Page 156 of Her Tortured Beasts

Ragnar chokes with shock and amusement at this new information.

“I want his eyes burned out of his skull for looking at my mate,” Ragnar says with new vigour. “I never want him to look at my female again.”

Uncle Fabian steps forward. “Surely that’s a step too far,” he says. “A disowning is enough.”

My heart misses a beat and my head whips back at my father. He stares at me, assessing. I see what his dragon is thinking. In a few years, I will challenge him for his crown. But disowning me, removing me from the family, would make me an enemy. An enemy who might come back for him. This needed to be dealt with permanently, but differently.

My mother appears by the doorway behind Father. The sight of her in her night gown, the thought of never seeing her again, makes my brain scramble in panic.

“Father, I was trying to help,” I plead. “Please, there was nothing else I could?—”

There’s nothing but dragon-deep magma in his voice as he cuts me off. “Hold the boy still.”

I shake my head, not believing this, not believing my eyes when Ragnar and Uncle Fabian take positions on either side of me, their big hands around my biceps like impossible shackles.

My father advances upon me. There is something worse than death in his eyes, something I’ve never seen in my sire. But it’s been growing for months now. At some stage, he’d stopped seeing me as a hatchling and begun seeing me as a rival. A threat to him and his household.

Nobody spoke about the fact that the dragon population had been dying off because dragon animuses were killing their sons out of rabid, possessive greed. It was a nasty cult secret. But my father was made of nastier material and mere death held too little satisfaction.

“Mother!” I cry.

She blinks at me. Uncertain. Confused.

I clench my teeth, refusing to show my fear.

“Keep your eyes open, Xander,” Ragnar says smugly.

Father holds my face, placing his thumbs just beneath my eyes.

But no, not this. Not this way. I try to wrench out of his grip. Try to save myself from a fate worse than death.

“All the way, Your Majesty,” Ragnar says. “They shouldn’t be able to grow back.”

Father’s eyes snap with irritation to Ragnar. “Your punishment is coming in a moment. Shut up and hold him still.”

Ragnar’s obedience is the only thing that saves him from a fate like mine.

A dark warmth takes over my eyes as my father’s power tunnels into my skull. Suddenly, there’s blinding white light. My vision twinkles, a thousand stars appearing in my world, takingover completely. Agony sears through my face, excruciating like knives penetrating my skull.

And an acrid, putrid smell like burning flesh fills my sinuses.

Those screams can’t be mine. That scent of burning flesh can’t be mine.

Chapter 91

Aurelia

Iwake with a shout, sweat dripping off my chest, the sheets soaked and twisted under me. Someone is shouting, shaking my shoulders.

Gasping, I grab at the hands on me, and when my eyes adjust, my vision is filled with four worried faces. My hand reaches up to touch my eyes.

But it wasn’t my eyes that were being burned. Wasn’t my head that was filled with agony. Xander’s glow catches my attention, and I hastily avert my gaze.

Scythe touches my face, worry etched in his, before he glances at Xander.

Lyle rubs my sore leg. “You’re okay, regina. You are safe. No one can hurt you now.”

Not true, but I’ll take it for the moment. I try to smile before reaching for the water on the bedside table. Savage quickly hands it to me and I gulp it down.

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