He glanced around, his eyes still trying to focus. “Is it morning?”
The centaur smiled, most likely remembering her promise from the night before. “Yes, my lord. Late morning.”
“Tell them I’ll be right there.”
Without another word, she bowed and left.
Rhiannon, still human as was he, was pushed up tight against his side, her head nearly buried in his armpit. She slept deep and looked beautiful doing it.
He smiled as he remembered their Claiming from the night before. With all that screaming and roaring and snarling, the whole court must have thought they were killing each other. He kissed her forehead and dragged himself out of bed.
Without even thinking about it, as human he went to the Queen’s Hall. He had every intention of getting right back into bed and enjoying Rhiannon—his Rhiannon—even more before first meal. Then he’d spend the rest of the day and eve taking her as dragon.
Several of his brothers and Ghleanna, all those who went to track down Rhiannon’s kin, waited for him.
One of his younger brothers whistled. “Gods, Bercelak. What did that female do to you?”
“What is it?” he barked, his arms crossed over his chest and his feet braced apart. He was in no mood for his siblings’ antics when he had the woman of his dreams waiting for him back in their bedchamber.
Ghleanna answered, “By the time we arrived, her three brothers and that viper sister of hers were long gone. Word is that two of her brothers went into the Northlands.”
“Northlands?” he scoffed. “The lightning dragons will eat them alive. What else?”
“While the sister and the other brother went to the desert lands of Alsandair. Those dragons might help them.”
Addolgar stepped forward. “There’s no guarantee the lightning dragons won’t help them either. They may be barbarians, but they are greedy ones. They’d love to have this territory.”
“And they’ll never get it.”
At the sound of Rhiannon’s voice, they all turned except Bercelak. When around others he would never turn away from those who may harm her. Now that she was queen, even with her mother dead, Rhiannon was in more danger than she had been before. So, instead, he gave a quick glance at her over his shoulder. She stood before them as human, completely naked, the marks of her Claiming pitch black against her skin and the collar and chain still around her neck.
Bercelak had never loved her more.
“Gods, Bercelak!” his sister exclaimed. “What the hell did you do?”
He knew what she meant. He’d branded a dragon the entire length of Rhiannon’s body, the tail starting at the very tip of her foot and reaching up one leg, across her stomach, around her back and across her ass, then back around and up her ribcage, across her breast, then upper chest and collarbone, until it rested across her neck and stopped at the right side of her jaw.
But even though he knew what his sister meant, he didn’t answer her. Their Claiming was their Claiming and no one, even his nosy kin, had any say in it whatsoever.
He spoke to Rhiannon without turning around, “What do you want us to do? Do we follow them?”
“No. I’ll not send out troops to bring back four dragons,” she stated with confidence. “But that doesn’t mean we won’t be prepared for them. If they come back here, with or without dragons from other regions, we’ll rip the scales from their body and tear their flesh apart.”
Bercelak bit back his smile as the entire hall fell silent at Rhiannon’s casually dropped words. He knew she meant it, but it was the coldness that frightened the rest of them. It didn’t frighten him, though. He knew she’d make a wonderful queen. He never had a doubt.
“We have things to right here first,” she continued. “My kin can wait until they do something stupid.”
She grew silent and he could feel her eyes boring into his back, examining her own mark. A dragon burned into his human flesh covered his entire back and, to his amusement, his ass as well. His body grew tight while his cock grew hard at the thought that his female wanted him as much as he wanted her. And he didn’t bother to hide his reaction. Let them see. Let them see it all.
“My bed grows cold, mate,” she murmured behind him. “Don’t leave me waiting.”
With that she turned and walked back to her bedchamber. Her chain dragging behind her.
Bercelak focused on his family. “We leave them for now as she said, but we’ll be ready for them should they return.”
His brothers nodded as did his sister. They were all part of Rhiannon’s court now. No longer the low-borns . . . but royalty.
With a nod, he turned and walked back up the stairs. He heard one of the other dragons, not his kin, mutter to a comrade beside him, the voice filled with disgust, “She’s marked him already. Look at his back.” The dragon snorted. “Well, we see who has the cock in that family.”
Bercelak kept walking, even as he sensed his kin silently backing away from the one who spoke. As he reached one of the weapon stands at the edge of the hall, he grasped a long pike, turned, and threw it with unerring aim.
The pike slammed through the dragon’s neck, yanking him back, and impaling him against the marble wall behind him.
Bercelak turned to the rest of the court who watched him in fear. All except his kin. They looked down at their feet or at the ceiling. Because they knew if they looked at each other they’d burst out laughing. Which would definitely destroy the terror thing they were all striving for at the moment.
He smiled, which seemed to scare the royals even more. “I didn’t hear him. What did he say?”
No one answered. No one dared.
“That’s what I thought.”
With that last bit sneered at those too weak to challenge him, he went back to his bedchamber and made his mate scream his name for the remainder of the morning . . . and well into the afternoon.
Epilogue
195 years later . . .
Snarling, Rhiannon marched back toward the family’s cave. While Devenallt Mountain held her throne, it was this cave where she raised her hatchlings. And what spoiled, rotten little hatchlings they were!
Without even thinking, she stormed past her mate, busy with his kin looking at attack plans. Her throne was at risk and they would be going to war. Already her two eldest had been given the armor of battle dragons. She didn’t want them to go, but they were old enough now to make their own choices.
Bercelak’s claw grabbed her upper forearm, holding her in place. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She tried to pull away, but his grip was like a vice.
“Leave us,” he commanded the dragons in the room. And, without hesitation, they did.
“What’s wrong, Rhiannon? Tell me.”
She yanked her forearm away and glared at her mate. “Your,” and she punctuated that “your” with the tip of her tail in his face, “viper offspring cut off his tail!”
Bercelak shook his head in confusion. “Cut off whose tail?”
“Gwenvael’s!” she shouted, so angry, she could barely see straight.
But instead of Bercelak demanding his offspring’s presence so he could tell them what horrible little bastards they were, he burst out laughing.
“I’m sure he deserved it.”
Her tail slapped him across the neck. “This isn’t funny!”
“Oh, Rhiannon, just repair it. You baby him too much.”
She slammed her foot down, shaking the cave walls. “I can’t!”
“Why not?”
“When I caught them, I yelled right as Fearghus was throwing it to Briec. He was so startled that it slipped past his hands and into the river . . . they have not been able to find it.”