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"The Goddess doesn't make jokes or mistakes.”
“Don’t speak to me as if I don’t know my own mother,” he snapped.
I sighed and said nothing further. Trying to talk to Rumir right now would be useless. He was all fire and brute force—brawn, not brains. For centuries, I’d ignored his hatred, allowing him to think and do as he wished, but this . . . I couldn’t ignore this.
"When the Goddess wakes up, we can ask her to reverse what she’s done.” I held my head back as thunder rumbled in the distance. “She’ll fix this. You’ve only just met Natalie. Despite what you're feeling, I know her. The Goddess can give you another mate.”
“That’s really rich coming from you.” Rumir laughed, but it held no humor. "I know what you’ve been up to, Lucian.”
He turned his head to look at me. “I know you’ve been inquiring about ways to break a bond without a rejection. At first, I didn’t know you’d found your mate, but people gossip about you a lot, Lucian. You should be more careful who you ask questions.” He laughed dryly. “You don’t want her, but apparently you don’t want to see her with anyone else, either. Especially not me.”
He paused and looked me in the eye. “Can’t you see that I’m the solution to your problem? Now she has another mate—one that wants her. You’re free to step aside. Or should I just tell her what you’ve been up to? Then she can decide for herself."
My upper lip twitched at the thought of Rumir going anywhere near her. “You’re not a wolf, Rumir, you’re a dragon. Aren’t you concerned about that? Your mother gave you a mate who’s not of your species.” I let that sink in for a minute, then went for the jugular. “Didn’t you see it at the ball, the moment when Natalie realized you weren’t one of us, not a wolf? What makes you so confident she won’t reject you the moment she wakes up?”
We turned to face each other at the same time, the smugness on his face wiped away as his eyes burned bright green. A mate bond between a god/dragon hybrid and a werewolf was ridiculous. But if he revealed what I’d been doing to Natalie, I’d lose her.
“We’ll just have to wait and see what happens when she wakes up, won’t we?” Rumir growled.
I shook my head. “You can’t know what’ll happen if she rejects either of us,” I told him. “You're a bigger fool than I thought if you think she’ll choose you over me. When I suggested we let the Goddess handle this, I wasn't thinking of just myself. I was thinking of Natalie. The Goddess can undo this without causing her pain and risking her dying a soul-death." My words, however, only seemed to anger him.
“I assume you haven’t told her what happened to the last woman you loved. Do you think she’ll look at you in the same way when she finds out?”
The grass beneath my feet turned to ice as my wolf awoke, while steam began to rise from Rumir’s body. He stepped forward, but a large root suddenly appeared between us. Long thorns the length of my arm shot outwards towards us, and we both backed away, barely in time to avoid being impaled.
Rehema stormed out of the house, the feathers on her dress blowing wildly.
"Enough," she yelled, although her voice was still low. "The two of you starting a fight out here won't do her any good!”
Rumir growled. “Who are you to speak to me like that?”
Rehema turned her heated gaze on him. “We’ve never officially met. I’m Rehema, daughter of Eir and Itsuki—a demigoddess. I’m also Natalie’s friend. Okay? Now it’s your turn to listen to me. Natalie needs to rest, and you're both arguing loud enough to wake the dead. Instead of constantly bickering, why don’t you try thinking of Natalie’s needs instead? This impacts her, too. So maybe you should both try to get over your egos and your messed up sense of ownership over her, and remember that she's suffering right now, too. And she’ll continue to suffer until this is—I don't know, corrected. She just arrived in this realm and has been struggling to settle in. And now she’ll have this to deal with as well. So why don’t you both just give her a break?"
Rumir’s temper seemed to calm, and he glanced down at his feet. Rehema’s tirade seemed to have done the trick. I looked up at Natalie's bedroom window. She was still sleeping soundly, but Rehema's words were pregnant with the truth.
Neither Rumir nor I knew when the Goddess would wake. So until then, we'd all have to deal with this.
“Goodnight, Rehema. I’ll be back in the morning.” I walked away without saying anything more and kept walking as I heard Rumir leap into the sky.
I stopped walking and listened to Natalie’s heartbeat for a second more before shifting into my first form. I’d be back in the morning to tell her everything before Rumir could make matters worse.
I’d started off not wanting to hurt her, thinking that breaking our bond was the only way I could keep her safe. But now that Rumir was in the picture, I realized I couldn’t let her go. I wouldn’t.
This was a wakeup call, letting me know that I wasn’t at all okay with losing her.
Tomorrow I was going to tell her the truth and head off that potential disaster while I still could. I knew it wouldn’t be the last one I’d have to deal with related to this mate situation.
Wherever Rumir went, disaster always followed.
