Griffith: The English Dragon ― Erotic Paranormal Dragon Shifter Romance

by Kathi S. Barton

  As soon as the rest of them were gone, having asked him several times if he was all right, he turned and looked at Lilac. “You didn’t tell me what you were. Telling us, in fact, that you were nothing more than a faerie. Why would you do that?” She got up off the stone and started to pace. He let her, knowing that rushing her would get him nothing.

  “I didn’t trust you.” He knew that, but had hoped they were past that by now, and said that to her. “Yes, I do trust you, but we only got to that point yesterday. And while I could have told you before, I was terrified that your brother would find out. And should he do that, then we’d never have peace from him.”

  “I understand.” He did, too. And she was correct in them only just trusting each other with their feelings. “The water that spoke to me, it said that you were also the daughter to the queen of the faeries. That you are the queen of all the waters. Keeping that from me, while I do understand, you can imagine my pain when I had to find out from the water speaking to me.”

  “I am sorry about that. I don’t know that I had plans to tell you. It was something that I have been holding to my chest for many years. To be caught, to be held by someone, was a greater possibility if someone knew. If I am captured and this person would know about my status, they could in turn order me to do great harm to the earth with my contact with the waters.” He asked her what that meant. “Unlike you, a creature that has his own mind and is able to decide what he’d like to do or not, I must do whatever is told to me if I’m caught. Much like a faerie. I am not a master of myself. Not until someone claims me as such.”

  “You mean that had James known what you were, he could have commanded you to destroy the lands with your water?” She said that there was more to it than that. “Such as? Again, I’m not sure why I wasn’t made aware of this.”

  “You and your brother are twins. Did you know that he can read your mind because he is the elder of the two of you?” Griff said that he knew, but hadn’t thought about it in some time. “You can block him out now, being a dragon of worth. But should he want, he could breach your mind and find out all manner of things simply because you didn’t think about keeping him out, am I correct? He would know that you have a vault of gems at your disposal. You have money that isn’t in the banks. If he were to capture me, as he had, and know what I was, then I could not have come to you as your mate. He could have controlled that, because he would have claimed me and my talent.”

  Griff tried to run this through his mind. There were so many questions that he had, but he thought that if he gave himself a moment, he’d get it. Just sitting there, his mind working out what she’d said to him, something else occurred to him. Griff looked at Lilac.

  “He thinks my mother is dead. I thought that he and she had gotten together to end my life. But it’s not that, is it? Why would she try and harm me, do you know?” Lilac told him that she didn’t but had a theory. “What is it? Right now, I can’t think beyond my mother being alive and then knocking me into a ditch.”

  “She may have thought you were your brother.” He’d not thought of that and told her. “You said that James killed your father, that he removed his head. Is this something that your mom would have known? I mean, before she was being fed the iron?”

  “Yes, it wasn’t until several weeks later—I would say about five—that she became ill and took to her bed. But feeding her iron the way that I think he was, I was always confused as to how that might have killed her.” Lilac said that she’d bet she knew what he was doing. “You think that she might have faked her illness or how bad it was so that she could get away?”

  “I do. And if he would do such a thing to his parents, what do you think he would have done with me should he have known?” Griff said that he would have destroyed her. “Yes, and anything that we hold dear on this earth. I would have had little to no choice but to do his bidding.”

  “And now—do you have to listen to him now if he were to capture you?” She said that so long as Griff didn’t claim her, she was fair game, even if they were mated. “Then how do I claim you? Because as much as I love you, I don’t want him to get you that much more.”

  “You have to ask my mother for me. To claim me from her.” Griff nodded, thinking that it had to be much harder than it sounded. “You have to call to her, as you don’t have me shackled to you. Then you ask her, not just her but all the creatures of the earth, if you might claim me as your own.”

  “When can I do that? Now would suit me just fine.” She laughed and Griff smiled. To hear her laughing when they were being so serious did great things to his heart. “I love you, my dearest Queen Lilac. ”

  “Hello, my son and my daughter.” Griff stood up and bowed low to the woman who made her appearance before him. She was much too bright for him to look at. Her crown and wings were brilliant in the waning evening. “Please, we’re family now, and I’d like nothing better than to help the man who has stolen the heart of my child.”

  “I have a wish to claim her as my own, my lady. She has only just told me what I must do or I would have done it much sooner.” Griff took Lilac’s hand in his when she reached out to him. “She is my mate, the other half of me that keeps me alive. I want to claim her for that reason, but not that one alone. I love her, with all that I have. My dragon is in love with her as well. We wish to keep her safe. To keep her with us for all time.”

  “You do this willingly, my son, Griffith of the dragons, king to the water? You will take her hand in yours from this day forward?” Griffith said that he would, easily. “And your wish to claim her, as she is, the queen to the water? You will keep her safe above all others, and never stray from her side?”

  “Nay, my lady, I will never leave her side, and I accept being king to her queen.”

  He looked at the ground when it rumbled beneath his feet. Bending over, he unearthed a gem, one made of the most beautiful Lilac he’d ever seen. When he pulled it from the warm earth, he realized that it was a ring; a better one he could not have wished for.

  “You will need to put the ring to her heart first, to claim that part of her.” He did this, and to the rest of her body as he was directed. “To her belly so that children will grow there, safely nestled within her. To her arms, so that she will have strength to be strong enough to keep you safe as well. And lastly to her eyes, so that she can only see you and how much that you cherish and love her. Please put the ring upon her finger, Griffith, king of the waters.”

  Slipping the ring onto her finger, he had a moment of worry when it was much too large for her delicate hand. But almost as soon as he thought that, the ring adjusted itself to fit her, even making the stone smaller for her tiny hands. Kissing first her hand that held his promise, he kissed her as well. She was his, in all ways, and he was hers. They looked at his new mother-in-law and smiled at her.

  “I cannot thank you enough for this, my lady. To have her in my life—she’s more than I could have ever hoped for in a mate.” The queen nodded and told him to call her by her name, Kassina. “Thank you, Lady Kassina.”

  The two of them made their way back to the house, walking slowly, stopping to smell the fresh flowers, to marvel at the intricate spider webs that were still covered in a fine dew. They spoke little, the two of them. But Griff didn’t mind. Lilac was his mate, and to him there weren’t words enough to tell anyone how that made him feel.

  Chapter 5

  James moved around the hotel rooms that he’d taken for himself and tried to think what had happened that woke him in such a state. Even before the sun had risen, he’d sort of gone from a rested state to full out horrific terror in a matter of seconds. He’d been so terrified that his body was drenched in sweat. And he had been trembling so hard that he’d bitten his lip and hurt his teeth. But the good news was, his hand was mostly healed, and he could at least bend his fingers without being ill.

  He couldn’t remember having any dreams. There weren’t any monsters chasing after him that he could remember. Even the room, f
or as hot as it had been during the day, was cooled off enough that the feeling of being burned alive seemed stupid now. But something had awakened him, and he’d been afraid to close his eyes afterwards.

  “What if someone came into my place to hurt me? What other reason could I have to have woke like that?” He’d always spoken to himself. His thinking was that no one else could give him the best answers. James knew that some would think him mad, but he was far from that. James knew himself to be extremely smart. It was just that people didn’t listen to him when he spoke, so they did not understand him fully.

  He went back out to the car. It looked all right. There were no marks on it to indicate that someone had tampered with it. James was glad now that he’d not had it washed when he’d last filled up. This way the fingerprints were right there for him to see should he be messed with.

  Eating his small meal of packaged noodles, he wondered what his woman was doing now. She’d be bringing him a nice meal, with all the things that he liked. Of course, that didn’t mean that he’d let her be unchained. Nor did he think that she’d not poison him. No, a person like her would run again or try to kill him. James wondered, still, who had unchained her while he’d been away.

  “It had to be Griffith. He was always jealous of me.” That wasn’t true either, he told himself. He’d been the one that had always been jealous of his younger brother. “He has it all, while I’m left with nothing. It’s unfair that I was not the one that received all the riches of being born to a dragon. And here he is flaunting it around like he’s something special. Mother should have taken better care that I was the one to be the dragon.”

  He thought that was why he’d taken such pleasure in killing his parents. They both should have suffered more than they had, to his way of thinking. Even his father, down on his knees before him, didn’t beg for his life when he told him—a lie, yes—that he’d allow him to go if he should beg him. He only stared at him with those green eyes that James had not gotten either. They were for Griffith too.

  “Why did no one think that I’d be so looked over when I was born? And who allowed me to be born with a brother anyway? I should have been the only one that was born. Did anyone think it strange or even wrong that I got nothing from my parents?” James went back into his hovel, the place that was looking more and more like the castle had before his brother took that from him as well. “The mother fucker just had to rub it into my face that he now owns what rightfully should be mine. The very least he could have done was tell me that he’d allow me to live in it. It was mine, according to the laws of our kind.”

  What kind was he? James wondered. He wasn’t a dragon—didn’t even have dragon strength. He wasn’t human either. Being an immortal told him that much. He could also heal faster, but not as quickly as Griffith could. And he was stronger than the average human, as well as the ability to read minds, so long as they were close enough for him to touch at the time.

  “Griffith, the fucker, can probably do all that and more without having to have limitations on how he can do it.” Making his dinner was easy, especially since he had no water or stove, and certainly no way to have the trash picked up after him if he were to toss it across the room as he had last evening. “I bet he has a houseful of servants. And they wipe his ass for him when he takes a shit, too.”

  Laughing while he complained made him feel better. He knew that there were servants at his brother’s home. Hell, he’d had them too when there was money to pay them. But one day, he woke up and not only were they gone, but they’d taken some things from him to compensate for the salary he’d not given them in months.

  Then Griffith took his home, the family home, right out from under him. That was still burning his ass, the way that he’d had the money to pay off the back taxes and the liens against the place, and to have it cleaned up. The lawns, what used to be his father’s pride and joy, had been in ruin—most of the bushes that surrounded the house were dead. The trees, once a source of fruit for the castle, had died from lack of care. Now all that was viable again. The lawns looked as good if not better than when his father had been alive. Even the fruit in the trees was plentiful, their bounty endless, it seemed to James. Yet none of it was his to use.

  The gardens, herb as well as vegetable, had been so overgrown when he’d been there that it was difficult to tell where the gardens started and the grass ended. And only when the yard had been mowed, which wasn’t often, could you tell that there had been something wonderful there. The smell of the vegetation that was struggling to push through would scent the air for hours afterwards.

  But without cooks, why bother with an herb garden? The same with the yard. James thought it had been at least a decade since he’d bothered with having the lawn mowed or the trees trimmed. Why bother? It wasn’t as if anyone would visit him. Not when they could hang around with his asshole brother.

  “And now look at how far I’ve fallen. I’ve nothing, not a single piece of the jewelry that Mother left behind when I killed her. Not one pipe that Father used to smoke in the evenings. All of it gone. Gone to the pawn shops and other places that would take his things for cash. I hope that my selling off the family things has bothered Griffith very badly.”

  Toward the end of his staying at the house, there had been few pickings left anyway. He’d lost a great deal of it while playing poker with his buddies and having lavish meals when he should have been saving. But he’d been the king of the castle, the oldest son of the lord and lady of his home. He wasn’t sure how he’d lost so much in such a short amount of time, but he knew that he’d had a great deal of fun while he’d been at it.

  Griffith had always had it all. Women galore, nice clothing that he would hang up in his closet and keep nice. James had known there were servants to clean up after him, and made them earn their keep. But not his brother. Griffith even had his first car still. The one that had been purchased by him when he’d gotten out of college, again, just recently.

  Waste not, want not was something that had been drilled into their heads since infancy. James hadn’t heeded that saying, spending when he had it, ruining more than he should have, and never setting foot in any school rooms beyond what was required of him by law.

  After he finished off his dry noodles, he got into his car and made his way into town. He was getting good at stealing what he needed from the local idiots. But today he was going to get something that he could heat up a meal in. He had no idea how he was going to make that work—there wasn’t any electricity at the hotel. But by God, he was sick of eating food from a can, and noodles that were much too crunchy for his tastes.

  There were any number of stores that he could have hit up for food, and clothing, for that matter. If he wanted to look cheap, that was. While he knew the value of money, it was only when he didn’t have any that he wanted to spend more of it. It was really fucked up, thinking that way, but he wasn’t known for his fashion sense for nothing.

  Moving in and out of aisles, he picked the things he was going to take. There was a great deal today too, as they were not only getting a large delivery of canned goods, but there was also a truck that had milk and eggs in it, as well as one that had some lunchmeat, bacon, and hams. He decided to try and swipe the things even before they got on the shelves. But once outside, he realized that wasn’t going to work at all.

  There were two cops parked in the lot. They didn’t seem to be paying any attention to him or what was going on around them. But he knew better than to think just because they looked uninterested, they’d not be all over him if he tried something. So, as he walked by the large truck that was full of meats, he only took what he could carry under his shirt and left what he really wanted. Bacon.

  Tossing what he’d gotten to the back seat of his car, he covered what he’d gotten with his old jacket and hoped that it’d not get too warm while he finished up today. Going into a second store, he was able to get him a few other items, as well as a hot plate.

  That had been the hardest thi
ng to get out of the store. He had nearly gotten caught twice with it when he’d been trying to get it under his shirt. Then as he was going out the door at the same time as another person, the doors had made a godawful racket that made him think that he’d surely been caught. But it hadn’t been for him. The person that had been about to go out with him went back to the register, saying that he didn’t know what was going on. James escaped with his hot plate, as well as enough food for a few more days. Now he had to figure out how to use it.

  The next place that he’d hit was much easier than the first two. He was able to snag him some underwear, shampoo, as well as a few towels and some bar soap. James would have much preferred some of the soft soap that came in the most delicious flavors, but he wasn’t able to stand there and sniff each one to figure out what he wanted. That he blamed on his brother as well.

  By the time he was headed back to the hotel, he was feeling pretty damn good about his things. He had food now, a way to cook it—when he figured that out—as well as some much-needed clean clothing. And a way to clean himself up.

  As soon as he pulled into the lot, however, he could only sit in his car and watch. The place had caught fire. Not only that, but the thing looked as if it had been burning for some time. The fire department was hosing down the roof, which he didn’t understand. It looked to him like it was a total loss. There were police there too, moving traffic around so that no one could get close enough to get burned.

  “Well, mother fuck.” James got out of his car to watch the only home he had right now go down in a ball of flames, along with the things that he’d stashed in there—a few changes of clothing, a case of water that he’d stolen. There had been other things too. Nothing of worth, not really, but they’d been his.

  “This is all his fault. Griffith did this. How else would a perfectly good place go up in flames like this? It’s not as if there had been anything running—there wasn’t any fucking power to the place.” James was going to have to start keeping track of all the things that Griffith had done to him.