Draconus [Anthology]

DRACONUS

“I have lived for more than three hundred years,” he said, watching with satisfaction as tiny chills raced up her arms in reaction to his voice, “and I still do not understand the way of the human mind, especially that of the human female.” She remained stubbornly silent, though he sensed her curiosity. He dropped her hands and plucked briefly at her skirt. “You left a life of luxury and riches. I was a generous master. You had your own servants, and I draped you in jewels. All I asked in return was your company and your music.” He ran a finger over her arm, scowling when she jerked away from his touch. “What thing so tempting lured you away so that you not only stole from me, but are content to live in poverty and endless toil?” His patience deserted him as she continued to stare at the floor and say nothing. A faint whimper escaped her mouth when he gripped her chin and forced up her head. Her gray eyes darkened with a dull misery as she finally met his gaze. “Answer me, Leida,” he snapped. “I was a possession,” she whispered. “A thing to be owned, like your treasures, and cast aside when I no longer gleamed so brightly.” Magnus worked to control the anger seething and bubbling in his veins. “You were the favorite. My favorite. I held you above all others in my service.” A single hot tear dripped onto his knuckle, sliding between his fingers…

ALSO BY GRACE DRAVEN Blackbird The King of Hel

DRACONUS BY GRACE DRAVEN

AMBER QUILL PRESS, LLC http://www.amberquill.com

DRACONUS AN AMBER QUILL PRESS BOOK This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental. Amber Quill Press, LLC http://www.amberquill.com All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review. Copyright © 2005 by Grace Draven ISBN 1-59279-438-6 Cover Art © 2005 Trace Edward Zaber

Layout and Formatting provided by: ElementalAlchemy.com

PUBLISHED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

For Meli, who stepped up to the plate, volunteered her time, her humor and her x-ray vision. You are a diamond of the first water and a lovely friend.

DRACONUS

DRACONUS

She had known all along it would only be a matter of time before they came after her. That she had evaded capture so long seemed nothing short of a miracle. Leida sat quietly on the stone bench and stared down at her hands, the pale fingers laced tightly together, the iron cuffs snapped around her wrists leaving red marks on her skin. The cavern in which she waited glowed with a golden light from an unseen source. Dragon magic, the simplest kind, illuminated the chamber, chasing away the shadows dancing along the curved walls and high ceiling. Leida had visited these caves once before, years earlier, during the great fire festivals when the earth dragons met before the Dragon King. It had been an exciting time, one that held both fear and anticipation of seeing things few humans ever would. She had returned, not of her own accord this time, still fearful of what awaited her. A hard shudder shook her from head to toe, and her throat closed against the threat of retching. There was no one here to 1

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speak in her defense, and by all accounts, including her own, she was guilty of the crime for which she now stood trial. Leida knew the nature of dragons, their cunning and wit, fearlessness and pride; she did not know of their mercy, or if it even existed. But if it did exist, she intended to beg for it, walk on her knees if necessary. They could strip her of her magic, flog her and march her naked through the streets. She would submit gladly, if only they let her live and live freely. Someone else depended upon her, waited for her, and she would bargain anything she had to return. “Please,” she whispered, the soft sound echoing in melancholy repetition throughout the empty room. “Don’t let me die.” Whatever deity heard her plea, he or she chose not to respond, and Leida felt fear settle heavily on her shoulders. The sound of footsteps from the single corridor leading to the chamber made her straighten. Her mouth felt parched; whatever moisture remained on her tongue dried to dust as she watched eight men march into the room. Leida rose, bowing low in respect as they came to stand before her. They were her judges, dragon lords, who meted out judgment and punishment to dragonkind and all those associated with them. Of different ages, from white haired and lined to young and vibrant, they all watched her with varying degrees of contempt and dislike. She felt the blood drain from her face. There would be little mercy here. That she had not been killed outright upon discovery was compassion in itself, an acknowledgement of her past status as a dragon lord’s favorite and deserving of some small leniency because of it. Her fingers knotted tighter as the eldest of the judges spoke, the fine hairs on her arms rising in reaction to the silvery, bewitching tones of his voice. She’d forgotten the beauty of a dragon lord’s voice. “Leida of the Glimmer South.” She licked her dry lips. “I am, my lord.” 2

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“You were once the favorite of Magnus Silverclaw.” The truth of his statement and her response made her chest tighten. “I was, my lord.” The judge’s words were chilly with disdain. “You stand accused of thievery, Leida. Thievery and the illicit use of dragon magic to conceal your crime.” He held up one hand, displaying a small ring, a creation of delicate spun gold mounted with a sapphire so deep a blue as to appear black in the cavern’s muted light. “I will ask you formally, Leida, did you steal this ring from Magnus Silverclaw?” She had already admitted to the crime, but the urge to lie was great, her sense of self-preservation screaming out an inner warning that to admit it again would be to sign her own death warrant. Too late, she thought. Too late. There was barely a quaver in her voice when she answered. “Aye, my lord. When I left the service of Magnus Silverclaw four years ago, I took that ring.” Low rumbles of disapproval, sounding more like growls than murmurs, echoed in the chamber. Leida shivered, her fear slowly transforming into terror. They wore the trappings of men finely garbed, but like the light in the room, it was magic of their making. Their true forms were of great wings and scales, curving claws and huge heads sporting mouths filled with teeth sharper than sword blades. Any one of them could change, snatch her up and swallow her whole. One of the younger judges spoke up. “Because of your previous bonding with dragonkind, we will allow you the chance to explain yourself before sentencing. You do understanding that stealing from a dragon lord’s hoard is punishable by death?” Leida nodded, nearly lightheaded with relief at the temporary reprieve. The judge scowled at her actions until she remembered protocol. 3

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“I understand, my lord, and thank all of you for your consideration.” The first judge addressed her again. “You are allowed to state your reasons, but you will do so before us and one other.” A high, thin ringing started in her ears as heat suffused her body and face. She turned, peering into the shadows of the corridor from which the judges had entered earlier. The judge’s voice, once vibrant with allure and power, sounded dull and far away. “Face your accuser, Leida of the Glimmer South, and explain yourself.” The breath died in her nostrils as Magnus Silverclaw, once her master, once her lover, walked into the chambers. Still reserved and prideful, as most of his kind, he wore the illusion of a tall, slender man with long, dark hair threaded with silver. Leida gazed at him, struck by the familiarity of his features. Their austere beauty haunted her dreams each night. He stared back at her, the slanting green eyes narrowing to mere slits. “Thief,” he said in a deep, seductive voice filled with loathing. *

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His first view of her after nearly four years struck him hard. A bitter joy, a seething anger—they swirled together in the pit of his stomach like so much sour wine. He had watched from the shadows of the corridor as she faced the judges. Her features, drawn with fatigue, went from pale to pink to pale again as she answered their charges and turned to face him. “Thief,” he said, letting all the venom coursing through his blood leak into that one accusatory word. She stared at him with an anguished expression before lowering her head to gaze at her manacled hands. Magnus smiled, the facial movement now unfamiliar to his human form. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d smiled, and this time it had little to do with humor or pleasure. 4

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He faced the eldest judge, Gersel, the dragon slated to be the next king if rumors of the dragoness votes held true. “I would take back what is mine, Your Grace.” The judge’s eyes glittered with recognition of Magnus’s double meaning. He gave the human woman one last withering look before striding to Magnus and dropping the ring in his outstretched palm. “You would do well to simply kill her, Magnus,” he said. “But she was once yours and is not dragonkind. We will sentence according to your wishes in this case.” Magnus bowed. “I request a private moment with her.” “As you wish.” Gersel motioned to the other judges. “We will wait in the main hall.” As they gathered together, he inclined his head. “Summon us when you are ready.” They filed out of the chamber on silent feet, dragon light casting their true shadows on the polished walls, revealing great hulking forms and clawed feet instead of human figures. Magnus’s own steps seemed loud in the tense silence as he approached Leida. She stiffened as he drew closer, but kept her head lowered. He circled her slowly, noting her threadbare clothing, the simple leather tie holding the long black hair at her nape. He seized her hands, ignoring her surprised gasp as he turned her palms up and ran his thumbs across them. They were rough, marred by calluses and scrapes, signs of hard labor. The iron bonds cut into her small wrists, and he felt their effect on his own magic, a slow leaching of potency. They rendered her powerless, a safeguard against whatever talent she was born with or skills she had acquired as a spellcaster. “I have lived for more than three hundred years,” he said, watching with satisfaction as tiny chills raced up her arms in reaction to his voice, “and I still do not understand the way of the human mind, especially that of the human female.” She remained stubbornly silent, though he sensed her curiosity. He 5

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dropped her hands and plucked briefly at her skirt. “You left a life of luxury and riches. I was a generous master. You had your own servants, and I draped you in jewels. All I asked in return was your company and your music.” He ran a finger over her arm, scowling when she jerked away from his touch. “What thing so tempting lured you away so that you not only stole from me, but are content to live in poverty and endless toil?” His patience deserted him as she continued to stare at the floor and say nothing. A faint whimper escaped her mouth when he gripped her chin and forced up her head. Her gray eyes darkened with a dull misery as she finally met his gaze. “Answer me, Leida,” he snapped. “I was a possession,” she whispered. “A thing to be owned, like your treasures, and cast aside when I no longer gleamed so brightly.” Magnus worked to control the anger seething and bubbling in his veins. “You were the favorite. My favorite. I held you above all others in my service.” A single hot tear dripped onto his knuckle, sliding between his fingers. Leida’s sorrowing expression transformed for a moment, becoming resentful. “Oh, yes. I was your favorite, but for how long? How long before you set me aside for another with a siren’s voice and the face of an elfin queen?” Her upper lip curled into a sneer even as more tears tracked down her cheeks. “Dragons are capricious creatures.” His anger, held in check by a slim thread of control, swamped him in the face of her hypocrisy. He released her jaw to wrap both arms around her back and pull her hard against him. Her arms pressed against him from chest to belly, her bound hands curled into fists at his navel. The iron manacles pulsed with a parasitic life of their own, their proximity a diseased sensation that made his abdominal muscles shrink away in instinctive reaction. Leida closed her eyes as he bent his head and breathed gently 6

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against her lips. “And yet it is you who deserted me, offered no reason, gave no warning. You waited for the opportune moment and made your escape, lured by something I could not give. And you took that which meant most to me.” His arms tightened against her back. “I’m sure we both recognize the irony of your statement regarding capricious creatures.” Her features, already wan, went bloodless, and she sagged against him. Magnus took advantage of the moment, drawn to the longremembered feel of her in his embrace. There were differences now. Her hips seemed wider, the soft breasts fuller, the long, curving waist a little thicker. But it only made her more appealing, a new lushness that fit against the planes and angles of his own form as if she’d been made specifically for him. He took her mouth in a hard kiss, offering no gentleness or forgiveness as he forced her lips open and slid his tongue inside. She tasted the same, felt the same—slick, wet heat and a tongue that met his in a mating dance to send his acute senses spiraling into madness. There was no protest, no resistance from her as Magnus ran his hands across her back and shoulders, sliding lower to cup her buttocks in his hands and lift her so that her pelvis rested hard against his. He had expected something from her, a struggle to put some distance between them, but Leida sank into his embrace, opening her mouth for a deeper penetration of his tongue. It was as it had always been between them, and four years of separation faded to dust as Magnus held her, lost to the heat they generated. His cock was so hard, it almost pained him. He would take her, here on the rock floor of the judgment chamber, with her skirts shoved to her waist and her long legs draped over his shoulders. The wisdom of centuries faded beneath the onslaught of his desire as Leida wiggled her arms partially free to raise them and rest her palms against his neck in a light caress. 7

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The feel of cold iron resting just above his heart was a dash of ice water on his ardor, and Magnus halted with one hand inching up her skirts while the other teased her small nipple to a hard point. He broke the kiss, ignoring her faint moan of protest. She was as beautiful now as she was four years ago, especially now with a yearning that burned clear and bright in her eyes. His anger returned full force, fed by the memory of his humiliation at discovering his favorite had not only left him, but stolen from him as well. Magnus watched her expression change, sadden and turn guarded as he continued to stare at her. He knew what she saw, the scorn in his own eyes, the mockery hovering at his mouth. He slid a hand into her loosely bound hair, and this time she did squirm to avoid his touch, grappling with him in a futile attempt to break free until he tightened his grip on her hair hard enough to bring tears to her eyes. “You play the part of a fond lover so well, Leida. One might think you’d only been away on an extended jaunt, returning to me with a full heart and a body eager for mine.” He clenched his teeth to rein in his fury and reached down to force a hand between her thighs. He cupped her hard enough so that the heat of her body flowed through her skirts and over his palm. “At least there is some truth to the second.” He shoved her from him, offering no help as she stumbled back, nearly losing her balance. She recovered quickly enough and faced him with the same haunted, terrified expression she’d worn before the dragon tribunal. He went rigid as that terror settled deep, turned to a resolve, which hardened her gray eyes to pewter. “I do not ask your forgiveness, Magnus.” “You dare to address me so familiarly now?” He snarled in a voice filled with threat, feeling a gut-level satisfaction as her resolve wavered. His eyes widened for a moment as Leida abruptly dropped to her knees before him. It threw him off guard. Leida was human and 8

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unencumbered by the overweening pride that sometimes plagued his kind. Still, while she had first taken to the role of pampered servant, she had never been a supplicant. He stared at her bowed head as she knelt before him in the position of a desperate beggar. “Please, my lord,” she implored, and Magnus scowled at the broken tones in her voice. “I am guilty of the crime of thievery. But I beg your mercy. Do not sentence me to death.” Magnus stared down at her for long moments, quelling the urge to yank her to her feet and admonish her for her groveling. She owed him this, this cowering obeisance. In the throes of his rage and despair, when even moonlit flights in the cold thin air did nothing to calm his emotions, he’d imagined just this scenario. Only now that it played out, he felt sickened by it. “Get up,” he said. Leida rose slowly to her feet, straightening and lifting her chin. The color ran high in her face, a testament to her humiliation at her actions. Still, Magnus could see it in her eyes. She’d do it again, and more, if necessary. Leida of the Glimmer South wanted desperately to live and would do anything to win clemency and save her own skin. He’d had enough. It was time to confer with the judges. There had never been any question what he would do with her once she was found and brought back. He’d only kept to the formalities of her trial to frighten her, and it had worked. She was terrified. Magnus chose not to tell her it was not the tribunal she should fear, but his own very personal retribution. The voices of the judges echoed back to him as he walked to the corridor. He turned back for a moment, staring at his erstwhile favorite with scorn. Her lips tightened, and she dropped her gaze to her hands. “Do you still sing, Leida?” Her eyes glistened in the muted light as she again met his gaze. “Sometimes,” she whispered. 9

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“Is it still a siren’s call?” He was puzzled by her smile, humorless and melancholy. “No, my lord.” He shrugged, turning away again. “I thought not. I should have known.” He didn’t stop as her voice carried to him, drifting with the shadows in the hallway. “You did know, Magnus. Long before I did.” *

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Dragons were an avaricious lot, the accumulation of wealth an instinctual urge bred as deeply into them as the will to survive. They held their own code regarding their treasures, bartering with each other for some priceless bauble or stealing outright from rich humans. But where humans were concerned, the pendulum did not swing both ways. Humans who stole from dragons usually faced a gruesome and violent death. Leida had been fully aware of the risk when she took the small ring from the heap of coins, jeweled girdles, and tangled necklaces that made up the pillow on which Magnus rested his head when in dragon form. She knew he would miss its presence upon returning to his caverns, likely more sensitive to its absence than to hers. But she couldn’t help herself, and dropped it into the small purse tied at her waist before sneaking out of the caverns while the other servants slept. She had expected his anger at finding it gone. She had not counted on his abiding need to hunt it and her down in order to return it to his possession. She rubbed her eyes, exhausted from fear, worry and lack of sleep. As the minutes following Magnus’s exit lengthened, she found a place near the entrance and sat down on the hard floor to wait. He had seemed unmoved by her plea, showing little expression save a faint, scornful twist to his lips as he commanded her to rise. In the mind of dragonkind, she had committed the unthinkable crime—humiliated her 10

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master by stealing from him. He might well demand her death, administer the killing blow himself. Leida prayed the ring’s recovery and her willingness to admit her larceny might earn some small mercy from him. What had he said? She’d robbed him of that which he held most dear. The remark puzzled her, for in her memory he had only shown a marked preference for a ruby-encrusted crown and a jeweled girdle he’d been fond of draping over her naked hips once their relationship had deepened in its intimacy. Leida blushed, recalling the long evenings when he’d taken his human form and reveled in the feel of her against him, beneath him, her only clothing the delicate girdle. She had not forgotten what he tasted like or how he felt beneath her fingertips, and if the slow throb still lingering between her thighs was any indicator, her body not only remembered but continued to crave him. He held her life in his hands, yet she could think of nothing beyond the hot taste of his tongue, the way he gripped her hips to hoist her against him, the hard curve of his erection as he crushed her to him. Four years or forty, she still desired and loved him as fiercely as the day she left him. Soft footfalls alerted her to the judges’ return. She knew from whence they came. The great caverns belonging to the Dragon King descended far into the earth, hollowed and polished by the passage of the greatest male earth dragon and his pages. Below her feet were soaring chambers filled with astonishing wealth and an aging reptilian king administered to by his dragon pages and a staff of servants comprised of humans and wood sprites. She rose slowly, her stomach again beginning to pitch and roll with dread. Magnus followed the tribunal, keeping a short distance between himself and the others. Leida glanced at him, sickened by the unmistakable gleam of retribution in his eyes. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears, and she struggled to hear what the dragon lords said. 11

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“Leida of the Glimmer South, Magnus Silverclaw has chosen to be lenient with you. He has spared your life.” It was the oldest judge, the silver-haired one who had first questioned her. A tide of relief surged through her, and she suppressed the urge to dissolve into uncontrollable weeping. Suspicion followed hard on the heels of her joy as the dragon lord held up a hand, revealing a delicate choker made of spiderweb strands of interlocking silver. A lustrous black pearl surrounded by tiny diamonds was set in the middle of the choker. It was a beautiful piece, made for a queen or highborn noblewoman of the middle kingdoms. Leida blinked in confusion, frozen in place as the judge approached her and wound the choker around her throat, latching it at her nape. It became immediately apparent that the choker was more than an ornament. A crushing weight settled on her shoulders. Invisible but undeniable, it bowed her back, only lightening when the judge removed her manacles. She staggered, reaching up to claw at the slender band. Her gaze turned to Magnus. He watched her, unmoved by her frantic attempts to rid herself of the necklace. “You cannot remove it, Leida. Only I can. It is iron disguised in silver, a means to bleed you of your magic, much like the manacles. His lips thinned to a vicious smile. “You wear it well.” Leida dropped her hands, curling them into fists by her sides to keep from reaching up once more and trying to tear the necklace away. She had been prepared to lose her magic, but not like this. Not this slow death like blood trickling from a small but fatal wound. Her voice was hoarse, thick with tears as she addressed Magnus. “Is this collar my punishment then?” His features hardened, their austerity becoming more pronounced as his expression turned grim. “No. That is but part of it. You owe me four years of time, time in which I searched for that which was mine, that 12

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which you took. You will attend me, no longer as the favorite, but as the least of my servants, bound to me by adjudication if not by loyalty.” His voice might have brought on ice storms, it was so frigid. “This is your sentence, Leida.” A blind panic threatened to swallow her. Not death, but close enough. Slavery and separation from the one she loved most in the world. Four years! He could have said it was an eternity, and it couldn’t have been worse. A red haze passed over her vision, obscuring the faces of her judges who watched her with widening eyes. In the euphoria of her desperation, her spirit seemed to leave her body for a moment, and she watched from a distance as her physical self ignored Magnus’s bellowed warning and bolted for the way that led above ground. That muted detachment came to an abrupt end when she slammed into an invisible wall. White-hot pain exploded in her nose, fanning out across her cheekbones and into her skull. There were shouts behind her, Magnus yelling some incomprehensible command. She ignored them, ignored the flow of warmth over her mouth and down her chin, the coppery taste of blood trickling in the back of her throat. Even the pain faded as she threw herself once more against the unseen wall imprisoning her in the cavern. She screamed as strong arms encircled her, lifting her clear of the floor. Lights danced across her sight as she clawed and punched at her captor in her bid to break free. It was futile. Even in human form a dragon lord held tremendous physical strength, and Leida found herself face-to-face with Magnus, her arms pinned behind her back. Panic and rage still burned within her, making her nearly insensate. Some distant, unemotional part of her heard her growls, almost animalistic, as she struggled in Magnus’s hold. His face was white with shock and fury as he subdued her. Blood smeared his hands. Her blood. “Pax, Leida,” he said softly, the words both a command and a spell. 13

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Leida felt the magic wash over her, a soothing warmth that calmed the terror if not dissipated it all together. Tears followed, making it difficult for her to breathe beyond the blood and mucus clogging her nostrils. Her eyes felt puffy, the pain in her nose blossoming to a swelling ache. She blinked slowly at Magnus. Where before he had shown her only his contempt, his eyes revealed a stunned dismay followed by a bleak bitterness. “When did it come to this, Leida? When did I have to imprison you to ensure your company? And when did you become so desperate to be rid of me that you nearly killed yourself trying?” His voice no longer held the bewitching, bell like tones that so enamored her. Blood continued to drip off her chin as she met his gaze, and resolve replaced her fear once more. “I will stay with you for ten lifetimes, Magnus. I will wear this collar and crawl on my belly if you but grant me one last mercy.” She did not lower her eyes, but stared hard at him, silently willing him to ask her what that mercy was. He didn’t comply, only asking that which challenged her determination. “And if I say no?” It was a risk but also the truth. “I will look for every opportunity to gain my freedom, and one day I will die trying. Either way, I will have escaped you.” He went rigid, his chest rising and falling against hers. He forced the words through lips thinned to a hard line.. “What more do you ask of me?” The stillness between them deepened as Leida took a long breath, caught between the urge to be sick and the relief of unburdening a secret too long held. “Let me retrieve my daughter.” *

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She had a child, a girl child. Magnus strode through the woodland concealing the Dragon King’s lair. Thorny brush snagged at his tunic, 14

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but he ignored it, focused more on counting each breath he took. It helped him control the seething emotions boiling so close to the surface. Darkness enveloped the landscape, the rustle of night creatures on the hunt loud to his ears. No wandering human would be about, a good thing, as his present state of mind danced precariously on the edge of violence. Her words had done to him what no human had ever done to a dragon: rendered him speechless. He’d been bewildered by her desperation to escape the cavern. Had she shot a crossbow bolt into his gut, it wouldn’t have pained him as much as watching her hurl herself against the protective barrier that shielded the entrance from intruders and trapped prisoners. He and the other dragon lords cried out warnings, but Leida either didn’t hear or chose to ignore them and slammed face first into the invisible wall. Magnus was certain he’d paused for no more than the space of a breath when she regained her balance, shook her head and threw herself against the shield once more, ramming her shoulder into it over and over until he lifted her in his arms. She’d fought him like a wild thing then, writhing and twisting in his arms with a single-minded ferocity. Had he been a mere human male, she might have broken free, but he held her easily, turning to the startled judges behind him. “Leave us!” He bellowed, and they acquiesced, shrugging and shaking their heads in puzzlement. He knew their thoughts, the questions they asked. He asked them of himself. Why be lenient? Why insist on holding on to such a rebellious and obviously unworthy servant? He’d turned her in his arms, reciting a simple spell to calm not only her but him as well. Some measure of sanity returned to her gray eyes, and she stared at him, with that same odd mixture of fear and resolve he’d seen earlier. She’d broken her nose, the blood from her injury smeared across the lower half of her face and onto his hands. 15

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His pride, his dignity, burned to ash before the need for an answer, an understanding of why stripping her of her magic saddened her, but four years of renewed servitude to him sent her spiraling into a state of near madness. Her answer had nearly brought him to his knees. Leida had a daughter, a child she was frantic to return to, one sired by some unknown, filthy, ale-swilling, ignorant peasant. Magnus growled low in his throat as he continued down a path leading to a spot where the grass grew high, but no trees blocked the view of the sky. It was a large clearing, large enough for a dragon turned human to turn dragon again. He stood in the middle of the open space and opened his arms, emitting a single high note of sound. Blood and bone coursed and stretched, transforming until he no longer saw the trees as towering pillars high above him, but slim reeds of wood, many now at his eye level. His claws dug into the soft earth as he shifted his weight, unfolding great wings to prepare for flight. A powerful surge of muscle and wing lifted him until he hovered just above the tallest trees, the landscape spread out before him in a vast blanket of shadow and shifting moonlight. Air swirled beneath his feet as he continued to flap his wings, finding a slow steady rhythm that soon had him soaring high into the cool night. Wind whistled in his ears as he increased his speed, allowing the rush of free, unencumbered flight to clear his head of the muddied, angry thoughts plaguing him. Magnus recalled the first time he’d taken Leida flying. It had been a clear night like this one, a bit warmer, and the moon hung full and white, silvering everything below it. At first she had sat on his neck, stiff and frightened, but soon relaxed, her thighs loosening against his scales as she began to enjoy the ride. He kept it tame, a slow easy glide that allowed her to view the countryside from a perspective few humans would ever see. By the time they landed near his home caves, she was laughing, her eyes bright with a joy that sent a sizzle of 16

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reciprocal pleasure through him. He’d lowered his head to come eye level with her, fascinated by the animation in her pale features. “May we do this again, my lord? Soon?” She clapped her hands together, smiling. “It is magic of the best kind.” Magnus stared at her, pleased beyond measure that she had not held onto her fear of flying, but came to enjoy it. “Aye,” he told her, his dragon’s voice rumbling low and silky. “We’ll go tomorrow if you like. But for now, you will sing for me. I’ve a mind to hear a lullaby.” She’d smiled and preceded him into his caves where the sweet sound of her singing soon filled the high vaulted chambers and the stroking caress of her hands on his neck soothed him to sleep. That memory lightened his mood, eased the hot jealousy burning in his chest. Those had been good years with her, when as his favorite, she sang for him and recited poetry, laughed with him and accompanied him on numerous evening flights. Over time, his affection for her deepened, became more possessive. He’d taken to wearing the guise of a man so that he might dance with her or feel her fingers threading through his hair. She’d always delighted in his human form, saying it reminded her of the first time she’d seen him, a richly dressed troubadour so out of place in the dusty confines of a threshing floor. That day had changed his life, when he’d wandered into a nearby village at harvest time and discovered a rich farmer’s daughter amidst the other villagers, separating grain from the chaff and singing in a voice to make his entire body shiver in reaction. It was inevitable that they became intimate. As a dragon, he thought of her as a brilliant, glistening jewel, one that outshone even the most beautifully cut diamond. Of all his numerous treasures, Leida was his most valued, the one in which he took most pride. As a man, he considered her the manifestation of his most brightly faceted dreams, a sultry fantasy come to life as he held her, kissed her, ran his tongue along her skin and buried his cock over and over in the slick, heated 17

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depths of her welcoming body. Magnus snorted, his breath steaming out of his nostrils as he flew high into colder, thinner air. Yes, they had been the best years for him, but something had changed, a slow poisoning between them that he still didn’t understand. She began making excuses for refusing to sing when he asked her. When he made love to her, she clutched at him with a nameless fear, one she refused to acknowledge when he asked what troubled her. In the month before she stole that trinket from him and disappeared from his life, they’d ceased to converse beyond barely civil words. His frustration and confusion at her continued withdrawal coalesced into anger, and he often stalked out of his caves, desperate to fly and clear his head. For all of his years and the blessing of wisdom that was part of his nature, he was unable to find a way to break that shroud of cold despondency and bring her back to him. His despair, his rage and his sense of failure knew no bounds when he discovered her gone. She was returned to him now, bound and accused. The ring meant nothing more to him than a means by which he could hold her to his brethren’s laws. Her punishments worked to his benefit. Her own meager magic suppressed by the choker, she would be unable to escape him again, and he was far more wary of her now. And he had four years in which to find the answer to the question still eating away at him. Why? A thin blaze of color edged the eastern horizon, a signal to return to earth where it was safer from the spears and arrows of men who feared what they didn’t understand. Magnus banked hard to the right, descending at a rapid pace so that his claws shredded treetops as he located the clearing again. An owl, feasting on his catch of the evening, abandoned his dinner, hooting in fright as he flew away from the monstrous creature landing so close to where he perched. Magnus folded his wings, softly murmuring the spell to return him 18

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to human form. The world around him altered, and he blinked slowly at the change in perspective, the uncomfortable awareness that he was suddenly smaller than most of his surroundings. The invisible barrier blocking the Dragon King’s cave entrance was still in place, but the wood sprite guarding it revoked the charm to allow him access. The chamber in which Leida faced her tribunal was deserted, and he traversed the hallway leading to the servants’ quarters. A small, wizened woman greeted him, bowing low and gesturing to a curtained alcove in one of the far walls. “She is there, Lord Silverclaw, asleep.” He followed her direction and pulled back the curtain. Leida lay on a cushioned bench, stretched out on her side, facing him. The blood was gone, cleaned off by an attending servant. Magnus had been the one to heal her, pressing his thumbs gently against the cracked bridge of her nose. He’d done a good job. Little evidence remained of her selfinflicted injury. A faint swelling along her cheeks, some bruising around her closed eyes. He crouched down next to her for a closer look. The silver choker was both beautiful and repulsive where it encircled her throat. She plucked at in her sleep, frowning as she touched it. Her voice was hoarse as she murmured a name, “Vala,” and Magnus wondered if Vala was the beloved daughter or the man who sired her. Magnus’s fingers curled into the cushion’s edge, leaving small tears in the fabric. He would accept the child into his household, even as he knew it would turn his stomach each time he looked at her. But her father…he intended to kill her father and leave his bloody, eviscerated remains at Leida’s feet. He touched her then, curving his palm around her jaw. Leida opened her eyes slowly, and within their depths, he saw a near dead hope. It twisted him in knots. He wanted to say no, that any child born of her body should have been his, and no others were allowed into his 19

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family. But he’d seen the determination in her gaze, believed her words when she’d told him she’d kill herself trying to escape and return to her daughter. “It’s near dawn. We’ll leave soon and travel by foot during the day. Gersel’s page says your village is three days’ journey by dragon flight.” His eyes narrowed as she smiled, a true smile of great joy and relief. For a moment, he thought she’d throw herself into his arms, but the moment passed, and she stared at him with a more somber expression. “Thank you, my lord. I have no right to ask for your trust, but I want you to know I will abide by my sentence. I will be the perfect servant.” Magnus gazed back at her, taking in the small changes that time and maternity had marked upon her. His emotions remained twisted with resentment, hurt and the painful knowledge that someone else had loved her as he did and shared a child with her. He ignored the small voice warning him not to ask the question hovering on his tongue, the one whose answer he both dreaded and hungered to know. “Do you love your daughter’s sire?” Her stricken look caught him off guard, and there was no mistaking the anguish in her voice. “Oh yes. Besides the child he gave me, he is my most beloved.” Again, she’d crippled him with her words, and he regretted not listening to that inner voice. The black jealousy returned full force with nausea hard on its heels. He rose, staring down at her with what he hoped was a blank expression. “He is lost to you now, Leida.” She curled in on herself, as if the position somehow helped contain her emotions within her. “He was never mine to lose.” *

*

*

Leida hefted her pack over her shoulders, adjusting the weight so that it fit comfortably against her back. They were in for a grueling walk through underbrush too thick to ride horses. Years of dragon 20

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magic had transformed this woodland into a thick, tangling maze, hard to navigate, easy to get lost in, nearly impossible to escape. She looked to Magnus, watching as he slung his own pack across his back, seemingly unaffected by its weight. He carried the majority of their supplies, including a sharp scythe and a leather harness he’d don for when he flew at night, and she rode on his back. Gersel spoke quietly to him, words Leida couldn’t hear. But the disapproving looks he sent her way spoke volumes, and she could guess at his argument. Leave her to her own devices. There were other human women to take as favorites, younger women with fairer faces and voices spun from sacred fire. She wondered if Gersel knew Magnus already had another favorite, a lovely girl named Sivatte. Leida didn’t fault the dragon lord for trying to convince his kinsman she was not worthy of such trouble. Dragons were prideful creatures and while generous with their servants, most often considered humans and other races beneath them. They kept them as servants, sometimes elevating them to the status of favorite. And in very rare instances, a dragon lord would bond closely with his favorite, fall in love with her and make her his mate in all things. She became the equivalent of a wife well loved. Magnus himself once told her of an ancient Dragon King who took a human woman to wife. When she died of old age, his grief over her passing ultimately destroyed him. He followed her along the Shadow Roads two years later. The dragons were fond of that story. It represented a conundrum for most of them, a riddle of emotion, of gentler love and an abiding faith that they, even with their vast storehouses of knowledge and lives long lived, could hardly comprehend. As a race, they only tolerated each other for short intervals. Leida loved that story as much as the dragons, if for a different reason. She understood the devotion between the Dragon King and his human wife. She envied it, and wished to the depths of her being that 21

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such a story could have been hers and Magnus’s. But fate and dragon nature intervened, leaving her in a place far below and more desolate than the one she’d left four years earlier. “Are you ready, Leida?” Magnus’s question snapped her out of her reverie. She nodded and came to stand next to him, bowing to Gersel as he passed her. The dragon judge frowned at her, shook his head, and disappeared back into the cave entrance, his entourage of retainers close behind him. They started out at a brisk pace, but soon slowed as the underbrush grew thick and tangled. Magnus cleared a path for them, swinging the scythe in a smooth, continuous arc to hack his way through twisting vines and thorny bushes. He sometimes used a spell to free them from the clutching weeds, but kept the use of magic to a minimum so as not to alert any human wizard who might be in the vicinity. By midday, they had gone a fair distance, and Leida was both thirsty and hungry. They came to a small, clear stream, one fed by the snows of the nearby Parcius Mountains. She smothered a sigh of relief when Magnus turned to her and called a halt. Leida shrugged off her pack and made quick use of the water. It was icy, a shock to her skin, but felt heavenly as she bathed her face and neck, her fingers skirting the silver choker. She paused in her ablutions to watch Magnus as he dropped his pack and scythe and divested himself of the harness as well as his tunic and shirt. She caught her breath at the sight of sun-burnished skin and hard, lean muscle glistening with sweat. He was even more beautiful than she remembered, graceful and sinewy as he bent to the water, letting it cascade from his cupped hands so that it raced in shining rivulets over his shoulders, chest, and belly. “You will attend me, Leida.” Once again, his voice pulled her free of her bewitchment, and with numb fingers, she took the small cloth he offered her. He sat on the 22

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stream bank, facing her with an expression both scoffing and challenging. He’d agreed to take her to her daughter. She had promised to obey him without question. Now it was her time to prove her words held true. This was familiar territory, a ritual performed between them during the years they spent together. The nostalgia nearly brought her to tears as she dipped the cloth in the water and wrung it out. Whether she washed lustrous scales or smooth, heated flesh, it was the same as it had always been, a pleasure to serve him in such a way. He smelled of sweat and sunlight as she knelt before him, keeping her gaze level with his chest, even as she felt the weight of his stare on her. She bathed him with leisurely strokes, running the cloth in a long path over his shoulders and down his arms, passing over his narrow waist and the hard, flat abdominal muscles. His nipples tightened, sensitive to her touch as she lingered, gliding her thumb across each one in a seductive caress. The rhythm of his breathing changed, quickened in pace, and Leida risked a quick glance at his face. He continued to stare at her, unblinking, his features still and expressionless. Were she not so close to him, touching him, she might not have thought her touch affected him. She licked her lips, flushing as his gaze lowered, focusing on her tongue as it glided across her lower lip. She ached to have him kiss her, open his mouth over hers so that she might taste him again, feel the slick heat of his tongue as he filled her mouth. But he stayed still beneath her hands, watchful and silent as she leaned to dip the cloth into the water once more. Magnus bent his head, leaning into her as she rose higher on her knees to reach his back and nape. He’d tamed his hair with a leather tie, and she pulled the dark mane over one shoulder, exposing the back of his neck. 23

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Water sluiced down his spine as she continued to bathe the heat and sweat from him. Her fingertips tingled, sensitive to the feel of his skin. He felt good, better than good, and the temptation to lower her head and follow the path of the cloth with her lips was great. She knew the taste of him, remembered the flex of corded muscle as she sucked and bit gently along his neck, the way he shivered and arched his torso when she laved him with her tongue. Birdsong and the stream’s bubbling laughter faded as the world narrowed to just her hands, Magnus’s broad back, and the feel of his breath as he leaned closer and placed a light kiss on the swell of her breast above her thin bodice. Leida dropped the cloth, reaching to clasp his dark head in her hands. She moaned, a faint quavering sound, as Magnus nuzzled his face against her, his arms coming up to encircle her back and pull her close. Leida arched into him, fingers kneading his scalp while he trailed a line of open-mouthed kisses over her chest, pausing to clamp on her nipple and suckle her through the bodice’s material. Desire coursed through her blood, traveling from her toes to her thighs, coalescing into an ache that made her squirm in his arms and open her legs in silent invitation. Magnus paused in his ministrations, finally drawing back so that she could see the damp spot his mouth made on her bodice. He raised his head, pinning her with a hard stare, his haughty features drawn and flushed. The green eyes burned with promise, and his mouth turned down at the corners. “I cannot give you gentleness this time, Leida. I have had four years to imagine this. You are again my servant, but I give you this one choice. Nay-say me now or I will take you. Here, in the sun, beside the stream, exposed for any to see. I will ride you until you cry out my name and acknowledge my possession.” He kissed her hard, sucking on her lower lip briefly before pulling away. “What say you?” he asked, his voice harsh, challenging. 24

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Leida didn’t hesitate. Like Magnus, she’d had four years to remember moments between them such as these, and imagine more of them. There was so much bitterness and anger remaining, questions unanswered, resentments unresolved. But he had shown a kindness in taking her to retrieve Vala and accept her into his household. A small flame of hope burned within her, as bright as the fires of her longing for him. She kissed him back, a more tender gesture than his had been, but no less passionate. “I say yea,” she whispered against his mouth. *

*

*

Those three words, more breathed than spoken, resounded in his ears. Magnus pressed his palms between her shoulder blades, arching her closer so that her breasts flattened against him. Leida tipped her head back, the motion highlighting the graceful lines of her neck. He accepted her silent invitation, bending to press soft kisses against the skin above the choker. The feathery touches soon changed, became harder as desire heated his blood. She tasted of salt and apple blossom as he flicked his tongue along her jaw line, trailing a damp path to her ear and the sensitive spot behind it. He laughed, a low triumphant sound, when she shuddered in his arms. It was as before. Those dips and crevices, unique to her body, were still familiar to him. He knew the ones that made her whimper, made her moan and shiver at his touch. The inside of her right thigh was especially sensitive, and he was eager again to caress all those places and hear her gasp with pleasure. Her hands slid from his neck, massaging and kneading as they passed over his back and his trews, slipping inside to circle around to his abdomen and cup his bollocks. They both moaned then, and Magnus thrust against her hand as she lightly rubbed the ultra sensitive skin, her fingers playing across the ridged surface. Lust, passion—both rushed through his veins, made him desperate 25

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to get inside her, fuck her until she screamed his name while he emptied four years of bleak loneliness into her willing body. He kissed her roughly, filling her mouth with his tongue even as he filled her hand with his swollen cock. She uttered a half-hearted protest when he shoved her blouse off her shoulders and broke the ties of her bodice. The action bared her breasts, and Magnus buried his face in their fullness, marveling at the silky softness of her skin, the way she filled his hands. Her grip on his shaft tightened, sliding back and forth at a faster pace when he closed his lips over her pink nipple. The friction of her hand sent his senses into an uproar, and he suckled her breast with a slow tugging motion while teasing the other breast with his hand. She writhed in his arms, whispering his name in a pleading voice. His hips moved with the stroke of her hand, the head of his cock and her palm becoming slick with a warm trickle of seed. Magnus took his mouth from her breast, leaving her nipple rosy and stiff from his ministrations. It was difficult to remain coherent, especially now with his woman draped half-naked in his arms, his shaft worked back and forth in her slippery grip. But he found his voice, slightly breathless, to bewitch her even more. “Do you remember,” he murmured against her cheek, “the fire festivals, when the young dragon queens prepared for their first mating flights? I presented you to the Dragon King who remarked on your unusual beauty.” Leida stilled in his arms, her hand pausing in its sweet torture. Magnus swirled his tongue in her ear, nearly purring. “The caves were hot, lit with the great fires and crowded with dragons. I was consumed with the mating fever, though I chose not to join the males in the mating flight and kept my human form. Do you remember?” he asked again. “I remember,” she said on a groan. “You took me, quick and hard in the shadows of an unlit pyre while your brethren roared and celebrated 26

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around us.” She squeezed him in reaction to the memory, and he gasped with the pleasure-pain of it. “You were so wet,” he growled, nuzzling her neck, “so ready for me. You came for me in moments, strong enough that I had to cover your mouth to smother your cries. You drew blood when you bit my hand.” “I’m ready now,” she panted and lunged for him, crushing her mouth against his, opening it so that it was she who plundered him, sucking on his tongue and kissing him hard enough that she split his upper lip, a stinging pain that served only to heighten his lust. Magnus spun her around in one swift motion, forcing her to her hands and knees. He shoved her skirts up to her waist, baring the pale, rounded buttocks to his appreciative gaze. His hands were dark against her skin as he spread her cheeks, exposing a small hint of dark curls and the curving strip of glistening pink flesh. The inside of her thighs were wet, and his nostrils flared at the scent of her arousal. Later, he promised himself, later he would remind himself of her taste, suck her into his mouth and feed from her until she was mindless with pleasure. For now though, he couldn’t wait. His cock throbbed, the pitch and swell of blood flowing into his groin almost paining him. Leida’s hips swayed, enticing him with their smooth, bare fullness. He lowered his trews, freeing his shaft, and plunged, sinking to his bollocks in her wet heat. She grunted at the invasion, a breathless whimper escaping her throat as she knelt, impaled on his cock. Magnus arched into her, his eyes rolling back at the incredible, familiar feel of her surrounding him. He stayed still for a moment, to savor that first flood of sensation and emotion swamping him and to allow Leida time to adjust to him. It didn’t take long. The alluring sway of her bottom fired his passions, and he gripped her hips with hard hands, driving into her with long, deep strokes. It was a mating, both primal and forceful and tempered by the swell 27

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of emotion that played havoc with his heart, even as the rocking motion of her bottom against his thighs played havoc with his body. Magnus traced intricate patterns over her torso with his fingers, tickling, squeezing, loving her even as he fucked her with abandon. His heartbeat thundered in his ears, almost drowning out the sounds of her moans, his own groans and guttural responses as he thrust faster into her tight cunnus. His climax struck him in a wave, his seed spurting from him in long pulses, filling her. He squeezed her waist, bending to kiss her nape and nuzzle the long black hair draped over her shoulders. She shivered when he gave one last thrust and slowly withdrew, his cock sliding out of her sheath on a milky stream of semen. Sweat poured off of him, and he breathed in short, heavy pants, mesmerized at the picture she made, quivering thighs spread, her cunnus dripping with the result of his climax and her own arousal. The sun beat down, hot and bright on his shoulders as he sat back on his calves, bringing her with him so that she knelt upright, her clothing bunched between them. Magnus gazed over the graceful slope connecting her neck to her shoulder, admiring her breasts, the blush staining her normally pale skin and reddening her pink nipples. Leida’s head fell back against his shoulder as he cupped her left breast, teasing the nipple between thumb and forefinger. His other hand fought through the layers of skirt and shift, sliding over her thigh until he cupped her, rubbing the soft, damp curls against his palm. She pushed against his hand, a silent plea to do more than simply hold her. Magnus nibbled at her ear lobe, giving her instructions as he continued playing with her nipple. “Spread your knees, my beauty. Wide.” She did as he asked, choking on a gasp when he slid two fingers inside her, his entry made easy by the lubrication of his spending. He plunged his fingers into her, using a third to smear his seed along the 28

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inner folds of her cunnus and over the tiny nubbin of flesh swelling at his touch. “You drip onto my hands, Leida. So wet, filled with my seed.” He bit gently on the slope between her neck and shoulder. “Fuck my fingers, Leida, as hard as you fucked my cock.” Leida writhed in his arms, moaning and pleading in a wordless chant as he thrust into her, rubbing her until she groaned loud and long, drenching his hand. She sagged in his hold, her body turned boneless as she gasped for breath and tried to control the shivers racing through her body. Magnus licked the bead of sweat trickling from her temple, savoring its saltiness. He held her in that position for long moments, one hand cupping her breast, the other buried beneath her skirts, his face pressed against her fragrant hair. He savored her stillness, the feel of her resting in his arms. Whatever four years of separation might have wrought between them, her desire for him had not lessened any more than his for her. Her voice, when she spoke, sounded thin to his ears. “I need to stand, Magnus. My legs are going numb.” Leida struggled to her feet, staggering for a moment before catching her balance again. Her skirts had fallen back into place, badly rumpled. He followed her, hitching up his trews and helping her pull her shirt back over her shoulders. His murmur of disappointment at seeing her breasts covered made her smile briefly. At some point her bodice had fallen to the ground, its broken strings hanging loosely from the eyelets. Magnus eyed it with some disgust. “Is it necessary for you to wear this?” She shook her head. “Not necessary but proper. I might draw attention otherwise.” He leered at her. “When was the last time you saw your reflection, Leida? You draw attention regardless of this sad excuse for a corset.” She flushed at his compliment, lowering her eyes. He found it 29

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amusing that she could, in turn, be a wanton in his arms one moment and a bashful maiden the next. He crooked a finger at her. “Come closer. Dragon magic is good for other things besides stealing gold and drowning ships.” He helped her shrug into the bodice, running his fingers along the laces until they stretched beneath his touch, elongating until they were full length strings. He left her to the lacings, having no patience for the strangeness of a woman’s garb. His shirt lay where he’d slung it earlier, and he dipped it into the stream, using it to cool off his heated skin. “Bathe quickly, Leida. We’ve lost time and will eat as we walk.” He didn’t bother to see if she obeyed his directions, the sound of splashing water letting him know she tended to her ablutions without his prompting. He did the same, lowering his trews once more and gasping as the icy stream water trickled over his bollocks and softened cock. The shirt felt good against his skin as he donned it, still wet with water. He’d dry off as they traveled. He finished bathing, straightened his trews, and dressed before shouldering the pack and harness once more. He watched from the corner of his eye as Leida picked at the tangles in her hair, admiring her profile, the delicate line of her jaw, the arch of her nose that made her features too strong to be classically beautiful. The tingling sensation in his thighs returned, a signal he was once more growing aroused despite having his cock sheathed to the hilt in her sweet body only moments earlier. “It will happen again, Leida,” he said, his tone abrupt. He wondered if she thought his statement one of warning or promise. “Tonight, when I must rest from flying, I will take you.” She continued to work at her hair, finally twisting it into a braid and tying off the end with his hair tie. Her face remained somber as she stared across the streambed to the line of trees on the other side, though he caught the hint of a smile hovering at her lips. Her words made him 30

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catch his breath. “Mayhap, I will take you.” *

*

*

They walked until sundown, only stopping twice when Leida had to attend her body’s demands. She kept a steady pace with Magnus, staying a little behind him as they navigated their way through the dense wood. They didn’t speak, for which she was glad. Her thoughts were in a tangled whirl, especially since the interlude by the stream. She wasn’t ready for conversation, even the most inconsequential small talk. The monotonous activity of placing one foot in front of the other and keeping Magnus’s broad back in sight served to calm her emotions, even if her feet ached by the time he called a brief halt. The sun had disappeared into the west, and the moon, still bright and nearly full, drifted low in the twilight sky. Magnus paused at the base of an ancient oak, its thick sheltering arms creating a canopy of shadows that swayed and shifted on the ground. Leida walked past him, sitting down with a graceless thump. Her pack created a cushion between her back and the tree’s rough bark, and she sighed with relief at being off her feet. It was with some irritation that she stared up at Magnus, noting he seemed none the worse for wear after the long trek. He gazed at her, amusement dancing in his slanted eyes. The pale light filtering through the branches made the silver in his dark hair glow, and carved shadowed hollows into his thin, haughty face. “You are tired,” he said. She felt no compunction to deny it. “Very,” she admitted, “but I don’t want to stop too long. We’ve made good time today, yes?” He nodded. “Aye, we have, even though we had to walk.” Leida smiled, hearing the derision in his voice. “It is much more dignified to fly, true.” Magnus lowered his own pack, rummaging in it until he pulled out a colorful bundle she recognized as their food satchel. He didn’t look at 31

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her as he untied it. “Yes, it is. And much faster. You may call it pride, Leida. I prefer to think of it as efficiency. Unfortunately, we walk in the daylight. I have no wish to be shot down by some vainglorious farmhand with visions of adding ‘Dragonslayer’ to his family name. There aren’t many humans so understanding as yourself concerning the close proximity of a dragon.” The thought of such a thing happening to him made her stomach lurch, and she stared at the honey bread he gave her with little appetite. A memory surfaced, a fearful time when in her sixth year as his favorite, he’d limped into the caverns, snorting with pain. She and the other servants had been horrified to see two thick arrow shafts protruding from the broken scales on his right side. Between the skilled hands of an ancient wood sprite named Dagden, and Magnus’s own considerable magic, he was able to heal in less than a month. But that time was burned into her mind, of days when he’d laid his huge head in her lap, panting and suffering as Dagden cleaned the wound. She had sung to him in those moments, even as her voice cracked with fear and wavered off key, no longer the beguiling instrument that first lured him to her. “What dark thoughts plague you, Leida? If you worry for your child, we will fly longer, even into the dawn. It will be risky, but it will lessen our journey time.” A frisson of warmth suffused her. He may have taken the fair Sivatte as his favorite and still nursed a grudge toward her for stealing from him, but somewhere in that great dragon heart, he still cared for her. Her cheeks heated, and she was glad for the darkness. He also still desired her, if his lovemaking at the stream’s edge and the promise of more were any indications. “I am eager to see Vala,” she said, picking apart the bread to chew on small pieces. “She is everything to me, and I miss her greatly. But she is safe in caring hands.” 32

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There was no mistaking the downturn of his mouth as she spoke of her daughter, or the flinching quickly hidden. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him he was mistaken in thinking she’d lain with another who had gotten her with child. But he would learn soon enough. One look at Vala’s eyes, and he would know. And then what? Dragon males were fiercely protective of their offspring. Magnus had already incubated and raised a male and four female hatchlings to adulthood. His pride in them was obvious, even the male, Ariadoc, born with a twisted wing and unable to fly. But this child was human, sired by Magnus when he was in human guise. Leida had heard of such progeny, rare though they were. Most often they had been as welcome in the dragon community as the full bloods. They were long lived, inheriting the powerful magic of dragonkind. She’d already seen hints of it in Vala, young as she was. What would Magnus think when he discovered Vala was his? What would he do? Few of the scenarios she imagined gave any comfort. She chewed slowly on her supper, accepting the flask of wine he handed her with softly spoken thanks. He crouched next to her, watching the darkening sky. Moonlight danced across his features, and she thought him the most beautiful man she’d ever seen. The wine was sweet on her tongue, soothing to her parched throat as she drank deeply. “Careful with that. You will be flat on your back if you imbibe Gersel’s spiced wine in such a fashion.” His vibrant green eyes, shrouded to shades of gray, glittered in the half light as she licked a stray drop from the corner of her mouth. Leida passed the flask back to him, already feeling euphoric from the wine’s effect. “Your warning comes too late, I think. I feel dizzy.” She leaned her head back against the tree, gazing upward at the white stars winking back at her from the clear spaces between the oak’s branches. A sigh and a chuckle drifted to her ears. 33

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“Too late, indeed. We’ll wait a bit before we fly. The effects are strong but pass swiftly enough, even in a human.” She turned her head, blinking slowly as her vision spun in an arc and finally caught up with the movement. Magnus appeared blurred around the edges as he dug once more into his pack, pulling out a pipe and small leather bag. Even in her inebriated state, it surprised her to see him with it. In all the years as his favorite, not once had she ever seen him partake of pipe smoking. He’d never been convinced of its virtues or its vice. “Were I meant to breathe smoke from my nose and mouth,” he’d told her once, disdain strong in his voice, “I would have been born a firedrake.” The sneering curl to his lip let her know exactly what he thought of firedrakes. Magnus must have felt her watching him as he packed the pipe bowl, for he turned his head, giving her a faintly amused look. “There are moments, few and far between, in which I will admit my haste in stating an opinion. This is a soothing ritual.” Leida laughed, her eyes widening as a hiccup followed the laughter. “You mean you admit when you’re wrong?” He arched a dark eyebrow at her, giving an audible sniff of disdain. “I am never wrong, only misunderstood.” The knowing humor in his eyes told her he made light of his sometimes overweening pride. She hiccupped again, smothering a giggle. “Forgive me,” she gasped, “I didn’t know the wine was so strong.” He waved away her apology, even as a small bright flame shimmered to life between his fingers, and he lit the tobacco in the pipe, blowing gently on it until it caught. Leida recognized the spell. It was a simple one he’d taught her in her first year of service to him. One she could no longer invoke with the silver-clad iron choker wrapped around her throat like some venomous serpent. She picked at the delicate links, suppressing the urge to try to claw it off her neck. The sweet scent of tobacco smoke teased her nostrils as Magnus drew on 34

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the pipe and watched her. “I will not remove the choker, Leida. You’ll not use my own magic against me to hide yourself and run again. I’d prefer not to waste another four years searching for you.” Confusion welled in her, along with the small hope she’d held close and almost refused to acknowledge in case she was wrong. “Why would it matter now? You have your precious ring back. Why hunt me again?” Magnus drew long on the pipe, releasing the smoke through his nose and mouth in leisurely fashion. He gazed at her from the corner of his eye, a measuring look that made her breath hitch in her chest. “What makes you think this has anything to do with some innocuous trinket?” She wrapped her arms around herself, suddenly cold. “Revenge is it? A way to draw a little blood for hurting your pride?” He snorted, his voice turning waspish. “Tell me, Leida, beyond the precautions I’ve taken to keep you close, what have I done to exact this revenge you speak of?” The look in his eyes dared her to blacken their earlier intimacy. Her throat closed up, clogged with tears that also blurred her vision. It took two tries to clear her voice and speak with some semblance of normalcy. “It isn’t what you’ve done. It’s what you will do.” Gods, but it would hurt to the depths of her being once they returned to his caverns, and she took her place as his lowest servant while he paraded his current favorite before her. Magnus blew out a rush of smoke, emptied the pipe bowl of its contents, and stamped out the still red coals with his boot. The pipe stem snapped in his fingers as he pinned her with a hard glare. “What I will do? What dark things do you believe me capable of, Leida? What revenge do you believe is appropriate for a lover who deserts her mate, steals from him, takes another lover, and bears his child?” 35

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He’d risen to stand over her, his face twisted with a snarling anger. It might have frightened her had she not grown so angry herself, spurred on by the temporary courage of the dragon wine. She rose to face him, resentment and rage bubbling out of her in a cleansing river. “Why can’t I take a lover? You’re a fine one to pass judgment on me! How do you think it felt when you courted the fair Sivatte before my very eyes?” She began to pace before him, hands on her hips. “I have my pride as well, Magnus, inferior human that I am. Did you really believe I’d wait until you escorted me to some far off city, spouting platitudes about the transitory affections of dragons?” She swatted his hand away as he reached for her and asked the question that had burned in her gut for four years. “How long did it take after I left for Sivatte to become a favorite?” Magnus’s stare was icy as he answered, his words clipped. “Three days.” Leida closed her eyes, the bravado of the previous moments seeping away, only to be replaced with a wrenching sadness. “Three days.” Her laughter sounded hollow to her ears. “I remember those days. I traveled with a family of fortune tellers along the base of the Riori Mountains, and wondered if you missed me at all.” She cleared her throat again, wiping at the tears which managed to escape her lashes. “Obviously not. After all, what is a farmer’s daughter with a damaged voice when compared to an elfin maiden who sings down the gods?” She didn’t know what to expect from him then, mockery and scorn, surprise that she had been hurt by his actions, amusement at her jealousy, but nothing prepared her for the reaction she got. Her yelp of surprise echoed through the trees as Magnus reached out and grabbed her shoulders, shaking her until she curled her fists into his shirt and begged him to stop. He pushed her from him, his face white with fury. Chills raced across her back, and she flushed, confused by the deep disappointment, 36

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the insult in his eyes. “You hide your thoughts well, Leida of the Glimmer South. In all the years you lived in my household and shared my bed, I never once suspected your regard of me was so low.” His voice was scathing, and she wondered how he managed to so neatly turn the tables on her, once more making her the accused. “And you name me pernicious.” She watched, struck speechless, as he dropped his hands as if she burned him, turning away, and stalking to where their gear lay. He gathered the broken pipe, tobacco pouch and flask, shoving them into his pack. When he turned back to face her, it was with a face devoid of any emotion. “It’s time to leave. We’ve a short walk to the Lomondari Cliffs. We will fly from there.” He didn’t bother to see if she followed him, and Leida scrambled to catch up, grappling with her pack as she tracked Magnus through the growing shadows amongst the trees. The wine still held a light grip on her, but one that weakened rapidly as Magnus promised. The euphoria it brought was long gone, leaving despair and bewilderment in its wake. He hadn’t denied Sivatte, but somehow he’d made her feel guilty, muddled, and she bore the uneasy sense that her actions of four years ago might well have been a colossal mistake. *

*

*

It would be nothing short of a miracle if he didn’t kill her before their journey’s end. Leida had tested his patience and control to the limit with her accusations, her insults that made him sound fickle, malicious even. Magnus might have thought she goaded him with the single-minded purpose of making him lose his temper if not for the stricken look in her eyes, the jealousy in her voice when she spoke of the elf woman, Sivatte. Wind rushed over his wings as he flew high over the dark forest, seeing it thin in the distance to farm and grazing land dotted with gently rolling hillocks. As always, the thrill of flight soothed his troubled 37

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emotions, calmed him so he could think more clearly, work his way through the pits and traps of her words to discern the meaning behind them. If he didn’t believe she would make an escape, he’d work his greatest magic, transform Leida for a short time so that she could feel the tickle of low-flying clouds beneath her belly, the stretch of wings across on her back. He snorted, steam rising from his nostrils to flow behind him. The gods knew she could benefit from any pastime that might curb her impulsiveness. She was human, but her nature was as mercurial as any dragoness he’d ever encountered. Despite his anger with her, Magnus couldn’t help but preen when he transformed and saw her eyes light up, practically glowing as she viewed him in his true state, giant wings stretching out on either side of him, amber scales tipped with obsidian and emerald. He’d arched his neck, elongated nostrils flaring as she raised a hand, running it over his withers in a reverent caress. The scales there rose in reaction, sensitive to her lightest touch. “Do you remember how to ride?” Magnus could see his dragon voice startled her, its deep thrum powerful and echoing. Leida nodded and reached for the harness. He lowered his head to accept it, finding some small measure of amusement as she stilled, watching the flicker of his tongue near her ear as he tasted the air around her. She cleared her throat, her own voice carrying a teasing note overlaid with a measure of wariness. “You aren’t thinking of…” He rolled his eyes and finished her sentence for her. “Feasting on you? No, at least not as a dragon.” Even in the dark, he could see her blush at his allusion. “Come, we are wasting moonlight. Strap the packs to the harness and climb on. We’ve some distance to cover before we rest again.” She nodded, quick to obey him, and soon they were soaring above the trees, skimming wisps of low hanging clouds. Leida rode astride his 38

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neck, legs curled against his spine as she clutched the harness to maintain her seat. Her slight weight didn’t slow him, and he wondered if she remembered earlier flights, when he swooped and spun in breathtaking aerial acrobatics, and she’d thrown back her head, laughing and shouting in sheer delight, gripping the harness to hang on. For now she was quiet, wrapped in a warm cloak he’d given her to shield her from the cold of night flight. Magnus felt a shift in her weight as she leaned forward, the faintest warmth of skin as she pressed her face against his scales. She’d fallen asleep, lulled by the rhythmic tempo of his wings as they beat the air. They flew for hours, until a steady ache grew in his shoulders, and his wings tired of their constant motion. It was still dark when Magnus passed over a grassy hummock with a sheltering stand of willows and small lake at its base. He circled it twice before finally descending. Once he hovered a few feet above the ground, he curved his head toward his back, his long, serpentine neck giving him a large range of motion. As he suspected, Leida was fast asleep on him. “Leida,” he said as softly as dragon speech allowed, and she jerked upright, blinking at him with owl-eyed confusion. Strands of dark hair escaped from her braid, fluttering around her in the swift current caused by his rapidly beating wings. He didn’t have to say anything else. They’d flown on long trips together before, and Leida was familiar with the precautions he took not to alert others of a dragon in the near vicinity. She slipped her feet out of the harness’s boot sleeves, sliding down Magnus’s stretched leg until she hung from one curving, silver claw. She released her hands, dropping to the ground with a soft grunt. The flap of his wings threatened to knock her over as she worked swiftly to unbuckle the harness and packs. Once free of his burdens, Magnus emitted the same high whistle, changing once more into a man. He landed on his feet, agile as a cat, 39

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and grabbed the packs and harness with one smooth motion. No one would be the wiser that a dragon had landed here. Even the most experienced tracker would note only a set of footprints, that of a man and a woman. He held out a hand, motioning to her. “Come, we will camp in the shelter of the trees and rest until midday. You can bathe if you wish, and I will bring a fresh kill.” Leida might have been happy enough with the bread and cheese packed by Gersel’s servants for their journey, but Magnus, even in human form, craved meat. His sharp dragon vision had noted fluttering movement in the stand of willows as he’d circled above them. Owls on the hunt meant there was game close by. The graceful willows offered a haven of privacy beneath their drape of green leaves and slender, arching branches. Magnus placed a possessive hand against the small of Leida’s back, guiding her to one of the largest trees as she stumbled sleepily alongside him. By the time he’d made a bed of their blankets and situated their packs against the tree’s trunk, she was asleep once more, clutching one of the blankets under her chin. Magnus gazed at her for long moments, noting the dark circles under her eyes, the pallor of her skin. He suspected the past week had drained her to the point of exhaustion. Her capture, her reunion with him, their flight to her village, the intense interlude by the stream bed, and all the emotional upheaval that came with it had finally worn her down. He pinched the bridge of his nose, almost as weary as she, but resolved to settle things between them. For now, though, he would take advantage of the remaining darkness and find some decent food. He cast a protective ward on their camp site, one that gave a passerby a strong sense of avoidance. Armed with the small crossbow he’d unpacked, he trekked through the stand of trees, his senses far more acute than a true human’s. It didn’t take long for him to capture and kill two large hares. By the time he returned with 40

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the brace of rabbits, dressed and ready for roasting, Leida had awakened again. She sat up when she heard him approach. Her eyes lit up at the sight of the hares, and she moved quickly to take them from him so he could start a small fire. “This is a fine catch,” she said. “Thank you. I’ve had only bread and a bit of fish for the past few days. This is a welcome change.” Magnus sat down on the blankets she’d vacated, content to watch her prepare their meal. He reached for his pack, taking out the wine flask and broken pipe. As with her laces, he held the pieces of the pipe stem together, singing a wordless chant to meld the broken bits, making it whole once more. “Will you sing for me later? When the meal is finished?” He glanced at her over his shoulder as he pulled the pouch of tobacco from the pack. “Do you still enjoy dragon song, Leida?” Her smile was both wistful and eager. “Yes, I do. I have always loved your singing. It is the music of the stars.” Had she told him he was the most beautiful dragon in the world, such words would have paled against these. Dragons held song and those with the talent to produce it in high regard. His chest swelled with pride, and he gave her an indulgent smile as he packed the pipe bowl. “It will be my pleasure. I am glad to hear you still have an affection for it.” Her smile faded a little. “It’s only been four years, Magnus. It would take lifetimes for me to forget your voice.” Magnus lit the pipe, drew deeply on it, and released a lazy swirl of smoke from his mouth and nose before answering. “Would it? Did you remember my songs as you labored to bring your daughter into the world?” He could hear the sneer creeping into his words, but was helpless to stop it, the bitterness once more awake and alive in him. Leida’s face paled, but she refused to glance away. “I did,” she said softly. “Their memory brought me comfort and eased the pain.” 41

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He flushed, uncomfortable with a small, niggling guilt for his spite. “I am sorry you suffered.” She sighed, the smile once more in place. “’Tis every woman’s burden and her joy.” Firelight reflected in her eyes as she searched his face, for what he couldn’t tell. “But thank you for your words.” He nodded once, pleased to make her smile again. A comfortable silence fell between them as he continued to smoke, and she cooked their meal. They ate in silence as well, only making small talk when they cleaned up the remnants of supper and walked together to the lake to rinse their hands. When they returned, Leida sat again on the blankets and Magnus stirred the coals of the dying fire. The sky had lightened to a pewter gray, the stars fading as the moon descended and dawn approached. “What song would you like to hear?” he asked her. She bent her knees, wrapping her arms around her legs and tilting her head. “It doesn’t matter. I like all the songs.” The embers continued to fade as Magnus took a breath and began to sing, a rich, low melody spun of dragon magic and ancient memories. He watched Leida’s face as he sang, watched its subtle changes as she fell beneath his voice’s bewitching allure. Her expression sent the blood racing through his veins, as it was one of rapture, as of a woman who had just found her greatest pleasure in her lover’s arms. He knew it was much like his own expression when he’d first heard her sing so many years earlier. His song came to an end, falling away to a breathless quiet. Leida sat as if hypnotized, finally blinking and shaking her head to shrug off the effects of his voice. Her gray eyes darkened, a yearning drifting through their depths as she met his gaze. “It is as I remembered. A gift of the gods. You have a wondrous voice, Magnus.” Magnus inclined his head in acknowledgment of her praise. He 42

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watched her as she rested her cheek on her knees, her own voice growing drowsy. “I know Vala would love to hear you sing.” He went rigid at hearing the child’s name. The knowledge of her existence twisted his insides. He could push it to the back of his mind, save for those times, like now, when Leida insisted on reminding him of her. He brooded, remembering their earlier conversation, including the odd remark regarding her voice. He straightened, gazing at Leida with narrowed eyes, a realization growing within him. “Leida,” he said. She lifted her head, eyebrows raised in question. “It’s your turn. Sing for me.” Her panic-stricken expression confirmed his suspicions. His favorite, once blessed with the same quality of voice as the fair Sivatte, could no longer sing. *

*

*

Bile rose in her throat, accompanied by a terror that froze her body in place. Magnus watched her, his severe features impassive. But there was a knowing look in the vibrant green eyes, an awareness of the reason for her fright. Leida had already told him her voice was ruined; however, his initial lack of reaction to the news led her to hope he had missed the comment, too intent on her remarks regarding Sivatte. She should have known better. Magnus missed very little. “I can’t sing, Magnus,” she said, shaking her head. “At least not in the way I once could.” His silence made her squirm. “Have you nothing to say?” He unfolded his long frame from its sitting position, rising gracefully to pace in front of her. “You say you damaged your voice. How? Were you injured? You never spoke to me of it, and I saw no wounds on you.” He stopped, pinning her with a hard stare. Leida licked her lips, feeling much like a child caught in an infraction. How many times, she wondered, could she incite his wrath before he finally lost every last bit of that phenomenal control and 43

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strangled her? She rubbed her damp palms over her knees. “Leida?” One deep breath, and she plunged into her tale, talking fast in the hopes she wouldn’t become completely incoherent before she was finished. “I wanted to improve my singing, make it even better than it was. I practiced every free moment.” She smiled a bit sadly, thinking of Magnus’s elderly wood sprite. “Dagden threatened to gag me with her apron if I didn’t give her some rest from ‘all that incessant howling.’” Magnus chuckled. “Dagden has never had an appreciation for the finer points of a well-sung melody.” He sobered almost instantly. “Continue. I can sense you hesitating in the telling.” Leida cleared her throat, annoyed at how easily he could discern her emotions. “I hit notes I’d never hit before, and you noticed. I saw your surprise when I sang for you on the eve of your trip to Meck’s Hilltown.” A sob caught in her throat. It was her last happy night with him, when he praised her voice with great enthusiasm and loved her into the dawn. When he left for the lakeside town, she had felt secure in his affection, sated and warmed by his loving. He didn’t tell her why he traveled to Hilltown, only that she and two other human servants were to meet him there later that evening. The scene she came upon that night still sickened her with its memory. Magnus came to crouch in front of her, lifting her chin with one finger, forcing to look at him when she tried to lower her head and hide within the sheltering folds of her skirts. “It was then, wasn’t it?” His voice turned brittle. “It was then that you changed, became someone I no longer knew.” He held her jaw in a firmer grip. “What was it, Leida, that made you turn on me? Withdraw so far that I soon rested my head in the lap of a stranger with a familiar face? A woman who no longer sang when I asked and stared at me with such revulsion?” Leida jerked her head, wrenching away from his hold. She stood up, 44

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skirting out of reach as he rose with her. The festering anger once again bubbled to the surface, and she was relieved that her voice sounded firm and even when she answered him. “I saw you with Sivatte,” she said. Her eyes narrowed as she glared at Magnus. “And you’re a fine one to speak of lying in a stranger’s lap. You had your head in hers, your eyes closed as she stroked your hair and cast her spell with her voice. You looked like a man who had just found his pleasure between a woman’s thighs. I imagine you did that too, before I came across the two of you on the edge of that farmer’s field.” There was a cautious note to his question. “Why didn’t you call out?” Leida gasped, stunned by what she considered pure idiocy. “Surely, you jest.” She flung out her arms in exasperation. “What exactly might I have said, Magnus? ‘Hello, would you mind not seducing my master? He already has a favorite. Me.’” She fisted her hands, hiding them in her skirt so he couldn’t see the true measure of her rage, her hurt. “What would you have done had the situation been reversed?” His black brows slammed together in a dangerous scowl. “I would have torn the bastard’s arms from his body and left his entrails for the farmer to use as fertilizer for his fields.” Leida’s eyes widened. Magnus’s voice was heavy with jealousy, and she might have found some small joy in it were it not for the gruesome image he described. She shuddered, knowing he would have carried out such a deed without a second thought. “This is about you, Leida, not Sivatte.” Her knuckles went white. If she sported longer fingernails, she would have bloodied her palms. “Oh, this is definitely about Sivatte, Magnus,” she snarled. “In fact, all roads lead back to your pretty elf.” The tears couldn’t be held back, and they cascaded over her cheeks, and it was now she who paced in front of him, hugging herself in lonely comfort. “I didn’t want to believe,” she murmured. “I didn’t want to 45

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believe you were courting another favorite. But how could I not? I saw her, heard her.” Magnus’s face blurred before her eyes. “I’d never heard singing like that. Neither human nor dragon could match a voice such as hers.” Leida sniffled, wiping at her tears with shaking hands. “And she was far more than I could ever be. Long-lived, ageless. She would be young and beautiful long after my bones had turned to dust.” Leida hiccupped once, no longer willing to look at Magnus. She sensed his stillness, a tense waiting as if he would spring on her once she finished her tale. “You went to Hilltown several times that month, and I knew why. I held some hope that maybe I wouldn’t lose you altogether if I just continued to improve my voice. After all, you seemed to still enjoy it when I sang or recited poetry to you.” “I have always found great pleasure in your voice, among other things.” She dredged up a small smile. “I counted on that. But practice wasn’t enough. I could drive Dagden to sheer madness and it wouldn’t be enough.” She did glance up at him then, seeing a new sympathy in his eyes. “So I used dragon magic, an arcane spell in one of your books. It was supposed to sweeten a dragon’s voice, so I tried it on myself.” Magnus’s face bled of all color, his pupils expanding so that his green eyes turned black. Leida rubbed at her arms, her stomach roiling as he stared at her in horror. She swallowed a scream as he lunged for her, lifting her from under her arms and slamming her against the sheltering willow’s trunk. He crushed her against the tree with his body, and she could feel the violent tremors coursing through him. “Had you gone mad?” he said, forcing the words out between clenched teeth. His thin face was so drawn it looked skull-like. “Do you realize you might have killed yourself with your own stupidity?” Leida squirmed in his hold, accomplishing nothing more beyond tiring herself out. “I didn’t think it would be so dangerous.” Her voice broke on a sob, and she abruptly sagged in his arms. “It didn’t work, 46

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Magnus. I thought someone had ripped out my throat, it hurt so badly. I was afraid to tell you what I’d done.” His grip lightened, changing to a comforting embrace as he stepped back, taking her with him. “I remember. You were hoarse. Dagden thought it was a cold, but neither of us understood why her draught didn’t work to heal you.” Leida felt his chest expand on a long drawn breath, and he spoke again. “Ah, Leida, why would you do something like this? Your singing was a thing of beauty, but not worth dying for.” She used his shirt to swipe at her dripping nose and dry her tears. His eyes still looked black, his face still pale, but the shock was gone, replaced with a pained regret and some other emotion that made her breath hitch in her chest. She shrugged. “It was a pointless endeavor anyway. As you’ve admitted, Sivatte became your favorite three days after I left.” He shook his head when she repeated the same insult she’d used in the judgment chamber. “Dragons are indeed capricious.” Her eyes closed as he tilted her head back, stroking her neck and the underside of her jaw with his fingertips. His breath fanned across her cheekbones as he spoke. “They can be. Capricious and greedy, prideful and short-tempered.” Leida sighed when he touched her forehead with a light kiss. “Look at me, Leida.” She opened her eyes again, drained and docile in his embrace. Magnus’s gaze was intense, willing her to look at him, to listen. “It is true Sivatte is a favorite, but she is not my favorite. I courted her for Ariadoc. She belongs to my son.” Leida was certain her heart stopped beating for a moment, before starting again and pounding in her ears like a Glimmer war drum. “What are you saying?” she whispered. His mouth twisted, caught somewhere between a frown and a smile. “You are a suspicious, foolish favorite, with a poor opinion of your master. Because of Ariadoc’s twisted wing, he will never fly fast 47

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enough to mate with a dragoness. He asked me to help him find a favorite. Sivatte was perfect for him, and the last I heard, she is as beguiled with him as he is with her.” It was stunning news, and she felt the urge to both laugh and scream. A ruined voice and four years of misery, lightened only by the joy of her daughter’s presence— it could have been avoided had she just possessed the courage to ask him what he was about. “I would have told you, had you asked. There were no secrets. But you expressed little interest in my trips to Meck’s Hilltop, so I did not mention it.” She thought of Vala, three years old and blessed with the magic passed on by the father she had yet to meet. Her arms came to wrap around Magnus’s waist. “Gods, Magnus, what have I done?” *

*

*

Magnus held her, savoring the feel of her in his arms, the knowledge that she turned to him for comfort. His thoughts still reeled with her revelations, the terrible repercussions of her actions and the reasons for them. When she told him of using one of the arcane and deadly spells to help her voice, he thought he’d burst into flame. Terror warred with fury as he considered her imprudence, and he thought the silvered choker might well be an ornament of protection instead of punishment. Certainly protection against herself. “Leida,” he murmured, kissing the top of her head, “I will bind you to one of my cavern walls with a length of iron chain if I ever suspect you will try something so foolish again.” He felt her hiccup against his chest. “Allay your fears, Magnus,” she said into his shirt. “It was a hard lesson well learned.” Magnus leaned away from her in order to see her face. It was tearstained, blotched in spots, and her eyes were puffy. She had never 48

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looked more beautiful to him. “You destroyed your voice in a failed attempt to gain my approval, and possibly my loyalty. You ran from me because you thought I’d replaced you with another favorite.” Leida reddened, lowering her eyes. “Yes.” “You truly do have a very poor regard for me.” Her head snapped up. “That isn’t true!” she cried. He smiled at her protest. “Such extraordinary measures to attain what already belonged to you.” She gasped. “Do you remember when I said you took from me that which I held most precious?” He felt her tremble. “Yes, and I’m sorry, Magnus. Had I known the ring meant so much, I would have chosen something else. I just wanted a keepsake.” He placed a finger against her lips to stop her nervous explanations. “I wasn’t speaking of the ring, Leida.” Her eyes widened as his meaning became clear. Magnus cupped her face in his hands. “Sivatte’s loveliness will remain long after you and I are both brittle bones in the earth’s embrace. Hers is a near immortal race.” His thumbs glided across her cheekbones, tracing the fine lines appearing at the corner of her eyes, marks of years passed, years spent with him. “But she pales in comparison to my favorite, a woman with the night in her hair and the moon in her eyes.” Her fingers dug into his back. “Even when you are gray and lined, I will still think you the most beautiful woman ever born, Leida of the Glimmer South.” Her moan whispered into his mouth as he captured her lips in a kiss, one gentle and long as he made love to her mouth. The sky had lightened even more, a hint of the dawn hovering on the horizon, but neither he nor Leida noticed. Magnus’s fingers worked at her bodice, unlacing her with impressive speed. Their shoes and clothes soon lay in a heap at their feet, and he stepped back to admire her, note the changes in her tall frame since he’d last seen her in her full naked glory. Pale and long-limbed, her body had filled out. She was still slim, 49

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but the reedy, girlish thinness was gone. Instead, her waist curved and flowed into rounded hips, and he could see the silvery track of thin scars lacing her lower abdomen, just above the triangle of dark curls. Leida stood silent as he continued to gaze at her. He was eager to bury his face between those full white breasts once more. “Childbearing agrees with you, Leida.” She gave him a small smile, both bashful and beckoning and returned his stare. Magnus held still as her gaze passed over him, pausing at his chest and arms, his flat belly, the blatant proof of his desire for her. “You are beautiful as a man, Magnus,” she whispered. “Almost as beautiful as when you are dragon.” She could not have extolled his physical virtues in a better, more sensitive way, and he reached for her, sighing audibly with pleasure when she pressed against him from shoulder to shin. Leida echoed his sigh, winding her arms around his neck and trailing small kisses along the top of his shoulder, over his collarbones and around his throat. They sank to the blankets, a tangle of arms and legs as they rolled together. The occasional slide of her damp cunnus against the base of his cock tempted Magnus to pull her leg across his hip and take her as swiftly as he had at the stream bank. It would be just as good, just as frenzied, but he restrained the urge, wanting to relish this encounter, enjoy her in every way denied to him for the past four years. He rolled Leida to her back, stretching her arms above her head. The position highlighted the line of her belly, the curve of her breasts and the dark pink nipples stiff with arousal. Magnus crouched above her and lowered his head, sucking one nipple into his mouth while worrying the other with his fingers. Leida’s moans echoed in his ears, soft wordless pleas that drifted into even softer hums as she held his head in her hands and pressed him closer. He switched to the other breast, groaning against her skin as she lowered her arms to stroke his chest, her fingers pausing at his own 50

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sensitized nipples and pinching gently. He almost came in that moment, a powerful surge of sensation flooding his thighs, coursing through his stiff cock. She whimpered in protest when he abandoned her breasts in favor of her belly. The whimpers quickly changed to sighs as Magnus ran his tongue in a long damp line down her middle, pausing to dip into her navel before gliding over the gentle curve of soft, scarred skin just above her womanhood. Magnus shifted his arms to find a more comfortable position in which to pleasure her. The movement caused his hand to brush the wine flask lying forgotten on the ground near the blankets. He paused, eyeing it for a moment before raising his head to leer at Leida. Her brows rose in puzzlement. “What’s wrong?” He shook his head and reached for the flask, sitting up between her spread thighs. He wiggled his own brows at her, making her giggle. The wine was sweet on his tongue, neither too cold nor too warm. Magnus swallowed the first sip and offered the flask to Leida. She shook her head in refusal. “What mischief are you planning, Magnus?” Her hands continued to rove over him, sliding across his thighs and belly. He stopped her hand as it reached for his cock. “Not yet, my beauty. I cannot think when you stroke me.” She pouted. “And that is a bad thing?” “No,” he murmured, leaning down to place a kiss on her belly. “It is never a bad thing to feel your hands on me. But it is distracting, and I want to indulge in that bit of mischief you speak of.” Magnus tipped the flask again, filling his mouth with the wine. But this time he didn’t swallow. Instead, he held it in his mouth and stretched out on his belly between her legs, his shoulders at her thighs and his face hovering just above her cunnus. “Oh my,” she whispered on a breathless sigh. The wine, warmed in his mouth, trickled between his lips, dripping 51

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in a thin stream onto her thighs and cunnus. He followed its path, nuzzling his face into the soft brown curls, wet with wine and the juice of her own passions. Leida’s knees fell farther apart even as her fingers furrowed into his hair, pressing on his head to coax him closer. Magnus acquiesced, spurred on as much by her scent, musky and sweet, as by the continuous low moans now emanating from her throat. He cupped his hands around her, using his thumbs to part the swollen folds and reveal the tiny bead of sensitive pink flesh to his gaze. His breath left him in a long exhalation, his mouth watering at the sight. Leida’s hands grew more frantic, tugging at his hair hard enough to cause a twinge of pain. “Oh, gods, Magnus, please.” Magnus smiled, gliding his tongue along the inside of her thigh to lap up a trickle of wine. “Please what, Leida?” he teased. It was a ritual between them, played out years earlier when he would make her say exactly what she wanted of him. As before, her breathless commands sent fire racing through his veins, and his engorged cock throbbed in response. “Put your tongue inside of me. Please. Gods, I need this.” She arched against his hands, a physical plea to accompany her words. He didn’t have to be told twice. Her deep-throated groan held equal measures of lust and relief as he fastened his mouth over the small pearl in which so much sensation centered. She tasted of heaven and ocean, even better than he remembered, and he wondered how he’d ever found the control to wait an entire day before indulging himself in this way. Magnus sucked slowly on her, sometimes pausing to swirl his tongue along the inner folds and slide inward to tease her slick opening. Leida slowly stilled in his embrace, her moans turning to soft mewing sounds even as her muscles stiffened. She skirted along the edge of a climax, her hips rocking on the blankets in an ever increasing pace. He knew the signs, knew her body so well. He moved back to the curved 52

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nub of flesh, sucking softly once more as his hands slid up to cup her breasts. Her small nipples, already hard, stiffened even more beneath the subtle play of his fingertips. It was the touch to send her over the edge, and Leida nearly slammed his nose with the sudden upward surge of her hips. Magnus flexed his shoulders to hold her pelvis down as she bucked and cried out, thrusting against his mouth. She was liquid heat, and he wanted to feel it surround him, soak it into his body. He lapped one last time at her before changing position, rising up and sitting back on his calves. From his new vantage point, he had a full view of her, the white skin, flushed and shiny with perspiration, the rapid rise and fall of her chest as she sucked in great gulps of air. Leida’s eyes glistened in the fading shadows as she stretched out a hand, fingertips brushing across the head of his cock. Magnus shuddered and leaned forward, bracing his arms on either side of her head. She smiled, her hand closing more firmly over him even as her legs slid over his hips and around his waist. She guided him to her, and he watched as the swollen head of his cock disappeared into the nest of curls. Slick, tight muscle gripped him as he sank into her, and Magnus groaned with the pleasure of it. He pulled out of her slowly, almost to the tip, fascinated by the sight of his shaft, rosy and glistening with wetness. Leida’s legs tightened around him, her heels digging into the small of his back to urge him forward. He needed no more coaxing. Her small, rhythmic moans, timed to the pumping motion of his hips were the sweetest music to his ears. He licked her throat, the soft hollow just below the imprisoning choker. Her hands clutched his arms as she met each thrust, took him deep. His thighs were slippery against hers, his bollocks slick with her spending as they rubbed against the curve of her buttocks. He fucked her hard, stroking in and out in a driving motion that pushed her up the 53

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twisted blankets. His mouth found hers, his tongue sweeping in to mimic the motion of his hips. She gripped him, sheathed him, muscles tightening on his cock until he groaned in her mouth. A hot tingle blossomed in his lower back, traveled over his buttocks and thighs before finally centering at his groin. It grew, fanning out to the rest of his body, and he heaved against her, desperate to get as far inside as possible, sink into her, body and soul. Two hard pulses and his back arched, his deep cries echoing through the trees as he thrust once more, his cock throbbing with an almost unbearable ache as he came inside Leida in a gush of warmth that flowed from him to her. Massive shivers wracked his body as he collapsed on to her, and it took some effort to find the energy and roll to his side so as not to crush her. He pulled Leida’s hips snugly against his so as to stay buried within her. His vision swam for a moment before focusing on her face, still rosy with her exertions. He imagined his looked much the same. She watched him with a sated, sleepy expression, her gray eyes almost glowing in the light put out by the dying fire. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to walk tomorrow,” she said, a smile in her voice. One hand tickled his nape as the other lazily caressed his side and hip. Magnus rubbed his palm over her rounded backside, pulling her closer still as he softened within her, rivulets of his seed streaming out of her to soak both their thighs. He kissed her, tugging gently at her lower lip. “Remember, we will travel mostly at night.” Another kiss, this one a little longer, a little more forceful. "There will be little walking. You will ride, when I am dragon…” he paused to swirl his tongue through her mouth, “and again when I am a man.” Her laugh, sultry and knowing, transformed to a small, welcoming whimper as he clamped his mouth over hers, pressing his lips to hers and sucking on her tongue. Soon, he thought, soon he’d take her again, when the darts of 54

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sensation that set his legs to quivering subsided, and he could pull himself away from the seductive lure of her mouth. He reveled in the feel of her fingers in his hair, the way she touched him with reverent, loving hands, as if she worshiped the feel of him beneath her palms. Magnus wrapped his legs around her, suppressing the urge to hold her tighter and risk injuring her with his need to bind her to him in any fashion. It would take more than a crushing embrace. He thought of the child, her daughter, and felt his stomach tighten with the pain of jealousy, regret, and envy. He pushed it down, suppressed it for the moment. It served no purpose, but the child might. He and his brethren were shrewd, cunning creatures, always looking for that which might benefit them most and further their aspirations and desires. Leida was his desire, his obsession, his need. And if her actions just now were any indication, she loved him as much as he loved her. The trick now was to convince her to stay with him beyond the four years of her sentence, assure her that he had no intention of ever replacing her, despite the ruin of her voice, or the daughter he couldn’t claim as his. Morning was full upon them when he felt fatigue finally take hold. Magnus was almost asleep when Leida’s slow breathing suddenly changed, alerting him. His eyes snapped open as she stiffened in his arms, and he lowered his head to stare at her, questioning. He grew suspicious at the sight of her gnawing on her lower lip, even as her fingers traced circles over his collarbones. Alarm grew at the timidity in her voice. “I have something else to tell you,” she said, clearing her voice twice before continuing. “And I’m afraid you will be angry again.” *

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“MY DAUGHTER?” Magnus roared. He towered over her, naked and enraged. “Vala is my daughter?” Leida clutched one of the blankets to her, urging him to lower his 55

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voice with a frantic motion of her hands. She yelped as he jerked her up from where she knelt on the remaining blanket. His green eyes burned with rage, pain, and disbelief. “You bore my daughter and never said a word!” His fingers dug into her upper arms until she flinched, and he pushed her away from him. “How long were you planning to keep such news to yourself, Leida? Another day? When we finally reached the village, and you presented her to me?” She held out a supplicating hand, unsure how to respond. His anger was justified, but she had held back Vala’s parentage from him, not out of spite, but out of fear. “I was afraid!” Magnus scorched her with a fiery stare. “Afraid of what? You keep speaking of this fear of me, yet I’ve done nothing to earn it. And how could you ever think I’d hurt my own child?” He bared his teeth, and Leida blanched, thankful he was still in human form, for as a dragon such a gesture would have been truly terrifying. Clothes flew as he hurled her skirts at her, and she dodged to miss being struck by her worn shoes. Leida held her garments, watching as Magnus tore through his pack, pulling out a fresh change of clothing. “Lying, deceitful bitch,” he snarled. “You kept my daughter from me because of some fear you can’t even name?” His hand closed around her wrist, and he dragged her stumbling after him. She gasped, trying to hold on to her bundle of clothing and still keep the blanket around her with one hand. “Where are we going?” she asked, trying to plant her feet and hold her ground. It was futile. Magnus was far stronger than most men. Her resistance was no more effective against him than a gnat’s. “The lake. I’m in desperate need of a bath.” He glared at her over his shoulder, his message clear. He wanted her scent off him, and his off her. 56

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That look, of sneering superiority, made her temper rise to match his. She couldn’t break free of his grip, but she wasn’t going to make it easy for him. His surprised grunt let her know she’d accomplished her task when she abruptly sat down. The dewy grass was cold and wet on her bare buttocks, but Leida clenched her teeth, refusing to let him see her discomfort. “Get up, Leida,” he snapped, tugging on her arm. “No. Not until you let me explain. I know you’re angry, but if you’ll just—” Her sentence ended on a screech as he suddenly dropped his bundle of clothes, bent and heaved her over his shoulder. The move drove the breath out of her as his hard shoulder dug into her stomach. The stinging slap across her bottom elicited only a breathless wheeze. She pounded on his back with her fists, and he adjusted her so that she could breathe again. There was time only to take in a huge gulp of air before she found herself flying through the air. A kaleidoscope of color flashed in her vision, the green of the willows, the brightening blue of the morning sky, before a shock of stinging cold water met her back, swiftly closing over her head. Magnus’s expression was smug with vengeance when she resurfaced, wiping water from her eyes and coughing and sputtering. Leida raked her hand over the surface of the water, sending a spray at him. “Bastard!” she yelled. “Are you trying to drown me?” “Don’t tempt me,” he shouted back and dove beneath the surface, coming up briefly before diving again, only to reappear in front of her. He circled her in a lazy, predatory fashion, reminding her none too comfortably of the great sea sharks of which she’d heard gruesome tales. She stood in shoulder-deep water, her teeth chattering hard enough to make her head ache. Magnus’s dark hair was slicked back from his face, highlighting its sharp planes and angles. He seemed completely unaffected by the frigid water, not even a single chill to be seen on him, 57

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while she stood there, shivering and nearly blue with cold. His green eyes no longer burned as he stared at her. Instead, they glittered with contempt. “Now,” he said an even voice devoid of any emotion, “I am ready to listen.” Leida only glared at him and began wading to the shore, her chattering teeth making it impossible to form a coherent word. And he called her mad? What person in his right mind decided to hold a conversation in the middle of a freezing lake? Naked at that, for any passerby to witness? She could only growl when his arms wrapped around her waist, lifting and turning her so that she faced him, her breast flattened against his taut chest. Magnus spoke softly against her ear, words that sounded strange and garbled. She gave a grateful sigh as the water around them warmed instantly, chasing away the shivers that left her quaking in his arms. “Better?” he asked, stroking her back with one hand as the other supported her weight, holding her to him. She was still angry, but grateful for the warmed water. “Yes, much. Thank you.” He nodded, but offered no mercy in his hostile gaze. “Tell me, Leida. Make me understand why you would keep my daughter a secret from me.” Leida shook her head. “I wasn’t hiding her, Magnus. I didn’t know I carried her until more than a month after I left your service.” His face darkened again. “And still you continued to run.” She could see the muscles bunch in his jaw as he clenched his teeth. “Dragon pages found you, forced you to return to me. You held your silence about her, made a fool of me by letting me believe someone else sired her. Don’t tell me you didn’t purposefully conceal her. You just did so in plain sight.” A harsh growl escaped him. “You have your cruelties, Leida. You only dress them in the finery of self-pity and 58

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imagined persecution.” Her hand arced out of the water, for once her reactions swifter than his. The crack of her palm against his cheek bounced off the surface of the water, echoing for several seconds. Magnus’s head snapped back from the force of the blow, and he responded instantly, the hand previously pressed against her back, lashing out to shackle both of her wrists in an unrelenting grip. Leida didn’t struggle, but she held herself stiff in his arms, panting hard and glaring at him with tear-filled eyes. “It’s not pity, nor is it persecution. But I’m a person, Magnus, not livestock. Even as your favorite, I was still no greater than any other servant in your household—easily cast off, easily replaced.” She sobbed, her words running together in a breathless sentence punctuated by sniffles. “And there was Vala. I could have returned. Life might have been easier. I wouldn’t have had to labor in the fields as I did, but I welcomed the work. My life, and that of my daughter, didn’t hinge on the whims of a dragon lord.” Magnus’s eyes narrowed. “That is the most foolish thing I’ve heard in many years, Leida,” he snapped. “So you threw off some imaginary yoke I’d placed on your shoulders, found your ‘freedom’ so to speak, and placed your welfare and that of your daughter, my daughter, into the hands of nature and fate.” He shook his head, his fingers tightening on her wrists. “What if there had been crop failure? Plague? All the things that have hounded the heels of men since before dragon memory.” He squeezed her wrists hard enough to make her wince. “You and your strange, misplaced nobility. Had you any sense about you, you would have returned to me.” Her anger drained away, leaving only a bleak melancholy “Returned to what?” She sighed. “You with your new favorite?” She shook her head when he made to interrupt. “I only acted on what I knew then. What if you greeted Vala’s arrival with celebration? 59

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Claimed her, but refused to allow me to stay? I couldn’t take that risk, Magnus. Vala is everything to me, the finest thing I ever made. My decisions may have seemed foolish to you, but my wisdom isn’t more than three hundred years in the making. And I swear, on any sacred thing you put before me, I didn’t hide her existence as some way of exacting vengeance on you. You have every reason not to believe me, but I love you too much to be that cruel.” There, she'd said it at last, acknowledged it aloud and was glad for it. Now she would wait and see how Magnus dealt with such a declaration. At some point in her speech, he had released her hands so that they came to rest on his shoulders. His silence unnerved her, and Leida lacked the courage to raise her gaze any higher than the hollow of his throat. “Look at me.” His voice was soft, beguiling, as if he prepared to sing to her. Leida raised her eyes to his, stunned, then overjoyed by the expression in them. The anger was still there, the frustration and the hurt, but she saw love as well. The same love she espoused for him shone back at her, deep and abiding. Tears blurred her vision as he kissed her, a worshipful touch of his lips against hers. She kissed him back, sliding her arms across his shoulders to hold him close. The ticklish feel of his fingers at her nape made her break the kiss, and she cried out, elated to feel the weight of the choker gone from around her throat. A faint tingling of power flowed through her, weak, but still present. Magnus dangled the choker off his fingertip, watching as sunlight glinted over the silvered links. “No more bindings, Leida. You are free to use your magic. Free to make your way in the world, without me if you so wish it.” He frowned at that. “You feared I would make you leave. I feared you would not stay unless I forced you. There has been enough fear between us.” He tossed the necklace from him, and they both watched as it flashed once more in the sunlight before sinking 60

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below the surface. “What say you,” he asked, a hint of urgency in his tone. “Will you stay?” Leida hugged him, nearly strangling him in her joy. “I will stay, always, for as long as you will have me.” Magnus’s chuckle was muffled against her newly bared throat, and he pried her arms from around his neck. “Then you will grow old in my caverns, and we will watch Vala grow up.” He kissed her again, and they floated together, lost in each other as the world narrowed to the rhythmic lap of magically warmed water and the twine of her legs around his waist. Leida moaned as Magnus slipped inside her, gliding in and out in slow, easy strokes while she rained kisses on his neck and nibbled his ear lobe. He caressed her beneath the water, cupping her buttocks when he came inside her, his grip tightening against her back when she soon followed. A distant sound, of voices and whistles, brought Leida out of a pleasant daze. She glanced at Magnus who stood alert in her arms. He glanced at her, his smile fleeting but intimate. “It’s time to leave the water, Leida. Others have risen and started their day. I’ve no wish to provide some wandering group of drink-sick soldiers or field hands the diversion of seeing your lovely body.” The scenario he described made her strike out immediately for the shore, the suddenly cold water spurring her on to swim faster. By the time they made it back to the shelter of the willow, dried off and dressed, she was swaying on her feet with fatigue. Magnus strengthened the ward he had laid earlier around the tree and helped her spread out the blankets. Leida sighed her pleasure as he spooned around her, warming her back and legs under the blankets. This time it was he who pulled her from the edge of sleep with a question. “Vala. She looks just like you, does she not? Except for her eyes. They are green, like mine.” 61

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Leida rolled to face him, surprised. “Yes. That is amazing. How did you guess?” Magnus smiled, that same superior expression that often drove her to distraction. “We dragons are astute, sagacious creatures, Leida.” She rolled her eyes, turning back on her side to snuggle up against him. “She is also much like you in spirit. Considers herself the queen of all things.” His soft laughter tickled her ear. “I look forward to meeting her.” *

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Leida sat on a flat rock near the entrance of Magnus’s caverns, enjoying the late afternoon sun on her face. The whispering laughter of an autumn breeze ruffled her hair and sent a swirl of red and yellow leaves fluttering over her feet. The forest seemed hushed, somnolent as the day waned. She enjoyed the quiet, finding it a respite from the usual constant chatter to which her daughter subjected her. At seven seasons, Vala was a talkative child, inquisitive and insistent that her parents have all the answers to her numerous questions. Leida often found herself hiding a smile behind her hand when the child would ask Magnus some question that would make his eyes widen before he scowled and demanded to know exactly where she’d heard such a thing. Still, he would always answer, patient with Vala’s ceaseless talking, even when Leida wanted to cover her ears and beg her to stay silent for at least three short breaths. An echo of childish merriment, carried on the gentle breeze, drifted to her ears. Leida peered into the maze of maples and birch, catching sight of a flash of scarlet as Vala ran past her, her cloak and long black hair rippling behind her like banners. She was long-limbed and as fleet footed as any young doe, quickly disappearing once again into the leafy underbrush. Leida didn’t have long to wait before Magnus appeared. He ran by as well, skidding to a halt and loping back to where she sat, watching. 62

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He bent, wrapped an arm around her waist and lifted her up against him. She welcomed his kiss, the brief teasing slide of his tongue across hers. “Wear the ruby girdle tonight,” he whispered into her ear. He released her as quickly as he’d embraced her, his teasing smile promising a long night of lovemaking. She resumed her seat, and he bowed once before following Vala’s path, hot on her heels in her favorite game of chase. Some might say she was a poor mother, allowing Vala to run through the forest like a wild thing instead of studying deportment for that far off time when some important nobleman might court her. Such imagined admonishments didn’t concern Leida. Her daughter was a child, and should be allowed to follow the pursuits of a child. Besides, she suspected Magnus would have a difficult time accepting Vala’s maturity from child to woman. He was already grappling with the issue of her short-lived rebellions. Raising a human child was quite different than raising a dragon hatchling, and the dragon lord sometimes cast her baffled looks. Nothing in his centuries of living prepared him for the surprises Vala often tossed his way. She smiled as Vala’s laughter floated to her once more, accompanied by Magnus’s deeper tones. Love swelled in her breast, a fierce welling of emotion that made her want to chase after them both and hug them close. “My blessings,” she whispered to herself. “My gifts from generous gods.”

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GRACE DRAVEN Grace Draven is a Louisiana native, living in Texas, and is a financial analyst by trade. She is the member of a large on-line network of writers, as well as a member of a site that archives fiction works. In the spare moments between working a full-time job and caring for three small children she writes romantic fiction. Grace has lived in Spain, honeymooned in Scotland, hiked through the Teton Mountains, ridden in competition rodeo and is the great, great-granddaughter of a Nicaraguan president. She is an avid fan of medieval history, Renaissance faires, Russian culture and the culinary arts. If you would like to contact Ms. Draven, please e-mail her at [email protected]. *

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Castil il Veras, a dowerless scribe born of lesser boyars, attends the wedding of her best friend to the notorious cursed king of Helenrisia. It is at the prenuptial celebrations that she becomes bewitched by the mysterious magus king, even as she recognizes that he is forbidden to her. Doranis of Helenrisia travels south to Caskadan, bound by duty to secure trade agreements by marrying a woman who loathes the sight of

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