Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

SIYANA

I’d fallen asleep with a scowl on my face and awoken to a similar one on my husband's face as I found him staring at me, his cheek still on his pillow with a large, muscular arm tucked beneath it.

My scowl had been due to how damn attractive his physique was and the way my body betrayed me in coming alive at the thought of him undressing me. Despite the roaring fireplace in the chambers, a chill had still crept in through the night, and I’d chided myself many times as the thought to scoot closer to him had crossed my mind.

The reason for his scowl? I hadn’t a clue. Probably my ability to breathe, irritating him, if I had to guess.

“What could you possibly be pissed at me about already?” I managed to ask as the sleepy haze cleared from my brain. “Was I cursing your name in my sleep or something?”

Not out of the realm of possibilities.

I lacked my usual bite as the fatigue and exhaustion from our journey yesterday still lingered. It didn’t help that I kept waking throughout the night, swearing that I heard screams echoing in the distance. It was highly unnerving, but each time I’d waited to hear it while alert, the screams never came.

As the morning light had risen during my last waking, I’d chalked it up to delirium. My body was exhausted and hallucinations were following me from my dreams to the waking world.

It was the same reason I still remained curled up on my own side, facing him, too tired to move without sustenance to combat my fatigue.

I quickly quieted the tiny voice popping up in my mind trying to tell me that wasn’t the only reason why, and that the morning light streaming in from the glass balcony door reflecting off of his silver scales wasn’t fascinatingly beautiful.

He didn’t answer and I began to grow uncomfortable under the heavy weight of his silence. As I tucked the hair tickling my cheek behind my ear, I cleared my throat, trying to knock him out of whatever stupor he’d fallen into.

“Who did it, Siyana?”

His pointed question and use of my actual name caught me off guard as my brain scrambled to understand. My lips pursed as the wheels turned and I came up empty. “Who did what?”

The slitted reptilian eye of his narrowed as he inhaled sharply before letting it out. The deep timber of his voice rumbled as he clarified, “Who gave you the injury on your arm? It was clearly fresh, with how easily it opened under my grip.”

His question was so far out of the realm of possibilities rolling around in my head that I simply laid there in silent shock as his arm bunched up, lifting to push his free hand through the mess of his bed-head hair falling into his eyes. His bicep flexed and the light did nothing to help hide the veins running through his forearm that bulged with his movement.

“Did you fall back asleep with your eyes open, wench?” he prodded as his hand came to lay flat against the bed once more. “Or are you taking a sudden vow of silence?”

It occurred to me at that moment, that we were just lounging in a bed together with very little clothes on, as if he wasn’t a hulking brute who had conned my father into letting him steal me from my home and everything I held dear.

Apparently, I was pushing his patience with my non-answer, and he let out a sigh before pushing to sit up and look toward the balcony. With the movement, his abdomen scrunched, showing off each individually cut groove of muscle.

“Fine, don’t tell me, it doesn’t matter,” he muttered in annoyance before moving on, “today we will begin training you to learn how to defend yourself properly. Your attempt to hurt me yesterday was pathetic, and there are too many threats to your life lying in wait here.”

My eyes narrowed and I murmured, “Bet you wouldn’t be saying that if you didn’t have the unfair advantage of magic, dragon boy.”

His head turned ever so slowly until he looked at me and blinked twice. His voice was a low rumble as he asked, “Did you just call me ‘boy?’”

Of course that’s what his fragile ego fixated on. He may be part dragon, but he was full-blooded egotistical like any human man.

“I’ve yet to see any behavior that lends me any reason to think you a man,” I answered with ease before closing my eyes and snuggling into the pillow. “Besides, I’m not well enough to do any training. I need to eat and sleep more to recover my strength.”

A shriek clawed its way out of my throat as the warm furs were yanked off of me. A moment later, I found my body turned to lay on my back as a heavy weight settled itself above me. I knew it was him from the heat radiating into me despite our skin not even touching. I contemplated not opening my eyes to avoid him, but that felt even more weird than just looking at him up close.

Cracking my lids open, I found his face mere inches away. Up close, I could see a multitude of different colors of blue in his dragon eye, mesmerizing me as my inspection trailed to the scar running through the hard scale around it, before he blinked and sent me back to reality.

His voice rumbled, “This is my castle, you are my wife, and that means you live by my rules. Tell me you understand, wench.”

I swallowed hard and took a deep breath, letting my chest expand until it brushed against his briefly. His cold demeanor withered with the small contact, but as I spoke, his icy walls slid firmly back into place. “You may be my husband, but you will never own my mind. It is mine alone, and no amount of years here beneath your overbearing and belittling rules as king will change that.”

My voice was soft and even, showing how little I feared him. If he wanted me dead, he wouldn’t have shifted and come back for me as I found myself buried amongst the drifts of snow last night. He’d told me I’d never be worthy of riding a dragon, but him carrying me in his clawed foot felt awfully close.

What was he going to do if I continued to speak back to him? Eat me? Unlikely.

Despite the rumors of his cruelty and seeing a small ounce of it for myself, I was beginning to wonder if his bark was bigger than his bite.

My cheeks heated with warmth as he leaned in until his lips brushed against the shell of my ear, sending a shiver through my spine. “You seem too comfortable around me now, dear wife, seeing as your mental barrier just came down. Did you mean eating you in this form, or in my dragon form? Unclear.”

He could read my mind?

Sheer panic flooded my nervous system as my eyes widened with the implication. I didn’t think, reacting instinctively as I pushed against his chest in an attempt to get him off of me and away, as if space could prevent him from hearing me.

He was an immovable mountain, chuckling as he pulled back and traced his eyes over my face and down to where his thin tunic covered my chest.

“Looking a little cold this morning, wench, or is that your version of saying good morning?”

My mouth dropped open in horror as I glanced down and saw my pebbled nipples poking up into the material. “Get off of me!” I screamed, bringing my knees up and against his chest to try to give me better leverage for forcing him away.

Lacking my full strength still, I failed, and in a fit of rage went with the go-to. A crack echoed through the chambers as the palm of my hand stung with the contact to his too-perfectly-chiseled cheekbone.

His tongue ran along his top lip before he smacked them together, and his dragon eye flared with magic like it had before he’d turned my arm to an icicle. “Careful, wench, the fight is intriguing my dragon, and I don’t think you want to fight him.”

A split second later his body was gone and the chill of the room quickly settled into me in its stead. I quickly scrambled to pull the closest fur pelt to cover me and sat up, clutching it to my chest.

He strode over to the balcony, stepping out of the pants he’d slept in as he pushed the doors open, giving me a clear view of his firmly muscled ass. I did my best to picture a wall of ice around my mind, preventing him from seeing inside. The last thing I needed was him hearing that I didn’t actually find him entirely disgusting. His back flexed as he twisted to glance over his shoulder at me, and I snapped my eyes up from his ass to meet his own.

“Can you make your way down the hall alone to your chambers to bathe and dress?”

I nodded instantly, unsure if I actually could, but wanting the chance to do something independently.

He stepped out onto the balcony and called out, “Stay there and I’ll come get you to bring you down to eat breakfast shortly. Keep that mental wall up.”

I only had a split second to revel in my victory of constructing a mental barrier before fascination overwhelmed me. I watched with rapt attention as his muscles elongated and more silver scales began to appear and cover every stretch of his exposed skin. Webbed wings began to grow, and thick legs bunched to launch into the sky as the full shift overcame him.

My mouth fell open as I quickly scrambled to my feet, using the bed to help push myself up. Gingerly, I walked over to the open doors and looked out into the beautiful blue sky dusted with a gentle snowfall.

His dragon soared through the air, cutting sharply as he banked to his right, flying up in the mountain range. As he turned and the sun hit his body, he was one giant ball of reflection, and it hit me how amazing of a defensive technique that would be, especially on a cloudy day.

My feet were glued to the spot despite the frigid temperature of the floor and the brisk air floating around me, pebbling every inch of my skin. I watched him soaring through the sky in a mixture of fascination and fear–that was the same person I’d just laid across from. It was one thing to know it, but an entirely different case to see it so clearly for the first time.

As he disappeared from sight behind the castle, I shook my head and turned back to his chambers. I gave the fireplace another glance, wishing I’d still had the clothes he’d burned, seeing as they were the only remaining tie to my home. Dwelling on it served me no good, though, and I walked slowly to the door and yanked it open, prepared to find my own chambers. Despite this being his castle, the concept of having my own chambers was appealing. A place that was mine to hide away in and not have to keep my mask in place.

I was a strong, fierce woman, and I wouldn’t cower, but I also needed a safe place to mourn the life and people that had been ripped away from me with no time to process it. Both could be true at once.

Crossing the frigidly cold stone floor to the long black rug that stretched the expanse of the hall before me, I breathed a small sigh of relief at the minor buffer against my skin. I took my time scanning the large murals lining the hall and took in each name placard beneath them. Each previous ruling king and queen filled the space, and I noted the same white hair passed down from king to king, but as I reached the most recent, the image that had to be his parents, I noted that his navy eyes and sharp features had been handed down by his mother.

I found myself glued to the spot as I took in his parents, the king seated on a throne of ice and his mother standing behind him with a hand atop his shoulder. If Theo was the king, it meant his father had passed, but was his mother gone as well?

Despite it being a painting, there was a gentle and easy aura that radiated from his mother’s soft smile and the wrinkled edges of her eyes that spoke of time and wisdom. I was drawn to her and marveled at the cold juxtaposition of the king’s obsidian eyes that dared the viewer to oppose him. His closely cut hair gave him a much sharper appearance than Theo’s, but I noted the waves from his mother’s blonde hair matched his own. He was a seamless blend of them both.

“She was beautiful, wasn’t she?” a voice asked, causing me to jump at the intrusion.

I covered my chest with my arms instinctively and took a step back as a young man came into view from the corridor just past the murals. His upbeat tone jogged a memory, and as I took in his large, broad build, it hit me.

“You’re the other person who was there last night,” I mused, recalling his words and smiling at it. “You chastised Theo for having one job in taking care of me. And failing spectacularly at it.”

His dark hair fell forward over his shoulders as he took a deep bow at the waist before standing rigidly straight once more. His black tunic held the crest of a silver dragon on the breast, the same one that hung on the banners in the hall around us. “Lucius, Your Highness. Pleased to formally meet you.”

His dimples broke through the shadow of a beard coming in, and his smile was disarming, matching his open energy as he regarded me with true respect. A part of me felt a trickle of guilt for branding all dragons as my enemies, when here one was, being as nice and polite as could be to me.

“Do you need assistance to your chambers?” he asked, tilting his head as he took me in.

I was surprised at the ease I felt around him already. It was easy to see his assessment of me was clinical, eyes never lingering for long in any one spot. “I was surprised to not see either of you in the dining hall this morning, as Theo normally rises before the sun. I wanted to make sure you hadn’t taken a turn for the worse overnight.”

Despite the comfort I felt, I shifted awkwardly on my feet as the cold still wrapped around my bare legs. “I appreciate your concern, Lucius, and it's lovely to meet you as well. My name is Siyana, but you may call me Sia.”

He seemed to sense my discomfort as his mouth widened at the same time his silver eyes did. It was a testament to either my ability to quickly adapt, or my denseness, that I noted the pale blue scales running along his forehead last.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to catch you in such a state,” he apologized as his eyes lowered to the ground. “Do you want me to wait for you to get ready and show you to the dining hall?”

It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him that Theo said he would be back to do exactly that, but the rebellious part of my brain shoved that fact down. I didn’t need to cower away and wait like the ever-dutiful wife.

“Yes, that would be amazing. Give me time to acquaint myself with the room and hopefully take a bath to freshen up after the journey yesterday.”

With a nod and his eyes still on the ground, he retreated down the hall he’d appeared from.

A knot in my chest loosened at the thought of maybe having a kind soul around. Seeing as he was close enough with Theo to berate him without being killed or told to get on his knees and apologize, I gathered he likely wouldn’t be an ally in my quest for independence while here. However, I’d happily settle for knowing there was at least one person I could speak to without wanting to gouge my eyes out with frustration, even if he was a dragon.

As I walked through the space he’d just occupied, I took in an appreciating breath and his scent lingered in the air. It was very much like the salty ocean air that bordered the northern portion of Andrathya, and in combination with his blue scales, I found myself wondering if he was aligned with the water affinity of the undine, whereas Theo was clearly ice. Either way, it was a lovely smell, and I wondered if they had bottles of perfume around that matched it.