“You smell like me.” Layla murmured back, a smile curling her lips. Snugging his arms around her, Dusk pulled her close in his lap, a rumbling pleasure rolling through her now as he growled low, kissing her neck gently. It was heaven to Layla, feeling his slow rumble course through her, wrapped tight in his arms with his smooth lips at her neck. Her Dragon had been hot with passion but now it settled, listening to a symphony pour through her bones. She should have been angry. She should have been pissed that the cuff had bound her to someone other than Adrian. Yet she wasn’t. Being held in Dusk’s arms after that explosive moment was the safest she’d ever felt – and the deepest.
“Adrian’s going to be pissed.” As if reading her thoughts, Dusk’s growl was dark – though Layla felt him smile by her ear.
“Did you plan that?” She asked, suddenly wondering.
But Dusk’s next laugh, bright and startled, assuaged her fears. “Gods, no! I thought the cuff had one Bind in it and one Bind only! I assumed it would only bind you to the first Royal Dragon who clapped it on your wrist. Not one trying to take itoffyou.”
“So I guess you are an actual Royal Dragon then,” Layla spoke with a small smile.
“I guess I am.”
“Are you sorry?” Pulling back, Layla gazed up at him, needing to see his eyes.
“That we’ve been bound? No. I’m not sorry.” Gazing down, Dusk’s eyes had returned to their clear sapphire color, though Layla saw lighter flecks in his irises now as if the diamond-brilliance would never quite recede. His face was serious, something beautifully amazed in his eyes. “I didn’t know this would happen, but I don’t regret it, Layla. This sensation with you…gods! I’m almost afraid to let down my wall and feel the fullness of it.”
“Because you don’t know what we’ll do.” Layla spoke softly. “I know what you mean.”
Layla felt it, too – the intensity of their Bind, as if it was more solid and earth-shaking than her Bind with Adrian. Layla and Adrian swirled like two sand-funnels roaring into a burning desert sky. But this sensation with Dusk was deep and passionate. As if his cavern-bright energy anchored her sand-funnel heat, making everything flow in a tremendous roar of coordinated power rather than chaotic eruption. It was deeply grounding and erotic, as much as it caused her to soar through the sky – and Layla loved everything about it.
Dusk’s eyes were luminous as her watched her; and she knew he felt the same way.
“What are we going to do?”
“Well,” Dusk smiled, though Layla saw strain there. “Now we do what we came here to do. You’re going to learn how to shield, just like I’m doing now. Because if it’s just me shielding from you, Layla, I’ll end up jumping your bones right in front of Adrian and then we’ll have a real Dragon-fight on our hands. And with my power increase just now…”
“You gained power from our Bind?” Layla wondered about his half-shift. Gazing at him, it was obvious Dusk had changed. If he’d been handsome before, the changes had made him ridiculously so – something no one would miss at the Hotel. As Layla watched, a flare of light went rippling through his body, following his stark ridges but also spreading out in an opalescent wave. He’d never refracted like that before and Layla watched it, mesmerized – like watching light shining through diamonds in a stream.
“I gained alotof power, Layla,” Dusk eyes were serious as the light passed away. “I nearly shifted all the way. I could feel it, coursing through every part of me. It was only my fear for your safety that kept me human tonight. And if Adrian gained this much power from binding you back in Seattle – then he’s playing small right now.Verysmall, to try and trick his enemies. If he’s gained as much power as what I’m feeling… then I don’t want to see what happens when he decides to show it.”
But his words suddenly made Layla’s heart clench and her Dragon coil up. Setting her lips to Dusk’s skin, she inhaled her scent running through his flows. “Dusk? Do you think Adrian would try to kill you for what happened just now?”
“I don’t know.” Dusk spoke softly. Setting his lips to her temple, he kissed her, letting his smooth lips linger. “I won’t pick a fight with Adrian, but if he takes this out on either of us, what happened just now by accident, I will rise in defense. That said, I think it’s best if we both learn control. Let’s work on shielding. Hopefully, we can get us both some passable control over this Bind by dawn.”
“And if we can’t?”
“Then we face the fire,” he breathed softly.
CHAPTER 22 – FOCUS
There was no clock down in the crystal Vault deep beneath the Hotel, though Layla was certain it was well past midnight and probably honing in on one or two a.m. Dusk had been trying to teach her shielding for hours, but ever since their Bind, it was proving impossible to separate their energies long enough to practice. Shielding necessitated a desire to resist the magics of another person – but all Layla’s magic wanted to do these past hours was to coil its way into Dusk and stay there, permanently.
They’d tried everything. Dusk had taught her over a hundred movements in the past hours to create various kinds of magical shields and wards. With an exhausted huff, Layla sat on the glassy flow of rose quartz in the center of the cavern, massaging out a cramp in her hand from all the sigils and shielding movements he’d been guiding her through. Magical fighting was far more physical than she’d expected, like a martial art, with precise hand and body motions for everything.
And Layla had failed at every single one.
“This is useless, Dusk.” She sighed, as irritated as she was exhausted. “Maybe I can learn to shield against someone else, but our energies are so intertwined now…”
“I know. I feel it, too. Let’s take a break.”
With a wry smile, Dusk flopped to a seat beside Layla. They had been working so long that the crystals in the cavern had begun to dim and he sent out a low rumble, flooding the cavern with resonance again. As if woken from slumber, the twisting luminescence in the crystal pillars flared in rings outward from the central space. With a start, Layla realized she could feel it as Dusk’s vibration surged into the pillars – like her own awareness suddenly expanded, diving into the earth and spreading out in a ring. A vicious vertigo took her, of being everywhere in the cavern at once, staring at herself from every pillar and stalactite.
She swayed and Dusk caught her, his hands warm on her shoulders.
“Whoa! Easy.” He spoke gently, though his voice had no vibration in it now. Layla could still feel his barrier preventing their energies from touching, though it seemed brittle now as if he’d held it too long. “What just happened?”
“I felt it when you lit the pillars.” Layla blinked at him, shaking her head a little to clear it. “Like I was inside them; my consciousness watching us here in the center from a thousand different locations.”
“That’s what it feels like for me.” Dusk narrowed his eyes, watching her with interest. “When I send my vibration somewhere, especially into crystals, I usually have a brief moment of vertigo like I’m in two or more locations at once. Bi-locational, or multi-locational. You felt that just now?”
