by Eden Glenn
She had to act quickly, watching as the glowing binding unbraided more. Wren tried but the threads slipped out of her metaphysical hands. She needed help. More of the intricate pattern dissolved before her eyes.
“STOP.” She shouted and the glowing fibers froze in place. She reached unsuccessfully for them again. There was a blackness in her awareness that kept her from exercising the power she needed. What was that barrier? Caleb and Ethan, the place where their thoughts and energy had been and was now blocked acted like a loadstone to her magic.
Wren thrust power through the barrier with a ruthless stab piercing Caleb with a swift slice opening the invisible lines of communication that had been clogged with misunderstandings between them.
Focus she ordered Caleb. The backlash of her effort grabbed Ethan, demolishing the shield he helped construct between them.
Anchor us, she commanded. She examined their incredulous appraisal of the power she’d used to blow their mental doors open. They whispered, Wren, It’s too late.
Too bad, I need you NOW. She demanded their metaphysical chi energy and they gave it without reserve. Wren wrapped the two men into a bond with her. She used their power to augment her own and examined the metaphysical rope before her again.
She didn’t have time to sever the black threads. She grabbed the lines with the ethereal hands of her psi-energy through the prism of the sword and pulled the glowing cable, weaving the strands of filament back into their intricate design. A thick black tar substance coated some of the strands causing them to slip through her fingers. There were dark blue threads so tangled with the black slime that she couldn’t grasp them either. How important were they? A motherly voice whispered to her.
Yes, you’ve done well my daughter, healing his soul is the task for another. What we will do is sufficient.
Sweat broke out on her forehead stinging her closed eyes, running in threaded trails down her sides. The other calmed and reassured her that the pattern she wove was true. Ethan and Caleb’s vitality bolstered her. She kept twisting, braiding until the Goddess within her nodded and smiled in satisfaction.
Good, place the rope right there. The Goddess instructed and she complied.
The dragon’s psychic voice rumbled in her mind. Phaux is no more, I am now Sorrow.
Yes, the darkness in his fractured soul left him with much sorrow. Yet, she knew it wouldn’t be forever. I accept you Sorrow. You will become Strength when your soul is healed. He was alive and yet somehow miraculously reborn with a new dragon chi that had entrusted her with his sacred name.
I am as I ever was. The weariness echoed in his mental voice.
She felt the dragon moving beneath her hands and opened her eyes. Izzy was staring at her aghast. Maxwell was by Izzy’s side dressed in ridiculous pajamas with cars on them, more suited for a ten year old. Rhys and Haydn stood just inside the entrance; obvious from their look of reverenced incredulity they’d seen the entire event. Caleb and Ethan flanked her, their expressions unreadable.
A slight edge of wonder filled Caleb’s voice. “You changed the course of events we’d witnessed as happening in a precognition, again. How do you do that?”
“Follow me.” Time for a settlement between Wren and these two slightly misogynistic dragon shifters, if they were going to stay in her life and in her head there were going to be some new rules.
≽∞≼
Wren had experienced the twin’s distress over the breach separating them when she’d merged into rapport to draw on their power for healing Kiernan. She’d not had the time to spare for niceties when she’d grabbed them. Now she considered what she’d seen and felt in their psyche connection.
They followed her through the house to the large family room. Extra furniture from the ballroom was stacked around but at least they had the guise of privacy. She sighed wearily, had it been only last evening that she and Izzy had relaxed here?
“You weren’t listening to me. I needed your help and you didn’t consider that I was a capable adult. You treat me like I’m this fragile porcelain doll that has to be bubble wrapped and cushioned from everything. You don’t give me credit for the ability to think and act with any level of intelligence.
‘You were quick to tell me that you weren’t going to have a bond with someone who wore the skin of another dragon. Did you think for even a moment how that would make me feel?” Ethan and Caleb at least had the decency to look chastised, while they shrugged and nodded to punctuate what she was telling them.
“No you didn’t. You’re both always making decisions without even the briefest consideration for me, ordering me around and hollering at me when I don’t do things to suit you. Even though I’m stumbling into this not knowing half of what I should know.
‘You stormed into my life, telling me your outlandish story. I was supposed to believe you at face value and take it all in stride. Well, I’ve got news for you. As one-hundred and twelve year old dragons you should know better.
‘I’m pissed and things are going to change.” She was on a roll now and didn’t even pause for them to answer her. She had them both backed up against the wall while she ranted and gestured with her sword. They’d better be listening.
“I want you both. But I need a relationship where I and my mates.” The word sounded a little strange on her tongue but she didn’t have a different one that would conceptualize the level of intimacy she desired. “…are…are working together, trusting each other, relying on each other, building something together.”
“Am I your Queen and mate or am I a decoration to parade in front of your people as an empty figurehead? I want an equal partnership with respect and thoughtfulness. If you can’t provide that you’d be better off marrying those two girls you mother has ready to hook you up with because I don’t think you’d be very good kings anyway.” That statement seemed at least to set Ethan off to say something.
Wren almost laughed as Caleb nudged him with a sharp jab from his elbow and said, shut the fuck up.
But she...
I don’t care, shut it. Now is not the time to argue with the woman with the sword-- especially when she is right, and you know she is.
She lowered the blade and leaned it against the couch. After what happened last time she was pissed with them, maybe it was better to set the thing down.
Caleb took her right hand and knelt, turning her palm to his lips. Ethan did the same on her left, with a tender, apologetic murmured kiss to her palm. “Our Queen.”
Caleb echoed “and Our Guardian.” They continued interweaving their voices back and forth together as they spoke, their words forming a pledge and a promise. She opened herself to feel the intensity of their declaration on a psi-level.
“All we have, all we can be is yours if you will have us. We have looked for you longer than you can imagine. Help us to be mates worthy of you. We pledge our vow to do all we can to struggle to be the dragons you deserve. Please forgive the beasts that we are. Give us a chance to be the kind of males you need and Goddess help us, we will.”
Their yearning desire to have the kind of relationship she described throbbed through the link between them. She leaned forward bringing her lips to Ethan’s. His mouth devoured hers hungrily matching the starving need she radiated-- breaking the kiss to claim Caleb’s lip so as to be understood he was hers too. Nothing was more important than the connection they shared. She accepted that now and knew what to do as she reached for more.
≽∞≼
Caleb and Ethan stood pulling Wren into their arms. Her mind latched onto Caleb’s psychic being and pulled the twins combined metaphysical power. They would not deny her anything she needed. Ethan and Caleb still shared the connection that had allowed them to work silently. Each man gave, responded to her draw as if no other option existed.
Their joined awareness tumbled down into her mind-- memories, his, hers, theirs, flashes of joy over common emotions, thoughts, experiences. The tidal wave of sensation swamped Caleb as the trio merged. Second
s passed like minutes, they became one mind, building speed, faster and faster, until a blur of combined moments, combined lives, combined souls all connected.
The structure of their world changed, realigned as if three magnets pulled together with a strong snap, echoed by a crisp pop deep inside each of their brains, followed by a clarity that made their entire existence up to this point, seem like a faded approximation of living.
The shared bonding swept away mind barriers and surrounded the men with the gentleness of her spirit. Three individual lives, melded to begin a shared existence as mates.
A sliver of each other’s essence remained, exchanged in the moment with the potential of linking them together forever. The lightness of spring and the promised passion of a summer storm made a place in each man’s soul and called it hers.
The savory extract of Ethan’s steadfast, earthy nature remained as a solid depth next to the woman’s. Caleb’s strong spiritual focus settled in Wren and Ethan an aspect of being both spontaneous and impetuous.
Wren absorbed the men’s warrior loyalty and fierce courage to face any challenge and finish any task without shirking no matter how hard. Their essence layered onto a core strength she’d always possessed but hadn’t allowed herself to exercise, one of leadership and power.
An equal exchange, a giving and a taking, as quick as the claiming began, the experience ended.
Ethan punched his breath out in a heavy exhale. “Fuck, yeah.”
≽∞≼
Thoughts rattled around in Caleb’s head, left him unable to form words. He’d often wondered how the bonding would happen for them, when or if the time came. How often he’d begged for it to be a triad joining. Nothing he’d imagined could ever compare with the reality.
How could he have lived this long without realizing his life was missing something, someone? No, missing her. The woman’s psyche claimed them, owned them and the change was irrevocable. Her presence deepened the intensity of bond with his brother.
When he drew back, his twin’s eyes caught and held his, revealing a wildness that seemed barely controlled as Ethan spoke in Caleb’s mind. The entire bonding focused through your chi. You filtered it all. She claimed us… together.
Feeling Ethan’s calm composure break apart struck Caleb as extraordinary. The three of them clung together like shipwreck victims tossed adrift at sea. Caleb, lightheaded, grappled for balance, hugging himself closer to Wren and Ethan.
He cradled the woman, Cathwren-- ah little Wren-- in his arms against Ethan’s chest, holding her between them with utmost tenderness and projecting relief through the link. The likelihood that this woman’s presence was going to rock their world seemed a sure bet. Actually, it was kinda cool to see Ethan, Mr. Calm, come all unhinged.
The shared embrace folded their feelings together and wrapped back around him with comforting acceptance.
Caleb laughed in relief. “Yes, this is right where you belong.” Ethan, I am yours as much as she is. I finally understand our connection in a mated triad. She’s made everything make sense. The fear of losing their twinned relationship to gain mates evaporated.
His twin’s whispered presence joined his thoughts. And you had doubts? Ethan regained his composure, part of him now. Ah, my brother, of course our union would be like everything else in our life, entwined and seamless. How could this be any different than when we shift into our Dragon, Si’Mon? Then we are aligned, as we are now with our mate.
The unspoken words sent a gruff, loving touch into Caleb’s psyche. Thank the Gods we’ve found her and she finds us acceptable.
Wren seemed to gain her bearings and stood between them with an incredulous expression. A bonding was quite an intense experience for a human to handle.
Caleb could hear the shaking in his brother’s voice from his reaction to the shared moment, longing for everything to happen right, as they built on this perfect beginning, to guarantee them long term victory.
However, this initial bonding link constituted only the first step in the Quaynar Rou, a complicated mating process that would culminate with the three of them being gifted with mating marks from the Goddess. Nothing for them had ever been easy.
Their future together remained fraught with possibilities for disaster before they could be positive of a complete successful Quaynar Rou. What they had put into motion would require a series of events steeped in sacred traditions from antiquity.
“That’s good.”
The soft lyrical tones of her voice caressed Caleb and drew him out of his thoughts. What?
She seemed to be coming out of the daze the flood of merged memories caused.
Wren’s eyes devoured him. He smiled, her sensual need was beautiful. A male should want nothing more than the hungry appreciation of his mate. She watched him with the intent ferocity of a lioness.
Prophecy superimposed itself over his thoughts. They’d just bonded with the Dragon Guardian.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Caleb prayed for the presence of the Goddess to bless the ceremony. The dawn streaked through the bay windows of the Victorian Ballroom. No one had slept but when events like these happened no one really needed sleep. Kiernan brought back from the dead and the Prince Heirs bonded to The Dragon Guardian.
Ethan, Caleb and Wren chose to seal their claiming before Isobeau and Kiernan. Izzy would be representative of the Arach, those human to dragon shifters. Kiernan in his dragon form would represent the Wyrm. Maxwell stood in as Watcher delegate out of necessity for witness. He’d found the references that guided Caleb’s actions.
He captured her hand in his. “Namshara, te anevasta.” Thank you, our love. Caleb knew what he needed to do, perhaps more clearly than he ever had in his life. Their actions were ceremonial to show acceptance in sealing the claim she’d initiated.
“You are to be our mate and Queen. You are also destined to be the Guardian of our people. There is no record of the same woman carrying both roles in our society. So unique it was thought to be forbidden.”
Chemicals were already flushing through the three of them aligning their DNA on a cellular level to fulfil the impression stage of the Quaynar Rou. They had received her blood by accident in their initial meeting. He and Ethan had raged through a one sided mating impression to her.
The events hadn’t happened as prescribed in the history of their people. She had gulped in their scented pheromones and their blood on her triggered the same changes, accelerating her need for them. She’d had to battle her way through to understanding and acceptance. She chose against all logic to claim them both.
Now, Caleb would bind their blood exchange with the words of their ancestors in as much privacy as custom would allow.
Ethan smiled. “We’ve broken lots of traditions and I suppose that pattern is just beginning for the three of us.”
A sharp sound drew their attention to the side of the room. The air split like a curtain allowing an elegant woman of timeless beauty to step through. Her long black hair fell over her shoulders captured by an intricate net of light like a crown, the Goddess Gelfin. Maxwell prostrated himself on the floor like he was struck by lightning. She floated more than walked to where they’d gathered.
She turned to Kiernan “You’re looking better than last when I saw you. I believe you’ve chosen well.”
Then glancing to Isobeau she nodded. “--As have you. I am intrigued by your place in all this. I’m not often surprised or curious. I find myself experiencing both recently-- quite extraordinary.”
She smiled at Wren and cupped her chin in her palm. “You are a delight, my daughter; you’ve ushered in a new age with quite a bang.”
The energy of the room was tense, like watching a balloon fill, not knowing when it might pop.
She picked up Wren’s Sword from the table and stood before the three of them with the blade raised.
“Ethan, Caleb, my lineage sons, you have served me well. You will restore the balance which was broken, foretold at your birth. Seek wisely
and listen to the counsel you are given.
Ethan and Caleb stood there stunned.
Wren’s psi-laughter gave them a sense of perspective. She has that effect on people. She’s really very nice once you get to know her.
Caleb retorted. It’d be helpful if she could make her vague premonitions a little clearer in the future, to make our job just a little easier.
He suspected Gelfin could squash them with a thought. Joking helped calm the nervous tension of being in the same room with the deity who’d had such a strong impact on their adult life, while they’d followed every vague wisp of feeling she’d given them.
Ethan spoke firm and sure. “Nigelia Gelfin The Mane’tung is ever at your service.”
“Proceed with the sealing Warrior.” They needed to blood themselves for the symbolic gesture. The Goddess lowered the blade, level before the three of them and they watched as it sharpened to a razor edge on its decent.
Fortunately, it would set things back on a predictable course toward their full-fledged mating bond.
May our Quaynar Rou be swift and uncomplicated. If anything with Wren could ever be predictable or uncomplicated. Caleb smiled at their mate.
She steeled herself and didn’t flinch as she touched her palm on the edge of the blade, blood flowing generously from the cut. Then Caleb quickly sliced his and Ethan followed suit. He wiped their combined blood across his hand to coat the surface.
He would prepare her as much as he could. “The fledgling binding you’ve initiated by drawing us into a soul merge has to be sealed. More psi-energy escapes with every passing moment. Every offering requires an acceptance to move forward, each is a step in a complicated mating ritual that dragon shifters go through which will bind our spirits and souls beyond this existence.”
Ethan shifted his hold on her to reveal access to his chest encouraging his brother. “I know you’ll find the right words for the sealing, Caleb.”