30. Kadia

Enzo’s growl pierced the silence, and Kaida took a step back from him. The last thing she thought would happen would be Beckett offering for Enzo to stay here. Enzo was the prince of Dragaal. He would not be able to stay here. He had duties to the kingdom, after all.

"What?" Kaida asked, hoping for an answer, because she wasn’t sure why Beckett would offer such a thing.

"If you don’t want to go back because of us, why shouldn’t Enzo remain here?"

Enzo growled again. "What makes you think I would stay? Kaida is mine. She is to be my queen, and we should rule Dragaal together."

"Because Kaida is not just yours if you recall what she told you," Beckett deadpanned and stepped behind Kaida.

Enzo’s face became red as his eyes scanned from each prince. He tried to hold all their gazes, but it was impossible with them all standing in various places. Arlo and Esen stood with their arms over their chests but still within reaching distance of Kaida. Blaze remained on the porch and pretended he didn’t care about what was unfolding in front of him. Kaida wasn’t convinced he wasn’t enjoying every moment of this.

"The Great Dragon chose her for me. Not for the four of you. She should come home with me and rule Dragaal."

"Do you have wax in your ears or something?" Esen asked while pointing at Enzo with his hand. "Kaida literally told you that we are her mates, too. The Great Dragon chose her for us, too. Not just you."

"That makes no damn sense. No one has multiple mates."

"Plasma Dragons do," Kaida retorted.

"I have not heard anything remotely like that in my teachings." Enzo’s chest rumbled with another growl as he took another step toward Kaida.

Kaida lifted her hand and had her magic crackle at her palm as a warning. "Don’t take another step toward me. I don’t give a shit if you believe us or not. It is the truth. I feel the bonds between you and them. It’s not a joke or a lie or whatever you seem to think this is."

"That is not possible. Why would the Great Dragon give you multiple mates?!" Enzo bellowed.

"So, she can start the line for other Plasma Dragons to be born. She is the only one. If she is mated with multiple dragons, it gives the chance for multiple breeds to pass the Plasma gene down to the next generation. Plasma can mate with any dragon. You Storm Dragons only mate with other Storm dragons, so now that is all that is born on the mainland. Here? That is not the case at all. There is a chance that any of the Elemental Dragons can emerge. If you paid attention enough, you would know that. I know royals are taught about things over here because, one day, they will be partially ruling here."

Arlo’s explanation hit every nail on the head. Kaida glanced at him to give him a smile. He winked at her and then returned to being stoic as he stared Enzo down.

"There’s not a chance in hell that my parents will allow you four to accompany her to Dragaal. There are laws. Only one King and Queen can rule over Dragaal."

"That’s why I offered for you to remain here. You will be able to be with Kaida, and we can find a way to return to Dragaal and rule as one. That is the whole point of Kaida being a Plasma. She is someone that will converge Dragaal with the island."

Kaida looked up at Beckett and gave him a confused look. He smiled at her and kissed her on her nose.

"I’ve been thinking about this a lot. What if Plasma emerged after a millennium because the Great Dragon was tired of the divide? They may want their people to be united again, as they were when Plasmas reigned."

"No. Not possible. Just no. There is no chance in hell that the laws will be rewritten.”

"It will if you are the one who leads the charge to change them. Only those who stand by and allow people to be repressed is how it will prevent change in our world. You Storms banished us Elementals to this island because you saw us as weak. You won’t allow us to go to the mainland even to celebrate the new royal births or attend any royal ball. You are allowing for these laws to continue to be pushed upon your people."

"I have nothing to do with that. I do not make the laws."

"But you are the one that allows for them to continue. You want me to come home with you, yet you want me to leave them behind. I can’t do that. They are my mates. I will not reject them either, so don’t think that I will."

"Enzo, you can either be part of the problem or part of the solution. The kingdom of Dragaal needs to be reformed as it led to this island."

"What are you saying? Do you want me to abandon my position as prince and stay here to form new laws to push my mother and father to change? You are not as intelligent as I first believed then."

Kaida shook her head. She didn’t think that Enzo was this stubborn. "We are saying that things need to change. If I am to have multiple mates, then things are supposed to change. Plasma Dragons died out a thousand years ago. Now, all of a sudden, here I am. That has to mean something. Storm Dragons and Elemental Dragons have been at each other’s throats for hundreds of years. Now, here I am, destined to be mated to all of you. That has to mean something. There is a reason for all of this. Why aren’t you seeing that?"

"Because I came here to bring you home. I am not leaving without you!"

In no time, Kaida put up the shield as Enzo’s magic went out of control. Arcs of lightning burst into a chaotic mess, and Kaida’s shield went over all five of them to spare them from the attack. Beckett pushed his water magic through her shield and hit Enzo in the center of his chest, sending him backward.

"What did you do that for?" Kaida yelled at him.

"To knock him off his feet. This is not the time for us to be fighting one another."

Enzo must have missed that memo because he jumped to his feet and began his fight again. Magic was being thrown from every direction as the five princes began to battle one another. Kaida was yelling at them all to stop, but her words fell on deaf ears. They did not want to hear her out.

Men. When a woman is to be fought over, it will be to the death.

Not if I can help it.

Kaida gathered her magic and let it go, sending it toward every prince. Her wall of magic struck each of them and sent them onto their backs. Kaida was happy with the result and used this moment to her advantage.

"Enough! I will not have the five of you fighting over me! Enzo, I am not going back to the mainland with you. I am staying right here with my mates. You can choose to stay with us and figure out a plan to show your parents that their time is over because the way our kingdom is run is out of date. New rules need to be made. I agree with Beckett. There is no reason for our people to be divided any longer. Elementals should be allowed back to their homes in Dragaal. On top of that, they need to have their own land like before our ancestors decided they didn’t belong here. If the island still needs to be here to have those who are rejected, we can discuss that, but I am drawing the line in the sand. I am not leaving. I am staying here."

Enzo’s face remained red, and Kaida could see the shimmering around him that told her that Enzo was close to shifting. Kaida wasn’t sure how to keep Enzo calm enough to prevent him from doing so. Shifting was not the greatest idea right now.

Five overly dominant men all fighting over a woman... we should probably run.

Kaida ignored her dragon and threw up shields around each of the men so they would not be able to throw their magic around anymore.

"You need to stop, Enzo. I can see how close you are to shifting, but you need to understand that I have made my decision, and I am not changing my mind."

"You are to be with me. If I have to take those four with me, fine. But we need to return home. I am to be named King! I need my Queen."

"No," Kaida said firmly.

Beckett chuckled. "I want you to know that it’s because of you rejecting her that this all came to be. If you never would have made that mistake, she never would have found us. We would have never known that she was our mate because we never would have met her. This is all your doing."

Enzo roared as Kaida screamed, "Enough! Beckett! You are not helping."

"Kaida, you need to realize something. We are not going to allow this guy to come here and just think he can take you. Fuck, he needs to understand how he hurt you! It’s his fault we are all in this predicament," Arlo explained.

"But not necessarily minding it. I found my mate," Esen added.

Beckett smirked. "See, Enzo. You are the reason why you are fighting against us all. Even Blaze is fighting because he knows that Kaida belongs here with us, even though he is fighting the damn bond, but you are not going to drag her out of here."

"I was never going to drag her out of here!"

"Then why the fuck are you fighting so hard?" Blaze growled. "You could have just accepted the information. Instead, you are fighting us all."

"Because she is mine! My dragon does not understand that you are her mates, too. He knows that she is his. That’s all he understands."

"Well, make him understand that I am not ONLY HIS. I am not going to be fought over like some prize. If those three can agree to share, you can, too."

Enzo looked at Blaze, "Why are you fighting the bond?"

"I will now allow some chick to come between me and my life. I am defending my brothers. That’s it. You go after them, and you deal with me."

Kaida snorted. "Yeah, okay. That’s why. Meanwhile, you could have walked away and allowed them to deal with this independently."

"Why aren’t you rejecting him? He doesn’t seem to deserve you at all," Enzo asked while pointing at Blaze with his thumb.

"I won’t reject anyone. I won’t put them through what you did to me."

Enzo’s face grew red once again. "I apologized for that. Like I said. I did not want to reject you!"

"Then why did you, dickhead? You could have accepted her for who she was when you discovered she had no dragon. You didn’t. You rejected her and then brought her here. There was no conversation, no understanding. You just dropped her off like an unwanted child."

"Now is not the time to have a dick-measuring contest, Beckett."

"I at least had the balls to mark her when I discovered she was mine. No idea why you passed on that opportunity."

Enzo’s head snapped toward Kaida. "He marked you?"

Kaida pulled her hair off her neck and exposed Beckett’s mark. She held Enzo’s gaze as she felt his power surge around him. The shifting began, and Enzo broke through her shield. Kaida was not sure what he was about to do. Her heart thrummed in her ears as she tried to catch her breath. Enzo’s rage filled the space and nearly cut off her air supply.

No. NO! No one will threaten us!

Kaida’s dragon pushed the shift and took off once her form was complete. As she left the boys behind, Kaida wondered if things would calm down between them. This is not what she wanted at all.

I just want my happily ever after!