“You really had no idea?” Grigori brushed a lock of her hair back from her face, his eyes pensive.
“That’s crazy. I can’t be . . . I mean, I would know if I wasn’t human right?”
The brothers exchanged looks and Grigori said something in Russian and with a sigh, Rurik came closer, kneeling down beside her.
“Don’t . . . blast me like that again.” Rurik warned in a low voice. There was a bite to his tone that startled her.
“I don’t even know how I did it. Is that bad?” Her body was shaking from exhaustion. She tried to get up but fell into Grigori’s arms.
“Rurik, she can’t even stand. She won’t be able to do that again anytime soon.” Grigori scooped her up, cradling her in his arms as he and Rurik headed back to Grigori’s home.
“But what did I do? What am I?” Madelyn asked, her voice trembling. She felt weak and scared, and all she knew was that she just demonstrated some kind of ability that knocked two dragons out of the sky and forced them to shift back into human bodies.
“You . . .” Grigori paused as he reached the front door. “Are a thunderbird. One of the few, if not the only, natural enemies of dragons. It’s why you terrify my brother.” He chuckled.
“You’re damned right I’m terrified. She could have killed us.”
“But I didn’t want to hurt either of you. I just wanted you to stop killing each other,” Madelyn explained. Suddenly there was a rush of noise as servants hurried over to them, all talking hastily in Russian, their eyes wide and expressions fearful. Grigori spoke soothingly and calmly and then when the panic finally died down he issued orders.
“Please prepare the three dinner trays for the main library. We will dine in there tonight.”
One of the older men, probably the head butler or whatever the Russian equivalent was, nodded and waved his hand at the fleet of maids and footmen. They all scampered away, leaving Grigori to walk down the hall. Rurik trailed behind them.
“Are you going to tell me more about thunderbirds?” Madelyn gave an experimental kick, hoping he realized she was capable of walking now, even if it did feel nice to be carried. When he held her, she felt safe. The panicky, shivery sensation under her skin vanished completely.
“We will tell you as much as we know, but I’ve never met one before today. thunderbirds are rare, and for the last few years we believed your race may have been extinct,” Grigori said, his tone sounded softer, a pitch of sorrow to it that Madelyn didn’t understand.
“Extinct?” The thought of belonging to something that was possibly gone forever left her hollow inside. And then she realized something. “Does that mean my biological parents were thunderbirds?”
“They would have to be. At least one of them. I’m not sure if they are like dragons. We must breed with female dragon shifters to produce drakelings,” Rurik said as he moved ahead of them and opened the door.
“What are drakelings?” Madelyn tapped Grigori on the shoulder, hoping he would let her down now.
“That’s our word for children.” Grigori tossed his pale hair out of his eyes before he carried her into the room.
“Wait, you have to be with other dragons to have kids?” A slice of pain cut through her heart. If that was true, then she and Grigori couldn’t have children.
“Yes,” his solemn gaze fixed on hers and she could see he was thinking the same thing.
“Oh,” she let out a breath, trying to ignore the stabbing hurt inside her. He lowered his head to hers, nuzzling her cheek.
“It doesn’t matter to me. You are what matters to me. Now,” he cleared his throat. “I’ve been dying to show you what I hope will be your second favorite room here—aside from my bedroom, that is.” His chuckle warmed her and she saw what he was trying to do. Distract me from my heartache, and his. And I adore him for it.
She glanced around the room they entered and her heart stopped. This was more than a library. It was a heaven just for books. The tall room was filled with cherrywood bookshelves that required ladders in several places to reach the top shelves. Late afternoon sunlight bathed the beautiful room in gold. Grigori carried Madelyn to a couch and set her down. He then glanced at Rurik.
“I’m going to fetch a shirt.” Then he placed a quick, heated kiss on her lips and left the library.
Rurik kept a discreet distance away from her.
“I didn’t mean to . . . hurt you or . . . scare you.” She wrapped her arms around her chest, feeling vulnerable, and frankly like she was a ticking time bomb. What if it happened again? That’s probably why Rurik looked ready to dive behind the nearest couch and take cover. He didn’t say anything, and the silence bothered her.
“Are you really afraid of me?” she challenged. His lack of response rankled her. She hadn’t wanted to hurt him and she definitely wasn’t going to now. She had a sixth sense that her skin would warn her when a pulse of air was building again.
“Am I afraid?” Rurik phrased the question carefully as he placed his muscled arms on display when he crossed them over his chest. “Yes. You alone scare me when nothing else for centuries has. Grigori hasn’t told you, but thunderbirds killed our parents. If he wasn’t falling in love with you, he wouldn’t be so blind to the danger you present. You could kill us.” He paused, his arms dropping to his sides, his hands balled into fists. The aggressive move made her skin prickle in her and his nostrils flared.
“I couldn’t smell that part of you until I turned into a dragon. I was going to kill you, but he stopped me.”
“Why?” She’d seen that moment in Grigori’s eyes when his beast to consider killing her but then decided against it. Was Rurik right? Was Grigori falling in love with me as much as I’m falling for him?
“Only he can tell you. It’s not my place.” He relaxed slightly. Madelyn relaxed too, but she didn’t miss the combative glint in his brown eyes.
“I don’t want to be your enemy,” she said.
“You don’t get a choice. We’re two apex predators. We can’t get along.”
Madelyn considered his words. “We don’t have to fight. I believe in choices and I choose not to be a creature destined to destroy or be destroyed.”
Rurik opened his mouth, but Grigori came back into the library. He now wore a black T-shirt like Rurik and she marveled at the resemblance. Rurik was gorgeous in a scarred, scary sort of way, but Grigori . . . he was a fallen angel. One that sent a rush of erotic thoughts through her. He approached her and sat on the couch, caging her in as he leaned in close to inhale her neck.
“The rain,” he mused. “I understand now. You smell like it when you feel something strongly. You summon the storms.” He feathered his lips over her skin and a distant rumble of thunder outside made her jump. Grigori chuckled.
“But I hate the rain,” she protested.
“Only because it comes from your pain, but it can come from joy and . . .” He nuzzled her cheek. “Arousal. Don’t be afraid of what you are, Madelyn.”
Even if we are destined to destroy each other?
She closed her eyes and gripped the neck of his shirt, pulling him the last few inches until their mouths met. In just one hour her entire life, everything she understood about who she was and where she’d come from had been obliterated. When she kissed Grigori, the fear faded. The feel of his lips, the taste of him on her tongue, and a deep sense of rightness of being close to him was stronger than the pulsing of her powers beneath her skin.
I choose my destiny. I choose Grigori.
* * *
Dimitri Drakor reclined in his black leather chair in his private apartments near the Kremlin, thinking. He’d been prepared to call for an immediate battle with Grigori yesterday, but then he’d caught a glimpse of the other man’s tattoo. And a new plan formed. One he was quite certain would succeed. He picked up a framed photo from his desk. The picture of his son Ruslan on his six hundredth birthday. Ruslan was grinning cockily at the camera, ready to take on the world. Dimitri smiled.
He had wanted great things for his family and for his son. But Ruslan was dead and that legacy was a phantom. Dimitri was over three thousand years old and he felt the passage of time more and more, the grains dropping piece by piece into an hourglass.
He would’ve been honored to die at his son’s hands, but he was facing a new destiny now. He brushed the pad of his thumb over Ruslan’s face in the photograph. His heart, while mostly black, still beat and bled for his family. Ruslan had been his chosen heir, his firstborn son, but his favorite child was actually his daughter Tasha.
She was too softhearted. Russia was no place for a beautiful softhearted dragoness. The wilds of Russia were harsh and uncompromising, and if Tasha had stayed with him she would have to have been guarded daily for her own protection. The other Drakor dragons would have hungered for her and he didn’t want her, his darling Tasha, to be bred by any male who would not treat her as the gem she was. Tasha deserved a mate and she would not find a worthy one among the Drakors.
Dimitri stared at the picture of Ruslan again and scowled. He couldn’t let thoughts of Tasha soften him. He needed to focus on vengeance for his son. Grigori Barinov had found his mate, that auburn-haired woman at the office. The human. Dimitri smiled coldly. They were not fully mated yet, but they would be soon. The tattoo had told him that much, the dragon crouching over the nest. It was why he agreed to postpone the fight by two weeks. He wanted to give Grigori time to claim his mate and fall in love with her. And then, once Grigori was hopelessly smitten and attached in every way to his beloved human . . . Dimitri would strike.
He would kidnap the woman and use her to destroy the head of the Barinov family. And then there would only be one left. Rurik, who would be unstable after watching his brother die, would be easy to kill. And Mikhail, the dragon who hadn’t been seen in two hundred years. Dimitri doubted he was even still alive.
And once all the Barinovs were gone, the Drakors would rule all of Russia. He set the picture of Ruslan back down and placed his hands behind his head in a pose of relaxation. He began to hum a Russian lullaby and smiled.
Chapter 13
Dragons beget dragons, and phoenixes beget phoenixes.
—Chinese Proverb
She was a thunderbird.
Grigori still couldn’t believe it. He’d never seen one before, but every drakeling was told stories about them. They were fierce shifters that in one blinding instant transformed from humans into birds of lightning and thunder. They could drop from the sky and break the sound barrier. And when they flapped their wings in a particular way they could create a sonic boom. The vibration was powerful enough to kill a dragon.
It was how his father had died, he had cornered a pair of thunderbirds, and when they fought back he’d been killed. His mother hadn’t been able to survive her grief. She died only a few days later. She’d had only enough time to call Grigori and tell him what happened and where she was. When he caught the first flight to the U.S., he’d arrived just in time to hold her hand as she passed away.
Any other dragon would have wanted revenge on the creatures that killed his parents, but Grigori didn’t believe that his father was right in hunting down another species simply because they had a natural power which could kill him.
And he’d never hurt Madelyn. He stared at her, her skin warm and soft beneath his hands as he stroked her cheeks. She was his mate. A thunderbird. He wasn’t even sure that was possible, but he could not deny how he felt.
His little mortal human was . . . not mortal or human.
“Grigori, you have to tell me everything about thunderbirds,” Madelyn said. There was a desperation in her eyes, a need to understand who she was that he understood all too well. He settled closer to her on the couch in the library.
“I will,” he promised. “I don’t know everything, but I will tell you all that I can.”
“Brother, you are a fool to mate our greatest enemy,” Rurik growled in Russian so Madelyn couldn’t understand.
“She is my mate. I may not understand how or why, but I will not question the gift I have been given. Don’t you see? She’s immortal.” He would not die another sixty years, not like he’d expected to. No, he’d been given a mate who can walk beside him for the next several millennia. It was a beginning. Not an ending.
“I really hate when you guys do that.” Madelyn was frowning, a light furrow on her brow.
“Do what?” he and Rurik asked at the same time.
“Speak in Russian. I can’t understand you. I recognize words here and there but you talk too fast.”
“That’s the point,” Rurik replied darkly.
“But—”
The library door opened and the butler rolled in with a tray. There was hot soup, a selection of roast beef, and a bottle of wine from the cellar.
“Thank you.” Grigori nodded to the servant who nodded back, bowed and left the room.
“Come and sit at the table,” Grigori stood and took Madelyn’s hands, lifting her to her feet. “We will eat and I will tell you everything I know about what you are.”
They gathered at one of the lacquered reading desks. Rurik, after a reluctant grimace, sat down with them and poured wine into their glasses while Grigori passed out bowls of soup. “No one knows where thunderbirds come from. They were born far back in the mists of time, like dragons and phoenixes.” Grigori sipped his wine.
“Wait, phoenixes are real?” Madelyn’s eyes were wide as she listened to him eagerly.
“Oh, yes. Phoenixes are cousins to thunderbirds, but they cannot die, only be reborn. Thunderbirds are immortal like dragons, but like us you can be killed.”
“Okay.” Madelyn’s eyes were still wide that she was focused on him. He could tell that the fact that she would live several millennia still hadn’t set in.
“You have a mortal form, but you can shift into a bird, a large one. Think of an eagle only a lot bigger.”
She raised her hands, and he knew what she was trying to picture. Her body covered in feathers.
“What do I look like? As a bird I mean?” she asked.
“I’m not sure. I’ve never seen one before. I think you might be gold feathered with a bit of red, but that’s all I know.” No dragon had lived to tell what a thunderbird look like when it wasn’t in a pulsing position. Except his father, who had killed a few but rarely spoke of it. That was the problem with creatures that were natural enemies. You never knew what the other one looked like until it was too late.
“Why didn’t I know what I was before now? I mean, I would’ve changed before, right?” She was forgetting to eat and that bothered him. She needed to regain her strength.
“Eat, little one,” he ordered, but kept his tone gentle.
Rurik chuckled, and he shifted a little closer to them. It amused Grigori that his fearless brother was petrified of an innocent young woman simply because of what she was capable of. They were all capable of dark and terrifying things. The dragons more so than the thunderbirds.
He waited until Madelyn took a drink of her wine and ate several spoonfuls of her soup.
“I know that dragons come of age around thirteen or fourteen, but it might be different with you. Some species need to be awakened.”
“Awakened?” She nibbled on a piece of bread before she dipped it into her soup. Grigori leaned back in his chair, studying her.
“Yes, some transitions or shifts are latent. A creature can be awakened after being around a possible mate or . . .”
“An enemy,” Rurik cut in. “Being around us might have awakened your powers. We are your natural enemies.”
“Okay, what about. . . .” she blushed. “Mates. What about them?”
Grigori exchanged glances with his brother. “Mates are a little different for each species. Dragons mate for life, and search the world for their true mates.”
“How can you tell who a true mate is?” From the way she was watching him, he had a feeling she was replaying every sexual encounter they had. Would she guess th
e truth? He was hesitant to tell her. She’d only just had her life turned upside down and he didn’t want to make that any worse by throwing a mate situation at her.
“Well, when you kiss you share . . . emotions, memories, and your very soul. There’s also an insatiable desire for the other person, a kind of frenzied lust, and yet it softens when you touch, like fur blankets and fire.” He tried to explain, but he could tell she didn’t understand.
Rurik coughed loudly and Grigori thought he heard his brother utter the word idiot under his breath.
“It’s like catching a scent you are drawn to and once you smell it, it’s inescapable. It’s fate.”
“Like cats and catnip,” Rurik interjected with a chuckle.
“You’re not helping,” Grigori growled.
His brother raised his hands in surrender. “You should tell her.”
“Tell me what?” Madelyn demanded.
“I think I’ll leave you alone while you tell her.” Rurik picked up his tray of food with a cocky grin and left the library.
Grigori shifted in his chair, suddenly hot and flushed. He tugged at the neck of his T-shirt.
“What?” Madelyn sat up, her eyes narrowing and he caught a hint of a storm in the air.
He set his wine glass down and shifted closer. It would be much easier to show her that would be to tell her.
“Allow me to show you,” he reached over and brushed her hair back from her face, his fingertips dancing along her cheek and then her throat. She shivered and let out a slow soft, sensual sigh.
“You are distracting me,” she murmured, leaning into his caress.
“No,” he whispered. “I’m showing you, what it feels like when a mate touches you. Soft like furs,” he brushed his fingers over her lips. “And yet it burns sweetly like a fire, one that can only be quenched when mates come together.” He gazed into her eyes, watching the moment comprehension lit their depths.
Grigori Page 14
