At last, he barked, “Yes. I’ll burn you.”
Triumph exploded through me like a second heartbeat.
“But understand me,” he added, tone turning lethal as his arms tightened around me, holding me in place. “If you die, I willrage.I canfeelit brewing already. Bad things will happen. What I do will become a cautionary tale told in ashes and screams about what happens when someone takes a queen from the man who loved her too much.”
A shiver raced down my spine. My grin came slow and sharp. “See,that’sthe energy I like. Very vengeful. Very hot. Let’s put it to good use, shall we? We can finish our game after I’ve revived and we’ve slaughtered our enemies.”
He smiled at me, a little sad, a lot scared, and he rose to his feet to offer me his hand. I took it, wincing slightly as he pulled me up.
Noticing my flare of pain, he scowled. “Ihate that you’re hurting. Where do you want to…” Torment contorted his features, his voice rough. “Burn?”
“Here,” I said, sweeping a hand around the cell. “It’s not romantic, but it’s practical. And I don’t wish to have an audience for this particular deed. Let’s just give everyone the big announcement afterward. How about, ‘Attention, subjects. Your queen lost her dragon, her king consortisthe dragon, and his firebrand is now officially fireproof. All hail and carry on.’”
He huffed a laugh, though it cracked at the edges. “I’m taking over the speechwriting.”
“Whatever you want, professor,” I told him with a jaunty salute.
His gaze darkened. “I wantyou.”
And then he was kissing me. Deep. Hard. Desperate. A man starved for his woman. Or a dragon who’d finally found his flame. His mouth claimed mine, and I kissed him back with equal hunger, utterly ravenous. We consumed each other with zero hesitation. No breaking for second thoughts. I poured myself into him. My fears, my hopes, my defiance, my love. All that I was, all that I would become.
He tore away with a roar that echoed throughout the stone chamber, rattling the very foundation. I met his gaze with no doubt. No fear. For a single breath, our world held still. Then I nodded, giving him my acceptance. Gifting it to us both.
Ready, I stepped fully into our future.
He unleashed his fire.
The flames hit me with the power of a living beast, throwing me back. In seconds, I was engulfed. The inferno spread and devoured me whole. There was no gentle lead-in, no slow burn, onlyconsumption.A searing heat that stolemy breath, robbed me of thought, stripped me to the marrow of my soul.
I tried not to scream. Oh, Itried.I didn’t want Taron to hear it and carry the memory for the eons to come as I had with his ancestors. But it ripped from me anyway, raw and broken, dragged from my deepest depths.
The fire never stopped. It melted my flesh. Turned muscle to molten ruin. Boiled my blood until it shrieked through my veins, then turned to steam. Bone cracked, blackened, then ashed. I should have lost consciousness or faded, but I didn’t. I wastherefor all of it.
The agony reached its crescendo, then snapped into silence. A void without flame or sound. No pain, either. Just smoke and cold with the ghost of heat, swirling around the space where I'd once stood.
Nothingness came bit by bit. But before the last of it claimed me, I remained aware. I sensed when Taron collapsed to his knees. Felt the anguish churning in his soul. Knew his body heaved with silent sobs, his head bowed in prayer, or mourning. Experienced the clench of his fists as his knuckles drained to white. Heard a horn blast, announcing the enemy’s arrival.
Then I was gone, a final thought brushing my mind.I will have my forever with Taron, and not even death will stop me!
Chapter
Twenty-One
So you unraveled. So you fell. Now it’s time to rise.
-Humaning for Beginners: A Dragon’s Tale of Human Management
Ash.
Ash was all I was at first. Ash and memory. But an ember of myself remembered how to exist—and answered. Slowly I gathered, clinging and fusing, stitching together until I became whole. Life threaded through me until I finally,finallydrew breath.
A guttural roar of primal rage thundered off the stone walls, dragging me from the darkness, a hook embedded in my chest. A glaze of confusion covered my thoughts, but clarity came with a rise of heat that licked me from the inside out. My eyes popped open.
I was in the cell. And I was naked. Alone. Lying on cold concrete.
The scent of him clung to the smoke. A perfect blend of heavenly cedar now mixed with wild spice, storm-soaked earth, and scorched leather. It wrapped around me like acloak, laced with wrath sharp enough to slice through bone. And oh, wow, it crackled in the air with the same intensity as fireworks.
Where was he? I scanned for clues. One wall of the cell had been obliterated, reduced to rubble; the tapestry continued to smolder. The cot was gone, devoured by flame, its remains nothing but dust and embers. I inhaled again. Still him, still here… and yet not.
