I pushed off the ground, stretching to the sky, and let my body do the rest to take us to safety.
Chapter18
Ward
Only Noth was old enough to remember a time when there were dragons and even the one he met was dying. Noth said the creature smelled like old parchment and rotten vegetables. The dragon had bestowed upon the elf a golden crown he used as a plant holder for the past couple hundred years. It didn’t do anything. As the ultimate instruments of the Goddess Veretis, dragons collected some strange things before hunters extinguished them in the Harrowlands.
Or that’s what we had been told, because shifters had done the hunting. Too powerful, too elemental, the monsters of the Harrowlands couldn’t contain abuse or magic dragons into submission. Dragons were the only shifters that managed to use magic in both their animal forms and human forms. Not to mention their size, cunning, and pure brute strength. Where there was fear, there was death.
It was those soul-shaking thoughts that had my bear frantically digging us a large den to hide in when Evie passed out and crashed to the ground in the middle of nowhere.
Help me,he asked.
With my magic tapped out, I could barely lift a finger.
Fine. I will do it,he huffed. My bear gathered bracken, pine needles and moss to make her comfortable.
His only thought was to keep his mate safe and let her recover from the giant expenditure of energy it took to transform into a massive dragon. Evie was easily three times our size in bear form. Her gleaming black snake scales translated into plate-sized dragon scales, golden light leaking from each overlap. She picked me up like the teddy bear she called me and my magic remained too exhausted from fighting Noth to contain my bear.
Anything more than slouching along for the wild ride was impossible, even though he hated his feet being off the ground. My mate absolutely did not know how to fly and did it anyway.
We watched her sleep in our den. Only her regular breathing kept my bear from destroying everything around us.
You cannot hide me away,my bear spoke as he let me take over our form, exhausted in his own right.She will need both of us in equal measure now.
He was right. When we started, I was supremely confident I could lead Evie through the mate bond and into life as a shifter. Now, I had no idea what we would be when she was a powerful, hunted monster the Harrowlands hadn’t seen in a millennium. I was strangely excited to find out. She would need my knowledge of magic and shifting more than ever to contain her dragon. Her beast was capable of leveling cities without trying and I had learned enough lessons about accidentally harming people to never want that for her.
Something settled as I watched her sleep. Fate had been leading me to this day my whole life. My strength, diplomacy as King, hard-earned mage craft, all served to become her champion. She would need every skill we both possessed to stay alive and control her power. We really were perfect mates. I just needed her, more than ever, to see it. Our individual pasts were nothing next to the future we had together.
Evie kicked out in her sleep and I caught her ankle before she hit me. The action woke her enough that she blearily blinked at me.
“Wait, did I tell you I love you?” Evie croaked.
Goosebumps broke out all over my skin.She what?
“Why are you over there?” she asked as she struggled to get up.
“I didn’t want to smother you while you were recovering.” I shuffled over to bring her some water and berries I’d found after we landed. It would have to do until we got back to the brood.
Evie sipped with a grateful smile. “I think I need some smothering.” She crawled into my lap and I hugged her loosely in case she still hurt from the fighting and the fall.
“Tell me what hurts,” I urged her.
“Nothing,” she said into my chest. “That shouldn’t be right. Noth almost bit me in half, but the shift healed everything. I was coming to tell dream you ‘I love you’ before you showed up with my sister on your arm. Please tell me that was not real.”
I froze, hands balling into fists as I worked to swallow. Noth’s nightmares really were hideous. “Please tell me the ‘I love you’ part is real.”
She wouldn’t look at me, but firmed her resolve and met my eyes. Hers said everything I had ever wanted to hear. “I’m going to be bad at this. My ex popping up as my nightmare and me stumbling through a conversation about feelings proves I’m bad at this. But I love you. I won’t let anyone take that away from me.”
My heart thundered in my chest. Her certainty left me breathless. My bear was ready to lunge forward and bite her immediately.
Evie shifted in my lap. “We’re going to need to be a team if a dragon is after us.” Genuine worry crossed her features. She didn’t know.
I stroked her hair, rubbing my thumb across her cheek. “Viper. Evie. My love.”
She violently shook her head. “No. No. No. Now, every time you start like that, it’s something terrifying or disgusting. I ate the relic as you told me to. It was awful, by the way.”
I held her close and kissed her cheeks, her forehead, her mouth. That she settled against me made my vow to be her champion even more real. “You are the dragon, Evie.”
