Page 19 of Dragon Awakened

"So much," Jianyu vows, stealing my lips. "I've loved you since the first moment."

"And yet it's more," Malik pants, still coming inside me. "Every day, I love you more."

Jianyu releases my lips, and Malik cups the side of my face to tilt my lips toward his. I crane my neck to his kiss, and I feel it. Their love is a binding force, and I'm enveloped in it. I let out a sob of relief, feeling so, so close to complete.

"We'll find him," Rafe says, quiet and low. "Your other mate."

"No matter what it takes," Jianyu agrees.

Their vow tips me over into a final, soft, throbbing climax. Malik's fingers press into my clit, helping extend the pleasure. My inner walls squeeze around his slowly subsiding cock, until the last wave crests, and I collapse back into him.

For a moment, the four of us lie there in a sweaty, sticky, blissed-out pile.

Jianyu, having had the longest to recover, comes back to his senses first. He strokes his knuckles along my bare thigh. "So. I guess we're heading to the Air Kingdom, then."

"Great." Rafe reaches for the sheets and pulls them up over our bodies. "Just wake me up when it's time to leave."

Chapter

Six

EMBER

In the end, Rafe didn't need to worry about us waking him up to go. We get in a decent nap, all snuggled up together, only for Malik's friends to return with supplies, as well as some news of the outside world.

"The Fire and Stone Kingdoms are at it again," Malik's grumpy friend, Obi, informs us as he's stocking the cabin's small refrigerator with an absurd amount of meat.

Rafe and Jianyu exchange a look.

Malik's other friend, a fierce woman name Zahra, gives more context. "The Stone Kingdom is accusing the Fire Kingdom of harboring fugitives, while the Fire Kingdom blames the Stone Kingdom for an attack on their capital."

"Typical," Malik laments.

Rafe clears his throat. "So, that's all about us, then, right?"

"Probably." Helping unload cans and boxes of food into the cabinet, Jianyu shakes his head. "I'm definitely the fugitive."

I cross my arms over my chest. "And we can assume that the attack on the Fire Kingdom's capital was the Shadow Dragon King's forces trying to capture me."

"Well." Zahra blinks rapidly. "You have all been very busy."

"You have no idea," Rafe agrees.

That awful night comes back to me--standing in the courtyard of the castle overlooking the Crimson City and watching dragon after dragon pour out of portals. I suck in a harsh breath. Storm and Fury were among them.

Everything was chaos, as Jianyu, Rafe and I fought for our lives, barely managing to escape through a portal I somehow magicked out of thin air.

We weren't alone in the Crimson City, though.

I snap my head up. "Our friends. The ones we brought to the Fire Kingdom with us--"

Overwhelming guilt threatens to swamp me. Amy and Jett and Sister Grace; Jianyu's friend Ben. We left them all behind.

And it's not that I haven't thought about them in the past couple of days, but everything has been such a whirlwind. In the Water Kingdom, there was no way to make contact with anybody from the outside world, and I didn't exactly have a chance to try to call anyone when I was locked up in the Shadow King's dungeon.

Zahra flashes a tight smile before glancing at Jianyu and then Rafe. "We were able to get a message through to the individuals you asked we contact."

"And?" Jianyu asks.

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