The Warrior King (Inferno Rising #3) - Abigail Owen Page 0,58

Their connection was so strong, so powerful, it filled a room with an electric charge.” Tyrek grimaced. “Almost painful to be around, actually.”

Meira sighed at that, softly, an ache creeping over her at never having seen her parents together. “Do you look like him?”

Her mother hadn’t even had a photograph of him to share, the technology coming centuries after his death, and dragon shifters didn’t do painted portraits. Something about not needing to capture their youth in image as it lasted a thousand years or more.

Tyrek shook his head then shrugged. “In some ways. Most said we looked alike in our faces, all sharp angles. I was more muscled, but he was taller. I have more cream in my coloring as a dragon, where Zilant was brilliant white. Blinding, practically, and he used that to his advantage. We both wore our hair long then.” His lips twitched at a forgotten detail remembered. “He was missing part of the pinkie finger on his left hand. Lost it in a fight with a bully when we were kids, before he ever learned to shift.”

Mama hadn’t told them that. Why that small detail made her father more real, she didn’t know. Meira sat quietly, waiting for more. For anything.

“He laughed a lot.” Tyrek shook his head. “Especially after meeting your mother. For one who took the throne at a young age, and with all the responsibilities he bore, he never let the weight of leadership change who he was. He found amusement in any kind of absurdities—a turn of phrase, a silly story, foibles of life.”

Wonder lit Meira up from the inside, like fairy lights she’d once seen over a summer’s eve pond in a forest. Part of her loved that her father had innate happiness in his life that way. “Did Mama laugh, too?”

Tyrek sobered. “Before she lost him, yes. They made each other laugh, often with just a glance.”

To have that and lose it. Oh Mama. Unconsciously her gaze drifted to Sam. Oh gods.

Tyrek sat forward, covering her hand with his. “I rarely saw Serefina after Zilant died. I thought her dead for almost a hundred years, until she managed to track me down to arrange Skylar’s safety in the event of her own death. How she found me, I’ll never know. After that, she’d show up about once a year to confirm my location.” He grimaced. “I moved a lot. She loved you girls. A mother that fierce, that dedicated, especially after losing her mate…” He shook his head, respect gleaming in serious eyes. “She loved you.”

Meira patted the hand covering hers, his bones sharp and distinct through the thinning skin. “I know.”

She couldn’t say more. The tightness in her throat wouldn’t let her.

A sudden warmth, like snuggling into a comforting blanket, enveloped her, and she didn’t need to look around to see who’d approached.

“Everything okay?” Samael asked in a low voice.

“Fine,” she said.

Samael’s eyes narrowed, turning assessing, but with such a protective edge to it, her irritation with him just sort of fizzled out. Or maybe the walls she was desperately trying to keep erected around her heart were starting to crumble. Which could only lead to disaster.

“We were talking about my parents,” she found herself explaining.

A glance at Tyrek showed her uncle to be watching with no expression, though his curiosity buzzed against her. Samael tucked himself awkwardly onto the picnic bench beside her, opposite her uncle, and put his hands on the table, his pinkie finger close to where her own hand rested, but with an inch of space between them. Like an acknowledgment that he wanted to touch her but knew he couldn’t.

If they had been alone, would his approach have been different? Would he have dared? Would she have let him?

Trying not to focus on his hand beside hers—larger, skin a darker shade, stronger—and how she wanted to tuck hers into his, Meira forced her gaze to Tyrek. “If we’re able to overthrow Pytheios, will you come out of hiding? Come to stay with me or one of my sisters?”

“That’s the plan?” Rune called across the room, voice full of skeptical doubt. “Take out the High King?”

Meira straightened, meeting the black dragon shifter’s stare. “He is not the true High King.” Her words echoed off the tall ceilings. “My father was. When Pytheios is gone, a new king will rise.”

Though only the gods and fates knew which one. Kasia had tried to see, but she claimed that part of the future was murky, like a