Page 150 of Deadwood
I was growing tired of them calling me that when they were angry. If anyone needed to get their emotions in check, it was them. All these fucking nicknames were pissing me the fuck off.
“I’ve done all I can to make her comfortable.” But if she was still hurting, why hadn’t she said so? I could’ve done more. I wouldn’t have left to release the built-up energy inside me?—
“It is not enough. You weak, helpless fae never care for anyone but your own. It is vacuous that we even have to keep our peace with you. Much rather obliterate your kind like we were meant?—”
I took a step toward her, careless of her dripping fangs. “And then what, Glacies? Have no help against the humans? Get every dragon killed because you’re too stubborn to be nice for once?”
“I am nice when I so please!” she roared. “I saved the girl, too. There is no reward for doing so.”
“Only avoiding war,” I reminded her. There was no doubt in my mind that King Tenere would ruin Serpentine if harm came to his daughter. Oh, if he could see her now.
“There is more she is not saying,” Vulcan spoke up.
Glacies swung her head in his direction, her neck cocked at an odd angle. “Speak, and I will rip your throat from your body.”
I raised a brow. She didn’t want him telling me, and that only intrigued me more.
“What is it?”
Glacies’s warning growl filled the air, and Vulcan narrowed bored eyes on her. They were nearly equal in size, but Vulcan had the upper hand here.
“She is protective of the girl,” Vulcan said, and Glacies’s deadly tail swung my way as she turned. I narrowly missed it, jumping back a foot as she darted for Vulcan with an open mouth.
Vulcan’s roar filled the air as he pinned his wings to his sides and clashed with her in the middle of the meadow. I wasn’t bothered by their fighting—not as his words settled in my mind.
Glacies was protective of Auria. I knew that. So why was she so mad about him speaking the words aloud?
Unless…
“You bonded with her.”
But dragons didn’t bond with humans. They hated everything they stood for, how weak they were. The only reason they put up with fae was because we had strength, power.
But Auria didn’t need vials to use magic. Could that be how she’d protected herself from the wolves? Was that what she was about to tell me inside?
Which meant…Auria might not be human after all. I’d gone back and forth on whether she might be full-blooded fae from a royal bloodline that had died off after the moon exploded, but if she was, that meant they weren’t extinct either. And that her father had been with a fae. The creature he despised.
A cacophony of growls and snapping teeth filled the meadow as Glacies took her anger out on Vulcan for speaking her truth into existence.
“When?” I questioned, raising my voice.
“It is not of your concern,” Glacies hissed before attempting to sink her fangs into Vulcan’s leg. He dodged it, batting his wing to keep his balance.
“When?” I asked again, louder. For the time being, everything about Auria was my concern.
Fuck, not just now. Forever. I didn’t think I could ever rid myself of thoughts of her.
Glacies backed up a few steps from Vulcan, turning her anger on me. She must’ve seen the concern in my eyes, for hers softened almost instantly, her lips falling to cover her razor sharp teeth.
Her head hung as glistening white eyelids blinked over frozen eyes. “The moment I saw her in the mountains.”
“And you’re just now telling me?” Anger laced my words, despite my attempt to keep it contained.
She lifted her neck, tucking her wings in. “It is not meant to be.”
“But it is. Because it happened.” There was no undoing a bond. They were connected for life. “Does Auria know?”
Those piercing blue eyes shot to me. “No. And she will not.”
