Chapter 13

MADELINE

I can’t help but giggle throughout the flight. Hael and Lochness were unable to locate the chastity belt—I’ve hidden it so well, even I wouldn’t be able to find it.

The thought of them digging through piles of treasure like dogs, never finding it, keeps me entertained. They waste half the day on their fruitless search, so they finally decide to take me to Haven without any silly contraptions. After all, it is my reward day for being such a good girl.

Lochness presents me with a beautiful red dress, soft and flowing, along with a large coat made from wolf’s hide. He drapes it over my shoulders and I ride on his back.

When we fly over Haven, we land at the south end, where there’s a strip of shops for little ones. Hael and Lochness even dress up to blend in with the humans. Lochness is wearing a crisp, brand new white linen shirt and new leather pants—still black, but they look good.

Hael is in his older brown leather pants, but with a new white shirt as well. They both go barefoot, which I find adorable. I’m in white rabbit skin slippers and carrying a satchel that I’m supposed to fill with gadgets and baby supplies.

As we walk into town, I’m leading the way for once, my long red hair catching the sunlight as I head for the first shop. Hael slips a small cloth bag of silver coins into my hand and I clutch it to my chest. “Thanks,” I say, grinning.

I notice that Lochness walks closer to the paved stones, avoiding the road with the horses and the noisy foot traffic. They both look so much younger in the daylight, dressed like mortals and flanking me. But their emerald eyes and the fact that they’re the resident Twin Dragons give them away.

Humans whisper and move away, and some stare pointedly at Nessy, who looks everywhere but at them. Hael doesn’t seem to mind the attention, but Nessy does. I quickly choose the nearest shop to spare Lochness any further discomfort.

“This’ll do,” I say, stepping in front of him and opening the door for them.

I’m surprised by their silence, not making any derogatory comments about the humans around them. I guess they feel out of place in a mortal town, away from the Horde and here on parental duty. The moment we enter the busy shop, a hush falls over everyone inside.

Young and old mothers, grandmothers, and some children, all stop what they’re doing and look over at Hael and Lochness—mostly at them. One child moves first to hide behind his mother’s skirts. Then the crowd collectively gulps, silently turning and making their way out the second door, furthest from us.

I blush, feeling embarrassed that they get scared off. But also feeling a bit guilty that I’m kind of happy I get the shop to myself. The shopkeeper, a woman with a newborn baby of her own in a wrap and sling, calls out nervously, “M-Madeline, is it? Please, take your time.”

I move toward her while Hael and Lochness follow close behind me. “What’s that?” I ask, pointing to the sling. “Can we have one?”

“Yes, oh yes, I make them to size,” she explains. “I have to measure for each. Come here.” She opens a wooden panel, steps out and ushers Hael in so quickly that we’re all taken aback.

She’s grabbed his wrist, nodding toward a measuring cloth hanging from the wall.

I step back in shock, not at her, but because Hael moves without complaint, although he looks a bit freaked out by the suddenness of it all.

“We have grey and white,” she says, moving around him and flicking up a piece of cloth that falls over his shoulder.

Lochness silently slinks backward and I turn to see him looking at something in the furthest corner of the shop, trying to avoid being dragged in next.

“Any color Madeline wants,” Hael murmurs to me.

“I think the grey is softer,” I tell the lady.

“What’s your name?”

“Faustina,” she replies, tucking another piece of cloth over his shoulder. “Done, now you.” She ushers Hael out and he grabs my arm and pulls me in past him, back to Faustina.

I quickly take his place and Hael waits close by, looking proud of himself for managing to do it right. But Faustina is just quick. She measures me next, wrapping the cloth around me.

“All done. Shall I make three?” she asks me.

“Yes,” I say. “Lochness’s shoulders are the same width, so…”

I hear Nessy make a noise under his breath but he doesn’t come over to prove a point. Then I decide to look around, since she’ll need time to make the slings. Hael walks with me toward a pile of bonnets and sock collections.

Hael picks up a pair of baby socks, pastel green with white edges and shows them to me. “Hmm?”

“Hmm,” I mimic him and nod.

“You’re not meant to find this mocking to me,” Hael warns in my head.

“On the contrary, I think I’m more in love with you than ever, my lord,” I whisper back.

I see Hael smiling with his teeth out of the corner of my eye—when I turn my head, he changes it to a more subtle smile and raises a brow.

“Forgiven,” Hael chuckles. “Keep looking, take your time. The day is yours.”

He quickly puts a hand on my back and moves me along after I’ve pocketed four bonnets and four pairs of socks, including the one he chose.

“My lord, this goes on your back, so you can walk far with baby.”

I look up to see Faustina trying to place a back satchel over Nessy’s shoulders—gosh she moves quick! He lifts an arm since she already slipped it over his hand slyly and pulled one end up to his shoulders.

“Is ‘my lord’ fine?”

“Lochness is better,” Lochness says, going stiff with his arms up as Faustina moves like a sly mouse, quickly ducking under and around him to settle the rest in place.

“It’s a little small for you, but I can adjust it,” Faustina says, moving in front and lifting the shoulders at the same time, trying to loosen the straps.

“Their little arms and legs hang out of the holes,” she says seriously. “They sometimes pull on long hair, it’s better for the men to wear these.”

“I’ll…take it,” Lochness says, slinging it off and handing it to her. He smiles with a twitchy lip and turns, hoping she stops torturing him.

Faustina quickly returns to the front of the shop, placing it with the slings she’s making as we browse. Hael is doing his best to suppress his laughter at his brother, while Nessy pretends not to hear it.

I notice Faustina’s baby, now nestled in a handmade cot, tilted at a slight angle and swaddled in a nest of fur. The baby pouts, looking so helpless except for its trembling lower lip, a sight that could melt anyone’s heart.

Hael and Lochness follow my gaze to the pouting baby, and I quickly wipe a tear from my eye. The sight of the baby’s sad face makes me want to cry.

The baby is so tiny, and my hormones are in overdrive. I turn to Hael, burying my face in his chest for comfort. He gently rubs my back.

~Mouse, what’s wrong?~ Hael asks, clearly puzzled by my sudden sadness.

~It’s just so adorable,~ I whimper in his mind. ~Did you see its lip quiver?~

“You’re going to have two of these little ones to look after, mouse,” Hael reminds me in his soft, soothing voice. I manage a smile—

“One,” Lochness interjects, moving closer to me. “The girl is mine,” he reminds Hael, standing behind me. “My baby girl. I’ll take her out.”

“Babies don’t need to go out,” Hael retorts with a smirk. “Relax, brother.”

“She’ll fly with me.” Lochness runs his knuckles down my spine. “The sling will probably fit around a talon quite well. She’ll learn to fly before the boy does.”

“Don’t be absurd.” I spin around to face Nessy, placing my hands on his chest and looking up at him. “You’re not taking newborns flying!”

“Only mine,” Lochness grins.

“You can’t play favorites,” I whisper. “You’ll break the little one’s heart.”

“You want to bet? The boy is his, Hael can spoil his prince.” Lochness gives me a cheeky smile—I can’t tell if he’s joking or not. I hope he’s just being sarcastic—because he better love and spoil both of them equally!

I think Nessy has walked away, but he’s taken my hand and is leading me to a basket full of plush toys. There are tiny bears, wolves, rabbits, owls, dragons—every animal you can think of, all about the size of my fist.

I spot a black dragon among them, but Lochness reaches in and pulls out…not the dragon, but a small green snake with a red tongue sticking out. “…it’s Hael.”

“Give me that,” I grumble, taking it from him and putting it in my bag. “It’s cute, I get it—but we don’t need your sarcasm in a store like this. You can pick out cute things without making jokes, Nessy.”

Lochness ignores me and pulls me along to another shelf while Hael glares at him from under his long lashes, his hand resting on my backside.

Lochness opens the bag and starts picking out small, hand-carved wooden cups and bowls. He’s determined to choose the best, and I don’t get a say in it.

A minute later, Hael hands me a plush toy—a little black bat with a goofy face, holey wings, and twirly ears.

“You can guess who that is,” Hael murmurs. I take it from him and gently place it in the bag. I force a smile.

“Brothers,” I mutter under my breath, rolling my eyes and pushing past them. I’m relieved I’m not having twin boys—but a girl ~and~ a boy.

I return to Faustina, who’s finishing up the slings with the new material.

“Excuse me, do you know where I can order cots and prams?” I ask. Faustina nods and points across the street.

“They’re quite expensive,” Faustina warns me.

“We can afford it.” I grin back at my mates, who are now standing on opposite sides of the shop, smirking and glaring at each other. They’re lost in their own world, probably debating who’ll be the better dad.

“I’ll take these.” I place everything on the counter, and Faustina quickly wraps them up in a complimentary baby blanket that doubles as a bag.

“A gift.” Faustina smiles. “Everything is in here—and remember to be gentle when you wash the slings.”

“Thank you, I will.” I hand her the money just as her baby starts to cry, hungry and unable to wait any longer.

Before I start crying too, I fill my bag and head for the exit.

Hael and Lochness are so engrossed in their conversation, they don’t even notice me leaving.

“I’m going to the cot store across the street, come on!” I call out to them, but I don’t wait.

~Do you always have to argue?~ I ask mentally, feeling their snarky responses but not being included in their conversation. ~I’m going across the street,~ I repeat, just to be sure. I know better than to be reckless and disappear on them.

I wait for them outside the shop for a few seconds before deciding to go shopping on my own.

There are so many adorable baby toys in there, and I can’t believe I leave with a snake and a bat. How frustrating.

Oh well.

There are more important supplies to get—and I’m going to get them now.

***

Eventually, Hael and Lochness cross the street. I watch them casually stroll over, completely relaxed and even laughing together.

It makes me happy to see them not fighting and apparently reaching some sort of agreement.

This store is quieter and much larger. I head to the back where the most luxurious cots are displayed. They’re just for show, but they give me an idea of what I want.

I’m drawn to one designed specifically for twins. Perfect.

It has two spaces for the babies to sleep side by side, soft netting on the sides, and wood that’s been polished to a non-toxic black. This is the one I want. It smells wonderful.

The blankets on display are ruffled on the side, which looks wrong.

I lean in to fix it, pulling the blanket up—but I feel something poking up from underneath. I pull the blanket down and see…a bone.

Not a toy…just a…bone? I stare at it, transfixed.

Oh, no. It’s…~cursed~. I’m unable to tear my gaze away from it, no matter how hard I try. What the hell is happening to me? I can still move the rest of my body, though.

My arm is outstretched beneath me, my fingers hovering over the strange object. I notice a red streak on my arm. A trail of blood.

I can’t feel the blood trickling down, only see it. There’s a spreading numbness in my skin, a burning sensation in my arteries. It’s…inside me.

I can only watch as the thin line of blood on my arm branches into more rivulets of fresh blood. More blood? Where is it coming from? It’s mine. But I don’t feel a thing.

I attempt to turn my head but I can’t. I reach up with my other hand, my fingertips tracing the shape of eyes, a nose…slightly crooked. Who the hell is nuzzled into my neck? Why can’t I feel anything?

Suddenly, I feel a release of pressure. My blood surges up into my head, causing a painful throbbing. I cry out. The head moves away from my neck and I spin around.

I’m free to move again. I feel lightheaded from the shock and the strange magic that is part of the bite I just received in my neck. A bite I can’t feel at all.

This is real blood magic. The worst kind. I turn my gaze to the perpetrator.

A familiar man who is unmistakably a dragon, given his too-tight, blood-stained britches that he clearly stole. His torso is massive, the only comparison to such height and muscle makes me think of Twin Dragons.

But this dragon has straight, sharp-looking black hair that reaches his ankles. It’s absurdly long, but it’s tied back with a single leather strap, keeping it mostly neat and out of the way.

A few strands frame his face, which is neither handsome nor ugly but somewhere in between. He might be attractive, if it weren’t for the purely sinister energy oozing from him, glaring out of his eyes.

One eye is ruby red and bloodshot, the other a faded jade green and cracked with grey. His eyes look sickly, but the rest of him is perfectly healthy because he’s well-fed and muscular like any Dragon Lord.

This dragon wants to kill me. I know it without a doubt by the way he looks at me with no lust, no interest—only malevolence and hidden secrets.

This emotionless, blood-lipped dragon is just staring down at me, waiting for me to lose it. My heart pounds in fear, and I reach out to my mates.

Where their strong flames usually are, I feel absolutely nothing. Not even a flicker.

Not even dulled. Just…nothing. To put it simply—there is no mating bond anymore.

The dream.

~The dream!~ I’m hit with a wave of deja vu.

This is…the ‘best friend’ of young Lochness. But he’s older now, and he’s found me.

“Nerezza,” I whisper his name. He looks surprised, and I see a flicker of emotion, a tiny wince in his sharp black brow. “You…bit me…and you want to hurt him,” I say, first with a sense of dull realization…then rage.

I think of the town…the fathers, the children, the mothers. Lochness being forced to intervene and end their suffering.

I think of Faustina and her newborn possibly being slaughtered. I’ve felt anger in my life, but nothing as strong as the rage I feel right now.

I’ve never wanted to truly kill anybody. But now I might feel different.

“I bit you, Madeline. Your babies will be miscarried by tomorrow morning if Ness and his brother don’t bite you back by then,” Nerezza tilts his head at the end and looks down at my belly. “My venom will kill them and—the best part—they’re already dying.” He starts to smile as his voice turns to a whisper.

He’s whispering because… I sidestep to the right to see Hael and Lochness have just entered the front of the shop, which is a long way away from me and Nerezza. They only just spot me with another dragon as I scream out, “HELP!”

I also lash out and claw at Nerezza’s face with my hand, managing to rake my human nails across his cheek, causing some damage. Nerezza grabs me and turns me around, slamming my jaw shut with a vicious hand that makes me feel like he’s one flick away from snapping my neck.

Nerezza murmurs in a language foreign to me—as I see the mist of Hael and Lochness forming around us—but they also fade with the shop, as I shift to a different part of the realm with my rogue abductor. My mates are just in time but still too late.

And I see the full-blown terror in Lochness before I can’t see him again. My vision is now blinding white. I’m surrounded by freezing cold air, stinging all over my skin as we move forward into a blizzard.

Nerezza drags me through snow, and I’m already so cold I feel like my blood might turn to ice any second. Nerezza keeps dragging me and trekking forward, until the deep snow opens up to a cave in the ground.

We move down. His second hand feels my belly, and nothing makes me sicker. I can’t scream what I want to scream with his hand still on my face.

Only when we’re in his secret lair in the ice, does he wave his hand, and a separate glacier groans up to block the outside wind. Then he lets me go and I fall in front of a weak and dying fire.

I can also feel weakness in my bones as the bite at my neck becomes incredibly itchy. Nerezza ignores me as he moves through a pile of bones, and a pile of jewelry, his own little treasure hoard.

He disappears down the back of the long cave, still moving into a darker part. He comes back a moment later with a small blade with an onyx handle and an emerald stone.

He drops the knife next to me so it cuts into the ice. “Here,” the rogue says, his voice devoid of any feeling. “I’m giving you a fair chance. Now you have your voice, Slayer, and a weapon. So, when you come at me—and I win—you’ll have earned whatever I do to you. You won’t have any right to complain.”

He circles me, his gaze predatory. “I heard you have a sharp tongue,” he taunts, nudging my leg with his foot. I remain silent, as still as a statue, while he continues to circle me, searching for a weakness.

My body tenses, bracing for an attack. When he finally moves away, retreating to the other end of the cave, I nearly collapse with relief. “You have nothing to say?”

His voice echoes slightly, carrying the sound of a light breeze and a heavy, shifting mist. My gaze stays fixed on the fire, my desire to fight him suddenly gone.

I can hear the ice crack and groan as his Dragon growls, its hot breath washing over my back and neck, sniffing my hair. One jagged tooth moves through the waves.

I feel like I’m on the brink of death. There’s a strange, foreign heat coursing through my veins, making me want to be nice to him.

I know it’s the venom.

It’s a memory from a dream I have, a memory passed onto me from Nessy, when his temple rests against mine in sleep.

I know better than to speak or play into his games.

I just need to listen.

Because this is the real Blackhearted dragon.

Lochness had been a toy to him when he was younger and naïve, exploring the world.

What chance do I stand against him?

~Don’t bother calling to them. They can’t find you,~ Nerezza’s voice invades my mind, tearing down my natural power with pregnancy, including my honed Slayer magic—and I know it’s also because of his mating venom. ~I destroyed that bond, your tether to them is gone. In fact, I freed you. You should thank me. You’re no longer a slave. You’re a freed Slayer. I’ve even given you the tools to Slay. I’m waiting. Take all the time you need…Madeline…~

When I remain perfectly still, saying and doing nothing, he snorts and retreats further into the cave.

He moves silently, despite his massive size, and I know he’s still too close.

rogues love to play cat and mouse.

He’s just looking for some fun.

That’s the only reason I’m still alive.

I try to reach out to Hael and Lochness, but he’s right.

That emerald fire is nowhere in sight.

I feel as free as I do the day before my brand.

I yearn for that freedom again.

But now, all I want is to go back to the nights before, to be in that birthing chamber, hidden and safe.

I try to imagine Hael or Lochness using magic or some clever trick to rescue me.

But my gut churns and my Slayer instincts tell me otherwise.

There’s no way they’ll find me before our babies die from his venom.

Which means I have to kill Nerezza by dawn.

But the moment I try, he’ll rape and slaughter me anyway.

He’s not just a monster, he’s something far worse.

I sit up and grab the hilt of the onyx blade, pulling it from the ice.

The sound echoes through the cave.

I see his dragon head, resting on a pile of human and dragon bones with fresh meat still rotting on them.

One large pale red ruby eye peers out from a scaled, crooked lid, watching me, waiting.

He’s covered in scars.

I remain seated by the fire.

“You had a twin,” I say. “Didn’t you?”

His sickly green eye opens, and both lids crease down—he looks furious that I dare to mention his dead brother.

He doesn’t respond, and I quickly lower my gaze, staring into the fire again.

So, talking about emotionally charged memories is off the table.

“Did you ever find your mate?” I ask a different question. “…Or do you only steal them…?”

And I ~don’t~ meet his gaze this time.

Surprisingly, he doesn’t just refuse to answer.

He doesn’t say anything at all.

So, I can’t talk my way out of this either.

He’s waiting for me to attack.

And then I’m going to die.

Not only will my babies never be born.

The Requiem Mountains will lose their Dragon Lords.

Nerezza might even take over.

So great—everyone’s fucking lives depend on me.

A pregnant brat and Dragon Slayer with zero kills.

Well—there’s always a first time for everything, right?

I finally know what to say to Nerezza of the Black Heart.

I look up again and tell him.

“I don’t know how,” I admit, “but come dawn—you’ll be dead.”

Nerezza grins.

~Such faith in Ness?~

Interesting. I finally find a topic he’ll discuss—Lochness.

I nod.

He seems pleased.

“He never talks about you,” I inform him. “You’re inconsequential. Unimportant. You’re nothing to him.”

~How would you know, little mate?~

I try…

…very hard, to keep my cool.

But I find a topic he’ll talk about and he immediately finds one that makes me lose it.

“I AM NOT YOUR MATE!” I scream, my voice echoing back to me.

~Yes you are.~ He continues to smile lazily, watching his prey scream. ~And there’s nothing you can do about it.~

“They’re not dead ~yet~,” I snarl back at him.

Nerezza closes his green eye and watches me with his red one.

~Here’s what’s going to happen…you’re going to try and slay me. I’m going to fuck and eat you. And then they’re going to die anyway.~

“You have a miserable, pointless existence,” I spit out. “~Blackheart~.”

~At least I have an existence… By tomorrow, you won’t.~ He continues to watch me with his pale, broken, sickly red eye.

His horn is broken too, more than the first memory.

Like he’s smashed it into rocks just to hurt himself.

Asshole.

I’m in deep shit here.

But I have to save myself.

The princess and the dragon.

But one of us has to die.

And it sure as hell isn’t going to be me.