by Anya Nowlan
“Until I don’t need it any more to know when you’re in danger.”
“How’s that going to hap… oh.” Devon chuckled at her curiosity and then the face she made at the realization. He wasn’t going to correct her guess. He didn’t mind her imagining him in whatever way she was imagining him right then and there. If anything, he preferred knowing that her mind could wander down that path, though he’d guessed as much from the way she’d kissed him back.
The distance between them was scarce at best, and on an impulse, Devon slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her into him, pressing her against his hard body. She squirmed a little, and his fingers spread on the small of her back, letting his heat travel through her. Her green eyes shimmered as she looked at him, and for a moment, they seemed to be shining brighter than all the gold in the caverns. Gemma’s hands were resting on his chest, and she pushed against him just a little, enough to make him want to pin those wrists down and ravage her right on the roof.
Behave, the annoying little voice reminded him. He was beginning to hate that voice. He would have much rather gone with the ancient rites – just spread her on a pile of gold and ram into her until she couldn’t help but love him. That’s how the forefathers had done it. Every time he had to deal with her petulant personality, he saw more and more worth in following tradition rather than forging his own painful path.
“Now, how about you stop toying around with the dragon stone and tell me what it is that you want, Gem? There must be a reason why you keep making me run after you, searching through the house and worrying sick for you several times a day. What is it that you desire?” he asked, trying to keep his voice level, though it was hard to do when his cock stiffened and his urges roared ever louder, right along with his dragon.
“I want you to let me go,” she said defiantly, as he’d expected. He scoffed.
“I thought we talked about that, Gem. If I let you go, I’m just going to have to burn down Gold Valley, and then no one’s going to be happy. Not you, not me. And hell, I’d probably just marry you anyway, seeing as I’m getting so accustomed to having you around.” He flashed one of his predatory grins at her, and she didn’t seem to appreciate it. No matter, she’d learn. Gemma pouted a little, and his eyes traced the contours of her plush lips before peeking lower at her delicious cleavage. The things he would have given to have her naked and moaning in his arms right now.
“Fine. Then tell me why me?” she asked, her tone insistent, though a scarlet blush was creeping along her cheeks. He’d learned by now that if he stayed close enough to her, he could make that lovely blush appear that travelled all the way down to her chest. It had become a bit of a game to see if he could make her gasp and blush before she could drive him to the brink of rage. So far, they were roughly even.
“How could it be anyone else?” he asked simply, letting the gold seep out of his eyes and the brilliant blue take its place. She glowered at him, but seeing as she relaxed the slightest bit, he knew his words had to have carried some weight. Gemma was so small and delicate in his arms, though she was a woman with just the kind of curves he lusted after. He towered above her, but unlike any other woman before her, he really did not want to go wrong with this one. “And I doubt it’s just that. I think you like having me go a bit crazy because of you.” He leant in closer, whispering into her ear now, his hot breath on her silken skin. “I think you can’t get enough of me, princess.” She shuddered a little.
With a sigh, he let go of her, and he thought he almost saw some disappointment in her. He knew he couldn’t overplay his hand, but damn was it hard to keep himself from throwing caution to the wind. Devon would much rather have been reenacting that night on the path than being good – a concept dragons barely grasped to begin with. He fished the bracelet out of his pocket, remembering the heaviness of it now that he was no longer entangled with her.
“It made me think of you,” he said, placing it in her palm without expecting her to reach for it. He brought her something gorgeous every day, and every day she would barely accept it, never wearing it. His heart thudded even louder in his chest now that he was handing her the bracelet than when he had been holding her, the action of giving her something from his hoard so intimate that he might just as well have been signing the deed to his heart over to her. The sapphire sparkled in the sunlight, fitting perfectly with her complexion. Without another word, he stalked off, his guts twisting inside him.
She’s going to drive you mad, Devon, he told himself. But to his own surprise, he smiled at the thought. Would it really be such a bad way to go, driven to insanity by a woman unlike any other?
CHAPTER TEN
Gemma
Gemma was becoming sick and tired of the Blackwing mansion. Over the course of the last few days, she’d become intimately introduced to just about every nook and cranny she could get to within the huge building, and as far as she was concerned, it was all getting a bit boring. At first, she’d just wandered the halls, looking at the stunning pieces of art that graced the walls and gasping at the many wonders the dragons had hoarded into their home. But with every precious masterpiece she saw, the novelty wore thinner, until she could barely muster up any enthusiasm at the beautiful pieces and gorgeous architecture that made up the mansion.
Mind you, she knew very well it had little to do with the mansion itself, and much more to do with the fact that she couldn’t really go anywhere but the mansion.
So, after a while, she’d figured out how to amuse herself. The curious pendant that Devon had given her was now always on her. Whenever she found a particularly hidden corner in the mansion or a room that seemed hard to get to (like one of the studies, with its entrance hidden behind a stone column in the main library, or the den that took three different staircases to finally access), she would palm the dragon stone and think of Devon.
She knew she was supposed to use it only when she was in danger – and when was that going to happen, what with her stuck in the mansion – but an opportunity to give the self-centered dragon a taste of his own medicine was just too good to pass up. In a matter of minutes, the man would show up, hissing and grunting, sometimes with steam coming out of his nostrils and his eyes gleaming with gold, looking for whatever danger was out to get her. Each time, he would relax when he saw that she was okay, and each time he would lecture her on the fair use of dragon stones and how dragons were not dogs to be called to heel whenever a princess was bored. To that, she just huffed.
If the dragon didn’t want to heel, he shouldn’t have made her a princess.
Other than playing pranks on the man, Gemma found herself with little else to do but think and study. She’d always loved reading, so being allowed into the Bluewing library was a real treat for her. Seldom had she even heard of books as old as the ones the dragon family had hidden away on the shelves, let alone been able to touch them.
Many were bound in thick scaly hides – dragon skin as Devon had confirmed – and adorned with gemstones. When asked about whether it wasn’t a bit odd to have books wrapped in the skin of his people, Devon had chuckled. Apparently dragons shed their skins, much like snakes, but they leave an almost intact replica of themselves every decade or so, which makes for great leather binding for books. Who knew?
Gemma ate up the information and attacked the books with great curiosity. It was a bit of a disappointment to find that ancient dragons weren’t as fond of writing in English as they were in their own tongues, but she still learned a great deal.
She spent almost every afternoon curled up in one of the large red velvet chairs in the library, poring through the ancient writings and trying to make sense of, well, just about everything. Today was no exception. After that morning’s confrontation with Devon on the roof that left her heart beating wildly in her chest, Gemma had slunk off to the library to distract herself from the dragon in the room. Her attraction for Devon was growing harder to ignore by the day, and it was starting to mess with her head.
A few
times, she’d wondered if the reason she’d called for Devon when she was in a secluded spot in the mansion was because she really wanted to make him run and aggravate him, or whether it was just that she wanted to see him. Being around him and remembering the kiss they had shared that seemed both like forever and just a few seconds ago, made her stomach tense and her nerves tingle. It was the kind of kiss that stayed with a woman, wrapping her in a soft, hot cocoon of need and excitement, and Gemma was finding herself more and more hungry to recreate the moment.
No, you’re supposed to be mad at him. He’s keeping you locked up in his mansion! His servants track your every move! He’s an asshole with too much money and power to care about anything other than what is best for him. But that kiss… And the way he looks at me every time he bursts into the room, like if I was gone or hurt, his world would crumble… What about that?
Gemma shook her head, annoyed at herself. There she went again, getting all romantic. Gemma thumbed through the book – another heavy tome with ragged old pages that felt like parchment under her fingers, its covers adorned with rubies. She couldn’t read a word of it, as it was written in some dragon tongue that read like Chinese to her, but unlike most others, this one had illustrations. She was just studying an image that showed two great dragons locked in battle – one somewhat distinctly snub-nosed and dark with two silver-gold horns like Devon’s, and the other, graceful with elongated features and a particularly long face that made him look both bored and aggressive at the same time – when the door to the library cracked open.
Gemma, sitting with her back to the entrance, heard some voices speaking in hushed tones and peeked behind her chair. She frowned a little, recognizing Devon’s voice in the tin. It sounded like someone, most likely Jolly, as the man seemed to be fixed on his heels like a tiresome puppy, replied something to Devon, and then a pair of padding footsteps headed further as Devon slunk in and closed the door behind him. Immediately, Gemma felt a blush creeping up her cheeks.
He was wearing dark denim and a V-neck black tee that showed her just a peak of that perfectly formed chest of his that she’d been pressed against just a few hours ago. He walked towards her, his blue eyes glinting with mirth, and his step that of a seasoned predator, long and almost soundless. Every move he made was fit for a beast who knew his worth and power, and watching him was doing things to her that she wished it wasn’t. For instance, she wondered what he would look like without that shirt covering his muscles – a thought that did nothing to make her blush wane.
She sighed to herself, miffed at her own weakness and the effect he had on her, and turned her eyes back to the book. Her fingers had been left splayed across the illustration, tracing the body of the long, menacing looking lighter-colored dragon. The black and white image left one to imagine the colors of the animals, but she had a good enough idea, which dragon families were being depicted. Gemma tried to make herself busy with the book, but out of the corner of her eye, she tracked Devon as he pulled up another heavy, plush chair slightly across from her.
He sat down with a heavy exhale, as if the weight of the world had just been lifted from his shoulders. He leant towards her with a light smile on his lips, and she could feel herself cracking under his gaze. It was the kind of smile she liked – the nice kind, the kind that made her want to smile back, not the one that broadcasted to the whole world how he knew better and shouldn’t be messed with.
Devon peeked at the book she was thumbing through, and his expression clouded for just the slightest of moments, Gemma catching the way his clasped hands squeezed together tightly like he was trying to keep them from balling into fists. When she looked up, his face had cleared and his hands had relaxed like nothing had happened at all.
“I see you’re making your way through the library,” he said conversationally, his white teeth flashing as he smiled. She had noticed that the dragon within him was always so close to the surface. If one were to meet the man or see him on the pages of tabloids, they could never tell, but after seeing his dragon in action, the animal was unmistakable about him, just underneath the skin.
“I am. I wish your ancestors acquired more books in English, though,” she said, smiling back despite her best efforts not to do so. Damnable man, it was impossible to stay impassive when he was around.
“Well, dragonkin don’t tend to speak much English amongst themselves. Or any human language, really. You’d think we only communicate through grunts and firestorms, but we can be surprisingly eloquent,” he said, motioning at the finely written lettering, beautiful to behold even if Gemma had no idea what the words said.
“So what’s this about?” she asked, pointing at the picture of the fight she’d been looking at. “This dragon looks like you and the other one looks like the red dragon that almost knocked me off the path when I first came to see you. A Redblade, right?”
Devon chuckled a deep sound that came from his chest and seemed to rumble through her. She liked his voice, even if most of the time she hated what he was saying. There was a musical, low quality to it that made her see how he could easily have been one of the dragons singing those breathtaking songs she’d heard when Dayton Bluewing was being put to rest.
“You’re very observant. Yes, those are a Redblade and a Bluewing, but the picture’s a bit misleading. If I remember correctly, this shows one of the battles for Head of Council, back when things were settled by blood. If you notice, the feeling this image gives you is that the Redblade is winning. The Bluewing, my ancestor Daedalus Bluewing, was the one who set up the original council. It was bigger then, with more families, and the Redblades always assumed that they should be the Head of Council as they were the biggest family back then. Roman Redblade is the one shown here, fighting against Daedalus.”
“What happened?”
“Well, if you could read Dragobir, the language this is written in, then you would learn that Roman and Daedalus fought many great battles against one another to determine, who was the greater of the two. Factions formed on both sides, and it became clear that no order could be restored without one of them being the victor. But though their methods were different, they were evenly matched in most respects – both strong, capable leaders of their families.
Of course, this book would tell you that Daedalus survived the first fights because of treachery and deceit, and when he finally slayed Roman on the tenth day of battle during the gold moon, it was because he had cast a spell to make Roman blind and then ripped out his heart when he couldn’t see the attack. Killing a brother when he is defenseless is thought to be the greatest offense for dragons, and ever since, the Redblades and Bluewings haven’t been the best of allies.”
Gemma cocked a brow at him. “But that’s not all that happened?” Devon shook his head, grinning a bit.
“Well, depends on who you believe. The book you’re holding was written by the Redblades.” Devon stood up and crossed to a shelf in the far end of the room. He reached up and snaked a book out of one of the higher shelves. Similarly to the one Gemma was holding, it was covered in dragon scale and gems, but that one was blackish blue with sapphires, while Gemma’s was clad in red and sanguine rubies. He plopped back down in the chair, looking almost ridiculously at ease and eagerly flipping through the old parchment pages. It was a stark contrast to when he was at his strictest, all glares and snarls.
“This, however, is written by a Bluewing. It says that the fights were all even, yes, but Roman would retreat before things could turn against him. Finally, during the gold moon, he couldn’t retreat any longer, as doing so would have meant forfeiture, and dragons don’t give up. So when Roman tired, Daedalus overpowered him and gave him a chance to give up and stop contesting the Head of Council position or die. He chose death. Ever since, the Redblades have held it against us. And I think that because Roman died, they still think they can contest the position whenever they’re in a foul mood.”
Devon stopped on a page depicting the same battle as the one she was looking at
, but the image was as if the polar opposite. The Bluewing stood proud and strong against the Redblade, who was cowering low as if surrendering. Every child in Gold Valley knew the stories of the great dragons and the way that the skies had been black with their wings when the town was first founded, the mighty beasts sometimes so numerous that they blocked out the sun.
Many families had disappeared altogether over the centuries – either died out or overtaken by others – leaving only the strongest of the dragonkin to rule Treasure Lane. But it seemed the light, wondrous stories she had read and known as a child were a far cry from the tales the dragons themselves had, spiked with blood, vengeance and the most ruthless of politics. She pursed her lips a little, peering at the picture he showed her, the words underneath it written in a similar style but reading quite differently. They must have had their own language in the family as well.
“So you don’t really know what happened? You can only guess? Your kin thinks that the story they have is the right one, and the Redblades believe in theirs, right?”
“That’s about the gist of it, yup. But I’d rather trust a long-dead Bluewing than a Redblade with a pulse, and I can only assume they feel much the same towards us.” Devon closed the book and put it on a small table next to Gemma that was already littered with books.
She could feel his eyes scanning her, as if searching for something, and his smile turned downward a little.
“You’re not wearing anything I’ve given you,” he said softly. Gemma looked up at him, and that blush she’d been working so hard to get rid of was back in full force. Her table in the bedroom was littered with boxes of jewelry, each more stunning than the one that came before it, and the bracelet he had given her that morning still sat in one of her pant pockets. She’d looked at each piece, admiring it with the kind of reverence it deserved, but she hadn’t dared wear one.
It somehow felt wrong to accept gifts from him, even if he had a fortune vaster than most developed countries. But the way he looked at her now, a hint of sadness in those gorgeous eyes of his, almost made her want to run to her bedroom and put them all on at once.
