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"We're going to take your heart, Evanthia," Hywel whispered. "We lay claim to it and to all of you. And if you want to fight us with your pretty claws and sweet little teeth, we will take your scratches and bites too.Allof you."
I was dizzy. The pair of them had taken me to some strange and impossible height, not ecstasy or panic, but some mix of the two. It was only Laszlo's hands that connected me to the real world, his touch and Hywel's eyes on mine as he thrust and snarled and groaned. Hywel's fingers stroked and swirled over my clit, thumb kissing and sliding in to join his cock, grasping onto my sex.
"Mate," Laszlo whispered into my throat, his voice breaking and body bucking wildly in contrast to Hywel's steady movement. "Love. Oh, Evanthia, I—"
Their words had found fissures in me, all the tiny places I threatened to break apart, and it was Laszlo's pleading and Hywel's fangs scratching sweetly on my breast that cast the final blow. I shouted wordlessly, body wracked and quaking, and then I was all in pieces, beautiful, glittering shards that should've torn through them both, cut the very fabric of the air and world apart. Except that Laszlo and Hywel were holding me so tightly, arms and legs wrapped around me.
Their bodies shifted, someone pulling inside of me, and I moaned in protest, shivering, rattling in all my little broken parts. They stilled, arms tightening around me, until I realized there must've been some whole pieces, because my bones ached at their grip. My face came back together as Hywel licked my cheeks, cleaning tears away.
"No," I breathed out, but I didn't want to move, didn't want them to release me to be wreckage on the lovely bed, all fractured in candlelight.
"Yes," Hywel said, kissing my mouth. That too was still in one piece, and my tongue tied easily with his. He pulled away too soon, and my lungs filled with air, no cracks to let it escape. My eyes opened, and Hywel was fuzzy, milky with tears, and too close for my gaze to know where to look. "Yes,blodyn bach. If your heart is not whole yet, you have use of ours."
Laszlo kissed the back of my neck, nose nuzzling the spot. "My wings are yours, dear one."
"And my fire," Hywel whispered, kissing me once more.
And as if to prove his point, our hearts did seem to match tempos, Laszlo and Hywel pressed so closely to me that I could feel them drumming together, easing and slowing as Hywel kept my objections silent with his steady kisses.
CHAPTER26
WINNING HAND
Ididn't remember sleeping, but I woke with dawn curling tendrils of light through nests of clouds.
"You don't know me," I whispered, the argument ready on my tongue, as if I'd slept with the words just waiting to burst free.
Hywel was awake, of course. He was still careful not to sleep, sitting up in the bed with me leaning against his hip and Laszlo still tightly fastened to my back. Long, pale fingers stroked my hair back from my face, and then the dragon shimmied down into the bed until we were nose to nose.
"You think I don't know the woman who dreamed in my lap? Who washed my scales while I was sleeping? Who saw the loneliness in my mate and gave him hope and reminded him how to feel affection?" Hywel blinked at me and waited for a moment, but I'd only had the single sentence ready and I was still foggy from the restless night, warm and pleasantly sore, surrounded by their bodies. "What have you hidden from us, Evanthia? What lies have you told?"
I nibbled on my lips, swollen and tender from kisses, and Hywel waited patiently, touching me everywhere he could reach in an absentminded pattern.
"What if I can't love you back?" I asked at least.
I expected him to frown or growl or object or correct me in some way. Instead, he simply took a deep breath and continued touching me, looking at me. "That's not quite the same thing as you not wanting to be loved," he said. He shifted, turning onto his back, still pressed against me. I couldn't help myself. I leaned in and rested my cheek on his shoulder, traced the elegant muscle of his arm with my fingertips. "Let's say, hypothetically speaking of course, that years go by and you find yourself never really in love with us, not wanting to remain at our side…" He paused, and I held my breath. "We wouldn'tforceyou to stay."
Asterion had demanded I be free to stay or leave as I chose, but I suspected if I told Hywel now that I was leaving the castle, he wouldnotallow me to do so. It ought to have rankled me or made me tense with the sense of being trapped. Except I didn'twantto leave. I didn't want to leave this bed, these men, this castle. I felt as though I should, but Hywel had more or less refused to let me turn away.
"What if I was in love with someone else?" I asked, less determined to prove to Hywel that he shouldn't care for me and now more curious about the terms of such a relationship.
He only shrugged. "It would depend on how detestable they were.Iam in love with someone else, you know," he pointed out, nodding over my shoulder to Laszlo and taking a moment to smile at the sight of the sleeping gryphon.
"That's different. He's—He and I—I mean, we—"
Hywel's eyebrows rose, mouth twitching, and I licked my lips and tried to think of a way of making my point without making it sound as if I'd already settled myself as their mate.
"Are you in love with someone else,blodyn bach?" Hywel asked gently.
I opened my mouth to say no. To say that if I was going to fall in love at all, if Iwascapable, it would probably be with a whole mess of men at once, but I wasn't in lovenow. I'm not, right?I wondered, a little panicked. Any possibletheoreticalother gentlemen in question weren't at the castle. Not at the moment. But was that as good as admitting that I was already on the way to falling in love?
What hadhappenedto me?
I'd been so…so frozen, a captive in my own body, and now I was basically squirming under Hywel's stare, thinking about horns and fur and feathers and scales.
"No," I forced out. The word felt odd on my tongue.
He smiled at me. "Well, then. Nothing to do about it but let things be as they are. How about breakfast? You ought to be hungry after last night."
