Claimed

by Sammie Joyce

  How do you know that?

  I can feel it in you. You have the potential—but your power is hardly the only factor. Only united can witches and dragons truly defeat Hellith for good. As I’m sure you’re aware, none of the other witches are especially keen on working with us. You’re the only one who has shown any inclination to treat us as equals.

  The whole thing was just too overwhelming. Rose had come here to learn to use magic, not start a revolution. What about you? You get a choice in this too. Would you be willing to work with witches, after everything they’ve done?

  Asher’s answer was a few minutes in coming. If you’d asked me that two weeks ago, I would have said no, that I’d fight to the death before ever working with witches. I only saw them as evil and vindictive creatures that couldn’t be trusted. You’re different, though. You treat us like people. It makes me wonder how much of this hatred between witches and dragons is really justified. If you could convince other witches to accept us, I would be willing to convince the dragons to work with you. I’m the leader, now that Atticus is dead. They’ll listen to me.

  They may listen to you, but no one is going to listen to me, especially if I start saying witches and dragons should work together. You don’t know what it’s like—if you say even one thing slightly wrong, the reaction is all out of proportion. If Kaylee suspects I’m even thinking anything but hateful thoughts about you, the consequences will be severe.

  What kinds of consequences? I didn’t realize feeding us was that bad. Asher’s tone took on a teasing note, but Rose didn’t smile.

  That’s nothing. I’m more worried about being forcibly reeducated. At best, I’d be kicked out of the coven and not able to do anything to help the situation. At worst, I’d be designated as insane and handed over to healers for “curing”.

  Rose flinched as she felt a wave of fury so powerful that it took her breath away. It wasn’t her anger—it was Asher’s.

  I’ll tear them limb from limb before I let them hurt you! Where are they? They will burn in my fire!

  Asher, stop! Rose didn’t know how much damage he could do to both the coven and the dragons if he went on a rampage, but she didn’t want to find out. I’m safe, no one is hurting me.

  She could feel him teetering on the edge of losing control. Rose was shocked at his reaction. How could he possibly feel so protective of her that he was willing to risk his own life decimating the coven at a mere perceived threat?

  You’re my mate, Asher growled in answer to her thought. It’s my job to protect you.

  Who said I want to be your mate? I have a choice, remember?

  That brought him up short. You don’t want me?

  Crap, now what? Would he be able to tell if she was lying? Regardless, Rose didn’t want to lie to him, but she also needed to diffuse this situation before it got violent. It’s not that. I just think you’re moving way too fast. I barely know you, and you’re threatening to raze this coven to the ground for something they might never do. It scares me, Asher, that you can become violent so quickly.

  Though she didn’t say it, his reaction made Rose suspect that there actually was some validity in the witches’ worry about dragons.

  She felt Asher picking through her thoughts. It was an uncomfortable feeling, having everything laid bare, but she didn’t try to keep him out. Rose needed him to understand. Finally, he sighed, some of the rage going out of his voice.

  I won’t act without your consent. You’re right—they have done nothing to you yet. But if they do, I’ll be there to rescue you before they can so much as touch you with their magic.

  I won’t argue with that. I don’t know how they reeducate people, but I’m not keen on finding out. We’ll have to be careful and make sure that no one suspects anything.

  Are there any witches you can trust? If we can start winning them over to the cause of unity without risk to you, I think we should do it sooner rather than later. We may not have a lot of time.

  What do you mean?

  Think about the timing, Rose. The prophecy says that one will unite us to fight Hellith. All indications are pointing toward you being that one. That means that Hellith must be close to resurfacing.

  Not necessarily. For all we know, it could take me decades to unite witches and dragons, if it’s even possible. This might only happen when I’m in my fifties.

  I hope that’s the case, but I don’t think so. The way the prophecy tells of the two events together makes me think that they’re linked. I may be wrong, but if I’m not, we need to start preparing.

  Rose felt helplessly inadequate for the task before her. I don’t know how. I can’t talk about witch-dragon unity without being shut down at the very least. How am I supposed to unite us?

  I don’t know. Believe me, if I did, I would have already told you. For now, I think it’s best we all get to know each other, learn each other’s strengths and weaknesses. It’s possible that when it comes to fighting Hellith, the clans will decide to put aside their differences and fight together, even if only temporarily.

  Rose thought that was a pretty thin hope, given everything she knew about how witches viewed dragons, but she didn’t have any better ideas to offer. Getting to know you sounds good. I’d like to know you all better.

  She could feel Asher smiling in his thoughts. Good. Do you think you can manage to stay on your “punishment” duty of feeding us?

  That depends—how good an actor are you?

  Not bad. What do you have in mind?

  If you can pretend to be in pain well enough to convince Kaylee, I can tell her that I want to spend more time with you to practice using magic to hurt you. Trust me, she’ll be delighted.

  I can work on that. I’ve had it done to me enough times that I should be able to pull it off. I’ll tell the others.

  I’ll see you tomorrow, then.

  See you tomorrow, Rose. Sleep well.

  She got a brief glimpse of Asher’s face in her mind. He winked at her before withdrawing, leaving her mind once more a quiet place. Even though they weren’t talking anymore, Rose knew that he wasn’t more than a thought away. She didn’t know whether that was comforting or unnerving.

  Chapter Nine

  Rose opened her eyes to find herself in a brightly lit room. After a moment, her eyes adjusted, and she realized she was in the mansion basement. She’d had these dreams often enough to know that at least one of the dragons would be here.

  Sure enough, Asher came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. Rose had been freaked out by these dreams at first, but by now, she was starting to enjoy them. After all, she’d never been in a sexual relationship with someone before. It was the dragons who had awakened this part of her, a part she found extremely pleasurable.

  Asher started kissing her neck. Rose turned in his arms, tilting her head up so that their lips met. She lost herself in the kiss, finally breaking away to gasp in an urgent breath. Her eyes had slipped closed, and when they fluttered open again, she gasped.

  Behind Asher were two huge, scaled golden wings.

  “Don’t be afraid,” he murmured.

  “What—?”

  “I’m a dragon, remember? These are my wings.”

  “I didn’t realize—it was possible—for you to transform—partially—” It was difficult getting a full sentence out when she was gasping for breath. Asher’s kisses had moved down to her breasts, and Rose’s heart was galloping as though she was sprinting.

  “If you don’t like it, I can put them back.”

  “No—I like it.” Now that she was over the shock, Rose realized that she more than liked it. The wings coming out of Asher’s back were undeniably hot. She hadn’t thought it was possible to become even more turned on than she already had been, but apparently, it was.

  Rose moaned and pressed herself urgently against him. She could feel that Asher was just as excited as she was. He brought his wings forward, wrapping them around her.

  “What else can you bring to
your human form?”

  His eyes glinted dangerously, but she wasn’t afraid. “Let me show you.”

  Rose woke with a gasp, sitting up in bed. She was still breathing hard. By the light coming from under her bed hangings, it was nearly time for breakfast. She made an effort to control her breathing. The dream had felt so real that she actually looked around, half expecting to find Asher in bed with her.

  Was what she’d experienced real, like their mental connection, or was it just a dream, like the others? This one had felt a lot more real, but that could simply be because of the conversation she and Asher had shared. She was undoubtedly growing closer to him.

  Her necklace was glowing brightly. Rose was lucky that she’d pulled the hangings around her bed the previous night, or Annabelle would surely have been woken by it. She definitely didn’t want to be faced with questions about how she got a necklace of power to work for her when it was only supposed to work for people devoted to the welfare of dragons as well as witches.

  “Rose, come on, we won’t have time for breakfast before class if we don’t hurry.”

  “Coming!”

  Rose dashed to get dressed, throwing on the first clean clothes she laid hands on. As she and Annabelle joined Jade and Wendy at their usual table, she saw one of the kitchen staff wheeling out a cart that held four trays. That must be for the dragons. Rose resisted the urge to follow them. She really wanted to talk to the dragons again.

  Of course, she could talk to them without being near them, now.

  Asher?

  Nope, wrong channel. This is Jagger.

  Oh, sorry. I guess I don’t really know how to control this yet.

  Hey, I’m not complaining. It’s not every day I get beautiful women interrupting my breakfast.

  Rose felt herself blushing. You can’t even see me.

  You think I don’t remember what I saw? Because I do—in great detail.

  Jagger!

  Not apologizing for it, beautiful. So, what’s on the study list for today? You moved on to dragon slaying yet?

  I hope not. Rose felt her smile melting off her face. I don’t know what I’ll do when they ask me to hurt you again. I can’t do it, but when Kaylee realizes that, she’ll kick me out of the coven.

  Sounds like you need some training in deceptive magic.

  That exists?

  Sure, witches use it all the time. Though if you do go that route, you’ll obviously need to make sure whoever teaches you doesn’t know what you’re using it for.

  Of course. I’ll have to look into that. I need to see you, all of you. We need to talk.

  You’ll see us tonight.

  No, I mean alone. I can’t talk to you properly with Kaylee hovering over my shoulder. I don’t see how we can do it, though. The basement is guarded, and the witches keep an eye on you whenever you leave. I can’t be seen sneaking off to be alone with you.

  I see your game. If you wanted to seduce me into your arms, there are easier ways. You have but to ask.

  Jagger, you’re terrible! Rose was doing her best not to laugh.

  Jagger chuckled in her mind. That aside, I agree that we all need to talk. I can help, if you want.

  How?

  Dragons have some magic of their own—nothing nearly as versatile as what witches can do, but we get by. If the four of us link our power, we should be able to do it. Tonight, after everyone else is asleep, we’ll make you invisible. You can slip right by the guards and come down to us. You’ll have to sort out some kind of soundproofing, though. We can’t do that.

  Who says we’re going to be doing anything that requires soundproofing? Rose almost winked to go along with her flirty tone, but caught herself just in time.

  Get your mind out of the gutter, Rose. Jagger chuckled. Just talking could be enough to draw their attention, if the guards are using spells to enhance their hearing.

  I’ll have to see what I can do.

  “Rose, are you okay?”

  Rose blinked in surprise. She’d completely forgotten that she was sitting at a table with four people.

  Got to go, talk to you later!

  She turned her attention to Annabelle. “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “You’ve been grinning and blushing on and off for the last five minutes.”

  “Oh, I—it’s hot in here, that’s all.”

  “Nope, not buying it. No one gets that look on their face unless there’s a guy involved. Now spill.”

  “There’s no guy.”

  “A girl, then. Who is it?”

  “No, it’s not a girl either.”

  Annabelle gave her a disbelieving look, one echoed by Jade and Wendy.

  “Look, I can’t talk about it right now.” That, at least, was true.

  “Ooh, a secret affair. That sounds juicy. You’d better tell me the moment you two decide to go public. Though if you want the night alone in the room, you’ll have to find a way to explain to Kaylee why I’m sleeping in a different room.”

  If only she knew that it wasn’t just the two of them. Rose didn’t quite know what she was going to do about the dragons. She was quickly developing feelings for all four of them, but she couldn’t be in a relationship with all four, could she? From the way Asher had talked last night, it sounded like all four of them planned to protect her, but that didn’t mean they’d be okay with sharing her romantically or sexually.

  Besides, being with one would be trouble enough if she was found out. Rose couldn’t even imagine how much worse it would be if it was discovered she was with all of them.

  Might as well have as much protection as you can. We’re big boys, we don’t mind sharing.

  Rose jumped at the unexpected voice in her mind. Mace?

  It’s me.

  You can read my thoughts even when I’m not trying to speak to you?

  Only now, when you’re still new at this. You’ll learn to control it and keep things private. I suggest you don’t, though. We’ll all work better as a team if we’re honest with each other about everything.

  I have to go—I’ll talk to you tonight, Mace.

  Rose forcibly brought her mind back to the matter at hand. She played over what Annabelle had just said in her mind.

  “I won’t need the night alone in the room.”

  “Right.” Wendy sounded like she didn’t believe it, but she didn’t say so.

  The three of them watched Rose closely as they walked to class. Annabelle’s eyes followed hers everywhere, probably trying to figure out if she was exchanging steamy glances with any of the other witches. Rose was grateful that they were unlikely to look for that with the dragons.

  When they got to Kaylee’s office, Rose was relieved to be led to the room with the fire targets. Shooting fire at targets, she could handle. But she didn’t do very well in the lesson, because she was thinking hard, trying to work out how to get soundproofing for tonight.

  It came at the cost of not learning much, but by the end of the lesson, she had it figured out. She hung back to talk to Kaylee in private.

  “Rose, how are you doing? You seem to be having a bit of an off day today.”

  “I know, I’m sorry. I’ll do better tomorrow.”

  “I’m sure you will. We all have our bad days. Is there anything else I can do for you?”

  “Actually, I was wondering if you could help me with a spell. You see, I snore, and I’ve been told it’s pretty loud. Annabelle hasn’t said anything, but I can tell it bothers her. Is there some kind of soundproofing spell you could give me that’ll keep sound in the area of my bed?”

  “Of course. You’ll learn the spell later in your training, but for now, I can give you a talisman that’ll do the trick. We keep a number of objects enchanted with useful spells like that. If you come with me, I’ll get one for you.”

  They walked to one of the rooms used as storage, and Kaylee handed Rose a small wooden box with designs carved onto the surface.

  “You need to write down the intended area for the spell in
feet, then put the paper inside the box. It’ll stop sound made within that area from escaping until the paper is taken out.”

  “Brilliant, this is exactly what I need.”

  Kaylee didn’t know the half of it. Rose had been envisioning extremely awkward scenes that involved her and the four dragons trying to squish themselves into the space of a bed. In her imagination, those scenes ended up with them naked a fair number of times. She was grateful Kaylee didn’t know her as well as Annabelle did, or she’d be getting questions from her next.

  “Just remember to take the paper out when you return it. We keep them empty so that they don’t end up blocking sound around the storage areas. Keep it as long as you need, though—there’s no rush. It’ll likely be a while until we do sound blocking spells. They’re of limited use fighting dragons, so we don’t really focus on them.”

  “Speaking of dragons…” Rose hesitated, knowing that what she wanted to say was risky, but she wanted it enough that she was willing to take the chance. “I’d like to volunteer for the crew that brings them breakfast. I think it’s doing me good, spending time around them.”

  “Doing you good?” Kaylee’s expression was dangerous.

  “Looking at them, you’d think they were just normal people. It was hard to think of them as the monsters they are, at first. Spending time with them is really helping me see them more clearly. I think I’ll be better at fighting them in the long run if I really know what I’m facing.”

  Kaylee’s expression cleared. “Of course. That’s why we order time with them as a punishment with people who are struggling. I generally revoke the punishment once the person starts doing better, but if you really think it’ll help you, you’re the one who would know best about yourself.”

  “I do. Thanks, Kaylee. I really want to do the right thing.” That was true. Rose did want to do the right thing—bring peace between dragons and witches. Not that she had any idea how to do that.

  She wandered off to lunch, her mind still on the dragons. She’d see them again tonight to bring their food, and again later on.