"I'm sorry, Sera," he said, turning to carry me in through the doors.
I didn't answer, suddenly unsure whether or not I wanted to continue to be stubbornly angry. I was sorry as well, but I didn't necessarily want him to know that.
I caved as soon as he sat me down in an armchair in front of the fire and knelt to massage the feeling back into my numb feet. "I'm sorry too."
He shook his head. "I should not have acted the way I did or said the things I said. I was unreasonable, and you have nothing to apologize for. "
"I do,” I asserted. “I think I threatened to cut your cock off."
"No, you didn't," he said, matter-of-factly. "You just expressed a wish that someone else might."
"Well, I do not, in fact, want anyone to cut it off. And for that matter, I would be very cross if anyone else even saw it." I put a hand up to silence him before adding, "—even just the faintest outline of it."
He huffed a laugh, moving on to my other foot. “I find it difficult to control my possessiveness, Sera. It’s the bond. I know you can’t quite feel it yet, but something tells me you at least understand it.” He glanced over his shoulder to the fire where the black, lacy undergarment sat unburned in the middle of the flames.
I looked at him, slightly abashed. “How was I to know it was nesericum silk?”
He grinned.
“Who does it belong to?” I asked. My heart raced in my chest. I did not want to know, but I also desperately needed to know.
“Freya’s rider, Alfa,” he said carefully.
“Did you...love her?” I asked as it felt like my heart might take flight from the frantic way it was beating. To know that she was the rider of his dragon’s mate made it all somehow so much worse.
He looked up at me, a slow grin spreading across his face. “I have never loved anyone but you. Not even close.”
I smiled as it felt like my chest suddenly expanded to double size. The words filled me with a kind of happiness that shouldn’t have been possible.
My smile turned just a tad malicious, though, as I asked, “Will she come here? Will I have to see her?”
“She comes often—to see Freya.”
I took a deep breath and realized I was gritting my teeth as I imagined the faceless Alfa in that very room, in his bed—inourbed. I wanted her to fall face-first from the balcony.
He chuckled, sliding his hand up my thigh. “I do so love it when you turn vicious, Sera darling.”
I rolled my eyes. "I do have a good excuse for it today, though.”
"Female monthly aggression?" he offered.
I gave him a withering look. "Enchanted sword. I'm sure you noticed the shredded training dummy?"
"Now that you mention it," he said, darting his gaze up to me.
I reached out to slide that stubborn lock of his hair to the side. "There is apparently a cost to using my sword—in the form of rage and homicidal fantasies of cutting...things...off."
He laughed, sliding his hands down my calf, massaging the tight, sore muscles. "There is always a cost to using magic that doesn't come from inside you. Spell work can have very unexpected consequences."
"Like how a love spell can make someone psychotically obsessed with you?" I asked, remembering the trouble black market love spells sometimes caused in Albiyn. Spells like the one Franca had once attempted to use on Arkadian.
"Exactly. But I'm sure we can help you learn to channel that rage in some other form so that you can wield the sword without worry. Which brings me to something quite fortuitous to that point."
I raised my brow.
"I have a gift for you...gifts, really."
A slow smile spread across my face.
