Waking the Dragon (30 page)

He propped the poker against the river-rock hearth, then clasped his hands behind his back, ignoring my question. “Then there’s the marking a Morgon man gives when he claims a woman as his own. His one and only. This is very different, the scent acting like a palpable barrier, a physical threat to other would-be suitors.”

“So, what you’re saying is Kol has claimed me.”

He shook his head.

“More than that,”—his smile widening—“you’ve accepted him as your own, as if you were already mates.”

“What?” I shook my head. “That doesn’t make any sense. He didn’t even ask anything. I sure as hell haven’t consented to anything.”

A bark of laughter escaped him. He crossed his arms, his smile no less arrogant. Now I really wanted to slap him.

“Yes, Moira darling. Apparently, you have. There’s no way he could burrow that deep otherwise. The marking is…violent in its possession. Only the seal of soulfire will ease the fierce nature of the aura he’s cast over you.” He gave me a mischievous wink. “You must’ve consented in some way other way than using words.”

Had I? Perhaps I had. Why didn’t that anger me?

I pondered the reactions of Morgon men around me since Kol and I’d spent the night in each other’s arms. All of them had been hesitant, edgy around me. Even the Nightwing guards back at Lucius and Jessen’s place. All of them except the king. But he wasn’t a normal Morgon. He was something…other.

Even Gaius, who had only touched me out of necessity, seemed wary. Gaius. I still couldn’t believe he was gone. I couldn’t believe his confession at the end. Forced to become a murderer to save his own family. And in the end, he saved me from untold horrors. He ended his life well, despite what he’d become in the viper-pit of Palace Prime.

My emotions see-sawed, my thoughts flipping from one thing to the next. Rather than being furious by Kieren’s revelations about scent-marking, I had a wonderful, unexpected reaction. My heart soared at the thought of bonding with Kol. I wanted even more. I wanted to be heartbound. I wanted soulfire.

Kieren stoked the embers, adding another log. The door alarm beeped. I jumped off the sofa as Kieren stepped in front of me. The door slid open. Valla and Bowen rushed in and sealed the door behind them.

A red slash cut across Bowen’s shoulder. Valla was perfect, untouched.

“They’re all dead,” she reported almost cheerfully. “Bowen, there’s a bathroom through there. A medicine kit in the cupboard.”

He crossed the room in swift silence and shut the door behind him in a bathroom off the main living area.

“No injuries, Valla?” asked Kieren.

“No. Of course not.”

“You’ll make a good assassin, sister.”

“I
am
a good assassin, brother.”

She stepped in front of the fire near me. “Now, we need to make contact with Kol and let him know what’s happened and where we are,” she said, eyeing Kieren.

“Right. I’ll take care of it. I’ll use a bedroom upstairs.” Kieren whipped out his wings and flew up to the loft as he did before.

I already knew what he planned to do. “He’s going to dreamwalk, isn’t he?”

“It’s the safest way since we don’t know how much of our comm net has been compromised. We need to keep this place as secret as we can. Obviously, our safe houses are no longer confidential. The enemy knew we’d be there.”

I stood next to her, letting the damp towel fall from my shoulders.

“Surely Kol won’t be sleeping. How will Kieren make the connection?”

She eyed me, still damp and cold. “Come on, let’s get you into something dry.”

She slipped through the kitchen and led me through a door on the other side. She twisted a knob at the entrance that lit four gas lanterns ensconced on the walls around the room. Many Morgons used electric lighting, but it seemed everything was done old-school at this hide-away.

The huge canopied bed was draped in shades of lavender and gray. Valla opened and stepped into a walk-in closet. I studied several photos on the wall above the vanity. One of her as a young girl squeezed between two smiling brothers. My heart leaped at seeing Kol, unscarred, before the rift between the brothers. There was another picture of a lovely Morgon couple—a dark-haired man with a square jaw, broad brow, and intense blue-fire eyes wrapping his arms around a beautiful platinum blonde with soft, almond-shaped eyes, her white wings open and out of the way so her lover could hold her close. She looked more like a butterfly than half-dragon woman, the love she felt for the man at her back shining in her eyes. I hadn’t known Kol’s mother was of the Icewing clan. I thought of Petrus, wondering if there was any family connection. I strolled, finding another of a scarred Kol and an older Valla. She held two long daggers in both hands as if showing off a gift. I laughed inwardly. While my father was buying us Primean silk gowns for balls, Kol was buying Drakonian steel weapons for his little sister, Valla. Funny that I felt such a connection with a stranger I’d just met, yet we were raised so differently.

The last photo on the vanity was a family portrait of all five of them, here in front of the lake at this home. Their mother now had black wings, her mouth open in laughter. Kol smirked, an arm around his brother’s shoulder, while Valla and Kieren laughed. Their father mirrored Kol’s expression. Their mother had different color wings than in the other portrait. I marveled at Morgon women, giving up their identity to accept the transformation of heartbonding, letting go of their clan colors to match her mate’s. It was more than a woman giving up her last name. They sacrificed a part of who they were to tie themselves completely to their love, a physical representation of the bond for all to see. Did Kol not want to give me soulfire because a human woman couldn’t show her full devotion to the world? Without wings, how could we ever match the union he admired so much between his parents?

“You asked about dreamwalking,” Valla called from the closet. I returned to her, shaking off darker thoughts. “Kieren and Kol don’t need to sleep to dreamwalk. Must be the twin thing. Kol once told me they can feel the pull of each other when they need to connect in the dreamworld. They go into a trance-like state, not needing to actually sleep.”

Valla perused through her clothes, pulling a pair of pants from the hanger. “Here. This should fit you. And try this top. We’re about the same size.”

I gazed at her slim, lithe body, unbuttoning and sliding off my jeans. “Except I’m a bit rounder and wider.”

“If you mean bigger boobs and full hips, well then, yeah. But trust me, you wear it very well.”

We giggled. Not needing to unbutton the back flaps of the cream-colored top, I slid it over my head. I had to squeeze into her brown leather pants, sucking in to zip the zipper.

“Moira. Do you need some antibiotic?”

I glanced up. She gestured toward my legs, having seen the tiny marks before I’d pulled on the pants.

“No. It’s fine. He didn’t—he wasn’t able to go deep.” I needed to know something only she could tell me. “Valla, can you smell him on me?”

I had to be sure there was no trace of that monster, knowing Kol’s reaction would be violent in the extreme. Not against me, but it would jolt Kol into a suicidal crusade to kill every one of them, even if I had killed their king.

Valla stepped closer and leaned toward me. She smiled. “No. Only my thick-headed brother’s scent is on you.”

I sighed relief, exhaling a puff of air.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked in a quiet voice.

“No,” I replied, stealing a look at myself in the vanity mirror.

Her clothes certainly fit. Like a glove. They looked obscene on me.

Shaking her head, she grinned, looking very much like Kieren.

“What?” I asked, self-conscious. “What’s wrong?”

She laughed. “Not a thing. But this better not tempt any of those boys to touch the merchandise. Kol wouldn’t like it.” She opened the dresser and found a pair of black, knee-high stockings. “I think I have some boots downstairs.” She tossed the stockings to me. “I don’t usually keep footwear here, but I’m pretty sure I have a pair I left last time.”

I sat on the edge of the bed, then rolled a pant leg up and slipped on a black stocking.

“Valla. Tell me about this place. It speaks of family and love, but Kol and Kieren—” I didn’t know if I should mention their obvious rift.

“My brothers.” She snorted. “Yeah, they’re total dumbasses.”

“What happened?” I couldn’t keep my curiosity from getting the better of me any longer. Prying or not, I needed to know what had put that scar on Kol’s face, the limp in Kieren’s gait, the darkness between two brothers who had once loved each other dearly.

She sat on the bed next to me as I slipped on the other stocking.

“Do you know about my parents’ deaths?”

I nodded.

She blew out a breath that lifted her fair bangs off her forehead. “My father served as a member of the Cloven Senate. His death was diagnosed as a heart attack, but Kol thought otherwise. Father had spoken to him of leaving Cloven altogether, as he’d been opposed so often on the Senate, not always sharing their views.”

“Views on what, if I might ask?”

Her blue eyes shimmered emerald in the warm light of the lantern on the wall. “Race, politics, Morgon dominance in the corporate arena. There were some clans pushing for Morgon dominance, a boycott of Gladium where Morgons were merging with human companies.”

“I imagine the Coalglass clan was one of them.” My stomach twisted at the thought of Barron.

“True. But they weren’t the only ones.” She tucked one leg under her, sitting on her foot. “So my father was one of few who opposed the majority. There was a significant vote looming that would boycott all imports and exports from Gladium. My father was on the side of Morgon and human merchants in Gladium who did business with open-minded Morgon merchants in Cloven. Because the taxes were too high for small Morgon merchants to ever make a significant living inside Cloven alone, many had reached out to Gladium to export their goods. They’d always have to bow and scrape to the nobility, who kept them under heel.”

“Then your father died. Before the vote.”

She smirked. “Smart girl.”

“And Kol believed it to be something other than a heart attack.”

She nodded. “Though only the eldest by a few minutes, Kol should’ve taken Father’s place on the Senate, but he renounced his position. However, Kieren wanted his place in government. As the son next in line, it was his right. Kol forbid Kieren from taking it.” She flipped her hair over one shoulder. “You can imagine that didn’t go over very well. So the two idiots got into a scuffle, which escalated into maiming one another.”

“I can’t believe it,” I said, glancing at the family portrait and the two happy brothers.

“Believe it. Men are fools. Morgon men are worse.” She hopped off the bed, hands on hips, looking at the portrait on her vanity. “Unfortunately, I happen to love those damn fools. I just wish they’d forgive and forget. Move on.” She led me toward the door. “I will say that since Kol has been investigating the disappearance of the Gladium girls, he’s talked to Kieren more in a month than he normally does in a year.”

We walked through the kitchen to meet with Bowen and Kieren, both seated in the living area. The gas lanterns were lit around the room, covers removed from the furniture. The cabin was truly charming. I wanted to see it by sunlight, the windows uncovered, the open sky through the skylights. They quieted when we walked in, masculine eyes travelling over me.

Looking quite different than I did in my baggy jeans and borrowed trench, my hair still in braids twined with gold falling halfway down my back, I wasn’t so naïve to not know how I looked to the opposite sex. I crossed my arms and sunk into a chair, trying to steer attention away from me.

“Hey. Boys. Stop thinking whatever it is you’re thinking,” snapped Valla.

Heat crawled up my cheeks. Bowen stood swiftly. “I’ll watch for them outside.”

“Them?” I asked, wanting, needing to change the subject.

Kieren stood, crossing his arms. “Kol was already en route to Cloven, having gotten a tip from someone in Cloven that Gaius was spotted flying toward the east bank with a large bundle strapped to him.”

“So you talked to him?” I asked.

A stiff nod. “I relayed all of the information Gaius had given us. And of course, I told him that you are safe.”

“Sit,” said Valla. “Relax. I’ll get us some tea.”

Sit. Relax. No way in hell could I relax, my stomach flipping somersaults. Still, I sat, wringing my hands, and waited.

Valla returned a few minutes later with hot tea in a saucer, a pattern I recognized from Gladium.

“This is a Bridewell pattern, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” She smiled. “The set was an anniversary gift from my father to my mother.”

“How beautiful.” I admired the teacup, not so much for the twining-vines pattern, but because it reflected the love of Kol’s parents.

“Remember those merchants I mentioned earlier?”

I nodded.

“The Bridewells were one of the human families my father fought to allow to trade in Cloven.”

I took another sip. The alarm at the door sounded. My teacup clattered in the saucer. I set it on a side table, hands shaking.

Standing, we all faced the door, waiting to see if it was Bowen or—

A snap of wings folding, seven feet of fierce Morgon man barreled through the entrance, pure dragon eyes blazing silver. The Morgon honed in on me in a millisecond, my heart leaping into my throat.

“Kol.”

He stood in the entrance, still as death, an electric charge rolling off his body, filling the room with his broad frame and larger-than-life presence. I’d stopped breathing the second I saw him. With predatory gait, he came for me. Scowl deep, jaw clenched, scar taut against the hard angle of his face, I trembled, watching him storm closer. Not from fear. From agonizing anticipation of his touch. The need a visceral torture.

With five long strides, blue-black wings half-extended, he gripped me in a vise, molding my body against his, fisting my hair, sucking the breath right out of my lungs as he crushed his mouth over mine. I slid my hands over his shoulders, around his neck, nothing but tight, flexed muscle beneath. Ignoring our audience, I tried to pull him closer.