Kings of the Fire Box Set

by Lily Cahill

  Arryn looked down at the cover and then back at her. There was something warm in his eyes that hadn’t been there before, something playful. “Oh? And what if I don’t like it?”

  Marta scrunched her nose. “That’s impossible.”

  “Well, then,” he laughed.

  His laugh was loud and clear and did something strange to her heart. He felt like … warmth. There was something strangely comforting about his presence, suddenly. Marta felt it beat in double time and fought back the blush that was threatening to rise up her cheeks. It was more than the sound of his laughter that hit her so, or the way it changed his aura—it was the way he looked, so unlike the brooding, serious person he had been before. It brought a lightness out of him, and she liked that she was the one who had done that, had given him that brightness that hadn’t existed before.

  Her mind suddenly drifted back to her mother, to the warnings she had given Marta about her empathic powers, all those years ago. Marta pushed the memories away—now was not the time.

  “You’re not what I was expecting, you know,” she said, unable to stop the words from spilling out of her mouth.

  Arryn smiled. He looked—happy. Possibly flirty. Was he flirting with her? Was he flirting with her? She was an empath, and she still couldn’t tell.

  “And what were you expecting?”

  Marta shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve met your brothers. I don’t think any of them would have accepted my book without protest.” She shook her head; the words weren’t coming out like they were supposed to. It was all so difficult to say. “I think maybe you dragons have a thing with your pride.”

  At that, Arryn stiffened. He went taut and his eyes shuddered closed.

  Marta frowned. What had she said?

  She rushed on, trying to cover her mistake. “Not that there’s anything wrong with being a little proud. After all, you’re one of only four dragons in the world. You’ve survived so much.”

  Instead of softening, Arryn took a step back. His eyes were fixed on a point over her shoulder. His emotions were swirling around her, so thick it was difficult to tell one from another, but his face was a mask.

  “I am going to get out of here,” he said, his voice tight. “I’m not sure I’ll be back to help with the rest. Will you tell Joy?”

  “Sure,“ Marta said. Confusion gave way to annoyance—what had she said that had made him turn into Mr. Sensitive, and why wouldn’t he own up to it?

  “Great.” He said, turning and storming toward the front door.

  The little bell above it rang as it slammed shut behind him. The sound rang too loud in the empty room, and with a huff of frustration, she held out a hand and let her magic flow through her.

  The bell stopped its jangling, and the place fell back to silence.

  Chapter Two

  Arryn

  ARRYN CLOSED THE DOOR TO his truck and hit his fist against the steering wheel.

  He shouldn’t have stormed out on Marta. It wasn’t her fault that she didn’t understand. He hadn’t told her anything, so how was she supposed to know?

  But being a dragon wasn’t an honor, and it wasn’t something that gave him pride. No, it was the thing about himself that he hated most.

  Turning the key in the ignition, he put the truck in drive and pulled away from his spot in front of The Witch’s Brew. It sputtered a bit as he shifted gears, but it didn’t stall out. Good. The truck was a piece of shit, but it was his piece of shit, and he loved it.

  An old country song came on the radio, and he flicked it off a few chords in. The last thing he needed was another reason to feel maudlin.

  There was nothing good about being a dragon, he thought as he made his way down the road, on the way out of Augustus. Hundreds of years ago, his ancestors had believed that this ability—the other form to which they could all shift—gave them authority, power. And they had wielded it, ruled with it, and used it to subjugate the other magical creatures.

  It was no wonder that someone out there had wanted them all dead.

  But it was more than that—it was more than the danger and the temptation of the power that he held inside of him. It was the fact that his parents were little more than shadows he could barely remember, and that no matter what he did, he could not escape the past.

  Being a dragon had made him a target for so long that he couldn’t figure out how to accept it now that it was finally okay to fully embrace all parts of himself. All of his brothers had struggled with this, and they’d all dealt with it in their own way—Damien, by finding someone who could check his power with her own, Blayze by embracing the spotlight, Vincent by preferring his dragon form.

  But Arryn didn’t want to be a dragon at all. It was what had caused all the problems in his life, and he wasn’t about to invite that chaos into his life.

  He didn’t want to be a dragon. He didn’t want to own that side of himself. Whenever the beast inside him reared its head, demanded that her snarl or growl or change or fly or whatever—he ignored it. It was easier to ignore the parts of himself he didn’t like than it was to change them, especially given there was no way to stop being a dragon.

  But it was so much to explain to someone, to Marta, who had been entirely innocent when she asked him about being a dragon. He shouldn’t have snapped at her. Shame cut through him like a knife.

  And he’d taken her copy of Jane Eyre. Dammit.

  Soon the town bled away. Building gave way to trees gave way to thick forests. The road went from well-maintained to pitted, and his truck bounced along. He needed to check the shocks; they obviously weren’t working as they ought to be.

  He took a turn off the main road onto what was little more than a dirt path. It wound through the trees, their branches brushing his windshield and scraping across his roof. This, he thought to himself, was why he never bought a nice car.

  He steered into a clearing, and then, a few hundred yards ahead, was his home.

  His home.

  He’d agreed to a few interviews after the big dragon coming out party a few months back. It hadn’t been anything like what Blayze had agreed to, but the press had paid him enough to net him a tidy sum of money. The first—and only—thing he’d done with the money was buy himself a plot of land and little cabin in the middle of the woods, ten miles outside of Augustus.

  It wasn’t exactly remote, but it was far enough that he didn’t feel like everyone was watching him, thinking about him, wondering when or if he would shift.

  He’d kept his apartment in town for a while. His cabin had a lot going for it, but there had been some serious repairs needed. Then he’d arranged to get a witch out there to put some protection spells on it. Maybe he didn’t need them anymore, but old habits died hard.

  His brothers had all been old enough to remember what it was like in the palace, in the world before the coup. But Arryn had only been five when his parents were slaughtered and he’d started his life on the run. Now, with everyone knowing his name, he couldn’t get comfortable. It felt like all eyes were on him and his brothers, and it was completely opposite of everything he’d been raised to believe would protect him.

  He wanted to be left alone—was that so bad?

  The apartment was all but empty, now, except for the last few boxes of odds and ends. Everything of import was in his cabin. Until he needed to get groceries, he could stay out here all by his lonesome.

  His truck rumbled to a stop and he parked it and turned it off. But he couldn’t muster the energy to get out yet. He’d have to check under the hood later, maybe put it up on blocks and see if he could figure out the problem with the shocks. He wasn’t great with cars, but he was learning.

  Jane Eyre sat on the passenger seat, mocking him. He shouldn’t have said what he did. Marta had only been asking an innocent question.

  And she was—different.

  He hadn’t met her before, and now he regretted that. It was hard for him to reach out to new people; a lifetime of believing someone was out
to get him had made his paranoia strong, and now it was hard to trust. But the moment he’d walked into The Witches Brew that morning and met Marta, he’d felt a spark that he almost never felt. He’d liked her more immediately than he had ever liked anyone. While Joy and Ramona had been arguing about color swatches, he had caught her smirking at them from behind her book. The sardonic look in her eye made him wonder what kind of thoughts she had tucked in her head.

  God, she was gorgeous.

  It was hard for him to put words to what it was about her that intrigued him so much. Sure, her looks were part of it. She had long, blond hair that tumbled down her back, and her complexion looked like she had never seen sunlight. She practically glowed inside the soft lighting of The Witch’s Brew, her bright blue eyes peering up at him. They’d seemed bottomless, like the ocean whose color they so resembled.

  She was round in all the right places, the curve of his breasts under her shirt, the roll of her hips and ass. He could have stared at her all day long. He was pretty sure he had stared at her for most of the day. There was something about her teasing smile, her generous lips, that made him want to know everything about her.

  But that was the problem. He didn’t want a woman in his life. Every minute he’d spent looking at her he’d felt as if a connection was building between them, , drawing them close. He felt tethered to her; when she stepped further away, he wanted to hearken after her, feel her nearer to him.

  He’d been attracted to women before, and he tried to tell himself that that was all this was: attraction, plain and simple. He liked her curvy body, her funny remarks, her sweetness when they’d spoken—before he’d ruined it, at least.

  The truth was, though, that attraction had never felt like this before. It had never been important like this was.

  With a sigh, he reached out and picked up the copy of Jane Eyre. He flipped open the cover, but there was no written dedication. The pages were thin and worn at the edges; obviously, this copy was well-loved. He imagined a younger Marta, learning to sound out the English syllables, curled around her mother. There was no way he could keep this, not with the way he’d left things between them. He needed to find a way to get it back to her, and soon.

  He picked up the book and slipped out of the car, heading toward the cabin. He would worry about it tomorrow. Eventually, he’d have to go back into town., He’d take care of it then. In the meantime, he had work to do.

  Chapter Three

  Marta

  MARTA PICKED UP A BLOUSE from the top of her pile of laundry and began to fold it carefully. When it was in a neat square, she placed it in the bottom of her suitcase.

  Joy’s voice came from behind her. “I don’t understand why you’re packing,” she whined.

  “Because I no longer work for you.”

  It was perfectly easy to understand. Marta had always worked odd jobs and moved around wherever she needed to be. Putting down roots just made it harder because eventually she always had to tear them up. She’d learned the value of packing light and being able to fit everything she owned in one suitcase years ago.

  “Yeah,” Joy said, still plaintive. “Okay, but like. Still. This is your room, you know? What the hell am I going to do with it when you’re gone?”

  Marta shut her eyes against the words, willing them to roll off her back. She knew that Joy meant well, and it was nice to know that her charge had grown just as fond of her as he had grown of her charge. But when it came down to it, there wasn’t enough work here. She couldn’t be a personal nurse if there was no one there for her to nurse, personally.

  And sure, there was a hospital, but those could be so overwhelming. Her empathic power made her a good nurse, but it also made crowds of people difficult to handle. Emotions coming at her from all sides, overwhelming her—it made it difficult for her to focus.

  She had to be careful with herself. Her abilities were not always a force for good in her life; sometimes she got too attached to things, and it made it difficult for her to see what was best for her. Toward the end of her relationship with Drake in Philly, when they’d been fighting all the time and she’d been miserable, she’d stayed because she could tell they both still felt so much. She’d refused to leave her home in Ukraine after her mother died and had ruminated in her own misery, becoming a shell of herself before she finally managed to get her life in order.

  Hospitals were full of the highest highs and lowest lows—it was too much for her to handle. Putting herself and her needs first had been a hard lesson to learn, but she had learned it. No hospitals, no attachments if she could help it. She needed to think of what was best for her.

  Unfortunately, she could tell she was getting too close, here in Augustus. It was best to let things end naturally, to let them die and move on. Attachments just got people hurt, and she was tired of being hurt.

  No matter how much Joy cared right now, how would Marta handle it when Joy eventually became annoyed, or worse—indifferent?

  “I am sure you can find a roommate if you want one,” she said, making sure to keep her voice light.

  “Yeah, but they won’t cook me shit and wait on me hand and foot and—“

  “Joy,” Marta interrupted. “I don’t do any of that.”

  “But if you did you could stay for free, that’s what I’m saying!”

  Despite herself, Marta burst out laughing. “You’re terrible. No, I cannot stay. I have a tip on another job, out near Pittsburgh, and I need to start heading that direction.”

  Joy threw herself down on Marta’s bed, lying atop all of her clean laundry. “But you’ll stay in touch, right? We’re friends now. You’re my best friend here, since Tania.”

  Although Marta had never had the displeasure of meeting Tania Maxwell, she had heard of the girl often enough. Apparently, she had been a great enabler of all of Joy’s worst faults, and had encouraged her in her substance abuse. Joy didn’t speak of her often anymore, but her name had been a near-constant toward the beginning of Marta’s stay.

  “Well, there are lots of people who want to be friends with you, Joy.”

  “That’s part of the problem. They all want to be friends with Joy Valdez, not with me. You were the opposite. I practically had to beg you to be my friend.”

  Marta snorted. “It’s called professional distance.”

  “Well, it’s dumb, and I don’t approve of it. C’mon, Marta. You could keep the room for free without being my live-in servant.”

  “Very generous, but no.”

  Joy stood up, accidentally knocking some of the laundry down as she went. “All right, fine. You can leave. But here are your conditions.”

  “Conditions? I don’t think you understand that I don’t work for you anymore—“

  “Shh, Marta, this is important. Okay, first of all, you will happily accept my rave reviews of you. And second, you will keep in touch, all the time, and visit whenever you can.”

  The words touched something sore inside of Marta, like poking a bruise. She wanted to keep in touch with Joy, but long-distance friendships were notoriously difficult to maintain. She already knew she was bad at it. A clean break was easier for everyone, but it was too much to explain that to Joy, who was staring at her so hopefully with her big brown eyes.

  Instead, she smiled and nodded. “I accept your terms.”

  Joy clapped her hands. “Great! Now quit packing for a while. Vincent is coming over soon, and we’re going to go out to eat. It’ll be fun.”

  Because being a third wheel sounded so fun. It was impossible to change Joy’s mind once she had it made up, however, so she didn’t bother to refuse. Marta decided it made more sense to change the subject and hope it threw Joy off enough that she forgot inviting Marta along in the first place.

  “Right. Well, do you have the books I let you borrow while you were recuperating? I want to make sure I don’t leave them behind.”

  Joy rolled her eyes. “You and your books. I swear, I’m surprised you’re a nurse instead of a librar
ian.” She disappeared out the door to Marta’s bedroom and reappeared a minute later, holding a stack of novels in her hands. “All right, so it looks like—The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and the first three in the Harry Potter series, right?”

  “Sounds right.” Marta hesitated. She knew what she wanted to ask next, but she wasn’t sure how to broach the topic.

  Arryn Dragomir still had her copy of Jane Eyre. And not just any copy, either. It was the one that her mother had given her, that her father had given her mother. Maybe not an heirloom to anyone else, but to her, it was her most precious possession.

  And then the moment she’d loaned it to him he’d gone from the kind man she’d just met to someone entirely different, and stormed off before she could get it back. The overwhelming swirl of his emotions still rattled her. He’d felt so much, and yet he’d looked so closed off—how had he managed it?

  It was too disappointing to think about it. Sure, they had only spoken for a few minutes, but in that time Marta had felt—well, something. Interest. The beginnings of desire, and not just for his body. Anyone with a pair of functioning eyes could see that he was attractive, but for a moment, she’d thought back to the things her mother used to tell her ….

  Empaths know when it happens, came the echo of her mother’s voice. When you meet your other half, you will sense it.

  And Marta had thought, if only for a moment ….

  It didn’t matter now, she guessed. There was no way that that moment had meant anything to him like it had to her. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have stormed off, and he wouldn’t have taken her beloved copy of her favorite book with him.

  “Say ….” Marta wasn’t sure how to broach the subject. God, if only she’d kept her mouth shut when he’d approached her. “I loaned a book to Arryn, and I need it back.”

  Joy’s brow furrowed. “When did you talk to Arryn?”