“No,” Bale said.
“Or we could take a draw from Piper, and try a transfusion—” Desperation quickened Rave’s words.
“Why don’t you just tell me to fuck him?” Piper snarked. “That’s what we actually did.”
He swung toward her, his lip curling in a snarl. The expression transformed his face into something bestial, sending a spasm of fear down her spine that tried to twist her legs into mindlessly fleeing. She refused, glaring at him.
Bale’s distinctive rasping chuckle broke their furious but frozen tableau. “Do it, Rave,” he mocked. “Command her to fuck me. To save my life. To bring her friends back. If I had my full power, I could take this city apart and you’d both have what you want.”
Could Bale find Esme and Anjali? Piper averted her gaze from Rave, but from his stricken expression, she decided he at least must believe that his brother could do as he said.
Piper wrapped her arms around her middle. She was deathly worried for Esme’s well-being and baffled by Anjali’s unwillingness to see the problem. But she wasn’t going to sleep with a stranger to figure it out.
Other than the stranger she’d already slept with, of course.
Was she?
Was there really an unusual substance in her that interacted with the ichor in Rave and kept him alive? She clamped her arms tighter around herself, as if she might feel whatever it was. Even though it was hard to believe. But then, she frequently had her eyeballs pressed to a microscope that could see things no one else would believe present in an otherwise clear drop of water. Interdependence and atomic resonance and the placebo response were all scientific principles she’d studied and didn’t deny.
Would she deny these Nox Incendi a chance at life?
The cold of the concrete floor had crept up her legs, chilling her skin, but she found herself looking to Rave again.
He didn’t get a say in what she did with her body.
She’d chosen
to go with him last night and again today. And
only
she got to choose what happened between her legs.
And yet somehow—when had
this
happened?—he apparently got some sort of say about what happened in her heart.
If he tried to hand her over to his brother, his king, whatever, he was going to break her heart.
Why had she given him that power?
But she knew that wasn’t the way it worked, any more than he had given her the power to somehow affect the ichor that flowed in his veins.
It just
was
, like the hydrogen bond of frozen water molecules turned ice into the perfect symmetry of a snowflake.
If there’d been a door anywhere she could see—hell, even a window—she would’ve left rather than wait for
his
choice. She’d made it a point to never confront anyone about her worth, for fear she’d be found wanting. The one time she’d questioned Esme and Anjali, they’d left her behind.
And now she was forced to watch Rave weighing the value of her heart.
When he didn’t even know that’s what he had in his hands.
Chapter 12
It killed him. No, Bale should kill him for the traitor that he was.
But Rave could not relinquish his true mate. Not for his brother, not for his king, not for the good of all the Nox Incendi.
She was his.
With a rumbling growl, he pulled her to his side, though she resisted mightily. He glared across the guttering candle that even with its feeble light and warmth must be agony to Bale. The stone blight would end him, and yet it was Rave’s fault.
With his roused dragon’s keen eyesight, he caught a glimpse of his brother, more than he’d had in several years. The petralys had advanced in that time, leaving Bale half shifted. The bare skin visible through his ragged clothes was hardened with thick scales, and draconic spines bristled along his backbone. But his wings were gnarled, as if they’d been broken.
Had he thrown himself against the concrete walls of his voluntary cage? He would never fly again with those wings.
The truth ripped through Rave.
His brother would never fly again regardless.
“You can’t give her away,” Bale said, his voice caught halfway between envy and awe. “Even if you wanted to. She is the heart of your treasure now, and the dragon will never let her go.”
At the word
dragon
, Rave felt Piper’s struggles cease, and he could almost picture her ears pricking through her thick, black hair. A flash of Bale’s teeth pierced the shadows in a Cheshire smile, and Rave wanted to curse his wicked king. Almost as badly as he wanted to cure his teasing brother.
He let out a jagged breath. “I thought I could finally return us to the way we were, before the petralys.”
“There is no way back,” Bale said. “The wind behind you is useless.” He quoted the dragonkin wisdom with a twist of bitterness; he must know as well as Rave that no wind would carry him now.
“It’s not over,” Rave vowed.
But Bale only shook his head. “It might be. For you. I think your mate is none too pleased with you. You’d best consider what you will sacrifice to earn her forgiveness. Now go. I’m tired.”
Rave tugged Piper backward.
She dug her heels in. “Dragon?”
Bale dragged in a rasping breath. And then blew out.
The candle exploded into a fireball that pushed back the darkness on all sides.
Pushed back Rave too, though his flesh was naturally resistant to fire. He yanked Piper behind him with an oath even as the fireball instantly collapsed upon itself.
If his brother crisped one hair on her dark head…
He hoped he’d pulled her away quickly enough to block the view of the room exposed by the overzealous flame.
The stalactites dripping from the ceilings, almost meeting the stalagmites below, likes rows of serrated teeth, were disturbing enough. But the sight of Bale emblazoned on his dazzled eyeballs…
“Ask your mate,” Bale rumbled.
Fuck.
Rave bumped Piper toward the elevator shaft, using his whole body to shield her. And to prevent her from whisking around him.
“What was…?” she sputtered, tugging ineffectually at Rave’s outspread arm.
The damned elevator couldn’t come fast enough. He cursed out a relieved oath when the door opened, letting out its square of innocuous electric light.
“Wait.” Bale’s growl was a king’s command, forcing Rave to a halt.
At least Piper swallowed the rest of her question.
“On your hand,” Bale said. The words rolled deep in his throat, like thunder after the flash of lightning. Warning of a deadly storm to come. “What is that?”
Rave looked down at Piper’s grasp on his bicep. On her little finger was a silver and gold ring with an obsidian cabochon, in materials and workmanship nearly identical to the one he’d seen on her before. This was a new addition to her hands, and it didn’t seem right to him. The warm glow of the copper-flecked sunstone better reflected her spirit.
Rave gave Piper a little squeeze, wordlessly urging her to answer. Not that he thought Bale would hurt them. But he heard the dragon on edge.
Piper cleared her throat. “It’s my friend’s ring. Anjali made it for Esme. But she left it behind. I found it on her nightstand when I went to look for them.” She twisted the braided metal around her finger. “It’s silly, but I wanted to keep it close.”
“Leave it here,” Bale said.
Piper’s head snapped up. And once again, Rave was stunned by her boldness.
“No,” she said. “I’ll give it to Ez when she comes back.”
To Rave’s continuing surprise, Bale gentled his tone. “You will do that,” he agreed. “But in the meantime, there’s something about it… I might be able to gather some insights into her whereabouts.”
Piper shot a glance at Rave.
He nodded at her. “Bale knows things sometimes.”
“Knows things,” she repeated skeptically.
He gave her a small shrug. “I think it’s weird too.”
After a long moment, she spun the ring off her finger. She looked at it then let out a sharp breath.
“Leave it there on the floor,” Bale said. “I’ll summon you, brother, if anything comes to me. Otherwise, don’t return.”
Some of Piper’s audacity must’ve rubbed off on him, because Rave wanted nothing more than to flip off his liege. Instead, he inclined his head and stepped back into the elevator.
Piper set the ring down, hesitated just a second, then joined him.
He pressed the down button as soon as the curve of her ass cleared the doorway.
“What—?”
He squeezed her hand to silence her.
They rode down without a word.
He’d been too keen on getting her away to pay attention to what button he pushed, but as the silence stretched on, he realized he was taking them to the very bottom.
To the garden.
When the door chimed and let them out, he led her down the short passage through the silver gate to the center of the garden.
The waterfall was off, and the pool was a silvery mirror reflecting the daylight far above. Fern fronds around the water and the leaves of the climbing vines danced gently in some faint breeze only they could feel.
He
could
, however, feel the laser-focused intensity of Piper’s glare between his shoulder blades. He’d have to jump in the pool to put out the flames.
He spun slowly on his boot heel to face her. Time to pay his Piper.
She had her arms crossed over her chest, fingers drumming in rhythmless agitation on her biceps. The remaining sunstone ring glinted on her finger.
“You told me not to be scared of your brother. But you didn’t say he was…” She flapped one hand.
“The transformation you saw is because of the petralys.” He circled around her to sit beside the pool, hoping she’d join him.
Instead, she paced a short distance away. “I’ve documented significant physical deviation in response to absorbed environmental contaminants, but that… Is that going to happen to you?”
He wasn’t going to tell her he could shift to dragon any time. That wasn’t what she was asking, anyway. Bale’s situation was not the same. “It would have,” he said. “But you stopped it.”
“Because I’m your solarys.”
That wasn’t a question either, but he nodded. “I’ve never really believed in soul mates,” he confessed.
She stopped her erratic pacing and spun to face him. “You don’t?”
He grimaced. “It sounds too fantastical, doesn’t it?”
“Compared to…?” She steepled her fingers against her forehead and peered at him suspiciously through the cage of her own hand. “I thought you’d try to convince me.”
He’d thought so too. But she didn’t want to believe, and he wasn’t going to force her.
At that decision, the tension within him loosened. The dragon surrendering? That would only let the blight progress more quickly, but better to turn to stone than have her come to hate him for ruining the life she’d worked so hard to create for herself. That was her treasure, and he would not steal it from her.
“I wanted to find a cure,” he said. “It was wrong of me to think of you as only that, a substance that fulfilled a need of mine.” He gave her a crooked grin. “You are more than that, obviously.”
She snorted. “A pain in that ass, or so I’ve heard.”
“Bale has been out of circulation for awhile. He’s forgotten his manners.”
“Plus, he’s a king.” She watched him closely, watching for his reaction.
He didn’t give her one, returning her gaze blandly.
If she didn’t want to be part of his world, then he had to keep some secrets. The ones that could hurt her or scare her.
Or the ones that would scar him forever. Like admitting he
wanted
her to stay.
Her solarys power had freed the dragon within him, but for her own good, he would lock it back in its chains.
At least until she was gone.
He wondered how long he had until the petralys crept back.
“My brother can be an ass too,” he acknowledged. “But it’s good to have his assistance tracking your friends.”
She snorted. “Like he’s a psychic?”
“Eh, more like a bloodhound.” Once upon a time, Bale Dorado had lit up the sky with his fire and the brilliance of his wings. Now he couldn’t leave his cold, dark cave. But his dragonkin affinity for hunting down precious metals and stones might give them a clue to the whereabouts of Esme Montenegro and Anjali Herne with their bespelled rings.
Rave trailed his fingers in the pool, watching the ripples spread.
With a sigh softer than the touch of water on his skin, Piper sank to the ledge seat beside him. “I’m sorry I couldn’t help him.”
“That’s not on you. It’s on me.” Maybe if his dragon hadn’t claimed her first… But no, Bale knew more than anyone about solarys; if he said a dragon chose only one heart for its treasure, then it was so. “I’ll stay on it. And really, the prospect of searching for your friends seemed to bring back some of his, uh, energy.”
He slanted a glance at her to see her frowning thoughtfully at the ripples.
She didn’t look at him when she said, “I think we should call off the search.”
He stiffened. “Why?”
“Because I think I was wrong. I couldn’t understand why Esme agreed to marry Lars Ashcraft, when he seemed like just some rich, aloof, controlling jerk. But I…” Her gaze darted to him then away again. “I get it now. Even if I didn’t, it’s not for me to say. Anj tried to tell me that, but I didn’t want to listen. That’s why they left: because of me.”
Rave took her hand, forcing her attention to him. Her fist tightened in his, the sunstone in her ring nestled in his palm. “You might have been influenced by your feelings, but that doesn’t mean you were wrong. The staff hired to be your entourage is off the grid, and your friend Anjali somehow tampered with our security system. You thought something was going on, and you
weren’t
wrong. As soon as Torch or Bale have a lead, I’ll be there.”
When she only stared at him miserably, he feathered his other hand through her hair. “You have a pure, innocent heart, Piper Ramirez. I am honored to have a place beside you, just for this little while.”
He leaned forward to kiss the crown of her head, inhaling her cinnamon honey essence for what he knew must soon be the last time.