Dark Heat

by Donna Grant

  Elena winced, but didn’t speak. She didn’t want to interrupt the story.

  “Dragons heal, but not instantly. When a dragon was wounded and fell, the humans killed it. Dragons were killing humans. Something had to be done, and our options were few. We did the only thing we could. We sent the dragons to safety, away from the humans who could hurt them.”

  “And Ulrik? Did you kill him?”

  “Nay, though it might have been kinder had we.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “It’s a part of who we are to shift, Elena, and to speak to the dragons we rule. We took away Ulrik’s power as King. He can no’ shift, nor can he talk to his Silvers.”

  She threaded her fingers with his. “I think you all ended up punishing yourselves as well, then.”

  “Aye, but we had no choice. We were able to catch a few of the Silvers before they left this world. We keep them asleep with our dragon magic, because the only way they can wake is by Ulrik. If that happens, the war will begin again. And mankind will be wiped out.”

  CHAPTER

  TWELVE

  Guy looked at the Silvers and wondered if Ulrik’s need for revenge had faded over the millennia, or if it had grown.

  “So Ulrik is still around?” Elena asked.

  Guy nodded. “Oh, aye. We keep an eye on him. It’s part of his punishment for attacking the humans to be immortal, but no’ to be able to be a King.”

  “That seems … cruel. It was the humans who hunted the dragons. I wasn’t there, so this may sound like I’m pitying Ulrik, but I think I would’ve sided with him. The humans had no right to hunt the dragons if everyone was living peacefully.”

  He smiled at her and smoothed the furrow of her brow with his finger. “It’s easy to look back now and know what we could’ve and should’ve done. At the time, emotions were running high and war was imminent.”

  “So you say you’re immortal. Can nothing kill you? You’re safe from everything?”

  Guy rose and pulled her up with him. He led her to the Silvers and placed his hand atop one of the immense dragons heads. “We can be killed, Elena.”

  “How?”

  “Touch the dragon. He’s asleep and can no’ feel anything.”

  She delayed a moment before she laid her hand beside his. “The scales are warm. I wasn’t expecting that.”

  “There is magic in dragons. You should’ve seen it when we reigned, before there was man. Dragons of every color and size ruled the skies, the water, and the land.”

  He pulled himself back from the memory he had held on to through the passage of time. “In dragon form, another dragon can kill us. It isna easy because we’re Kings, but it can be done. It has been done. We lost many Kings during the war before we contained it.”

  “What happened to the dragons who lost their King?” she asked as she slowly stroked the Silver.

  “Other Kings stepped in to rule them. We didna think any more Kings would ever be made, until Tristan showed up five months ago.”

  She frowned and bit her lip. “Is that a good sign?”

  “No, especially when it coincided with two other events.”

  “Which where?”

  Guy knelt beside the Silver closest to him and put his hand in front of the dragon’s nose as a rush of wind blasted his hand from the dragon’s breath.

  “The Silvers moved.”

  Elena yanked her hand away and took a step back. “They moved?”

  “Aye. We doona know how. It was just an instant, but they moved. It shouldna have happened.”

  “And the second event?”

  Guy rubbed the Silver’s snout and straightened. “With the betrayal of Ulrik’s woman, it did something to Con. He didna want us to ever be in that position again. So, we all joined our dragon magic and bound our emotions.”

  “Excuse me?” she said in half surprise, half outrage.

  “We feel things like hunger, laughter, anger, happiness, and such. What we did was prevent ourselves from becoming entangled with a human.”

  “You have no human friends or lovers?”

  He shook his head slowly. “None. Until five months ago when Hal, another King, fell in love with a human. Hal wouldna give Cassie up, and she wouldna give him up. Con tested her to see if she could love the man and the dragon.”

  “Did she pass?”

  “Aye,” Guy said with a smile. “They are bonded. I can no’ remember the last time I saw a King bonded to a human.”

  “Is the magic used to sever your emotions gone?”

  This was what Guy had dreaded answering, the question he knew she would ask. “For five months, my answer would have been the magic is still in place. And then I met you. I feel things I’m no’ supposed to. Things that I doona know what to make of.”

  She looked away before walking around the great cage. For several minutes, he watched her, waiting and hoping for her to say something.

  When she didn’t, he asked, “Do you no’ have anything to say?”

  “I don’t know what to say. These past couple of days have turned my world upside down again and again. I hate Con for keeping me here against my will, but when you wanted me to leave, I’ve never felt so crushed in my life.”

  She stopped as she made her way back to him. “I thought what was between us was just physical. All I can think about is you. When you’re near, I want to be beside you, I want you touching me, even if it’s just holding my hand.”

  “Is that all you want from me?”

  “No,” she said, her eyes wide with torment. She lifted her face to the ceiling of the cavern. “Oh, God. This is happening too fast. I can’t wrap my head around it.”

  Guy pulled her into his arms and simply held her. He closed his eyes when her arms wrapped around him. “I’ve never told a human I was immortal before. You believed me. Even when you saw Tristan and then me change into a dragon, you didna run away in fear. Why?”

  “I was scared, which is why I couldn’t move. I just knew Tristan was going to eat me. And then I saw you, before I knew it was you. You protected me, fought for me. No man has ever done that.”

  “I’m no’ just a man.”

  “No,” she said, and leaned back to look at him. “You’re dragon. Maybe that’s what’s different about you. Maybe that’s why I’m drawn to you so.”

  He tucked a wavy blond lock behind her ear. “Doona leave me yet, Elena. Give me time to win you.”

  “That’s the problem,” she said with a small laugh as her eyes filled with tears. “You already have, Guy.”

  He could hardly breathe with her revelation. “If you stay, you need to understand things are changing, and I fear the danger could only get worse.”

  “From Tristan?”

  “Nay. The Silvers. And whoever sent Sloan here. If our secret is discovered, war will come again.”

  She sighed harshly. “And you’ll be killed. You know the weapons humans have developed now. Nuclear bombs, rockets fired from thousands of miles away, and poisonous gases.”

  “We’d survive every one,” he said with a smile. “I told you how we could be killed in dragon form. In human form, the only way to kill us is if another King uses his sword.”

  Elena rolled her eyes. “Oh, please, Guy. Everything immortal has to be killed somehow. I mean, you can’t survive if they cut off your head.”

  “Want to give it a try?”

  Her eyes widened again and she hit his arm. “Uh, thanks but no thanks. Can you be serious?”

  “I am. When I say nothing can kill us besides a King wielding his sword, I mean it, Elena.”

  “How?”

  “Magic. Dragon magic.”

  She lowered her gaze to his chest, her nervousness palpable. “Do you want me to stay?”

  “More than anything,” he said gently as he lifted her face to his. “You’ve made me feel again, and I doona want to ever lose that.”

  “How long?”

  His brow furrowed at her question. “What?”


  “How long do you want me to stay?”

  He gazed into her sage green eyes and wanted to speak from his heart, but he paused. It would be asking too much of her too soon. He realized his feelings for her went deep, deeper than he ever thought to feel for anyone, but she had yet to tell him of her love.

  “I want you to stay as long as I can have you.”

  “I get to choose?”

  “Aye,” he said with a nod. “Understand, Elena, if you stay, you can never bring anyone here. No one can know where you’re at or who you’re with.”

  “I know.”

  “And your job?” He hated asking the question, but she needed to be reminded of why she was in Britain at all.

  The fact she looked away caused his worry to grow.

  “You mean I’d have to give up the job I’ve sacrificed everything for?”

  “Aye.”

  Silence stretched, and it nearly killed Guy. He buried his frustration and forced a smile as he took her hands in his. “This is a big decision, one you shouldna make hastily. Besides, you’ve a lot to take in after today. Let’s get back to the house and get you something to eat.”

  She didn’t pull her hand away as they walked from the cave. That the only thing that kept Guy from throwing all caution to the wind and shifting so he could take to the skies.

  At the door to the house, he paused before following her in. When she looked at him and tucked a strand of her blond hair behind her ear, he said, “I need to check on Tristan. Maybe my clobbering jarred his memory, and he can tell us his name.”

  Guy let the door close before she could respond. He walked away, knowing he had lost Elena. He hadn’t wanted the feelings she evoked within him, but now that he’d experienced them, he couldn’t imagine life without her.

  But it was going to be a life without her. Her career was too important. And he … wasn’t enough.

  Guy wasn’t paying attention to where he walked until he found himself blocked in the mountain by Rhys and Tristan.

  “I doona like the name Tristan,” Tristan said.

  Guy shrugged. “Then remember your own name.”

  “I wouldna have harmed her.”

  Guy looped his thumbs in his front pockets of his jeans. “You frightened her. I couldna allow that.”

  Rhys crossed his arms over his chest and stepped in front of Guy when he tried to leave. “What happened?” he demanded.

  Guy laughed as he looked away. He wanted to be alone with his thoughts, but it seemed his friends wouldn’t let him. “It doesna matter.”

  “Is it as Con fears? Does Elena fear you as a dragon?”

  “Nay,” Guy answered softly. “I told her everything, and she accepted it all. She even touched the Silvers.”

  Tristan shifted his feet. “Then I doona understand.”

  “She wanted to stay. Until I told her it meant giving up her career,” Guy explained.

  “Shit,” Rhys said.

  Guy nodded. “Exactly.”

  CHAPTER

  THIRTEEN

  Elena sat in her room, her legs drawn up to her chest as she gazed out the window. The sky had darkened, and rain splattered against the windows.

  It was as if her own emotions had brought the rain. The storm was able to shed the tears she couldn’t.

  “You’re still here.”

  She jumped at the sound of Con’s voice behind her, but she didn’t bother to turn around. “I am.”

  “Even though you’ve chosen your career over Guy?”

  The anger in his voice made her want to turn around and shout at him, but she didn’t have the heart for it. Because Con had every right to be furious at her.

  “I’ve sacrificed everything to get to London.”

  He snorted. A few moments later, he stood between her and the window. As usual he was perfectly dressed in slacks and a button-down with his long blond hair pulled back in a queue and his black eyes zeroed in on her. “Now you know why I doona want our secret revealed.”

  “I won’t tell anyone,” she promised.

  “It doesna matter anymore. You’ve made your choice. In a bit, every memory you have of Guy, the dragons, and everything you learned here will be erased.”

  That got her to her feet. Her chest heaved with indignation. “You can’t do that.”

  “Aye, I can. I do it to protect what we’ve kept secret for thousands of years. I do it to protect Guy. After what happened to Ulrik, after what I was forced to do to his woman, I vowed I’d never have another of my Kings hurt again.”

  “You’re going to take away my memories of him, memories that would sustain me in the years to come?”

  “It’s your choice,” he said with finality.

  Elena slumped down into the chair. “When I was sixteen, I fell hard for this guy at school. He was a jock and one of the cutest guys, and he started talking to me.”

  She looked up at Con and laughed. “I thought it was the best time of my life. Up until I allowed my enjoyment of his kisses to cloud my judgment to make a wrong call in my life.”

  “What was the wrong decision?”

  “I chose the football guy over an interview for a scholarship to the University of Georgia. I lost the chance at the scholarship, and it turns out the guy only wanted sex.”

  Con leaned a shoulder against the windowsill and sighed, his dark eyes taking a far away look. “We’ve lived in this world as men, but always we pine for what once was. I see my men looking to the sky, the yearning to spread their wings there for all to see. It was my decision that destined us to this life. Was it the right decision? Even now I know that it was.”

  “But,” she urged when he hesitated.

  He chuckled and turned his head to her. “But if I had taken just a few moments and thought about what would happen with Ulrik, about what I’d be forced to do, I doona know what I would’ve done.”

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “That sometimes the decision we think we should make isna always the right one. You say you want to keep your memories of Guy. Why?”

  She looked away from Con’s black eyes that saw too much. “Because no one has ever made me feel as he does. And I know no one ever will again.”

  “Are you frightened of what he is?”

  “Meaning a dragon shifter?” she asked, and then shook her head. “No. I think it’s amazing that he exists at all. I’ll admit the sight does evoke fear at first, but seeing him as a dragon was mesmerizing.”

  Con rubbed his chin. “You care for him as a man, and you care for him as a dragon?”

  “Yes. As odd as that might sound, yes.” She laughed then. “If I hadn’t known Guy, before I might have died of fright on the spot, but knowing the man he is helped me quickly get past the fear. That and the fact he stopped Tristan from eating me.”

  Con chuckled at her words. “I doona know what’s coming for me and my men in the next months or years, Elena, but I know Guy is going to need you. I could have Guy erase your thoughts of your career to keep you here, but I know he wouldna do that to you.”

  She stared at him as he came over and placed his hand on her injured ankle. Elena felt something warm rush through her, and instantly the pain of her ankle vanished as if it had never been. She knew without asking that Con had healed her.

  He straightened. “All I ask is that you think long and hard about why you care for him so much. And then tell me if your career staring at gems will keep you warm in the years ahead of you.”

  His words reverberated in her head long after he’d left her alone. Elena knew Con was right, but she’d made a hasty decision once before that had cost her so much. She was afraid of doing the same thing again.

  And then she thought of her life in London, a life without Guy. She’d thought she hated it in Scotland, but she was really coming to love the land.

  The quiet, the beauty. The enchantment of it all.

  London was crowded, noisy, and filthy.

  She groaned as she thought of how lo
nely her life would be in London. Once more, she’d be working long hours late into the night. There would be no social life for her, because she’d continue to try to climb the career ladder.

  It’s all she’d ever wanted. Or all she’d ever used to want. Now she wanted something else.

  She wanted Guy.

  Movement through the rain caught her attention. Elena jumped up when she saw Guy walking away from the mansion and into the woods on the far slope.

  Without another thought, Elena was running out of her room, down the stairs, and then into the rain. The rain instantly plastered her clothes to her, and the chill had her teeth chattering.

  She kept running, even when she slipped on the wet grass again and again. Elena paused only once she was atop the hill and in the trees.

  Her side had a stitch in it and her lungs burned, but she wasn’t going to give up on finding Guy. She didn’t allow herself to think of what she would say when she found him, though.

  Elena started running again, searching through the thick forest and the rain for some glimpse of Guy. She cursed inwardly when she saw him heading over the next peak.

  It took everything Elena had not to fall on her way down the valley. Her pace slowed, however, and it took her twice as long to climb the next rise.

  The rain was coming harder and the wind had picked up, slinging the rain in her face so that it felt like shards of ice hitting her.

  Elena raised an arm to help shield her face as she finished the last of her climb. She prayed Guy was there because she didn’t think she had the strength to go on much longer in this weather.

  And then there he was.

  She stopped and watched him as he stood on the edge of a sheer drop-off, his arms spread wide as his face lifted to the clouds and the long locks of his dark hair flying about in the wind. Elena hadn’t realized how steep the mountains were until that moment.

  The bright green grass mixed with the dark rock face. It was beautiful to behold, but nothing compared to the sight of Guy shirtless, his tattoo and plentiful muscles there for her to see.

  The rain and mist surrounding the mountains prevented her from seeing how far up the mountain went, but that didn’t matter. Nothing mattered now that she’d found Guy.