by Zoe Chant
His heart still racing, Raul looked around. It didn't look any different than the passages they’d run through before. The snow walls were a little higher here, and the path before them twisted in a strange angle—which was probably why Claire had disappeared from view so suddenly.
Raul took a deep breath, his unsettled dragon slowly growing calmer at the presence of his mate by his side.
“Onward,” he said, then paused to quickly gather up more snow. “Let's not go down without a fight.”
Claire grinned, damp strands of hair sticking to her flushed cheeks as she immediately followed suit. A minute later, they were moving forward through the corridor of snow.
It was really strangely silent here. And they hadn’t seen a referee for a while, Raul realized when they carefully turned yet another corner.
Nothing. Another empty path spread before them, walls of snow rising up high on either side.
Had they somehow gotten lost inside the maze?
No, it was more likely that his dragon was able to hone in on the treasure, but had no understanding of the twisted paths that led there. So if they initially had picked an opening that led into the direction of the center of the maze, that same path had probably twisted back several times by now. For all he knew, it was leading them into a dead end, far from where the center and the treasure was waiting.
But why could he still feel his dragon’s utter conviction that they were going towards a treasure...?
Once again Raul cursed the fact that he’d never gained real control of his dragon. Someone who couldn’t even properly shift probably shouldn’t expect too much, especially since they were fully intending to lose the fight. But he’d hoped to at least lead Claire to the center, so that they could safely watch the final show-down and be there to congratulate the winners.
Claire’s fingers searching out his own pulled him from his dark thoughts. When he turned his head towards her, he saw that her face was relaxed. She was no longer out of breath, but her eyes were still gleaming.
“This is nice,” she murmured, leaning against him. “Getting lost with you in the snow maze for a while. No paperwork, no restaurant meltdowns, no events to plan and calls to take. This is what they call a stay-cation.”
Raul laughed. “A stay-cation should involve your couch and a blanket and a good book. And a large cup of hot chocolate.”
“With lots of whipped cream and marshmallows,” Claire sighed, still watching him with that special, sweet smile that soothed the pain of his dragon like nothing else ever had.
“My mother had a special hot chocolate recipe for the winter,” he said. “She’d cook a real vanilla bean in the milk, and she’d add cinnamon and the tiniest hint of chili. And then there’d be towers of whipped cream on top for the children—and marshmallows she’d roast with a tiny burst of dragon fire.”
He was silent for a moment as he contemplated the memory. For so long, he’d shied away from any thought of the parents and the home he’d lost. The memory was still painful—he’d always miss them. He’d miss them until the end of his life.
But now, for the first time in what felt like an eternity, the memory brought a smile to his lips as well. He could taste it now: the hot chocolate with the slight bite of heat from the chili, and the marshmallows that had been perfectly browned, the dragon fire adding a special taste that nothing else could compare to. He wasn’t even sure he could describe it to Claire if he tried.
“That’s strange,” he said slowly, “I just realized that as a child, I loved winter.”
“Even as a fire dragon?” she asked.
Raul laughed as memories came pouring in which he’d suppressed for so long. “Especially as a fire dragon! My dad and I would play a game. I was just a little dragonet back then, with a tiny flame—but he’d throw snowballs, and I’d melt them with my tiny burst of dragon fire.”
Claire pressed closer, and he raised a hand to her face, gently brushing another melting snowflake away.
“I can’t promise that I can ever show you that game, or serve you marshmallows roasted with dragon fire—but I can promise to make you hot chocolate, and make sure you get a little stay-cation every winter, when the season gets too stressful.”
“It sounds wonderful,” she said softly. She tilted her head so that she could press a kiss to his hand. “And I don’t need dragon fire when I can have you. Just you. You’re already almost too much heat for me to handle.”
Her eyes teasingly gleamed at him.
“Is that so?” He trailed his finger along her lip, the heat of her breath sending a jolt of sudden, possessive desire through him.
Maybe that was why his dragon was so confused about directions. With his mate by his side, his treasure was right here—no matter which direction they took, she’d always be by his side.
“You’re exactly the right degree of heat for a fire dragon,” he said, the desire of his dragon for the mating coming through in a deep rumble beneath his words.
They’d mate—truly mate. They’d be one. And he’d learn to live his life as a man who’d never be able to fully control his dragon—and it wouldn’t matter one single bit, because he’d have his mate by his side.
But not now. Not here in the snow.
Claire’s eyes were dark and dilated with need. Through the half-formed connection between them, he could feel the answering heat of her need for him. It felt like a wave of sunshine that warmed not only his skin, but reached into the deepest, loneliest places inside his heart.
Unthinking, he leaned forward to kiss her.
And then, just when their lips touched, there was a sound that made them hastily pull apart.
Somewhere before them, there’d been the voice of a child calling out. The sound had been faint and distant, but Raul knew that he hadn’t imagined it when Claire frowned.
“The snowball fight for the children is long over,” she said. “It’s been at least an hour, and the teens were in here after them...”
“Do you think one of the kids got lost?” Raul looked around again. This part of the maze did seem deserted...
“Shall we go on? Maybe we’ll meet a referee...”
Her voice trailed off when she seemed realized what Raul had: that they’d been walking deeper into the maze for several minutes now, and that there had been no referees in the bright parkas of the Snow Castle employees.
They’d planned the event themselves. Raul knew that there’d been enough referees that it should be impossible to walk for so long without encountering someone.
“Let’s go on.” Determined, Raul brushed the feeling of uneasiness away. “We aren’t trying to win anyway. Maybe we’ve just walked in a circle and made it nearly back to the entrance—but I don’t like the thought of a child in here all on its own.”
It wasn’t as if the snow maze was dangerous—it had been designed as entertainment, not as a trap, after all.
Though the fact remained that they, too, had walked for longer than he’d thought possible without finding an exit or other people...
Before them, another opening loomed in the wall of snow. This one seemed narrower, and there was loose snow all around it. A child distracted by the battle, who hadn’t noticed time passing and hadn’t seen the flare sent up to signal the battle’s end, could have been attracted by the snow. More snow meant more snowballs, after all.
Raul studied the ground for a moment. It didn’t look like anything had disturbed the snow—but there, nearly covered, he could make out what had to be part of a footprint.
“Someone came through here,” he said when he straightened. “I’ve no idea where the snow came from, though.”
Claire looked up at the sky. Another snowflake landed on her face. It had snowed—but only very lightly. It shouldn’t be enough to cover up the footprints of someone who’d passed by a short while ago.
“Sometimes you get strange winds in these corridors,” she said, then laughed. “Okay, I admit I made that up. But isn’t that what they
say about the wind in the mountains? And big cities? It probably works the same way with walls of snow.”
Raul’s dragon was still pulling him forward, and with a shrug, Raul accepted Claire’s theory.
“I’m no wind dragon, but I suppose that makes the most sense. Anyway, now we know we’re on the right track. Let’s see if we can find the little rascal hiding in here.”
“Maybe we’ll need to introduce another prize—the last player still holding out,” Claire said. After a moment, she dropped the snowball she still held, only to take hold of his hand again.
Together, they stepped through the narrow opening—and all of a sudden found themselves right at the center of a snowstorm.
The wind was howling all around them. It drove snow into their eyes that bit like fierce little needles of cold. The wind tore at their hair, shrieking in their ears, so loud that he almost couldn’t hear Claire’s shocked cry of terror.
A heartbeat later, the dragon within him roared to life.
With his mate’s fear pounding through the half-formed bond between them, his dragon’s power rose within him.
Raul tightened his hold on his mate’s hand, then pulled her close against his body, despite the barrage of the snow that had now begun to turn into stinging hail.
With Claire pressed tightly and safely against his chest, his dragon’s anger receded a little. Instead, his power now streamed out of him, warming first his mate, then building a small bubble of heat all around them. The hail no longer hit them—as Raul watched, he could see every tiny piece of ice turning into water, as soon as it hit the protective shield of heat around them.
Then, almost as suddenly as it had arrived, the storm died down.
Everything was silent. Claire was shivering in his arms—more from the shock than the cold, now that he could warm her. He could feel her terror through their bond, too—but despite her fear, his dragon’s rage at seeing their mate in danger had died away as suddenly as the storm.
In fact, his dragon was suspiciously calm. His dragon felt... pleased. At home.
“Oh shit,” Raul breathed as he looked around, finally getting a good view of the passage they’d stumbled into.
The narrow passage of snow walls had widened, so that it almost felt like they were standing inside a cathedral. Instead of snow, the walls surrounding them were made of ice—and they seemed to reach impossibly high into the sky.
More than that, they not only reflected the sunlight that fell in from far above, but seemed to gleam with a light of their own.
The ice shimmered in all the colors of the rainbow, depending on which direction they looked. Pale blue, an icy green, a soft pink and orange... The ice seemed alive, veins of lights moving through it in a way that made the dragon within him feel intimidated and at ease at once.
This was the realm of another dragon. A powerful dragon—far stronger than him, a dragon who'd come into his full power and was master over the cold.
But at the same time, there was a distant connection.
Family, his dragon seemed to say. It was a feeling of respect—and of yearning.
“What’s going on?” Claire asked, at last stepping out of his embrace to push her hair out of her face. Then her eyes widened when she looked around. “Holy shit...”
“It’s quite something, isn’t it?” Raul gave her a small smile, even though he didn’t feel it. “We’ve just entered a dragon’s lair. An ice dragon’s lair—Henrik’s, in fact. And distant family or not, we really shouldn’t be here. This sort of place you only share with your son or daughter—and your mate, of course. Not with a powerless cousin however-many times removed.”
Immediately, the look of wonder on Claire’s face turned into a look of worry. “Does that mean we're in danger? Is that what caused the storm? Come on, let’s just leave—”
Her voice died away when she turned around.
And when Raul followed her gaze, he saw that the opening through which they’d come had vanished.
There was no snow wall behind them. There was only another wall of impenetrable ice, stretching towards the sky.
“Shit,” she murmured again, and this time, there was fear in it.
Chapter Fifteen: Claire
She’d never seen anything like it before—and in her years of work, she’d seen quite a few outrageous hotels built by billionaires with way more money than taste. Once, she’d even interviewed in Dubai for a job—she hadn’t gotten the job, but the flights had been paid for, and she’d had an entire afternoon to stare at the incredible buildings rising high into the brilliantly blue desert sky.
But the sight before her now was different.
There was nothing man-made about it. It looked as if the massive walls of ice had just risen straight out of the ground. There were no seams, no marks of knives or saws—or whatever tools one would use to construct a giant labyrinth made of ice.
Instinctively, she shivered. There was a distinct feeling of wrongness. She couldn’t say how she knew, but it was an awareness deep in her bones. Perhaps it was an ages-old instinct, from back when humans still knew that dragons were real.
This was the lair of a dragon. And anyone who dared to disturb a dragon’s hoard would die.
“It’s okay,” Raul murmured. His thumb rubbed comfortingly against her nape, as if he knew what she felt. “I’m family, remember?”
“Distant family, I thought. So distant it almost didn't count.”
His lips quirked in a small smile that did nothing to hide the worry in his eyes. “True. It’s just enough that the land doesn’t see me as an intruder—but I should definitely be an intruder here. That storm should have blown us right back out through the door.”
“But for some reason, it just—stopped. Did you do anything?” she asked, grateful for his touch.
Raul shook his head. “I’m grudgingly accepted here. Which is strange, because I really shouldn’t be. The thought of someone else touching that gold necklace I gave you makes my dragon roar in anger. It’s the same for any dragon, and we’re way too close to Henrik’s hoard now.” He shrugged helplessly. “This doesn’t feel right.”
“Then we have to be careful,” she said in determination. “And we have to find a way out.”
Just then, there was a different sound, carried through the silence and echoing eerily between the stark walls of ice. It was the sound of a child. Somewhere before them, a child was crying for her mother.
“A girl. How did it get lost in here? This should be impossible,” Raul said and cursed again as he looked around.
Gingerly, Claire touched a gleaming wall of ice. Even through her mittens, she could feel the cold. “Do you think that’s why we were allowed in? Because for some reason, Henrik's hoard knew that a child was in danger?”
“It’s the only explanation that makes sense to me,” Raul admitted. “But how do we find her in here? And how did she even get in? Unless she’s a shifter—but I would have felt another dragon...”
“Even when they’re that young?” Claire asked curiously.
After a short moment, Raul shrugged again. “Maybe that’s it. Maybe her family only arrived today, and we never came across them because we’ve been too busy with the preparations...”
There was an obvious hole in that explanation, because if her parents were dragon shifters too, wouldn’t both Raul and the land itself have known? At least that was how Claire understood it worked.
Either way, even though she wasn’t certain at all what was going on here, there was a young girl all alone and lost inside this maze. And it had happened during an event she had organized, too.
“We have to find her. And then we have to get out.” Claire paused for a moment, biting her lips as she looked up the giant walls of ice that seemed to reach straight up into the sky.
Was that the sky? Or was the brilliant brightness above just the light of the sun shining down onto a ceiling of ice? Were they trapped inside a giant cave of ice?
“If you could
fly, we could see across the walls,” she said softly, hating to even suggest it.
She knew how Raul felt about what he called his weakness—even though there was nothing weak about him she could see. Still, right now there was a child waiting to be rescued...
Raul swallowed, then shook his head. “I can’t,” he said hoarsely. “I wish I could—but I can’t. The last time, it was my dragon taking control because you were in danger. I can’t make it consciously happen. And if I did... “
Claire nodded slowly. “I’m sorry. I know what it did to you the last time.”
He smiled grimly. “I’m really sorry. I fear that, even if you were in danger, I wouldn't be able to pull off what I did last time.”
She felt a sudden jolt of pain as she remembered the blood he’d coughed up. “You mean it gets worse every time you shift?”
“That’s why I gave up even trying, long ago.” Raul’s look was pained, as if it took him a lot to admit it. “Imagine it like a phone you can’t recharge. I’m almost out of battery.”
“Your dragon’s at one percent, huh?” she weakly joked, then cringed. “Sorry, that was tasteless. I saw the blood. If your dragon dies... you die with him. That’s it, isn’t it?”
Raul’s throat worked. Finally, he nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said again, his voice rough. “You deserve better. If I could shift, none of this would be a problem. We’d fly up until we could see the girl, grab her, and get the hell out of Dodge before Henrik’s lair decides that I’m a terrible intruder after all.”
Claire took a deep breath.
All right, calm down. This is a problem—but that’s what people hire you for. Impossible problems are your specialty, whether that’s the diva chef of a restaurant or a kid lost in a dragon’s magical ice lair.
“But we are wanted here,” she then said out loud. “There’s a kid crying for its mom, and you’re currently the dragon of the Snow Castle. Distant family or not, right now you’re the only one who can help, and this place knows it. So we go in and do our job—the human way. And then we’ll leave, and the lair can go back to doing whatever it is a lair does.”