I have lost count of how many females I have bedded, but her scent is entirely different, yet somehow familiar. Perhaps it is simply because she is human, but the scent of her arousal carries the one thing I crave most: pure, raw power. I could tell her scent had the same effect on Cercies and Aurelius.
The night I met her in my dining hall, I sensed the faintest hint of pheromones, and it seized me with an iron grip, stripping me of control over my own mind and actions. I fought against it, and though I was successful, the strength and power it took shocked me. That was when she was weak, scarcely more than a walking corpse. Admittedly, I was more uncouth with my lewdness than usual, but it was the only way I could pry myself free from her hold. I needed to stop her. She needed to hate me.
In her brief time under my roof, her mortal body has been drinking in the magic of my realm at an alarming pace. Every hour, it seems she looks stronger, healthier, and, as much as I hate to admit it, rather alluring. I should have known the effects of her scent would be stronger now too, a miscalculation on my part that I will not make again. In a way, I suppose I should be thankful my cunt of a sibling interrupted, because the moment she did, I was able to snap out of the mortal’s influence. Fuck, she looked good in leather.
I am not easily tempted or persuaded, but for once, just once, I wanted to be me. The weight of this oncoming war has left me sleepless at night. I am being crushed beneath my crown. I allowed myself a moment of indulgence, a fleeting escape into the carnal, to forget the endless burden of my responsibilities and find a sliver of release in the heat of a different kind of fire. I wanted an hour, onehour, to feel like the young male I was before I took the flaming throne, one hour of simple fun and pleasure. So when I sensed her arousal in my lounge, I lost control. I was thin ice ready to crack, and Delilah struck me like a perfect storm of hellfire.
I could not resist her scent. Perhaps it was the wine that amplified it, but there was no fighting it. I made a mental note not to let her have any more wine. Ever.
For the first time in my life, I was utterly powerless, and that is why I cannot allow myself to grow too attached to her. I cannot make the same mistake again. The stakes are far too high.
I am disgusted with myself and my weakness for allowing things to get so heated. She had seemed like such a prude before, holding out for her pathetic mortal mate for reasons I cannot understand. Why anyone would choose a mortal man over a high Fae male is verifiably insane. I asked her handmaid to learn as much about her as possible and report back to me. That was when I realized how I could motivate her to play her part in my plan to save my kingdom.
I am not even certain that I can, or how to, send her back to her realm once I have possession of the God Dragon. All I have are stories and old scrolls to guide me. I will try. I may have a reputation for many things, but I am always true to my word. Besides, the farther she is from me, the better.
What she said to me just before Prisca barged in, “I’m yours,” stirred something deep within me, a feeling I did not know existed. In that moment, I wanted to whisk her away to my bedroom, lock the door, and worship her. I wanted all of her attention and pleasure focused on me, and only me. I realized then that she was far more than a body to use and discard.
Was I falling for her? Only a fleeting time ago, she disgusted me with her frailty and weakness, but now, after seeing what she is capable of with my dragons, I see her with new eyes.
She was weak and frail when she was brought here, and I misjudged her. I assumed it was due to her humanity, but the more I learned about her, the more I understood.
“Maybeyouare the one who should not form opinions about something you know nothing about.” She had said, my own words thrown back into my face, and she was right. I did not know she was deathly ill, and through it all, she had still survived.
Fire answers fire. Any hearth I light becomes an eye. So, I have been studying her, watching her obsessively through my fire gazing ability, in her room and in every room of the castle. If she is there, I am watching, studying her with captivated curiosity, and I see the truth. Delilah is not weak. Cercies gave her the nickname “tiny warrior,” but I see her for who she truly is.Delilah is a ruler. She simply does not know it yet. For my sake, I hope she never does.
I have witnessed centuries of fire and fury, but never have I seen anything like this mortal woman. The very idea that a creature of soft flesh and fragile bone could approach, let alone command, one of my beasts was an insult, a laughable conceit. Yet when I saw her riding Zephyros bareback at a near ninety-degree incline into the belly of the storm, it stole the breath from my lungs. She looked like a goddess of dragons, a fucking warrior queen. Never have I felt my own power so challenged, nor the inclination to bow.
The contempt I once held for her vaporized in an instant of sheer, blinding awe. I no longer saw her as flesh, but as a vessel of pure, indomitable will, a force of nature wrapped in mortal skin. It was then that I feared what I am only now beginning to understand. Her power, though it manifests differently, may be equal to my own, perhaps even greater. She must never discover this. I will make sure of it.
Aurelius was the first to notice her strong, natural connection to the dragons, which is likely why I caught him in her room through my fire gazing. I knew he wanted her. I could see it in the way he looks at her. Still, he disobeyed my order not to touch her until I returned from Tercia.
It seems my trusted Master of Dragons is influenced by her just as I am, as he has never disobeyed me before. But that was before I understood the extent of her power. It is an incredibly formidable force, yet it cannot be measured or tested by the usual Faerie methods. Her connection to my dragons is something I can no longer ignore. They accept her. They submit to her. They respond to her, and in her presence, they seem stronger, more vibrant.
It is common knowledge in my world that whoever possesses the most dragons holds the most power. What I failed to consider were the implications if a single individual could commandallthe dragons within the realm. What if she could control not just fire dragons, but water, earth, and shadow as well? She must never know what she is. The risk is too great for me and for my kingdom. I must keep the upper hand.
For now, I will continue to play the role of the asshole High Lord who believes she is weak and pathetic. It is just another mask to wear, another to add to the collection. If I can convince her that she is powerless, then I can control her.
But I still have two problems to deal with. My second and third in command. The three of us are the pillars that support the entire kingdom. If Delilah sinks her claws into them the same way she has done to me, there is no telling how those pillars might crumble.
I am going to have to warn them about what I suspect she can do and discourage any relations with her, because she is a threat. I know they will think I am trying to keep her all to myself. I hope I can reason with them, but deep in my gut, I know there will be bloodshed.
CHAPTER 17
The War Room
TITUS
Iburst through the great obsidian doors of the war room. The air was thick with tension and the residual heat of many bodies. Advisors and captains, all having traveled by dragon, were already gathered.
It must have taken Prisca a while to locate me. A wave of guilt rolled through me. Everyone had already arrived, waiting for their leader, while I had been selfish and irresponsible.
I ground my teeth when I saw the seven crimson robed figures seated in their designated places. The Temple’s Council. The other half of the governing body in my kingdom. An infuriating partnership that stifles and blocks everything I try to do to improve it. Their extreme loyalty to ancient, chaotic laws, called Holy Laws, has polarized the Fire Fae for centuries.
Caddver, the head of the council, sat perfectly centered among the other six, three on each side, wearing his usual snarl of condescension. If I could incinerate him, I would have done so long ago. Any attempt to overthrow the council would ignite a full fire Fae civil war, and we have far greater problems to face.
As much as I despised him and his extremist ways, I was grateful for
one thing and one thing only. It was Caddver who proposed thecompromise with the Kingdom of Terrain’s council that sentenced my father to death. I hated my father.
