Page 6 of Burned

Lord is a dragon.

And that means he’s an enemy.

Chapter

Three

LORD

Istruggle to keep my expression neutral and my breathing even in spite of the spike of terror and anxiety I can feel through our bond just before Alrick’s eyelids droop closed and sleep pulls him under. It’s not only his panic raging inside of my chest and twisting my stomach into knots.

He’s a dragon slayer. That’s what he was saying as the potion Dahlia gave me started to take effect. A dragon did this to him. I put my hand on his healing chest, the steady rise and fall of his breathing comforting in spite of everything else. Not just any dragon. I would bet money that it was Judre. It’s too much of a coincidence otherwise.

Was Alrick the one who’d landed the fatal blow against my old friend?

With his eyes no longer on me, giving me incentive to remain calm, my breathing becomes rapid and my mind spins. Even if he wasn’t the one to end Judre, if it was one of his brothers or another slayer who happened to be with them, does it reallymatter? He was party to the attack. How many dragons have soaked his hands with their blood?

Bile rises in my throat, and I gulp down air in desperate pants. I clutch my chest with one hand, fighting back the urge to sob or roar or scream until my throat is raw and the pain inside me has burned itself out to nothing but ash and cinders. My other hand, the one still resting on Alrick’s chest, ripples with scales, my fingers elongating and my nails sharpening into talons capable of tearing through flesh as easily as a hot knife through butter.

He’s fast asleep and he won’t be waking up anytime soon thanks to Dahlia’s concoction. It was meant to help him sleep so he could heal, but that was before I knew what he truly was. I could finish the job Judre started. He would have died in the forest all alone anyway if I hadn’t stepped in and knocked fate off course. I would only be setting things right. I could sink my claws through his already torn body and rip his heart out. We’re bonded, which means it would kill me too, but I don’t think that’s what’s making my body tremble and my heart race.

A sob finally slips past my lips and my hand shrinks back into its human shape.

What a fucking mess I’ve made.

Another sob works its way up my throat, but it turns into a strangled laugh as I choke it out. Centuries spent feeling superior to my brothers, over a millennia of thinking it was my advanced control and maturity that was keeping us all safe and on the right path, and look where it led me.

Laughter and anguish converge into one strangled sound that I gasp between breaths before finally slumping forward. I bury my face against the bandages covering Alrick’s chest. The coppery smell of his blood is less alarming than it was before, his body well on its way to being fully healed. It’s the flowersand ocean scent that overwhelms me now, filling my lungs and wrapping itself around me.

In spite of everything I just learned, my dragon purrs happily inside of me, content just to nuzzle our mate.

Our mate.

Our fucking mate.

There’s a faint pulse of warmth and peace through the bond that links me to this stranger who’s hell-bent on destroying my kind, and I fucking hate that I take comfort in knowing he’s sleeping soundly. He’s lost in his dreams, blissfully unaware of this mess… for a few more days, at least. Once he wakes up… well, that will be a different story, I’m sure.

“You knock.” My brother Arson’s whisper comes through my bedroom door as clearly as if he were standing right next to me, speaking at full volume.

“Why do I have to knock?” Hemingway hisses back. “I think Nico should knock.”

“For the love of Versace, I have never met a bigger bunch of overgrown baby lizards than the four of you,” Lake, Nico’s mate says, not bothering to lower his voice like the rest of them. There’s a sharp rap seconds later and he speaks even more loudly through the door. “Lord, sweetie, we’re worried about you.”

I sit up reluctantly and reach for the damp rag I brought into the room right before Alrick woke up, wringing it out and then using it to gently clean the days’ worth of sweat and grime off of his face.

“I’m fine,” I answer, keeping my voice as even as possible.

There’s scuffling and more hissed voices that I try to tune out. I’m sure they’re arguing about whose turn it is to speak next in this half-baked intervention or whatever this is.

Someone clears their throat—my brother Valentino, from the sound of it.

“It’s just that you left to return Judre to his clan two days ago and you’ve been locked in your room ever since. It’s not like you,” Tino says.

“Am I not allowed to grieve in peace?” I growl in a low voice. It’s a half-truth. Even if it weren’t for Alrick, I can’t imagine I would be in the mood for company at the moment. But still, I have to bite my tongue to keep from confessing the rest to my brothers.

Since the day we hatched, I can’t think of a single time I’ve lied to them, even by omission. I’ve never had a reason to before. But what am I supposed to tell them right now? ‘My dragon went rogue, and I bonded a dragon hunter whose brothers may or may not be on a warpath to destroy us as we speak. Oh, and he might have killed Judre?’

My throat tightens and I set the damp cloth aside, settling back in my chair, my gaze fixed on my mate’s sleeping form, just like it has been since I brought him home.

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