Wolf Princess Sold to the Dragon King

The Dragon King carried his unconscious wife through the Keep like a man who was one wrong look away from setting the entire fucking corridor on fire.

The guards received the message loud and clear: move.

As he passed, they became part of the wall.

Maddox stopped in front of his quarters.

The doors hung open, and inside, two of his mages were dragging glowing runes across the floor because his chambers were still drenched with dark magic. A clusterfuck hazard zone that his wife was allergic to until further notice.

He turned, pushing open the double doors to the quarters opposite his. Then he laid her down on the bed. Smaller than his, but still very large.

She didn’t stir.

His dragon whimpered under his ribs.

Maddox didn’t blame the horny bastard one bit. He wanted to crawl into that bed with her too, preferably naked and buried twelve inches deep. His dragon could fucking get in line.

He forced his hands to release her and straightened just as his Third appeared in the doorway.

”Sterling. Stay with her. I’m checking on my brother.” Maddox’s voice left zero room.

”I assumed I would be, Commander.”

”You do not leave this room. If she wakes up, you mindlink me before she finishes her first sentence.”

Sterling gave a single nod and Maddox was gone.

The door clicked shut.

Sterling got to work like a Third who had long since decided that guarding Guinevere and taking care of her were the same.

He poured a glass of water from the pitcher on the side table and set it within her reach for when she woke. He moved the glass a centimeter and angled the handle towards her dominant hand. Sterling did not do things halfway. Then he crossed to the bathing chamber and ran a cloth under the cold tap until the fabric went heavy.

He wrung it once, folded it, and laid the cool cloth across her forehead. A wrinkled compress was unacceptable. He adjusted it twice until it sat exactly right.

She sighed in her sleep. The fever-flush at her cheeks eased a fraction under the cold.

”Your husband is never going to let you out of his sight again,” Sterling informed the unconscious woman, deadpan, folding his arms. ”A noble plan. Doomed. But noble. I look forward to watching it collapse in real time.”

Unconscious Guinevere declined to comment.

Sterling settled in to wait. That’s when he noticed a glowing mark on her neck.

”Oh shit.”

He rubbed his eyes. Still there. Moved her hair in case that was it. It wasn’t. Blinked a few times in case it was a trick of the candlelight. Nope.

”Fucking hell. Maddox is going to lose his goddamn mind.”

✦✦✦

A conscious Kael Ashenvale was physically incapable of silence. So when Maddox walked into his brother’s room and found it quiet, he already knew, before he saw the grey, exactly how bad it was.

Blair was sitting at his bedside.

”Don’t.”

”Wasn’t going to say anything.”

He had, in fact, been about to say several things. A full opener, dripping with sarcasm and brother superiority.

He looked past her to the bed, and the other words died in his throat.

Kael was grey. His eyes stayed shut, which for Kael was the single most alarming symptom in the room, because a conscious Kael was physically incapable of shutting up.

Aldric knelt at the bedside grinding something in a bowl, sleeves shoved up, the picture of a man who had turned a corpse back into a patient and refused to celebrate until he was sure it’d stick.

”He’s holding,” he said before Maddox could ask. ”Your sister bought him the first stretch. He needs more, and the more he needs is you.”

”Take it.” Maddox was already across the room, sleeve up, arm out, dropping into the chair on Kael’s other side. ”Whatever he needs, take all of it, I don’t care.”

”I need a controlled amount, actually, because two dead Drakencrests is worse than one and I’m the man who’d have to explain it.”

Aldric had the vial drawn, capped, and running into Kael’s line in under two minutes.

”A Luminari healer is coming at dawn to check on both Guinevere and Kael,” Maddox said.

Aldric didn’t look up or blink at the term Luminari.

”I’ll be there for both. Guinevere would be a match for Kael’s blood too. The wolf part would be interesting in a dragon. But in theory. How is she?”

Maddox dragged a hand down his face.

Blair sat up in her chair. ”What.”

”She got blasted with dark magic,” Maddox began. ”It almost...” His voice trailed off. Some words you didn’t spend out loud. Saying them made them real, and it had been real enough. ”She’s in the room across from my quarters, and will need to be looked at.”

Aldric glanced up at Blair, not Maddox. ”She stays in bed tomorrow. All day. Doctor’s orders.”

”Consider it handled,” Blair replied without sparing Maddox a glance. ”All day, in bed, and I’m revoking Maddox’s access.” She finally looked at Maddox. ”No offense. Actually, full offense. You earned it. All of it.”

”Offense taken.”

”Too bad. You lost your Guinevere privileges. I hope you said your goodbyes.”

”You can’t revoke my access to my own wife.”

”Watch me.”

Kael’s eyes cracked open a bare slit.

”Both of you are in one room. Bleeding for me.” His mouth twitched toward the ghost of a grin. ”I’ve fantasized about this exact scenario, though the framing was different.”

”Fantasized,” Maddox repeated.

”Yes. My two favorite blood bags in one room. Dreams do come true.”

”He’s fine,” Blair announced to the ceiling. ”Rescind my blood. Give it back.”

”Doesn’t work like that,” Aldric said without looking up.

”You died on a filthy sex-camp floor an hour ago, brother,” Maddox commented.

”Course I did.” Kael’s grin flickered and held this time, faint and real. ”Told you I had a whole speech planned. Nobody let me finish it. Your wife kept interrupting the death scene.” His eyes slid mostly shut. ”Rude, that one. I like her. Don’t tell her.”

”She already knows.” Maddox glanced at the tube, at the color still climbing back into his brother’s face one shade at a time. ”Rest. That’s an order, and this time I’ll enforce it by sitting here until you obey it.”

”Bossy.” Kael’s voice was a thread now, sleep pulling him under whether he approved or not. ”Runs in the family. Blair’s worse.”

”Shut the hell up,” Blair snapped. ”Just heal, Ashenvale. You’re wasting perfectly good royal blood being awake.”

”Fifteen percent.” Kael’s lids sank. ”Of a hundred twenty billion.”

Maddox rolled his eyes. ”Landon will be back at dawn. I’ll see if he’ll take you instead. How about that?”

”Where do I sign?”

Maddox let out a laugh that had a crack running through the center of it. Kael was only half kidding and they both knew it.

”The gods mock me,” Blair muttered.

”He’ll keep,” Aldric said. ”Both of you can stop looking like a funeral. The corpse is going to make it, gods help us all, and he’s going to be even louder about surviving than he was about dying.”

From the bed, without opening his eyes, mostly asleep, Kael Ashenvale opened his mouth.

”Fuck me.”

”Don’t,” Maddox said immediately.

”I’m.”

”Kael.”

”Thirsty.”