Can't Get Enough (Dragon Kin) - G.A. Aiken Page 0,45
cut his throat in the first place.
“Shalin, wait.” His voice, always low, sounded like the hardest gravel and she knew each word caused him immeasurable pain. “Please.”
“No. I’ll come back to Kerezik as I’ve been ordered, but I’ll not stay in your bed or even in that blasted castle. But I’ll be on your territory until the full moon. Then I’ll be heading back to school, and I never want to see you again.”
She yanked her arm away and walked to the edge of the exit, ready to take flight.
“I’ll come for you, Shalin. I don’t care if you’re on my property or living in a desert cave in Alsandair. I’ll not give you up. You’re mine. I am yours. Face it.”
Shalin didn’t even turn around. “The only thing I have to face is that I’ll be paying for the foolishness of leaping into your well-used bed for decades to come.” With a sigh, she glanced at him over her shoulder and the look in his eyes nearly tore her heart from her chest. She ignored it. “Leave me be, Ailean,” she forced herself to say. “I’m sure there are thousands of females who’ll happily warm your bed. Someone more suited to you and your life—for it is not me.”
Shalin let her wings stretch out, but before she took off, she felt compelled to add, “And I wouldn’t shift to human anytime soon. You’ll only bleed to death if you do.”
Without another word or another glance back, she pushed off from the edge and headed back to Kerezik.
Ailean stood at the edge until his brothers arrived. Without bothering to look at them, he managed to ground out, “We need to find a healer.”
“I know,” Bideven answered. “My snout is still bleeding.”
Rolling his eyes, Ailean snapped, “Not for you, you big baby.”
“You really do love her, don’t you, brother?” Arranz asked, awe in his voice.
Ailean nodded rather than answering. With every spoken word, pain ripped through him.
Arranz grinned. “Then we’ll help you, Ailean. We’ll get you your dragoness.” Abruptly looking off, Arranz stroked his chin. “In fact…I think we should round up the entire clan.” When his brothers only stared at him, he shrugged. “Trust me, Ailean. We may be low-born Battle Dragons, but we’ll do whatever necessary to help one of our own. If you want that royal…you’ll get her.”
Ailean smiled, loving his brother more than he ever thought possible. He placed his hand on Arranz’s shoulder and Arranz did the same to him.
“If you two are done having this moment of brotherly bonding, I am possibly bleeding to death here.”
Ailean gave a small shrug at Arranz before using his tail to ram Bideven in the back, shoving the poor bleeding—and now screaming—bastard out of the cave.
He hit the side of Devenallt Mountain three times before he could catch flight.
“He’s going to get you for that,” Arranz warned.
“Perhaps,” Ailean said, ignoring the pain so he could get this out. “But it was so worth it.”
13
It started the first morning she woke up in that cave she found on Ailean’s territory. Big and roomy, she’d nearly crashed into it, immediately falling asleep in the first chamber she found. She’d been more exhausted than she realized and slept a good twenty hours. She awoke when something indescribably small and adorable nipped at her snout and climbed up onto her head.
He’d brought her the puppy.
A few hours later she found Nightmare in one of the caverns with lots of hay and water.
The next day books began to appear. All sorts of books. Many she’d read. Quite a few she hadn’t. She’d find piles of them in chambers, lined up against walls. Everywhere.
Then his kin came to visit. His aunts first, in teams of two or three.
“Just talk to him,” they’d say.
“You know you love him,” they’d accuse. “Why are you fighting this?”
Her favorite comment of the day? “I heard you were smart. You couldn’t be that smart.”
After the aunts, the uncles and male cousins arrived the following day. But they said very little and mostly brought flowers or cows before hastily leaving.
If only the same could be said of the female cousins. They came back and stayed for hours. They talked. They cajoled. They outright threatened. Except the twins. They never spoke to her and instead sat on the edge of the cave entrance sharpening their weapons. Every once in a while, they glared out over the land. Their silence hurt the most because Shalin had grown so fond of them. But unlike