“Let’s stay for however long we need to, then head home and rest,” Hemlocke offers diplomatically. “We can have movie night—pick something mindless and fun.”
“That’s the best thing I’ve heard all day,” I admitted with genuine relief. “I definitely need a shower before any movie, though.” Smirking, I give myself an exaggerated sniff. “I’m stinky from all that combat.”
“I’m gonna get everyone home the fast way,” Keir announces before vanishing with Raven and Finlay in that distinctivepopof displaced air that marks his teleportation.
Hemlocke quickly makes some take-away plates and slips them into cloth bags with practiced efficiency. “Snacks for later,” he explains with a grin.
He barely makes it back to me before Keir reappears and grabs us both—one hand on each of our shoulders. Reality folds around us in that nauseating rush, and then we’re standing in the familiar warmth of our home at Malivore.
Time to unwind, shower off the grime of battle, and spend quality time with my family. After today’s political games and combat, I need the normalcy of movie night more than I realized.
Raven wokeup in a foul mood this morning, snapping at everyone and barely touching her breakfast. Then I remembered—today is the dominance challenges. The realization hit me like cold water, explaining her coiled tension and the way her scales kept rippling beneath her skin.
Keir has transported us to the Sovereign nest in several quick jumps, and now we’ve gathered around the challenge field. The space is enormous—a circular arena carved into the mountainside with stone walls that rise fifty feet high. For the dominance challenges, combat is shifted and to the death. No quarter, no mercy, no second chances.
Raven steps away from us without a word and heads over to where her mother stands near the edge of the field. Even from here, I can see the rigid set of her shoulders.
Lily is the first one challenged by a green dragoness from the Northern territory—smaller than Lily but aggressive, launching the challenge before the official start. They shift simultaneously, and it quickly becomes an aerial battle. The sound of wing beats fills the air like thunder, and I watch them climb higher into the sky.
Raven’s sapphire eyes are glowing with an intensity that makes my silver scales prickle with warning. I can feel her agitation through our bond—a vibrating tension that sets my teeth on edge.
After thirty brutal minutes of aerial combat, Lily executes a perfect maneuver and snaps the neck of the green dragoness with an audible crack that echoes across the field. The mangled corpse falls onto the packed earth with a heavy thud that I feel through my boots, blood pooling beneath the twisted body.
Inara strides into the center of the circle before the corpse has even stopped twitching. “I wish to challenge Raven for her male, Corvus.” She raises her chin at such an arrogant angle that I know immediately it’s going to set Raven off like a powder keg.
Slowly, I turn to look at my mate standing near her mom, and my blood turns to ice in my veins. Raven’s face has gone completely blank—an emotionless mask that’s somehow more terrifying than rage would be. She stares at Inara with eyes that have shifted fully to her dragon’s slitted pupils, burning sapphire bright.
She turns to look at Klauth, and he actually takes a step backward despite being an ancient. I’ve never seen him retreat from anything.
“I do not think this match is safe to proceed,” Klauth says, looking directly at me as I close the distance with my bond brothers falling in behind me on instinct.
“What’s the matter, Klauth? Don’t think the heir apparent will win?” Magnus says with a laugh that carries cruel amusement.
“I don’t think anyone can stop her if she goes on a rampage,” Thauglor says grimly, then looks at Inara standing in the ring with the confidence of someone who doesn’t understand the danger she’s in. “It’s your funeral, girl.”
“Raven, don’t,” Mina pleads, stepping directly in front of her daughter. Raven just smiles—and it’s the most unsettling expression I’ve ever seen on her face. Empty. Predatory. Wrong.
“I am not forfeiting my mate to her. There is no way in Tiamat’s name I will ever allow that to happen.” Raven’s voice is too calm, too controlled, like a string pulled to breaking point. She looks at Finlay with sudden intensity. “If I lose control, get me out of here. Take me back to where my dreams led me.”
There’s genuine fear in Raven’s eyes. Not fear of dying or losing—fear of what she might do, what she might become.
Raven takes off running and shifts mid-stride. Her enormous dragoness explodes into existence with a sound like a building collapsing, blocking out the afternoon sun and casting the entire field into shadow. The ground trembles beneath the force of her transformation.
Inara has a sudden look of genuine fear in her amber eyes as understanding finally dawns. She shifts quickly and goes immediately on the attack—probably hoping to end this fast. She blasts Raven with a massive cone of fire, the flames so hot I can feel the heat from here, and I hear myself screaming my mate’s name.
Raven takes a direct hit, fire engulfing her entirely. Then the other two gold dragonesses—who had no business being here—joined Inara in attacking Raven, all three breathing fire simultaneously.
“Why isn’t she fighting back?” Hemlocke yells over the roar of flames, his voice cracking with panic.
It’s now I notice something crucial—the fire hasn’t hurt her at all. The expected smell of burnt flesh and charred scalesisn’t there. Instead, I catch the scent of cinnamon and smoke—Finlay’s signature. Slowly, I turn and look at Finlay, and the bastard actually smirks at a time like this.
“I gifted her my feather and my immunity to fire,” he explains with insufferable calm, shaking his head as he watches the four dragons in the air. “I warned Inara not to mess with Raven...” Finlay turns to look at Magnus with cold satisfaction. “I suggest you call your three females off before my mate goes on the attack. Which, by the looks of it, shouldn’t be much longer.”
Inara makes the catastrophic mistake of charging toward us on the ground, probably trying to draw Raven away from witnesses. Raven turns with predatory focus, and I look directly into her dragon’s eyes—and they are hollow. Empty. Void of recognition or mercy. It’s not my mate in control anymore. Her dragoness has taken the driver’s seat completely.
She swoops down with terrifying speed, and her massive, taloned hand comes out like a striking snake. She grabs Inara by her dragon’s throat, the golden scales crunching audibly in her grip, and climbs vertically with her prey trapped in her talons. The other female screams—a sound I didn’t know dragons could make.
“Shit...” I look at my bond brothers and physically pull them aside, away from the carnage about to unfold.
