Serafina grasped my face and peered deep into my eyes. Cheeks flushed. Green eyes gleaming. Legs wrapped tightly around my hips. She’d never been more beautiful.
“I am yours, Thorne Blackwing. And you are mine. My mate. Forever.”
Lost to emotion, I plunged into her in a single, claiming thrust. The sensation like coming home.
“Blessed Goddess, yes!” she cried, her nails raking my shoulders with a delicious burn.
Instincts surged. Scales rippled across my back as fire built in my chest. My flame burned through both of us. It twisted with the golden spark I had given her, completing a circle older than either of us.
“More. More, Thorne,” Sera demanded. Her hips ground against mine, legs locking me to her.
“Yes, my mate. Everything I am is yours,” I said, my low growl rumbling. Flames painted my throat, and I sank elongated teeth into her neck, completing the bond, branding my mate. Serafina’s cries raced through my blood. I thrust harder, deeper, until we were nothing but flame and movement, two halves of the same inferno.
“Fly for me, my beautiful girl,” I commanded. She threw back her head, shattered within my arms, and shouted her pleasure at the sky. Heat gathered at the base of my spine, breaking me apart as well. Passion exploded in a detonation of burning embers. Ecstasy overloaded my senses, my vision turning white as I gave her every piece of me, claiming her.
My mate’s heated channel pulsed against my shaft. Drawing me closer, eager for every bit of my essence. The two of us becoming one—man, woman, dragon. Everything about the moment felt right. Destined.
As I fell from the heavens, back to earth, I registered Sera’s panting breaths. They mingled with my own. I gathered my mate in my arms and rolled her on top of me.
I struggled to keep my heart from soaring out of my chest. My soul from tearing out of my body to soar joyfully amongst the clouds. This kind of bliss was something I was unfamiliar with.
“I love you, Serafina,” I whispered, voice hoarse. With the back of my finger, I grazed the mark I’d given her.
Her tears wet my chest as she nestled her face into me. “And I love you, my dragon.”
We lay there in silence. Our bodies cooled while the fire of our bond lingered between us. For a few perfect breaths, it felt as though the world could not touch us. While I clung to those precious moments, the shadows haunting us crept in.
My mate’s curvy body tensed against me by degrees. Mine clenched in response. Tension threaded through her limbs where minutes ago there had only been surrender. The shift was subtle, yet it was enough to tell me the dream was over. Reality had found us.
“I wish we could linger,” she said, her voice a soft ache of regret, “but there is something urgent you need to know.”
I drew a steadying breath, already dreading the words. “What is that?”
“Alaric has partnered with The Dark One. He’s the one who broke your brother’s curse. Not me.” She quickly explained all that had happened since I’d left Pyrrhus. About Alaric’s endless betrayals. How he traded her life for his own. That he’d joined The Dark One’s ranks. “They march on Carcerem as we speak. They plan to attack the new royals and destroy their sacred arbor.”
Dread was an icy fist, squeezing the joy out of our shared moment. “I knew Alaric was desperate, but never imagined he’d stoop this low. With the Fallen Trials about to begin, it will be a slaughter.”
She bit her bottom lip, eyes darkening with remorse. “I’m afraid there’s more. This isn’t the first time they have teamed up. Alaric is the one who let him into Pyrrhus.”
Rage swept through me. Burning so hot as to cross a threshold where it became cold, brittle, icy. Instead of erupting, my fractured heart turned into a frozen tundra. In this place, Ifound an odd sort of calm. Where my brother, my guilt, my pain once existed was a vast sea of nothingness.
“All these years, he let me believe I was the reason our kingdom fell that day.”
“What do you want to do?” Sera whispered as if anything more would shatter me.
My words emerged on a jagged snarl. “If Alaric wants a war, then he’s got one.”
Chapter Thirty
QUEEN RUNA CUSTODIS OF CARCEREM
LOCATION: THE PIT.
“Ladies and gentlemen,welcome to the opening ceremony of The Fallen Trials!” the announcer’s voice boomed, and the arena erupted into cheers. Not a single seat remained empty. The turnout for the newly reinstated games had exceeded even our highest hopes. Soon, Carcerem’s depleted coffers would be full again—our kingdom poised to thrive as it was always meant to.
“Are you ready, Little Thief?” Victor peered down at me, silver hair catching the sunlight. My mate looked every inch the king he was born to be in a tunic richly embroidered with shimmering threads. Together, we stood in a gilded chariot, decked out in full regalia. Matching crowns gleamed on our heads, golden branches set with priceless stones.
Nobody staring up at their queen would ever guess I’d once been a thief. The bodice of my gown was sculpted with silver stitching that mimicked the trunk of our sacred tree. Its limbstrailed down my hips before bursting into deep purple leaves that mirrored my lavender-tipped hair.
