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“What?” The question was a growl as it left Landers’s throat.

“What else is she hiding from us that you know about?” Wren scolded.

Andrues’s eyes flared. “She is nothidinganything; she has been in denial. She found out about her familiar only twenty-four hours before she left for Ammord.” Andrues bit out the words. “While in Ammord, Dukovich was helping her sort out the dreams we believed came from Svech left in her mind, only to find out that they are visions.”

I stared back at him, panic sinking in as I realized what this could mean.

“S-she saw me burning . . . so that means I’m—”

“No,” Landers interjected, knowing the conclusion I’d come to before I said it. He dragged a hand over his face as he took a step closer to me and pinned his eyes on Andrues. “Gather everyone. Tonight.”

“I shouldn’t be there, not with Cain . . . lurking. Now that we know he’s found a way around the wards, and until we figure out how to fix this bond issue, I shouldn’t be near any talk of plans.”

A smile flickered across Landers’s face as he fully turned toward me. “Luckily, we have a solution to the bond. And as for tonight, we need you there. There are spells that can be cast to protect the room from uninvited ears.”

“What is it?” I asked, my brows knitting together.

“Gentleman, will you give us the room please?” Landers asked as Andrues grinned back at him.

Wren and I glanced at each other in confusion as Andrues shuffled him out of the stable. I watched as the door closed at their backs, the sounds of their weapons being strapped to their bodies fading as they tethered from the grounds.

I turned my head slowly back to Landers to see him beaming down at me, his eyes glittering with excitement.

He gestured his head to the large opening at the other end of the stables, extending his hand to me. “Walk with me?”

I nodded, taking his outstretched hand as we stepped out into the crisp winter air. The snow swirled around us in gentleflurries, blanketing the world in a serene silence. Warmth radiated from him, flowing through my arm and settling into my body like a heated blanket.

He had warmed me with his touch so many times before, dried me from the water that soaked my skin, and as the heat seeped into my bones I finally understood how he did it.

The dragon fire in his veins.

There had been so many signs that I missed, so many things I should have put together sooner. But as I stared down at our hands, I didn’t care. He was mine, and I was his, and in my soul, I knew that there was nothing that, together, we could not navigate.

Landers guided me along a path that twisted through the snow-covered trees, our footsteps disappearing as a fresh layer of snow fell. The silence between us was comfortable, yet filled with a palpable energy. He seemed nervous, his grip on my hand tightening ever so slightly as we walked.

I glanced up at him, studying his profile in the soft light filtering through the trees. His jaw was set, his brow furrowed in concentration as if he were gathering his thoughts.

The path opened into a small clearing, where a frozen pond glistened under the early afternoon sun. A smile crept onto my mouth at the sight of it. It was gorgeous, like diamonds sparkling against the glow of the winter backdrop.

Landers stopped and turned to face me, his breath forming small clouds in the air as he reached out and brushed a snowflake from my cheek. His fingers lingered on my skin and I leaned into his touch. His eyes, usually so serious, were now filled with such sincerity that my heart gasped against the hold they had on me.

“There is a question I need to ask you before I explain how to break the mating bond because I want it to be your choice, not something you do out of obligation to me or your family orfor the realms. It has to be what you want.” His voice was soft and earnest but there was a thread of intensity vibrating through every word.

My brows furrowed. “What is it?”

He let out a deep breath as he pulled my other hand into his and my body stilled.

“I love you, Hyacinth. And it is not a quiet love. It is the rage of every sea and the heart of every storm. My existence in this world has never been soft, has never been gentle, and I fear that it will never be. But you—you have ignited a hope in me that maybe, I am not doomed to an eternity of violence. In the hundreds of lifetimes that I have lived, you are the only thing that has felt right. The only thing that has ever calmed the fury in my veins. You are my home, Hyacinth. My compass.”

The world spun around me as I stared back at him, his words colliding with my heart in an explosion of pure, exquisite love.

“So I stand before you today, not as a King, not as a beast, but as a man. A simple man that wants nothing more than for you to love him—to marry him.”

The air vanished from my lungs as Landers’s words echoed through the stillness of the clearing. Snowflakes danced around us, catching the sunlight like tiny jewels, but all I could see was the raw vulnerability shimmering in his eyes. Those eyes that had seen countless lifetimes and witnessed unspeakable horrors, now gazed at me with a love so profound it stole my breath.

My heart thundered in my chest as Landers dropped to one knee before me, his eyes never leaving mine. With a steady hand, he reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a small velvet box. He opened the lid slowly to reveal the most stunning ring I had ever seen. Crushed emerald, the exact shade of his eyes, was set atop a delicate gold band.

“Hyacinth,” he whispered, his voice a thunderstorm of emotion against the quiet. “May I have the extraordinary honor of becoming your husband?”