I draw a ragged breath, because this is only part of the story. “He threw me out of the house while I was still bleeding, trying to keep my ruined eye from falling out of my face, and shut the door. For four years, he got his wish. To everyone else, I was dead and gone and forgotten. Until one night, I was bouncing at some shitty, back alley club, some of my brother’s friendsrecognized me. They were drunk and thought they’d make an example of the fallen prince, and attacked. My world exploded into white dragonflame as the first ever moratus dragon took flight and didn’t stop until he landed at our ancestral stronghold. My father stood there, happier than a kid getting Christmas presents from Santa Claus himself, when he realized what I was.
“Ever since, he’s tried to get his hands on me, on my dragon. To be the crown prince again, to be his puppet, to fucking—” I sneer, disgusted, “to breed more dragons. He sent Council Enforcers to hunt me down when I refused, but Church convinced them to vote on sending me here instead of letting him lock me up where I’d be at his mercy. So.” I exhale sharply. “That’s the kind of man my father is. That’s who you’re dealing with.”
I don’t know what I hoped for when I flick my eyes to hers, but it’s not the hard look I get.
“You are notdisfigured, Ramsey. You aren’truined. And fuck anyone who made you feel that way, because there isnothingshameful about surviving what you have. Not then, not now.”
Her words aren’t soft.
They aren’t pitying.
They’re like a hot knife, cauterizing old wounds.
Even if her scent wasn’t burned into my brain, I’d still find her among the dancers winding ribbons around the Maypole. I can’t take my eyes off her. It’s not just the red sundress she’s dangerously close to spilling out of, or the wildflower crown that catches her hair in the evening breeze. It’s the joy that makes her skin glow as twilight descends on the clearing where the witcheshave set up their Beltane celebrations against a backdrop of twinkling fairy lights. A legitimate cornucopia of food and drinks is at one end, and two massive piles of wood at the other.
Stop being a fucking coward.
Fuck you, I’m not a coward.
Says the man too scared to ask his woman for a dance.
She’s not mine. Yet.
That’s not what you told the serpent.
The memory of Thane staking his claim on her weeks ago still makes my blood boil. I’ve listened to her talk about having him and Killian in her classes and their little fucking study group. Bit hypocritical for the snake to callmea wyrm with how hard he’s trying to win her good graces.
He’ll never get the chance now. Not after she and Luther nearly killed each other.
Until she wears our bite mark around her throat as a necklace, nothing is certain.
She’s not ready for that. Neither am I.
My patience has limits.
What patience?
Precisely.
I roll my eyes as my dragon recedes into the back of my mind, content to watch through my eyes. I finally step into the clearing, ignoring the shocked stares that follow. Her breathless laughter draws me to where she and her friends are getting drinks. When one of them notices me standing behind Nyx, she screams in surprise.
“What?!” Nyx cries out, but her friend only points at me. I’m close enough that her hair and dress brush against me when she faces me.
“JesusChrist, dude. Make some noise next time.” She smacks my chest with the back of her tiny hand, and the girlsfreeze. Good, my reputation precedes me. A laugh rumbles deep in my chest as my dragon preens at their terror.
She hands me a plastic cup full of the same horrifying excuse for alcohol they’re drinking and pokes my chest. “Take this. Stop that.”
Her wide grin can’t hide her blush as my dragon purrs, “As you wish.”
“Good boy.” I chug my drink to save my own dignity when her words have the same effect. She giggles and shakes her head when I hold out my empty cup in silent request for a refill.
“We’re going to run out if you keep that up.”
“I’d be doing you a favor, that shit’s toxic.”
“Hey, I tried my best!” one of her friends argues.
I crook my eyebrow. “You made this?”
