought I was doing right by you, at least by sending the purse every month.” He bristled from head to toe as he mentioned the squandered money. “I have waited three decades to be here, to see you, praying all the while that the gods would let you live.” His voice was thick with tears.
Callum Gentry rocked forward in the chair, stared deep into the eyes of the prince, and began to weep in earnest. “Matt,” he choked out. “Is it really you?”
The prince of Umbras nodded. “Aye, it’s really me, Father. ’Tis why King Dante changed my name.”
Callum could no longer contain his joy, his relief, or his awakening love.
He snatched the male up with more strength than he’d felt in a dozen summers and pulled him into a harsh embrace. “My boy,” he rasped against his golden hair. “My strong, stubborn, reckless Matt—you survived, and the gods brought you home.” They held each other for what felt like a lifetime, and then Callum finally pulled away and smiled at Raylea. “And you got yourself a fine little lass there, too.” He shook his head in wonder. “Promised to Raylea Louvet. That’s…that’s amazing.”