“I have to be dreaming,” Sam said. “Surely, you can see how impossible this sounds. And yet, I really am sitting in your dining room, and you do have glowing stones in your chests, and now you’re telling me you’re dragons.”
“Yes,” Mabon said simply.
“And the stones mean I’m your...” Sam trailed off, like he couldn’t quite bring himself to say it.
“Treasure,” Urien said quietly. “The fourth member of our triad. The one we’ve been waiting for.”
“Your...what?” Sam was looking a little pale, but he was still sitting down.
Mabon shifted his weight. His knees were going to protest later, but he wasn’t about to move.
“A Treasure is the fourth mate,” Mabon explained, keeping his voice level. “The three of us have been together for nearly a century. But a triad isn’t complete without a Treasure. Someone who balances us, grounds us, and who…” He stopped, searching for words that wouldn’t sound completely mad. “Someone who makes everything make sense.”
“And you think that’s me.” Sam’s voice was so quiet. “You think I’m this...Treasure.”
“We don’t think,” Rux said. “We know. The heart stones don’t lie, Sam. They appeared when we saw you. That’s how it works. That’s how it’s always worked for dragons.”
Sam looked down at his own chest, as if he expected to find a glowing stone there too. “I don’t have one.”
“Only dragons get heart stones,” Urien said. “But you’re…” He paused, seeming to struggle with his vocabulary too. “You’re the reason they exist.”
“This is quite a revelation,” Sam said, but he still hadn’t moved.
Mabon’s dragon rumbled with satisfaction. Sam was trying to understand.
“I write about this,” Sam said suddenly. “I write about fated mates and paranormal beings and…” He stopped, his eyes going wide. “Oh, my god. I write aboutthis.”
“You do?” Mabon asked.
“It’s a romance novel, about three vampires who find their fated mate in a coffee shop.” Sam’s voice was climbing in pitch. “I’ve been writing it for months. And now you’re sitting here, telling me that the fictional thing I made up is actually real, except you’re dragons instead of vampires, and I’m the - the Treasure instead of just a regular human, and…”
He stopped and took in a huge breath. “This is crazy.”
“From your perspective, it is,” Mabon agreed.
Sam’s gaze snapped to him. “From my perspective?”
“You didn’t know dragons existed ten minutes ago,” Mabon pointed out. “You didn’t know mates or heart stones or Treasures existed. Your entire worldview just shifted. That’s not a small thing, Sam. We know that.”
“But for you, this is normal?” Sam asked slowly.
“This is everything,” Rux corrected. “Heart stones appear only once in a dragon’s lifetime. Sometimes never. After all the years we’ve been together, we’d resigned ourselves to never finding our fourth. And then you walked past that grocery store window, and…” His voice cracked.
Sam stared at him. “You really believe this,” he said. “All of you. You’re not joking, you’re not…this isn’t some elaborate prank.”
“I swear on my hoard,” Mabon said solemnly. “I swear on everything I value. We are what we say we are, and you are our Treasure.”
“Which is another word for fated mate,” Sam whispered.
“Yes.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Urien
Urien’s dragon surged forward at the directness of Sam’s stare, demanding he claim their Treasure now, but Urien pushed him back. The whole situation required care and delicate handling.
He moved from where he’d been standing near the sideboard, closer to Sam. He didn’t want to crowd him, but he wanted to be near enough so that Sam wouldn’t have to raise his voice.
