Dragon Mated: Supernatural Prison #3

by Jaymin Eve

  “Next time I’m going to make sure I hurt him just a little more.” Braxton was all growls and rumbling chest right now. My boy had pretty much been one big growl since we’d found each other again.

  Tyson interrupted. “What’s his ultimate game? I don’t understand why he hasn’t pulled the army in and started training them. Why are the marked still just hanging around?”

  I had no idea, and that was more worrying than anything. Before Larky had come back from the dead, I always thought his first act would be to gather his army and then wage a massive war. So far, though, he’d been more interested in me.

  Our pace along the bridge was just short of sprinting, my energy holding steady, but if I didn’t get food and sleep soon I’d be completely useless. Food was a dream that I’d hold close to my heart, the sort of dream that I’d bring out and examine when I needed some beauty in my life. My precious one.

  Stretching my muscles as I jogged, I winced as that low pain rocked through me again, my hand instinctively reaching back to press against it.

  Braxton never missed a thing, and I should have known he would jump all over me now. “What’s wrong, Jess? Are you injured?” His pace slowed, and I knew I was about eight seconds from being scooped into his arms.

  Jacob opened his big mouth and dumped me right into the shit. “Her back has been hurting since we were attacked in the maze, but she should be healed. I don’t know what’s wrong.”

  Concern etched across all of the quads’ faces, and the others slowed their pace, forcing me to stop.

  “Spill, Jessa.” Four sets of eyes locked on me, eight muscled arms crossed across broad chests. They were so alike that I actually had to stop myself from kicking them. They were doing that stupid thing like the Four, where they were carbon copy robots. I wanted my individual boys back, right now.

  Knowing they were as stubborn as me, and that we could be in a standoff all day, I spoke quickly. “I’ve been having this lower back pain. At first I thought it was just from when a critter dug his claws into me, but Jake is right, I should be healed by now.”

  Braxton’s hands reached around me to gently massage my back, his warmth and energy soothing not only my pain but my soul.

  “I sensed you had some discomfort there, but I didn’t realize it was actual pain. Why didn’t you tell Louis while he was here? He’s the best we have to heal anything complex.”

  The shifter in Braxton was rising up with the need to protect and care for his mate. I’d been thinking about the pain a bit, and I actually had an idea about what it might be. The timing wasn’t exactly right, but maybe with my journeying in and out of Faerie, the timeline was all messed up.

  “It’s possible I’m coming into my fertile period,” I said. Generally I had very distinct symptoms a few days before it was to begin, symptoms which I hadn’t had, but this was also the first time I’d been fertile since the release of my dragon mark. And none of us knew what that might have done to my body and hormones.

  Fears crossed my mind. “Do you think Larky did something to me? Brought on my fertility early? We all know he wants something from me. What if that something is a baby?”

  As the thoughts continued to pour from me, my voice sounded a tad hysterical, which was another thing that occurred during my fertile period – heightened emotions. I felt Braxton’s arms tighten around me, and before I could blink my feet were off the ground. The dragon shifter had his arms tightly wound around me and I could feel the heat pouring off him – the rage and fear.

  I kept my voice low and calm. “He never touched me, Brax. There’s no way I could be pregnant with any little dragon babies, unless he used osmosis.”

  It didn’t work. The thought that I might be pregnant to someone else had pushed my mate over the edge. He was not listening to me now, and the moment any of the quads moved near us, growls ripped from him. I wriggled closer, managing to free my arms before lifting my hands to cradle his face.

  “Braxton Compass…” I was relentless, forcing him to focus on me, holding his head firmly. “He never touched me. I would never touch another male. You’re it for me. I made my choice and you’re never getting rid of me.”

  We stayed like that for a few moments, and finally some of the feral faded out of those tumultuous eyes.

  “Why would he want a baby with you?” Each word was ripped from his throat, sounding gravelly and pissed. “Why is he trying to create a dragon heir? There’s a larger plan here, and it’s part of the reason why he’s been lax in using his army of marked.”

  I would have gasped deeply but I wasn’t able to breathe too much. Braxton was right. His keen intelligence had risen to the surface as soon as he pushed enough of the predator down.

  “That makes perfect sense. That’s why he was trying to seduce me. He wants an heir. He must have been waiting until my fertile time. Maybe the fact that I was in Faerie has brought it on early.”

  Either Faerie or Larky himself had done something to bring it on early. I had eaten the food from Rose; there could have been some sort of elixir or spell in them. My wolf usually detected such things, but not always. Rose had seemed legit, but right now I trusted no one but my pack and family.

  Despite the unease which hung amongst us, we couldn’t delay on the bridge forever. Braxton held me close for an extra few moments before eventually dropping me back on my feet, his touch soothing as he ran his hand across my back, over and over, in this gentle circular formation.

  Generally, when I came into my fertile period, it started with lethargy for a few days, and then this massive high of energy. My wolf would become very agitated, unease stirring her – I always knew at that point it was time. Even though it was only a week of discomfort, shifters could get pregnant from as early as the first signs of fatigue, so we had to be careful. I was generally careful for the entire month of my fertile time, even though there was no more than a two-week window to conceive a pup.

  This sort of lower back ache had never happened, certainly not this early out. It felt like magic, like something trying to force my body into a state it was not ready for. I was half tempted to march back along the bridge and find the king’s body so I could kick the shit out of him. That stupid asshat. What had he done to me?

  Chapter 8

  The bridge remained unchanging, glowing, and spanning into the distance as we walked. None of us knew if the end would just pop up out of nowhere or if we’d see it coming. Nerves and worries still crossed my mind, and needing a distraction from the fears, I said: “I think you boys better tell me exactly what’s been happening while I was gone. How much time passed on Earth?”

  Jacob and I had started this conversation, but a lot had been left unsaid.

  Tyson jumped in first. He liked to talk and liked being the center of attention. Unlike Maximus and Braxton who just preferred to kill shit in the background.

  “The moment you were taken in Krakov, Braxton pretty much lost his shit. He was mindlessly smashing anything that walked into his path, which unfortunately for one of the fruit twins, was her head.”

  I heard Braxton give a bit of a snort, trying not to laugh at his idiot brother. “Yep, you could say I was a little upset.”

  I heard the absolute chasm of emotion in his monotonous words, which might seem like an oxymoron, but Braxton was at his scariest when his voice and tone was dead. If he was showing no emotion, then you knew for damn sure he was feeling everything.

  Tyson continued: “So Braxton had just killed one of the twins. Everything was in chaos, and I was helping Grace while she worked on keeping your sister alive.” The wizard’s voice lowered when he said the healer witch’s name.

  Grace used to be a little in love with him when they were younger, and he’d rejected her without much thought. Now, though, it seemed that careless action had turned back on him. He wanted to explore how he felt and Grace was refusing to let herself be hurt by him again. It was complicated, and with all the drama there was no time for these sort of personal worri
es. I had faith that it would all work out for them though. They were both awesome supes, and I’d love to see some happiness in their lives. As long as Grace didn’t mess with our pack dynamics, she was okay with me. Cardia, on the other hand … I still wasn’t sure how I felt about Maximus’ mate. I just knew we were going to have trouble with her.

  Our pace picked up to a run again as Tyson continued his story. “We took the other twin back to the sanctuary. Louis wanted to make sure his brother was okay, and that the dragon marked weren’t going to immediately rise up and form some sort of crazy army.”

  “Where are Quale and the rest of the mystics now?” The strange silver-haired supernaturals were the council for the dragon king, but it had never seemed as if Louis’ brother was really on board with that.

  Since none of the mystics had met the king, they were the descendants of his original council. I wondered how they’d all reacted when he’d popped back into existence. Bet they were at least a little worried; his last council had lost their heads, which wasn’t the nicest legacy to live up to.

  Maximus shifted his arm, hugging me to his side. “They’re still in the sanctuary,” he said. “The last time we saw them they had received no orders from the king, and were still just going about their everyday lives. The knowledge that he’s free is being kept quiet around the supernatural communities. The councils are hoping we can sort it out before mass panic ensues.”

  I was pretty sure the councils were shit out of luck. Larky had lost me, his prize, he was going to be very angry and totally come out with guns blazing. Jonathon had a legit reason to worry that this was all going to spill out into the human world.

  “So both twins died, and you still had no idea where I was. What did you do then?” Our pace had increased, and something was glimmering on the horizon.

  Braxton’s voice was monotone again. “No one knew anything. Larkspur literally appeared on this plane, snatched you up and disappeared to Faerie. There was no time for even his closest followers to be aware of his actions.”

  Jacob snorted. “Yep, Brax learned the hard way that no matter how hard you beat someone, they cannot give you information they don’t possess.”

  My mate chuckled, some of his old humor returning. “It was kind of therapeutic, hunting down and questioning those who had ties to the king. Gave me a distraction from my need to kill every single member of our councils. Useless assholes were far too slow in their reactions.”

  He stated this as fact, and none of us doubted that it had been a fine line of control which stopped him going on a mass killing spree which would have made the time of the dragon king seem like Sunday brunch in the park.

  “Well, we’re all back together now, and I for one am not letting anyone else get their scaly claws on me.” I could reach my dragon now, and we would fight those fuckers all the way to our death.

  Jacob spoke up then, he must have been following the same train of thought. “Has Jess mentioned that she saved our asses in the maze by learning how to call on her dragon?” He was all proud of me and shit.

  The rumble in Braxton’s chest increased. “You figured out how to shift on command?” It was sort of a question, but mostly he sounded proud too.

  “Yep, we broke down the wall. Now there’s no more barrier.”

  Tyson reached across his brother to drop a large hand on my shoulder, which was quite the dexterous feat with our current pace. “Never doubted that you could do it, Jessa babe. Damn, I missed you. I don’t think any of us realized the true depth of our pack bond until you were gone. We were fucking lost … a mess … a bunch of idiot males wandering around beating the shit out of people. We’re nothing without you, Jess, so don’t disappear on us again. I’m not sure any of us would survive.”

  I had to swallow a few times. There was this stupid huge lump in my throat. Maybe it was the fierce and loving looks the boys were bestowing on me, or the emotion rocking their voices, but I was feeling every single way they had suffered without me. As much as I had hurt, it had been much longer and worse for the quads. They had not known if I was being tortured or other horrible shit. Larky was the big-scary in our world, and I’d been his captive.

  I reached up and squeezed Tyson’s hand. “I felt the same pain, like I was missing an essential part of my soul, and for me it was only a few days that we were all separated.”

  “It was a month for us,” Braxton said. “The longest damned month of my life. How do you feel about handcuffs?”

  I snorted. “As long as it involves whips and chains, then I’m down, but if you’re talking about leashing me to you for life, not a chance, buddy. I can fight plenty fine on my own. Larky took me by surprise in that first meeting, but I’ve been fighting him ever since.”

  Maximus skipped back to our previous conversation. “Tell us more about this Rose.”

  “She’s the first marked, and apparently Larky’s wife. Like I said before, she’s human, but there’s something important about her blood. It’s tied to the marked curse. The fact that her family line is descended from the shining ones allowed him to use it to bond the supes to him.”

  The boys were silent for a beat before Jacob said, “If we kill her, will it break the curse?”

  I scrunched up my forehead, trying not to think too hard about that. “I doubt it. Firstly, there’s no way to truly know, and I’d hate to think she’d die for nothing. And secondly, Larky is very protective of her. We’d never get close enough to hurt her. She’s a victim in all of this. Killing her should be the absolute last resort.”

  No one answered straight away and I knew what they were all thinking. If it came down to me or her, Rose was fucked. They would not hesitate for even a second before ripping her head off. I had to make sure that didn’t happen. We had to find something on the Isle of the Gods.

  I changed the subject from the killing of Rose to Faerie gods. “Do you think we’re getting close to the … the destination now? What dangers are we facing there?”

  Surprisingly enough, Jacob answered, and with none of his usual reticence of sharing about Faerie. “A long time ago Faerie used to be ruled by two powerful groups: the shining ones and the shadow spawn, two factions who lived on opposite sides of our world. The Isle of the Gods was home to the shining ones, and the Land of the Dying was where the shadow spawn existed. The shadows are a dark spirit, they care very little for anything other than power and feeding. The shining ones were pure of spirit … or so they would have you believe, but like all powerful beings, were never to be trusted. They always have their own agenda.”

  “So what happened?” I asked. “You said used to be ruled.”

  “I wasn’t born of course, so this is a folk tale passed down through the generations of fey. There was a war. The shadow spawn rose up against the shining ones, they wanted the Isle of the Gods, for it was there that the most abundant of magic existed, the Gold. You know the essence they teach us about in magic classes. The base of all supernatural creatures. If they had gained control of this wild and ancient power … shit, it would have been bad. End of world bad.”

  Echoes of something flickered across Jacob’s green eyes. He might not have lived there, but he felt the pain of that time quite acutely.

  “The battle raged for countless years, thousands of years in Earth time. So much of Faerie was destroyed, but still there was never to be an end. The shining ones and the shadow spawn were the balance of each other. Neither could ever truly be destroyed.”

  This was not sounding great. No wonder the fey had started to flee.

  “In the end, the shining ones managed to trap the shadows, placing the demons into a deep slumber, and then they removed themselves from actively policing Faerie, focusing on keeping the shadows locked away. Faerie has fallen into a land of ruin and fear ever since. Without the shining ones influencing the Gold, the world was no longer safe for the fey, so some of our ancestors left.”

  “Do the shining ones still live on the Isle of the Gods?” Braxton asked his b
rother. “Will we have a fight on our hands when we get there?”

  I knew the boys wouldn’t care either way. We had no choice here. But it was always good to be prepared.

  Jacob shrugged his broad shoulders. “I don’t know, Brax, I’ve never been to the island, and I don’t know a single fey or demi-fey who has either. The shining ones abandoned our land. Maybe they’re slumbering too.”

  I was reminded again of Louis saying that he hoped “they” wouldn’t wake. Shit. Right about now I needed that damn sorcerer here so I could ask him if he was talking about the shadow spawn or the shining ones. It would be nice to know what we were walking into, and who we didn’t want to wake.

  “Where do the shadow spawn sleep?” I wondered out loud.

  Creases formed around Jacob’s fey eyes. “The location of the shadows has been lost through history, either deliberately or by chance. I don’t think any fey know where the shining ones stashed them.”

  Great, so they could be anywhere. We were so screwed.

  During this conversation our speed had continued to increase; we were running now, and the length of bridge behind us was increasing dramatically. It also seemed as if the length in front was shorter. I still couldn’t see our destination, but it looked brighter across the horizon.

  Why is Larky not welcome on the Isle of the Gods any longer?

  This information had been niggling away at me. What had he done all those years ago? What had he asked for and promised in return? Creating an army of marked required a massive level of power. A spell like that was multi-layered, intricate, and extremely difficult to cast and maintain. We were talking about thousands of supernatural creatures, all now tied to the king. The shining ones would not have done this for him unless he’d promised something huge.

  A heaviness settled into my gut, joining the dull aching pain in my back. I knew his plan had everything to do with me, with the massive dragon mark spanning the side of my body. I was different to the others, but why? What had Larky done?