Loren’s expression turned grave and pensive, and Olivia placed her right hand over his on the arm of his throne, curling her fingers around to brush his palm. Offering Loren comfort just as Taryn had for him.
The longer Loren stared at Taryn, lost deep in thought as he mulled over what she had told him, the stronger the urge to fight him became, until all Bleu could think about was launching forwards, wrapping his hands around his prince’s throat and throttling him until he swore to never look at her again.
Gods, he was fucked.
It was rare, damn near unheard of, for an incomplete bond to view even a mated male as a threat, but that was exactly what he felt as he watched Loren staring at his damned mate. He wanted to gouge the bastard’s eyes out with his thumbs.
Bleu ground his teeth and pinned his gaze on the floor in front of his boots, breathed through the darkness that clogged his lungs and clawed at his heart. The voices of Taryn and Loren swirled around him, their words twisting in his ears into new ones, whispers of illicit lovers caught deep in a passionate tryst.
He curled his fingers into fists, dug his nails into his palms and wished he had his armour. He wanted his claws. He needed them.
“Bleu?” Taryn’s soft voice pierced the dark veil that had descended over his mind, a shaft of light that chased the shadows back.
He exhaled hard, releasing the breath he hadn’t realised he was holding, and looked at her, his strength draining from him together with the tension as it left his body and the images of Loren and Taryn locked in a wicked embrace.
He stared blankly at her, feeling empty.
Lost.
He needed to get away from this place. He needed to get far away from everyone. He was too dangerous right now, on edge and unfit to be around any male when Taryn was present.
“I will send men to speak with the Third King, as this dragon Tenak will strike those lands first in order to reach the elf kingdom,” Loren announced in English, filling the thick silence, giving Bleu a moment to pull himself back together.
Bleu expected to feel a reaction to the mention of Thorne, but he felt nothing.
It dawned on him that whatever he had felt for Sable, the mortal female now mated to Thorne, it was nothing compared with what he felt for Taryn.
He stared at his little dragon and a blush climbed her cheeks.
When he felt Loren’s gaze on him, he dragged his eyes away from her and faced his prince.
“I will relay that order and also issue notice to the First and Second Realms.” He needed a moment to breathe, a few minutes to an hour in which he could find his balance again and master his turbulent feelings.
Taryn would be safe under Loren’s protection. As soon as she was settled somewhere away from danger, he would leave for the demon realms, returning as quickly as possible to her.
Hopefully as a male able to be around another male without wanting to rip their throat out.
Loren shook his head. “Another will do that task. You are to find quarters for our guest. Perhaps on the second level?”
Bleu frowned at his prince. Loren was meddling. He had known the male for over forty centuries and he was atrocious at hiding it when he was up to mischief. It was right there in his violet eyes. He was placing Taryn on the second level because Bleu’s quarters were there and there was a vacant one right next door.
“The third floor would be a better choice,” Bleu shot back. “It is quieter and few reside there. The female might like some peace and some space away from us elves.”
His prince folded his arms across his chest, firmly shook his head, and barely contained the damned smile Bleu knew wanted out. “No. I am sure the female will feel safest closest to you.”
Bleu could almost feel Taryn’s blush. Or maybe it was his own damned one.
Loren’s lips were finally stronger than his will and they curled at the corners. Beside him, Olivia openly grinned.
Bleu scowled at both of them. “Very well, my prince.”
He turned on his heel and stormed down the aisle between the pale wooden pews, barely leashing his desire to grab Taryn’s arm to drag her with him. When he reached the arched door, he shoved it open and strode out into the corridor, and couldn’t bring himself to move any further.
The distance between him and Taryn already felt too great.
It tugged him back to her, filling him with a sensation that unsettled him.
It felt as if he had left his heart behind.
CHAPTER 28
Bleu paced the corridor, taking swift agitated steps across it, ignoring the two guards watching him as he waited for Taryn.
She appeared in the arched doorway and he immediately looked across at her, his steps slowing as he took her in, her beauty hitting him hard all over again, as if he hadn’t seen her in weeks, not seconds.
She flicked a nervous look at the two guards and hurried past them to him.
“You will be safe here,” he whispered in the dragon tongue but she didn’t look convinced.
He glared at the two guards, gently caught hold of her arm and led her away, back along the wide corridor, towards the entrance of the castle. He turned left before he reached it, leading her up a set of stone steps. Her fingers trailed over the carved balustrade, eyes on the leaves and small animals. Avoiding him.
Nerves still flowed through her, but this time they weren’t born of fear of the other elves in the castle.
They were born of fear of being alone with him.
The innocence behind those feelings had him pulling her into the vacant room beside his on the second level, kicking the wooden door closed and drawing her into his arms. He placed one hand against the back of her head and guided it to rest against his bare chest. She was still for a moment but then her arms were around him, palms pressing against his spine, holding him to her.
“I do not like that female.”
He smiled at that. Did she know how jealous she sounded?
“Olivia is mated to my prince,” he said and she drew back and frowned up at him, her eyes silently asking him whether that was meant to make a difference.
He could hardly say it should when he had threatened Loren for looking at her.
Those knowing eyes leaped between his.
“You are going to leave,” she whispered, her soft voice laced with a touch of fear and a hint of hurt.
“Not for long. I will only go to relay orders to my men and make sure the demon kings are warned about your brother.” Bleu lifted his hand and stroked his knuckles across her cheek. “You will be safe here.”
Taryn cast her gaze around the large room. It mirrored his. With a low line of cabinets against the dark grey stone wall to his right, and wardrobes lining the solid half of the side of the room to his left. Beyond those wardrobes was a huge opening that led into the bathing area.
Her eyes settled on the neat double bed directly opposite the door, against a wall lined with three tall arched windows that allowed light to flood the room, and widened.
Someone had put fresh sheets on the bed.
Fresh purple sheets.
Bleu ground his teeth, rubbed his left hand over his face and cursed Loren’s name in his head. This was taking meddling too far. His prince had already prepared the room for Taryn, and had intentionally ordered sheets that matched the beautiful colour of her hair and eyes, a deep shade of violet mixed with cream pillows against the wooden headboard.
He huffed and stomped across the room towards the bathing room.
The huge rectangular pool in the centre of it was empty just as he had expected. It seemed Loren hadn’t thought of everything.
He strode past the stone basins that lined the wall to his left, the mirrors above them reflecting him and bouncing light from the bedroom across the room, illuminating it together with a chandelier of glowing crystals that hung above the pool set into the floor.
He felt Taryn’s gaze on him as he crouched at the end opposite the entrance to the bedroom, grasped a thick metal
ring, twisted it and pulled upwards, opening the sluice gate. Steaming water thundered into the pool.
“It will take time to fill… but be sure to keep an eye on it.” He straightened and looked across the pool at her.
Her eyes were on the water.
Light washed over her right side, casting her left into shadow.
She wrapped her arms around herself and he was striding towards her, long legs devouring the distance between them, before she had even lifted her eyes to him. He pulled her back into his arms and closed his eyes as he held her, feeling her trembling.
“I will not be long.” He resisted the temptation to press a kiss to her hair and tried to think of something he could say to reassure her. He looked back at the pool. The water was barely an inch deep now. He clutched Taryn’s shoulders, gently eased her back and then caught her under her chin with his left hand and tipped her head up, so her eyes met his. “I swear I will be back before the pool is full.”
She glanced beyond him to it, something akin to sorrow in her eyes.
He found he never wanted her to look so sad again. He wanted her to always smile. He wanted her life to be happy and filled with joy. She deserved that after everything she had been through.
It was an impossible dream though, a desire he could never fulfil because her brother was coming and he was bringing war in his wake, and Bleu knew that she meant to continue with the mission she had taken on.
She meant to stop her brother.
Doing so was only going to hurt her, but taking her place as her brother’s executioner wouldn’t lessen the pain she would feel when her twin was taken from her.
He couldn’t see any alternative route to stopping the dragon either.
No matter how much he wanted to find one.
He had no love for the bastard, would gladly end him given the chance, but the thought of hurting Taryn tore at him and made him want to seek another path, one where she wouldn’t have to suffer the ordeal of losing the brother she so clearly loved.
“The pool is filling fast,” she whispered and raised her eyes to meet his. “You will not keep your promise if you do not leave now.”
“I know,” he husked, captured both of her cheeks in his palms and lowered his head, resting his forehead against hers. “But I cannot leave when you hurt so deeply.”
She placed her hands over his and smiled.
“I am tired. My vision weighs on my heart. That is all. I will rest while you do your work.” She pulled back and the wicked twinkle in her eyes made it even more difficult to drag himself away from her. “You are filthy too. Perhaps when you return… y-you should bathe?”
He knew what she had meant to say before her nerve had failed her and he nodded, wanting to growl at her that he was going to take her up on that offer she had wanted to extend to him, suggesting they should bathe together.
He backed off and forced himself to turn away, but she caught his wrist and he looked back at her.
“Wait.” She released him and he frowned, curious as to what she was doing when she grabbed a square of cloth from near the basin, wetted it and came back to him.
He raised an eyebrow at her as she tiptoed and rubbed the wet cloth over his face and then his hair and down his neck.
She settled back on her heels and preened her fingers through his wet hair in a way that felt too damned good. “There. Now you are more fit to meet with a king.”
He smiled. Would she ever stop seeing through him?
He had worded things in a way he had hoped would make her feel he was remaining in the castle as Loren had ordered, but she had seen straight through to the truth—he was going to speak with one of them himself.
He teleported his leathers away, not bothering to cover himself before he called fresh clothes to him, letting her get a quick flash of him naked. Her heartrate quickened, jacking his up with it, and desire flooded the link between them.
“I lied,” she rushed out and clenched her hands at her sides, flexed her fingers and curled them again, as if she wanted to grab hold of him and was resisting that desire. “I mean I did not lie as such… but I meant to say… earlier… w-when I talked about the pool…”
His smile widened as tight trousers appeared on his legs, hugging his thighs, followed by riding boots, and then his black knee-length jacket. The one with the pale blue embroidery on the two long rectangular tails on the front and the two on the back, around the cuffs and the stand-up collar. The one that he liked to save for special occasions because it was damned expensive and Loren had given it to him as a gift, but the cut was incredible and he thought it emphasised his physique, and he wanted to look handsome enough that his little dragon would want to eat him whole.
The hunger that filled Taryn’s eyes as she raked them over him said that he had been right to think it.
He stepped towards her and husked in a low gravelly voice, “You were talking about bathing with me.”
Fierce red coloured her cheeks, but then she straightened, looked him right in the eye and nodded.
“I wish to bathe with you.”
He liked that flash of courage in her eyes, that determination in her stance and the challenge in her tone.
He snaked his arm around her waist, hauled her close to him and feathered his lips up her throat to her ear and whispered into it, “You scrub my back and I’ll scrub yours.”
She trembled, a little squeak escaping her, a deliciously feminine sound that he wanted to hear again and again because it was so at odds with the dangerous side of his powerful little dragon that was all he had ever known. It made him want to stay and learn this new side of her, to learn everything about her, every little thing, leaving nothing hidden.
She tipped her head to one side, moaned as he tongued the lobe of her ear, melted against him before bracing her hands against his chest and pushing him back. He growled at her as she broke free of his grip, stealing herself away from him when he was hungry for more of her, and she planted her hands on her hips and glared at him.
“The pool is filling.”
He looked beyond her, cursed when he saw it was almost a quarter full.
“Stay here. Do not leave this room. Lock the door.” He pulled her to him for a quick hard kiss that had her gasping into his mouth and then teleported, intent on keeping his promise to her.
He wouldn’t break another one.
He appeared in the central courtyard and strode towards the arch in the high wall that led to the outer courtyard. The soldiers who had greeted him in a not so friendly fashion when he had returned with Taryn were gone, returned to their duties, leaving the orchard quiet. He didn’t need more than one shot at guessing where he would find his men.
He reached the pale garrison on the other side of the arch and took quick steps down the narrow corridor between the stable block and the main building. A grunt sounded from ahead and Bleu’s lips twitched into a smile.
Dacian was in his usual place in the arena, fighting Fynn for a change while Leif leaned against the wall, propped up on his elbows and shouting suggestions to the younger elf as he desperately tried to best the big warrior.
Good luck with that.
Bleu had fought Dacian before and the one time he had won, it had been a hard fought battle that had left him bed bound with strict orders to rest for three days.
He shrugged to himself. Dacian had had it worse though. The medical team had ordered him to rest for three weeks. The warrior male had grown close to losing his mind by the time his term in sick bay had finally ended. Bleu had never seen a male so glad to get back out onto the battlefield.
“Leif,” Bleu said and the noble male turned his head and looked over his shoulder at him before straightening and coming to face him. “I need you to relay information to the First Realm of the demons. Fynn and Dacian can hit the Second Realm.”
The two males in question broke apart and jogged over to him, both breathing hard and sporting a few new wounds.
“We are to warn them
that Tenak will be passing through their lands. He is amassing an army en route. They need to decide how to act… whether that is evacuating any villages along the path the dragon might take or fighting him… but warn them that Taryn, this dragon’s sister, has seen a vision of them fighting on the side of the elves in our kingdom in a great battle against her brother.”
All three males frowned at that and he could see they had questions, but he didn’t have time to answer them.
The damned pool was probably close to a third full now.
Leif’s frown stuck. “What of the Third Realm? The dragon lands are closest to that kingdom.”
Bleu nodded. “I will take care of informing King Thorne.”
He couldn’t send anyone else in his place, no matter what Loren had ordered. It was his duty to go to the Third Realm. None of his men had met the demon king who ruled it, but they had met with the First and Second Kings before, during their previous search for the dragon.
He waited for all three males to nod and willed his portal, vowing to thank Dacian later when he had more time and they were alone. Green-purple light chased over the contours of his body and the darkness embraced him, cold against his face and hands, and then dissipated to reveal the courtyard of the squat dark stone castle belonging to King Thorne.
Part of him had expected his clearance to use the portal that exited in the castle to have been revoked and to find himself bounced to the nearest public portal or back to the elf kingdom.
He hadn’t exactly been on the best terms with Thorne. He couldn’t quite imagine worse ones since they had both been after the same female. Sable.
He took a step towards the nearest demon warrior milling around the courtyard and then stopped when a revelation hit him.
He was testing himself.
Sable would be with her mate and part of him needed to know whether seeing her would affect him as it used to, when she had been unmated and even after she had made her choice.
The demon swung his way, hefted a great broadsword up onto his wide shoulder, and strode towards him, the huge muscles of his bare torso shifting with each heavy step and dark brown leathers reflecting the light from the braziers that burned around the courtyard. The male’s dusky horns flared, curling from behind his pointed ears and around on themselves, so they resembled those of a ram.
Possessed by a Dark Warrior Page 30
