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“I can.”
I remembered how he’d burned his enemies in the throne room after he’d beheaded his father.. My stomach dropped with a sickening thump.
“Come. Let’s say hello to Drakmir.” He guided me toward the giant, lounging beast. “Tell me, Drak. Have you any secret female fae lovers I should know about?”
Goll rested a hand on Drak’s snout, smirking.
“Enough.” I smiled. “You don’t have to mock me.”
The flicker of his smiling attention had my pulse racing again. “Tell me about Hava,” I said, watching him pet his dragon.
“What about her? Is everything going well with her?”
“I adore Hava, but she told me she’s half shadow fae. I thought wraith and shadow fae did not like each other.”
“They do not,” he assured me. “But that doesn’t mean there aren’t a few who won’t choose to mate with one another, regardless of their cultural differences.”
“I suppose,” I admitted. After all, there were many fae of both light and dark, enjoying one another’s company at the Borderlands.
And here I was mated to a dark fae king. It was simply unheard of inside the palace walls of Issos. Fae races typically stayed with their own kind.
“Hava came to me through another,” he said gently, “one of my trusted military councilmen, Morgolith. He had served under my father, but he’d left under his rule to serve the shadow fae instead. Before he left, he’d heard I was in hiding and found me. He introduced me to Hava who was a servant in the palace. She pledged to serve as my spy for she saw the kind of ruler my father was and didn’t approve.”
“No, I wouldn’t think she would. Hava is a kind fae.”
Goll nodded. “He promised to return when I was king, for it wasn’t as if he could help me in hiding. Everyone knew his face, and he’d be killed if my father caught him.”
“Has he returned?”
“He has. Some told me not to accept him back as he’d been a traitor to the last king, but the last king had thrown me in a dungeon for decades because of a prophecy.” He patted Drak, who’d done nothing but stare at us both. “Turns out the prophecy was right.”
I stepped forward and reached out my hand. Drak immediately tilted his giant snout toward me. I pressed my palm along his jaw and rubbed his soft scales.
“As a child of two dark fae whose people despised one another,” he continued in that soft voice that I found completely enchanting, “Hava wasn’t welcome among the shadow fae. Both her parents had died, and she needed a new home. A safe place to land.”
“I’m surprised Xakiel took her in.”
“He took her as a servant. But I trust her as a loyal friend.” He was quiet for a moment, no longer petting Drak, his gaze distant. “No one will trouble her in my palace.”
“She is very endearing.”
He smiled, turning his lovely expression upon me. For that was the only way to describe how he looked with a genuine, soft smile on his beautiful face. It wasn’t a sardonic or lascivious one or the typical cold, hard façade he wore so often. For the first time, I felt like I was with the young fae who saved me from death, from that infernal dungeon.
“She is,” he agreed, his gaze dropping to my mouth. “As are you.”
A spark of fear shot through me, but I wasn’t afraid of the heady desire heating his gaze. I was afraid that I liked it. A wash of shame had me glancing and stepping away, closer to Drakmir. How could I so easily open my emotions to the man who forced me to give myself to him to save my people? How could I be attracted to the king who had killed so many of my own?
As I stroked Drak quietly, the dragon lifted his head, his glowing silver-blue eyes focusing intently on mine. That’s when I felt the buzz of his magick rippling into my palm and fingertips. I gasped softly, and then I was no longer there in the moonlight. His thoughts became my own as I slipped into his mind, into his memory.
I growled and snarled, the chains cutting into my throat and back leg. The three demon fae with giant black wings and thick horns laughed at me. The one with a whip lashed it in the air, snapping it across my snout. It stung painfully.
I bellowed another roar, furious and frustrated. I was in a small cave somewhere with nowhere to run, no way to escape the cruelty of these demons who imprisoned me.
The big one lifted the whip again. I bellowed another roar in rage, awaiting the pain that had lashed me for so long. Then another demon stepped into the mouth of the cave and kept walking on silent steps. This one had no wings, but he seemed familiar. His gaze met mine, and I knew. He was a brother of old.
The new demon whispered an ancient word, and flames leaped from his hands, lighting the three cruel demons afire. A burning sensation deep in my chest told me that one day, my own fire would come and one day, I would call flames to my aid just as this demon had. I was too young yet.
The fire demon ignored the screaming, burning fae and stepped toward me with hands outstretched, saying soft words that calmed me. I did not fear when he lifted a blade, for I knew he was my brother. He sliced through the air and the chains fell upon the cave floor, setting me free.
