Garruk moved forward then, and the other Dragon Lords made space. His presence was different—less actively magical than fire or ice, but somehow more fundamental. When his hand came near the mark, I didn't feel temperature change. I felt weight. Pressure. The mountain's attention focusing through his will to examine what had been carved into my flesh.
"It's a trap," Garruk said, and his voice was granite-hard. "Specifically designed, meticulously planned. If you consummate now, while the mark is this active, it will corrupt your bond at the moment of greatest vulnerability—that first joining when souls are most open to each other, when the Caretaker Pact would normally seal itself permanently."
He pulled his hand back and met Caelus's eyes with the full weight of his ancient knowledge. "The Unnamed will pour through Wren into you in that moment. The orgasm, the soul-connection, the opening that happens during first consummation—all of it becomes a doorway for corruption to flow both ways. Wren will become a vessel. And you, Caelus, will rot from the inside out as the mark spreads through your bond to consume you both."
The silence that followed was absolute. Even the wind outside the windows seemed to hold its breath.
I watched horror dawn on every face in the circle. Lark clutched her rag doll tighter. Mira's frost marks pulsed with distress. Kara's jaw clenched hard enough I heard her teeth grind together.
And Caelus—through the bond, I felt his world ending. Every instinct screamed at him to complete the bond, to claim his mate, to seal what we'd started. But now that path led to mutual destruction. Everything he wanted would kill us both.
"How long?" His voice was barely recognizable, scraped raw by realization. "How long before the mark forces the issue?"
"Days," Sereis said quietly. "Maybe a week at most. The compulsion is building exponentially. Eventually, neither of you will be able to resist."
Kara crossed to Caelus in three strides, and when she spoke, her voice carried absolute authority—not asking, not suggesting, commanding. "You cannot have sex with her. Not now. Not tomorrow. Not until that mark is completely, utterly, permanently gone." Her fire marks flared bright with emphasis. "One moment of weakness, one lapse in control, and you'll both become vessels for the Unnamed. Do you understand?"
Caelus's hands clenched into fists at his sides. Through the bond, I felt him taking her words and forging them into chains, wrapping them around his desire until it couldn't move, couldn't breathe, couldn't act. Making her command into absolute law that he would die before breaking.
"I understand," he said. Then, quieter, "I won't touch her. Not like that. Not until it's safe."
Mira stepped forward, her gentle voice cutting through the tension. "There could be a way. It wouldn’t be easy, but it could be possible." She touched her frost marks, fingers tracing the delicate patterns that spread across her arms. "The key is regression."
The word meant nothing to me. I looked at Caelus, but his expression was carefully neutral—listening, processing, not letting hope or fear show until he understood what was being offered.
"I don't—" My voice came out smaller than I'd intended. "What does that mean?"
Lark moved closer, her earth-sense making her steps deliberate and grounding. She still held her rag doll, andsomething about that simple comfort object made what she was about to say feel less frightening.
"Deep littlespace," she explained, her voice patient in a way that said she'd been confused too once. "When you regress fully—not just playing at being small but actually becoming small, letting go of adult fears and defenses entirely—it creates a purification effect. The bond magic intensifies, wraps around you completely, and burns away anything that doesn't belong."
I tried to process that. Playing at being small versus becoming small. The distinction felt important, but I couldn't quite grasp why.
"I still don't understand," I admitted. Through the bond, I felt Caelus listening intently, his mind working through implications faster than mine could. "Regression means . . . what? Acting like a child?"
"Not acting," Kara corrected, and her fire marks flared with emphasis. "Becoming. That's the crucial difference, and it's what makes this work." She crossed to stand beside the other brides, and together they formed a wall of feminine knowledge that felt both intimidating and comforting. "The Unnamed's mark feeds on fear, trauma, adult understanding of mortality and suffering. It uses your knowledge of what's at stake against you—the constant awareness of danger, the weight of responsibility, the terror of becoming a vessel."
She paused, making sure I was following. I nodded, recognizing the truth of it. The mark thrived on my fear, grew stronger every time I lay awake imagining Penny's fate becoming mine.
"But in deep regression," Kara continued, "you don't have access to those things. You're not an adult woman fighting for survival. You're just . . . Little. Safe. Cared for. Pure. Your world shrinks to immediate needs—being fed when hungry, comfortedwhen scared, played with when bored. The mark can't survive that purity because it has nothing to feed on."
The idea was seductive and terrifying in equal measure. Let go of being an adult entirely? Stop fighting, stop planning, stop carrying the weight of knowing what the stakes were? Part of me desperately wanted that—the promise of safety, of someone else handling everything, of being small enough that the world's horrors couldn't touch me.
But another part was screaming that letting go meant vulnerability, meant giving up control I'd needed to survive.
Mira must have seen the war on my face because she spoke gently. "It's not losing yourself. It's finding the part of yourself that exists underneath all the armor you've built. The part that knows how to be cared for, how to trust completely, how to exist without constantly bracing for the next blow."
"When I regressed," Lark added quietly, "I was so scared. I'd survived on the streets for years, never trusting anyone, never letting my guard down. The idea of being that vulnerable made me want to run." She hugged her stuffie tighter. "But Garruk guided me into it slowly, showed me it was safe. And when I finally let go—when I stopped trying to be strong and just let myself be Little—everything changed. The bond wrapped around me like armor made of love, and nothing dark could touch me inside that space."
I looked at Garruk, trying to imagine this mountain of a man caring for Lark with the gentleness she was describing. He met my gaze and nodded once, and through Caelus I felt echoes of understanding between the Dragon Lords—they knew what this required of them too.
Sereis stepped forward, and when he spoke, his voice carried the precision of someone explaining a technical process. "Caelus must guide you into the deepest regression possible—days, perhaps a week. He'll need to care for you completely, help youlet go of everything that makes you 'adult.' Feed you, bathe you, comfort you, play with you, enforce bedtimes and naptimes." He paused, ice-blue eyes serious. "Let you be truly Little until the mark starves from lack of the fear it needs to survive."
The reality of what that meant hit me like cold water. A week of being completely dependent. Of letting Caelus make every decision, handle every need, see me at my most vulnerable. Of existing in a headspace where I wouldn't be able to hide behind adult defenses, wouldn't be able to pretend I was fine, wouldn't be able to maintain any distance between my needs and his care.
Through the bond, I felt his response—absolute determination mixed with tender anticipation and bone-deep fear of failing me. He wanted this, I realized. Not just because it would save me, but because caring for me like that was fundamental to who he was as a Daddy, as a Dragon Lord, as my mate.
"Will it hurt?" I asked, then felt stupid. Of course letting go of everything you'd used to survive would hurt.
