Chapter Four
Sophia
I slept deeply, and when I awoke it took me several rapid heartbeats to figure out where I was. After a lifetime of waking in the same room, my world shifted as I remembered flying out my bedroom window.
I’d gone to sleep with the door closed, but now it was open with light filtering in from another part of the safe house. I made my way to the bathroom and emptied my bladder again, not sure I wanted to brave the added instructions for flushing solid matter with the little hose hooked on the side. If we were going to be here weeks, I’d have to figure it out, though.
I did my business and then worked the lever so the liquid went out of the bowl, and worked it again to close the drain. Instead of the urine smell I expected upon opening the drain, I was assaulted by a strong chemical smell.
Aaron looked up from his electronic gadget as I came into the living area, his smile telling me he was truly happy to see me. I had no idea if I’d slept two hours or twenty, though I felt well rested.
“What time is it?” I asked.
“Nearly noon. We’ll take the plastic off your mattress tonight — I’m surprised you slept so long with it crinkling under your sheets.”
I shook my head. “I’ve never put sheets on a bed before, and by the time I got them on and realized maybe the plastic should’ve come off, no way was I taking them off and starting over.”
He looked distressed as he said, “I’m sorry, Soph. I should’ve realized and helped you before I went topside.”
I waved my hand as if it were no big deal, and headed towards what I hoped was the kitchen. “Don’t apologize. I have a lot to learn about everyday life, I’m sure, and first up for today is figuring out how to scrounge breakfast.”
He stood and joined me. “The food here now is designed to keep for years. It’s either dehydrated or in cans, mostly, though I stored some dry staples like oatmeal and rice.”
“Oatmeal sounds good. Will you teach me how to make it?”
Somehow, Aaron didn’t make me feel stupid as he barely kept me from burning myself. Twice. He also didn’t talk down to me as he explained about putting the sugar in while it’s hot so it’ll all melt together, because if you put it in afterwards it’ll still be gritty. He’s always been a good teacher, and part of me looked forward to learning all kinds of things from him.
My governesses and various keepers and teachers had forbidden me from ever feeling anything sexual, and in a house full of shapeshifters, this didn’t just mean pretending not to be aroused, but staving it off completely. They could even smell sexual curiosity, so I’d trained myself to not let my mind wander even close to that direction.
However, working side by side with Aaron, alone, I had to fully concentrate on the task at hand to keep my body from reacting.
I’d seen people holding hands and even kissing, mostly at parties and dances we held in the ballroom. I’d read Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, and a few other books my tutors told me were risqué, though they’d advised I not focus so much on the romance but the writing styles.
Still, I wondered what it would be like for Aaron to kiss me.
Cyrano had held my hand since I turned eighteen, and had given me a chaste kiss on the lips as a hello or goodbye since I turned twenty-one, but he’d never kissed me with passion. We were always chaperoned so he hadn’t had a chance, but I wondered if he’d have wanted to even if there hadn’t been a minder around.
I’d been in a car alone with three men last night, and today I was in this house alone with Aaron. It felt naughty, just standing beside him learning to make oatmeal.
He let me eat half my bowl with casual conversation before he said, “We’re going to have to talk about some difficult subjects today, Soph. Some of them may embarrass you, but I hope you understand it isn’t my goal. I’ll try to make the discussions as easy as possible, but there are things I need to know in order to help us make plans.”
I nodded. “I’m not sure I can skin myself again. Flogging the skin off me hurts, but cutting it away myself? I only managed it because once I started I knew I’d never get another chance. It took me years to gather what was needed to defeat the stupid ankle bracelet.”
“Tell me about the ankle bracelet.”
“I was never sure why father brought someone in to make it for me, but it was designed so I could only turn on the three nights around each of the four calendar points. Since I had to be flogged in order to change, it never made sense, but I suppose it was insurance in case I managed to have a dalliance with the gardener or pool boy, to keep me from escaping.”
“Rumor has it you were never allowed to fly, and you were changed back to human as soon as you turned.”
“Yes. Not allowing a swan to turn four times a year is apparently a horrible ordeal, and is used as punishment for swans, sometimes. I’m told the pain lasts six months — so if you don’t turn on one solstice, you’ll hurt until the next. Same with the equinoxes.”
Aaron nodded. “I’m aware. I’ve seen grown men in the throes of the change for the entire six months, begging for someone to kill them to put them out of their misery.”
I took a breath. “Asking you to flog me is… it’s too much. If you can get me a scalpel or a crafting knife, which is what I used before, I’ll get myself out of my skin.”
Aaron shook his head. “No, Soph. I’ll flog you. I know how and I can keep it from being too terrible.”
I shook my head, “It’s always horrendous. There’s no way around it, but it isn’t as bad as being forced to cut myself out of my skin.”
He turned his face to me and said, “Cyrano did it? He didn’t try to make it good for you?”
I laughed, but it sounded bitter even to my ears. “He did it once, and it hurt so bad I screamed and cried and begged him to stop, but he just kept going. And then when I changed and tried to fly into the other room, Boris turned me back to human.” I took a bite, swallowed. “I was supposed to flog Cyrano, so he could change, but I begged him not to make me, so he said he’d have someone else do it. After that, he had Boris flog me. Six months later I asked him if we could try it again, but he said it hadn’t worked and Boris would be helping me change from now on.”
Aaron’s jaw clenched as he said, “Boris is an asshole. He’s the one who flogged you? Every damned time?”
I nodded, nervous at Aaron’s anger, and he seemed to pick up on my anxiety and calmed himself before saying, “Sophia, I promise I can flog you so it won’t be as horrible. There will still be bad parts, there’s no way around it when I have to whip you out of your skin, but I can keep it from being as bad as it’s been.” He took a breath and added, “Or, there’s the option of us fixing things so you don’t have to be flogged to change. No pressure, no discussing it right now, just know it’s one of the many possibilities we need to look at in the coming weeks.”
The only way to keep me from needing to be flogged was to take my virginity. I thought Aaron was saying he might take it, but I wasn’t positive and didn’t have the nerve to ask. I stared at my oatmeal, too mortified to look up, and he changed the conversation.
“My best case scenario isn’t so far from your fantasy scenario, Princess. In it, you and I rule together and you’re my Dragon Queen while I’m your Swan king, with a little k. You rule the Swans with my help, and I rule the Dragons with yours. There aren’t many of us left, but I hold a high position amongst the other Kings, and I’d love to have you as my Queen, if the two of us turn out to be as compatible as I believe we’re going to.”
I looked at him probably thirty seconds, going over his words in my head before daring to ask, “You’re a Dragon?”
He nodded. “I am, and there’s another cavern about a quarter mile from here, with a waterfall and a stream, where I can easily change and walk around, if you’d like to see me in my Dragon form. Maybe not today, but soon. I’d like to get you used to me, and show you how to ride me when you’re in human form, should we need to escape quickly
.”
“I didn’t know there were any Dragons left. They’re…you’re…supposedly extinct.”
He looked away, and I could hear the pain in his voice when he turned back to me to say, “We may as well be. There are three males left, no women.”
I looked at him, horrified, trying to figure out what to say.
He didn’t wait for me to figure it out, but said, “There are some things I need to explain, and you need to hear them from me, and you need to understand that while I may have put myself in a position to be in your life because of myth and lore — it’s only what put me in your life, not what is making me take care of you now. I truly do care for you, Soph, for the person you are on the inside.”
His thumb stroked absently over my skin and I silenced my body’s physical reaction to his touch before it could begin.
Aaron sighed, considered his words, and said, “I’ll just explain, and then try to convince you I care about you as my sassy Sophia, not just you as Princess Sophia Siyanko.”
He told me about his grandmother’s last words to him, and about all of the research he’d done over the centuries. I sat still, my oatmeal bowl long since empty, and listened to his story, my heart hurting as I realized what it could mean to him if he and I formed a couple. How could I be sure he loved me, and not the chance I could give him?
“Soph, I’m laying this all out now because I never want you to feel as if I’ve hidden things from you, and I especially don’t want you to think I only want you in my life because of what you might represent. You need to know I’ve cared for you, deeply, since you were an energetic and opinionated toddler, and you’ve amazed me more and more as you grew.” His thumb absently slid over my arm again as he spoke. “It might be true that you represent possibly the only hope the Dragon line can continue, and my only hope for having children, but it’s a long shot, and I adored you as a child and then had thoughts about you I shouldn’t when you began turning into a woman. I want you to be mine, but I know it may not be possible. I’m going to do everything I can to give you power, help you get to a place so you can rule your people as their Queen, and I hope you’ll choose to let me stand by your side as you take control and become your own woman. Your own Queen.”
I’d been in love with Aaron since, well, forever. And I’d had a huge crush on him since shortly before he had to stop teaching me once a week. If I could somehow help him bring the Dragons back from the brink of extinction, I wanted to.
“How would it work?” I asked. “A swan giving birth to dragons? I mean, swans lay eggs, and I’m assuming dragons do as well? So, there are some biological similarities. How do dragons normally conceive?”
“We have sex in dragon form, the female lays eggs, the couple takes turns sitting on them to keep them warm. The hatchlings come into the world as dragons and spend a few weeks learning to fly and control their fire before we shift them into human form. Dragon children can’t shift on their own until somewhere between six and ten, so their parents must handle the change for them. Learning to shift is hard, no one accidentally does it, so we’re kind of the opposite of most of the predatory shifters in that they have to control themselves to keep from shifting into their animal, and we need control in order to make the change.”
“Swans are hatched in our animal form as well, but you know that.” I hesitated and asked, “Do you think it has anything to do with true-love’s kiss?”
He shook his head. “No.”
I took a breath and asked before I could chicken out. “Could you kiss me anyway, just in case?”
Aaron’s gaze felt as if it penetrated my soul. “Do you know what you’re asking, Soph? I was prepared to give you a few days to get used to me touching your hand, your back, your face, before I tried to venture farther. You froze last night when I touched your back. I assume I’m going to be your first romantic kiss?”
I nodded, unable to talk, and he said, “You stole my heart at three, but I think I fell the rest of the way in love with you when I threw you in the river. It wasn’t a romantic love then, but it will be, now.” He shook his head and said, “It is, now.”
“I was seven!” I finally found my voice, and it came out in almost a shout.
“I know.” His smile was gentle, as if he was afraid of spooking me. “If I kiss you, it won’t be to test out your theory.” His eyes were intense. Dark. “We need to get to know one another better as adults, and have a lot of discussions about consequences and repercussions before we…” He stood, stepped to me, and pulled me from my chair, drawing me into the warmth of his arms. No one had ever held me like this, enveloping me, surrounding me, and I had to think about breathing as his heat and power surrounded me and threatened to overwhelm me. Holding onto my reactions was hopeless now, but this was Aaron and he’d never expected me to be someone I’m not.
“Not saying no, Princess. I’m giving you a chance to decide for sure, though.”
I leaned my head against the hard wall of his chest as I tried to get my heart to slow down. “Don’t call me Princess.”
“Deal with it.” No apologies. His voice was a rough scrape over my skin, but I understood. He wanted me to consider the ramifications of kissing him — and doing more than kissing — as not only Sophia, but also the Princess who might want to try to hold the reins as Queen, one day.
I needed to know more about him, about us, before I could decide. “You made this house, in this cave, to hide me.”
He stilled, frozen in time for a brief second, and then caressed my back. “To hide supernaturals, Soph. Every way into the cave has a body of water you must cross, and the air is sucked into the earth in this cave system and rarely blows out. The crystal formations in the area help camouflage both of our magical signatures, and with no ley lines close, not even the Fae have a hope of finding us.”
“Not many supernaturals have occasion to need to hide from the Fae.”
He chuckled and kissed the top of my head. I liked this, being so close to him, feeling the vibrations of his chest as I heard him laugh. His lips on top of my head, if only for a brief second, set my insides on fire.
“More of us need to hide from the Fae than you might think,” he said. “In my business, when someone comes to me needing protection it’s always good to have options.” His sigh told me he’d given up on me deciding whether I wanted a kiss, but when he tried to pull away, I held on. He relaxed and snuggled me back into him. “I’d given up on any hope of the Swans providing an answer, and then had to feel guilty when your mother died and the news came that there was one viable egg, and the Fae announced you were a girl. I felt grief for your father, and heartache for the child who would be born without a mother to raise her, but at the same time I felt a spark of hope. And then I got to know you, came to adore you, and later came to love you. Part of me wants to spirit you away to an island that shows up on no maps, and is out of bounds so the Fae can’t get to it from the Summerlands. I would make you fall in love with me, and try to figure out how to make it work…but I care too much about you. You’ve been locked away all your life, and if it kills me, or kills both of us, I’m going to do everything in my power to give you your freedom.”
I gave in to the sensory input snowballing in my brain. For the first time I my life I didn’t have to worry about revealing my body’s reactions, so I looked up, caught his gaze, and said, “Kiss me, Aaron. I don’t want to wait.”
His face came towards mine, slow, as if he were giving me a chance to change my mind. He ran his lips across mine, fast, hot. He paused, pulled back a few millimeters, and then touched his mouth to mine again, so languorous, delicate, and sensually slow my lips opened to him without my realizing it. I closed my eyes, relaxed into his arms, and let him have my mouth, let him do whatever he wanted with it.
His tongue encouraged mine to move, to do a kind of dance with his, and once I relaxed into the kiss, my lower body came to life in a way I’d never experienced and I pressed my thighs together, alarmed he’d smell wh
at he was doing to me.
The kiss grew from a slow, relaxed caress to an urgent, demanding, hungry claim. I felt as if he branded me, owned me, and if he hadn’t ended it I’m not sure I’d have been able to. I was breathless and speechless as I opened my eyes to see him watching me, his eyes so focused on me it felt as if he could see every thought in my head and wish in my heart. All I could do was smile, close my eyes, and rest my face against his chest. The quick fantasies I’d allowed myself while swimming laps in the pool, or while showering — places no one was likely to smell the scent of arousal — were nothing compared to the larger-than-life reality of Aaron Drake in person.
“If that wasn’t true love’s kiss then the real thing might be enough to give someone a heart attack,” I said into his chest. “I had no idea, Aaron. Is it always like that?”
He kissed the top of my head and his voice rumbled on my cheek through his chest. “No, that was an exceptionally good kiss. We have chemistry, Soph. I knew we would, but it’s nice to have reality live up to what I’d hoped for.”
Something occurred to me, and while I was sure Aaron knew everything there was to know about swans, I told him anyway. “I asked one of my governesses why swans had to be flogged to change until they were no longer a virgin, what the purpose of it could be, and she told me it’s so parents can protect their children during the vulnerable time between human and swan. She said we can be taken over, shifted into another species, during this critical time, so we must have someone close by to protect us until we have a husband or wife to be there for us.”
Aaron looked at me a few seconds and said, “I’ve never heard that. The reason is actually attributed to a curse, likely whatever curse was the origin of the Swan Lake story.” He looked at me a few seconds and said, “Sometimes, the old women of a species know more than the books, though. It might be something for us to keep in mind at some point in the future. I’m glad you told me.”
I nodded and leaned away from him, needing to break the physical connection, though I didn’t want to. I wanted to stay in his arms forever, but it felt naughty and good and…I needed some time to sort through everything I was feeling.
The Dragon King Page 4
