Soren
She thought I was going to hurt her. I could see it in her eyes.
The rage burning in my chest blazes higher as I pace the floor of my room. I had to leave, had to breathe, and yet the urge to charge back in there and demand she tell me who made her afraid of an outstretched hand is nearly uncontrollable. A female doesn’t fear being struck unless someone strikes her first.
I’ll tear apart whoever did it, rumbles through my mind. I’ll sink my teeth into their flesh, and rip their—
I stop in place and inhale, lifting my hands to my chest and easing them back down as I exhale. I do this ten times before my teeth start grinding against one another.
This isn’t working.
I fling my arms down and fall back to pacing. Thanks to Abely, I’m starving, which only enrages me further. How dare he come to her room and beg like some kind of victim? And while she was in her nightdress, no less. My nostrils flare. I could track his scent right now if I wanted. The smell of fear was thick on him. I could follow that…seize him in my jaws, and—
“I am king,” I say aloud to the urge. Like a disgruntled cat, my first form curls into grumbling submission within me. I can’t remember the last time I’ve had to remind it of its master.
I’m too close to her; that’s why my control is slipping. I can smell her scent still lingering on my skin, a heady mix of jasmine and vanilla that reminds me of the glossy festival cakes street vendors sell for the Andrames shower.
I love those cakes. I want one right now. I want it slathered in icing that glistens like her skin did in the setting sun yesterday. I want to trace each glowing line with my mouth, each shining inch of—
I let out a groan and grab at my hair.
How does anyone survive this madness?
Snarling to myself, I charge from the room. The guards by her door flick their eyes my way but wisely stay in position. All of them but one. This one slips behind me like a shadow.
“On her,” I growl over my shoulder.
He keeps following.
I wait until we’re alone in a back corridor before swinging around, teeth bared, scales itching to rise. “What don’t you understand about that order?”
Rally doesn’t blink. “Princess Serah is well-guarded,” he says in a maddeningly rational voice. “You’re dangerous right now.”
I seize the neck of his shirt. “I would never harm her, you—”
“Dangerous to yourself,” Rally clarifies.
My jaw clenches. I endure his infuriating calm as long as I can stomach before flinging him off.
“Why did you let Abely in her room?” I demand.
“Ty did.”
“And why did Ty see fit to let the minister into my betrothed’s bedchamber?”
A trace of uncertainty crosses his face. “He didn’t. He let Abely into her parlor and told him to wait there.”
“And tell me, Rally,” I say, my voice nearing a hiss, “did Abely wait there?”
My guard and most trusted comrade, my oldest friend, meets my glare with an insufficient degree of fear few would dare. “No.”
“No!” I begin pacing once more, the close quarters only piling fuel on my fury. “He had the audacity to crawl into his future queen’s room, to grovel like a wyrm on her floor before she was even dressed.”
“He would never have hurt her, Soren.”
“Of course not,” I spit. Abely is like a second father to him and Ty. I know that. “But the—the…” I fight for the right word to encompass the error. “—impropriety of it.”
If she thought Tirenth uncouth before, she’ll think us barbarous by now. Her mother would sneer and call us all beasts, the tyrannical old bat.
“It was wrong of him,” Rally says. The heel of his boot scrapes at the floor. “My understanding is he was in fear for his life.”
“As he should have been,” I roar.
A single, prolonged blink is all the surprise Rally shows. I turn from him and press my forehead against the stone wall. Half a minute passes.
“He didn’t tell her anything, Rally,” I say. “Nothing. He was too busy marinating himself in spirits.”
This surprise actually drags a sound out of him. “Abely?”
I nod, the stone grating against my skin.
“Abely’s no fool, Soren. He knows the risks.”
“We all do.” Yet Abely had risked losing control of himself. He risked transforming in the middle of a Vasnan tavern, risked those people’s safety and my subjects’ hope of water.
He’d risked me losing my fated flame before she was even mine.
Rally’s disbelief is clear in his tone. “There has to be more to it.”
“Or maybe,” I say, my voice cutting even to my ears, “he’s just not the saint you seem to think he is, hmm?”
When Rally doesn’t answer, I cast a look back. His expression is stony, which tells me I cut too deep. I let out a long breath.
“My apologies,” I say.
Rally lowers his head in acknowledgement.
“Look into it if you want,” I say, pushing away from the wall. “But not at the risk of her safety, understand?”
“Of course. Thank you.”
Silence fills the corridor. I relish the momentary quiet in my mind.
“What are you going to do with him?” Rally asks, boring into my peace.
“I wanted to rip his head from his body, but the lady disagreed.”
Rally says nothing.
“I think I would have only maimed him,” I say.
“You think?”
I shrug.
Rally’s brows draw together in thought. “He really didn’t tell her anything?”
“Other than to not call me by my name, no.” A dragon’s name is his to give, of course, but I’d empty my coffers to hear my name on her lips. I’d shower her in diamonds, wreath her in—
“Nothing else?”
With effort, I focus on Rally. “No.”
“So she won’t know what you did to—”
“No,” I say firmly.
“And she’s already accepted the jewel?”
I shut my eyes. “Yes.”
Our heads lift at the sound of three drawn-out horn blasts, the call of visiting dignitaries arriving. I sigh.
“I’ll handle it,” Rally says, and when I let out a noncommittal grumble he adds, “You aren’t even dressed.”
“I haven’t had breakfast either.”
He chuckles. “You have plenty of time. They’re not here to see you. They just want a look at that water magic of hers—”
My first form rounds on him before I can even think. He’s half a head taller, but suddenly I loom over him, my teeth bared, my voice thick with flames.
“She’s mine.”
The words reverberate with enough force to rattle bones.
Rally drops to his knees, and shutting his eyes, he tilts his head back to expose his throat. It’s the stance of a dragon in abject submission.
“I was not thinking,” he whispers. “Forgive me, Soren.”
Seeing him like that hits me like a blow. I step back, driving my first form back down as I do.
“For stars’ sake,” I say, glancing off, “stand up.”
Rally climbs to his feet as I scrub my face with a hand. I need to go. “Was this how it was when you met Marta?”
Rally married a human female. Perhaps their kind holds some special gift for bewitching dragons.
“It wasn’t this severe,” he says, dusting off his knees. “I also wasn’t trying to hold my horns.” He makes a vague gesture toward my head.
“You know why I must.”
“I do.”
Turning on my heel, I go to leave. “Make sure the dignitaries are seen to properly, Rally.”
“Of course, Your Majesty.” A pause follows, and then, “Where are you going?”
“To find breakfast.”