by James, Jacki
“Whatever,” he said, scooting over and making room for me. “That should give you enough room. I mean, heaven knows, you wouldn’t want to accidentally touch me.”
“I’m sorry you heard that. I didn’t mean it the way it sounded, and I know you were trying to help.”
“Well, how did you mean it, then?” he asked, not looking at me. Instead, he focused on the prism and the way the rainbow specks sparkled on the beach below.
“Look, there are things going on here that you don’t understand,” I started, but he interrupted.
“And whose fault is that? If you don’t tell me what’s going on, how am I supposed to understand?”
“You’re right, I should’ve told you everything, but some parts of our lives and traditions are pretty hard to believe.”
“Harder than the idea that this sweet little beastie here lives on your arm in the form of a tattoo and can turn into a full-sized dragon? I mean, I handled that pretty well.”
I smiled at him. “You did. Once you got over Itsaso carrying you, you took it all really well.”
“Well, it isn’t like it’s every day a beast you believed to be a myth swoops you up and carries you off to its lair.”
“Oh, so it’s a lair now, is it?”
“Eh, if the cave fits,” he said with a chuckle, but he quickly sobered. “Azaran, I don’t understand what’s going on. I couldn’t leave. I’m trying not to freak out here, but I’m being serious. I physically couldn’t leave. This rock was as far as I could go.”
“Yeah, our property ends on the other side of this rock. I’m surprised, though, because that means the bond has progressed further than I thought. How did you feel?”
“Like I couldn’t breathe. Like my legs were walking in quicksand. My chest hurt. I don’t know how to describe it; I just couldn’t go any further. And what bond are you talking about?” Sindri felt his agitation as he remembered what it had been like. She rubbed her head against his chest and he gave her a weak smile.
“Okay, I need to tell you something, but I’m not sure how you’ll feel about what I have to say.” I paused and looked at him. He nodded for me to continue. “So we come from a long tradition of dragon riders. Our father was a dragon rider and our grandfather before him. We’re human, but we’re born with magic. Not the kind you probably picture when you think of magic; like, we aren’t witches and don’t cast spells and things. Our magic is that little dragon right there in your lap. When we bond with our dragons, we are fulfilling a pledge that our ancestors made to help protect the innocent with their very lives. That pledge is passed down through our bloodline and in exchange, fate gives us what we need to fully enjoy the lives we have pledged. One of those things is a mate. We call it our monaha senka which means our heart song. That one person who can make our heart sing just by being close to us.”
“You mean a fated mate like in romance novels, right?” he asked.
“I guess, I mean I haven’t read many romance novels. Most legend has some basis in reality, and yes, that’s the general idea. There’s one special someone out there that fate has chosen for us, and once we meet our mate, we’ll form an unbreakable bond and be together forever.”
“So hold on, you think I’m your—what was it? Monaha senka?—and that we’re bonding? That makes no sense, you can’t stand the sight of me.”
I reached up and brushed my fingers lightly over his cheek. “That’s not true at all. You’re the most beautiful, precious thing I’ve ever seen.”
“I don’t understand. If that’s true, what have the last few days been about? Why have you avoided me and refused to have anything to do with me at all? From the first moment I saw you, I experienced this pull to you that made no sense. All I got from you was a very strong message you wanted me gone.” He reached up and placed his hand over mine stopping my movements. I flattened my hand on his cheek and looked into his eyes. I wanted him to see the truth in my words.
“I’m scared, Toby. I’ve spent my whole life taking care of the boys and trying to be everything they need. I’m not sure I have anything left for a mate, for you. It isn’t that I want you gone; I just didn’t want a mate. I was sure that the worst possible thing that could happen to me right now was for a mate to show up and I’d have to add another person under my care and protection. I’d planned to keep my distance hoping once you left everything would go back to normal. I had it all figured out, but there was one thing I hadn’t counted on.”
“What’s that?” he asked with a whisper.
“You, Toby. I didn’t count on you. Your kindness and your intelligence. Your humor and your acceptance,” I said, and then I gave him a wicked grin. “And I sure didn’t count on your ass.”
“My ass?” he gasped with fake indignation. “Well, it is a pretty fine ass. I do a lot of squats and work hard for that ass.” He scrunched up his brow, a tell I’d spotted over the last couple of days when something was bothering him. “But wait, if we have this bond, why is it that you can leave me and go out flying around on your dragon or go shopping in town, and I can’t even leave the edge of the property?”
“It’s because I wasn’t leaving you. I was running errands or flying patrol. There was no intention in me to leave you, but you were trying to leave me. I guess the bond wasn’t on board with that.”
“Okay, so do we have a choice in this at all? What if I don’t want to be a mate to a dragon rider?”
Just hearing him say that made my heart squeeze and my whole body felt strung tight. “You have a choice. You can walk away and never look back.”
“Can I though? Because that didn’t work out so well earlier.”
“No, I guess not, but there are ways to break the bond. If that’s what you want, we can do it,” I forced myself to say. It was tempting to tell him he had no choice. I’m not sure when I went from not wanting a mate at all to wishing he wanted to stay with me, but I thought it was when I saw the hurt in his eyes at my words earlier. Knowing I had caused him pain was eye-opening.
“And if I don’t? Want to break the bond I mean.” For the first time since I sat down, he met my eyes. Emotions swirled there: hope, fear, desire, and doubt.
“If you don’t want to break the bond, you can stay here with us. Be a part of our family, patch us up when we need it, and I’ll spend the rest of my life proving you made the right choice.” Without breaking eye contact, I slowly lowered my head to his until our lips met. Just a soft, sweet kiss to let him know there was no mistake about what I wanted from him. He reached around behind my head, pulling me closer and increasing the pressure. He swiped at my lips with his tongue. I opened for him, deepening the kiss, and it wasn’t only my heart, every cell in my body sang.
Chapter Ten
Toby
Azaran deepened our kiss and pulled me closer. Sindri wiggled between us and hopped down, taking my prism with her. I moved closer to him. “I have never felt anything like this before. I need you so badly it hurts.”
“Me too.” He ran his nose up the side of my throat. “You smell amazing. But this,” he slipped his hands inside my shirt, “is what I meant when I said I didn’t want you to touch me. I knew if I ever felt your skin on mine I wouldn’t be able to stop wanting more.” He flattened his hands on my back and everywhere his skin touched mine tingled with electricity, like every nerve cell in my body was waking up for the first time. “And with every touch, this need will grow stronger, Toby. Until we can’t resist it.”
“I don’t want to resist it. I want you now,” I moaned, not sure exactly who this man was speaking through my mouth. I mean I liked sex, but I’d never experienced an all-consuming desire like this. It was what I imagined it’d be like if I took ecstasy or some other party drug. “But what does it mean if we do this?” I asked as I ground my body against his. I wanted a touch or a taste. Just something. “As far as mating, I mean. Is this how we become mates? Because fuck, Az, I want you. I mean I really want you, but I need to process the mating thing.” He gr
ipped my ass with both his hands and guided me as I rocked against him.
“There is… fuck,” he groaned as I hit the right spot, rubbing my erection against his. “There’s a ceremony we have to go through before we’re fully bonded. But this’ll make the bond stronger, make it harder to break if you decide to leave.”
I leaned down and sucked on his neck, a primal urge to mark him as mine. I moved my mouth up and found his with mine, taking a kiss unlike anything I’d ever experienced. “Because I think we need to talk first. Before mating I mean. Not before fucking. I swear if I don’t have you inside my body in like the next five minutes I’m going to die. I don’t need to talk before that.”
“Come on. Let’s go to the house. The last thing I want is Eeli coming across me doing any of the things I want to do to you out here on the beach.” He pulled away from me and I reached for him, not wanting to break contact. “I know, baby. Let’s have Sindri get us to the house. You can ride right in front of me.” He pointed over to the huge dragon waiting patiently for us.
“I still can’t believe that’s her.” I climbed up on her back and he joined me, pressing his front to me.
“You fit so perfectly here, like you were made to ride with me,” he whispered as he held me close and we took off into the sky.
“Can we do this, go flying I mean, sometime when my whole body doesn’t feel like it’s on fire?” I asked. He murmured something that sounded like a yes in my ear as he ran his hands up and down my chest and stomach. I felt better, more settled as long as we were touching, but it wasn’t anywhere near enough.
We flew into the cave entrance and landed. We slid off Sindri’s back and she ran up the stairs ahead of us. Azaran grabbed me by my hand and started up to his room.
“Should we tell the guys we’re here?” I asked.
“Sindri will tell them. I want you in my room; now.”
He barely got the door closed, and I was on him. “Too many clothes,” I grumbled.
“Way too many,” he agreed. We stepped apart and quickly stripped. We came back together skin to skin, and I groaned at the feel of his body against mine. He wrapped his arms around me and we both tumbled onto the bed, his body looming over mine.
He trailed his fingers down my chest to my stomach and back up again, his eyes following his movements. “I want to memorize every detail of your body, every freckle, every scar, every reaction to my touch,” he said as he brushed his thumbs over my nipples. I gasped at the contact and he chuckled. “Like that, do we?”
“Oh yeah,” I moaned as he replaced his thumbs with his tongue and then his teeth, licking and nipping, first the right and then the left. The sensations were so intense I couldn’t take it. I wrapped my hand in his hair and dragged his mouth up to mine. Our tongues tangled in a desperate kiss that left us both breathless.
“What do you want, Toby?” he asked, and I knew there was only one thing that would satisfy the craving in my body.
“Fuck me, Az,” I said, looking him in the eyes. I saw the same desire and longing in his, I knew he saw in mine. “I need to feel you inside me.” I’d wanted other men before. I’d always enjoyed sex, but this was something else entirely. Something primal and needy that I’d never experienced before. I was on sensory overload. Every touch of his skin against mine was so intense it was overwhelming.
He rolled to the side grabbing a condom and some lube from his bedside table. He rolled on the condom and then poured lube into the palm of one of his hands and rubbed them together warming it. With one hand he stroked himself, coating his cock, while he slid a finger from the other hand into my hole. “Damn, you feel good,” he said as he added another finger. He continued to stroke his cock in rhythm with his fingers, slowly and deliberately. All my nerve endings were firing, and I felt like I was going to explode. When he curled his fingers up, finding my prostate, I almost came.
“Azaran, I need you inside me now,” I told him again.
“Whatever you want, mate,” he said as he lined himself up and slid slowly inside me. Once he was all the way in, he stilled and waited for my body to adjust to his. Once my muscles relaxed, he began to move, pulling out and thrusting back in again. My whole body lit up. A sensation of rightness and oneness I’d never experienced before swept over me, and in that moment, I was his. It would upend my entire life, but there was no way I was leaving this man. Not if he would have me.
“More, I need more.” I wasn‘t sure what I was asking, only that every part of me was crying out for more of him. In me, on me, deeper. I just needed. He shifted so that with each thrust he grazed my prostate. I cried out, and the sounds I made spurred him on. He sped up, fucking me hard and fast. I was so close, but I didn’t want to come without him. He wrapped one hand behind my head bringing my mouth to his. Then he tore his mouth from mine and moved even faster. I grabbed my cock, stroking it in time with his movements, and then I was there, my whole body tensed as an orgasm slammed into me. I’d never come so hard. My whole body pulsed as pleasure, unlike anything I’d known, washed over me. I was only vaguely aware of Azaran joining me as he also went over the edge.
He flopped down on the bed beside me and rolled to his side facing me. He lightly touched my face, awe in his eyes. “Damn, Toby, watching you fall apart like that for me may’ve been the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
My face warmed at the compliment. I don’t know where the surly, difficult Azaran had gone, but this sweet, caring Azaran was pretty much irresistible. I snuggled closer and asked, “What now?”
“Now we get some sleep.”
“Sounds good,” I said as he pulled me close, and I let myself drift off to sleep.
Chapter Eleven
Azaran
I lay there in the bed with Toby in my arms for hours. Sleep wouldn’t come, but I didn’t want to leave the bed. Something inside of me had settled now that I found my mate, but the rest of me was still reeling from the thought. A mate. I had a mate. Not that I didn’t want a mate, I did, someone made just for me. And Toby was perfect. He was smart, kind, and amazing in bed. It wasn’t the idea of the mate I didn’t like; it was being responsible for him that scared me.
I’d been so determined to push him away, but when I thought he was gone, it was like I’d lost something I’d never had to begin with. I guess some part of me had known all along it wouldn’t do any good to resist what fate had planned for me, but now I didn’t even want to. Now I just needed to figure out how this would work. The man was a doctor. He wouldn’t be satisfied sitting at home all day waiting for us to come in with some wound that needed patching up.
I didn’t know as much about him as I should. He had gotten close to the boys, but I’d kept him at a distance. There was so much he didn’t know about us, the dragons, and the Brotherhood; things he needed to be aware of. He’d need to learn to protect himself because a dragon rider’s mate could be a powerful tool against a dragon rider, but I didn’t believe for a minute that keeping him locked up at home where he was safe would be an option. I finally drifted off to sleep thinking about ways I could keep my mate both safe and happy.
I wasn’t asleep long before I heard noises that told me something was wrong. It was the sound of dragons flying, but that wasn’t possible. My room was underground; there was no way I could hear dragons. Then I heard my father’s voice, and I knew—I was back in my nightmare. I’d had this dream often over the years since my parents died, but knowing it was a dream didn’t dull the feelings of dread and fear.
“Who are they?” my mother asked.
“I don’t know,” my father answered. “But they’re dark wraiths. Someone sent them.”
“Cadmar, what’re we going to do?”
“We will fight because we have no choice.”
I rushed into the room. “Father, let me and Sindri come with you and help you fight,” I insisted. “I’ve been training for this. I can help.”
“Azaran, you listen to me. You haven’t been training for this battle.
What you’ve been training for is something much bigger than this. You are Azaran, eldest son of Cadmar, Grandson of Revas. You were born for great things.” He pulled me into a hug, and I wanted to weep because his speech felt like goodbye.
“Father, please…”
“No, Azaran, what I need from you is not your help. What I need is for you to protect your brothers. You four are the future of the Brotherhood. Take them into the tunnels below and head for the shore. Don’t look back, and no matter what, you keep going. Do you understand me? Protect your brothers.”
There was a roar outside, followed by a huge boom and the glass in the window panes exploded inwards. My father grabbed my mother and pushed her behind him as flames leaped up from the outside. Another boom and the windows in the kitchen blew. “Azaran!” my father yelled. “Get your brothers to safety.” I wanted to argue with him. I wanted to say that with three of us we could defeat them, but I heard the rush of the wind overhead as wraiths swooped and flew over the house. I couldn’t tell how many, but there were a lot of them. And even though I wanted to stay and fight, the pleading look in my father’s eyes stopped me.
“Mom, Dad, I love you both,” I said, turning to run down the hall where my brothers hid. I threw open the door and yelled for them to come on. “Guys, grab your dragons. Malachite, you carry Eeli. Zale, you’re with me; hurry.”
“What is it?” Zale asked as he ran to me. Malachite was right behind him with a terrified Eeli in his arms.
“Dark wraiths; we have no idea where they came from, but it's a bunch of them. Dad said for us to go into the tunnels.”
“Where’re Dad and Mom? Where’s Mom?” Zale asked, panic in his voice. I locked eyes with Malachite who let out a breath. I could see that he knew.
“He and mom are holding them off. We have to get going.” I barely got them out of that room and headed down into the tunnels when an explosion rocked the house. I knew two things. One, as soon as the door closed behind me and we were safe, my father’s dragon would shift into the mighty warrior he was, and he and my mother would take to the sky to distract the wraiths. And two, that I’d never see my parents alive again.