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Fiorean’s body protected Aemyra from the flying debris that was now raining down around them.

They hit the ground with a hard thump and Aemyra hissed in pain as it jostled both of her wounds. Fiorean threw his arms over her head just as a torrent of white-hot fire was loosed above them.

“What in Brigid’s name—”

They both sat up to see Terrea facing off with Aervor in the clearing as thunder rumbled overhead.

Fiorean uttered the filthiest curse in the Seann that Aemyra had ever heard as they both scrambled to their feet.

The two dragons advanced on each other, mouths open with the threat of more flames hovering in the back of their throats. Aervor stretched his neck out toward Terrea in challenge.

Her dragon must have been remaining close to Caisteal Lasair in case Aemyra managed to escape.

The ground shook as Terrea stamped her front legs and her talons gouged great chunks of earth out from underneath her. With one more furious roar, she sent a second volley of fire shooting just to the left of Aervor’s face.

A warning.

Aemyra held her breath as Aervor growled and Fiorean was frozen beside her, no doubt feeling the same rippling power emanating from Terrea.

The black dragon’s ancient magic was undeniable as she took one confident step toward Aervor, growling menacingly with her amethyst eyes narrowed.

“We need to get out of here,” Fiorean said, tugging on Aemyra’s sleeve.

Wrenching her arm from his grip, she made to sprint for her enraged dragon, ducking when Terrea’s barbed tail shot over her head.

“Are you utterly stupid?” Fiorean called out, grabbing the back of her dress.

Aemyra cursed as the dragons illuminated the meadow with their fire once more. As if the Goddess Beira agreed with Fiorean, another thunderclap sounded and the heavens opened.

The two sprinted for the trees as the dragons met in a fury of fire and teeth.

The ground shook, steam filling the air from where dragonfire met the pouring rain. Aemyra stopped under the boughs of an old oak tree, her hair already plastered to her skull.

Aervor’s wing bent as Terrea pushed him to the ground. Fiorean winced and took one step forward as if he could help his beathach. Terrea’s sharp claws were poised against Aervor’s softer underbelly and Aemyra could feel the fear emanating from Fiorean. Thankfully, Aervor’s smaller size worked to his advantage, and he freed his trapped wing.

But the black dragon wasn’t finished. Terrea took another step forward and raked those dagger-sharp claws through the dirt, right in front of Aervor’s face, as if to let him know how well they would tear through his scales.

Then something shifted as Aervor lowered himself completely to the ground, wings clenched against his sides, completely submitting to Terrea’s dominance.

Aemyra smirked at Fiorean as he stood dumbstruck. “At least your dragon has better sense than you do.”

“I’ve never seen…”

Aemyra ceased being smug the instant Fiorean’s eyes drifted to Terrea’s tail. Noticing the number of spikes. The double-crested horns.

He swung around to face Aemyra, blinking rain out of his emerald eyes.

“The Terror is female?” he gasped.

Unable to deny it, Aemyra set her jaw. “Need another sign, Prince?”

She watched him soften, those emerald eyes searching her face as the rain lashed down through the winter-worn trees as two dragons rippled with power in the meadow beyond.

“I will not betray my family,” Fiorean said, taking a firm step backward. “No matter what my brother has done, he does not deserve to die.”

Temper breaking as lightning illuminated the sky, Aemyra pursued him.

“How many more people will die if Evander remains king?” she shouted over the next clap of thunder. “My father will bring war to the gates of this city whether you like it or not,” Aemyra shouted over the storm, struggling with her rain-soaked skirts.

Fire illuminated Fiorean’s hair as he walked downhill away from the posturing dragons, boots sinking into the rapidly softening mud. “It’s already too late. Leuthanach has mobilized, and they have a larger force than any of the other clans combined.”

“They have no magic,” Aemyra scoffed, wiping rain from her eyes. “And we have dragons.”

“The Covenanters have more weapons,” Fiorean bit back.

A fork of lightning split the sky.

“Fuck the Co—”

“How many Dùileach are even willing to fight?” Fiorean asked as the caisteal came into view. “Clan Leòmhann will lurk in their caves until one side is almost victorious, and the vast majority of Dùileach who will fight for you are un-Bonded,” Fiorean continued, his face set.

The rain lashed down like it was trying to beat her into submission. There was truth in Fiorean’s words, even if she didn’t want to hear it.

“The river lairds have declared for me. My father has gathered an army ten thousand strong and Clan Iolairean is sending a thousand phoenix warriors north as we speak.”

Another thunderclap had them both hurrying their steps down the hill.

“By the time they arrive, the battles will be lost. Evander has an army of thirty thousand men encamped at Fyndhorn,” Fiorean said.

Aemyra stepped directly into a puddle but barely noticed the water soaking into her boot.

Thirty thousand battle-hardened warriors against ten thousand soldiers, less than a quarter of whom would be Dùileach. If Alfred sent for more Covenanters from Tìr ùir, they would wield the binding agent as a weapon, she was sure of it.

Winning Fiorean to her side might be her only chance.

Reaching the secret passageway that led into the caisteal, Fiorean held the slab of stone open for her to slip through.

Hating herself for it, she stepped back into her prison.

Brow furrowed, Fiorean ushered her up the roughly hewn steps and through the door that led to the walled garden and back into the pouring rain.

Unable to contain her temper any longer, Aemyra spun to face him. “I should have killed you hours ago and left with Terrea tonight.”

Fiorean stiffened. “So, what are you waiting for, Princess?”

Losing all sense, knowing a priest or a guard could walk into the garden at any moment, Aemyra pulled the dagger from her pocket. “I am queen of this territory and my duty is to my people. What happened between us yesterday changes nothing. ”

Fiorean’s eyes darkened as he stalked toward her.

“Didn’t seem like you hated me so much in that cupboard earlier,” he said.

Aemyra clenched her jaw as desire pooled deep within her. She should not want this. She could not want this.

Lifting her chin, she tightened her grip on the dagger. “Take me to the dungeons to free Sorcha and let me return to the meadow for Terrea.”

Fiorean shook his head. “I can’t let you do that. There are people in this caisteal I care about. Your father needs a leash, and you are the perfect thing to stop him from putting àird Lasair to the torch with Gealach.”

Aemyra scowled. “That’s all I am to you. A piece in this infernal game. I am not some object to be manipulated, I am the queen !”

With her last word, Aemyra let the dagger fly, launching it by the hilt toward Fiorean’s face as lightning cleaved the heavy clouds above them. He was only a few feet in front of her, and yet she missed.

With catlike reflexes, Fiorean expertly caught the hilt of the weapon and fixed her with a glare.

“That is what it means to be royal, Aemyra. We are all being used by somebody, all we can do is anticipate their actions and make countermoves.” He spun the dagger, the blade glowing with heat, his magic barely under control. “In order to keep those you love safe, you need to become what they fear most. Are you prepared to do that?”

Aemyra glared at him. His words were eerily reminiscent of her father’s, but was that how she wanted to rule her people? To be a queen they feared?

“So you became a conceited, swaggering, prick of a prince,” she spat.

A muscle was straining in Fiorean’s jaw. “Careful, Princess.”

His proximity was unnerving, and Aemyra’s chest was heaving with her rapid breaths as the rain dripped in rivulets down his scars. She wasn’t sure if her physical reaction to him was born of fear, anger, or something else. Fiorean didn’t give her the chance to figure it out as he glowered down at her.

“My entire life everybody told me that I was fire,” he said, his voice barely audible above the rain.

Aemyra huffed a laugh. “Of course they did. Your brothers can barely summon a spark between them. I bet Alfred hated you as a child.”

Fiorean’s eyes shuttered, his expression downright furious as he took one more step toward her. Close enough now that she had to look up into his face. She refused to back away even as flames licked at his fingers, Fiorean’s magic crackling out of him as he struggled to control his temper.

“When I met you, I suddenly understood that I wasn’t fire at all. I was ice. Decades of living within this court had me crafting an unyielding, impenetrable facade that only your infuriating and downright excruciating presence has been able to crack,” he growled, towering over her.

Aemyra was shocked into silence as his presence overwhelmed her senses, steam curling from his shoulders as the rain hit his shirt and evaporated against his power.

“Until I met you, my life was free from torment. Free from your hateful face across a table, free from the anguish of hearing your voice in my halls. Warring against my better judgment every time my blood was set alight by a simple brush of your skin.”

Fiorean leaned in closer, anger etched on every sharp edge of his face.

“But from that very first moment in the forge, when you blazed through my glacial pretenses, I knew I never wanted to be free of it. Of you. Because the intensity with which you burned simmered through my soul and left me forever changed. For weeks, thoughts of you have suffocated me, like the cloying smoke of an inferno I will never escape.” He paused, his eyes roving across her face as his voice quieted. “I never knew what it felt like, to burn.”

Aemyra was lost in his emerald gaze as he spoke the words she didn’t want to hear, and yet needed desperately. Heart pounding in her chest, she was soaked to the skin but did not feel cold.

“So how can I be fire? If the only thing that makes me burn…is you.”

Aemyra’s mouth dropped open as Fiorean passed the dagger to her. As though seeking to arm her in case she still wanted to kill him. The second it was in her grip, Aemyra knew she would never use it. Hating herself for what he was making her feel without even touching her, she could sense his magic begin to envelop her. Teasing her already overheated skin to the point of distraction. Breaths erratic, she stared at the droplet of rain on his Cupid’s bow and let the dagger clatter to the ground.

The moment she released the blade, Fiorean grasped the back of her head and pulled her lips up to his in a kiss so overwhelming, she melted.

Forgetting her weapon for the second time while in his presence, she found that she didn’t care. Not as long as Fiorean kept doing that with his tongue.

Maybe a smarter queen wouldn’t want this, perhaps a more sensible ruler would have thrust the dagger through the heart of their enemy at the first opportunity. This had never been part of her plan, and yet it felt like the only thing in the world that made sense.

Fiorean’s hands dropped from her face and his arms wrapped around her body, pressing her farther into him as if he couldn’t bear any distance between them.

“Aemyra…” Fiorean moaned into her mouth as she dragged the tip of her tongue lazily across his bottom lip.

He pulled back just enough so that she could read the desire in his emerald eyes.

“Is this what you want?” he asked quietly, his face illuminated by another lightning strike.

Aemyra spoke her answer onto his lips as she crushed them to his once more. “Yes, but we’ve already established I don’t have much common sense.”

His low chuckle turned into a growl as Aemyra met his kisses ferociously, just as desperate to taste him as he was to taste her.

She had no idea how they made it back to their chambers without being spotted. Lost in a haze of stolen kisses and passionate touches against stone walls and in shadowed alcoves, Aemyra only became aware of their surroundings when Fiorean set the hearth ablaze.

As if suddenly willing to take his time now that they were in private, Fiorean pressed his thumbs underneath her jaw and tilted her head back. He trailed a passionate line of kisses from her jawline to her neck in a way that made her knees go weak.

This was nothing like the sloppy kisses she had exchanged with men before. Growing irritated with the way Fiorean seemed to master the map of her body in such a short space of time, Aemyra drew her hand back and punched him on the shoulder.

He stilled against her, his lips pausing at the base of her throat. “Something wrong?”

When he flicked his tongue against her clavicle, her words came out significantly more breathless than she had intended.

“Is there anything you aren’t good at?” she muttered.

She felt one strong hand fist in her sodden curls at the nape of her neck and Fiorean pulled her head even farther back, exposing her throat to him. He nuzzled his nose across her jaw and brought his lips up to her ear.

“I can’t carry a tune to save my life,” he whispered.

It would have been funny, had he not sunk his teeth into the soft flesh of her earlobe and she spasmed in his grip. He clamped his other arm around her waist to stop her from falling and the hand in her hair loosened to skim down her spine.

“What about you? You’ve been extremely confident about your forging skills, and even I’ll admit that you’re not a terrible sparring partner.”

Aemyra bent her leg to try and kick him in the balls, but he was too fast for her. Before she knew what was happening, he had twisted so that her back was pressed against his chest. He bent his head over her shoulder and clamped both of her arms against her sides. She became aware that they were dripping all over the lavish carpet.

“Hmm?”

His fingers popped the buttons on the back of her dress, and she let her head rest against his shoulder.

“Horses. I’m a terrible rider,” she admitted.

Another dark chuckle met her ears. “Oh dear. That isn’t what a man wants to hear before he beds a woman.”

The second she thought about striking him, he ensnared both of her wrists.

“Careful, Princess,” he whispered wickedly into her ear. “You’re playing with fire now.”

Maintaining eye contact, Fiorean released a flicker of delicate magic that dried them both in seconds. Shivering with the delicious heat, Aemyra squirmed in his grasp until he let go.

Tendrils of flame snaked out from the hearth to attach to Fiorean’s shirt. His auburn hair gleamed as the fire burned away his clothes, leaving him wreathed in flame.

Then he reached up and tied his hair into a knot behind his head, baring his scars proudly for her to see.

Heat prickled across Aemyra’s skin that had nothing to do with the fire that licked wickedly around Fiorean.

“You looked just like that the first moment I saw you,” Fiorean said, his emerald eyes alight. “Cheeks glowing in the light from the forge, eyes blazing with your inner fire. Even before I knew who you were, I wanted you.”

Aemyra’s breathing hitched as the fire began retreating from Fiorean’s skin, baring the lean muscles of his chest.

“If you had asked me, I would have ripped that dirty shirt off of you, bent you over the anvil, and fucked you until you screamed for more.”

Fiorean stepped closer to her, the tendrils of fire slipping away to reveal the smattering of hair on his lower abdomen, his muscular thighs.

“I didn’t understand it then. But I was drawn to your magic. The magic that fueled the forge was calling to me. You were calling to me.”

When Fiorean finally stepped completely out of his flames, Aemyra forgot to breathe. It had been a long time since she had been with a man, but she wasn’t nervous.

Quite the opposite.

“Come here,” Fiorean said, his voice low.

By the Goddess, Aemyra did as she was told.

His hands pulled the dress down to her waist, the fabric fluttering over her wounds. His eyes dipped to her unbound breasts, and she watched his teeth sink down on his bottom lip as if he wanted to bite her.

“Do it,” Aemyra whispered.

Fiorean drew his gaze back up to Aemyra’s face. Too slowly, as if he hadn’t yet looked his fill. Heart pounding and heat pooling between her legs, she clarified. “Touch me.”

He was so close now that her peaked nipples brushed his skin and she sighed at the utter agony when he still refused to grant her wish.

Then Fiorean broke.

His lips met hers as his hands branded her skin, and for a moment she wondered if he was still harnessing his magic. It took her a minute to understand that his touch was setting her skin alight without the help of his gifts. It burned through her like a fever, incinerating what was left of her hatred for him.

One hand skimmed over her buttocks and when he cupped the generous curves, he groaned into her mouth. Aemyra arched herself into him, her nipples seeking friction as Fiorean’s hands explored her body like he was committing the shape of her to memory.

“The sight of your arse is enough to drive a man to distraction,” he muttered as his hands skimmed the soft underside of her breasts, cupping their heavy weight. “And these…”

He pulled back again to watch his hands knead them, his mouth dropping open slightly.

The lust on his face was undeniable as he gazed upon her, and Aemyra arched into his expert touch, needing more friction.

Before she completely lost all sense and began to beg, Fiorean dropped his mouth to her nipple. The moment his teeth made contact with the taut bud, a strangled moan escaped her lips and she bowed into him.

His tongue rolled over her nipple, deliciously warm, and when he sucked it right into his mouth…

“Fiorean…”

With her breathy moan, Fiorean seemed to lose whatever control he had and got to his knees. She looked down at him, his auburn hair already escaping its knot, as she stepped out of her dress. He pulled the soft cotton down her legs slowly, even though she had been sure he was going to rip it off in haste.

“You are flame given flesh, Aemyra,” he said when she was completely naked save for the garnet necklace. He spoke her name reverently as his long fingers trailed the back of her thigh, making her shiver.

His hands continued their path, tracing the outlines of her calves, the arch of her foot, until she nearly kicked him in the stomach to let him know where she really wanted to be touched.

She almost came apart when she found his gaze trained on the smattering of auburn hair between her legs.

Aemyra would have blushed if she had been ashamed of her body.

Instead, it pleased her to see him so entranced by her nakedness. Indeed, no lover had ever looked upon her save for in the moonlight, when the hair between her legs was bleached of color.

Fiorean rose to his feet in a show of self-control, his arms coming around her waist as he carried her over to the bed. He placed her carefully on the quilt covers, and Aemyra gazed up at him as he wrapped one hand over himself and began pumping.

Aemyra arched off the bed in invitation and Fiorean loomed over her, pressing her down into the mattress. His lips found hers again and she felt him pull back. Confused, she looped her hands around his neck to pull him closer.

She wanted this. She needed this.

He broke away from her insistent kisses, their noses still touching.

“This might hurt,” he said, his voice gentle.

Aemyra bit her lip to contain her laughter. “Trust me, it won’t,” she said, digging her fingers into his hips to move him closer.

He narrowed his eyes at her.

She arched an eyebrow. “I will admit that I often prefer the company of women, but tonight I’ll make an exception.”

Fiorean reached down and tweaked her nipple in retaliation for her cheek.

“You let me cut myself on our wedding night for no good reason?” he asked, incredulous.

This time Aemyra did laugh. “Your brother seemed to need proof. We gave it to him.” Remembering how Fiorean had rhythmically moved the bedposts, she tilted her head. “Although if that was an indication of how you fuck, perhaps I’ve changed my mind.”

Fiorean growled low in his throat before pinning her to the bed again, his sizeable erection pressing against her pubic bone.

“I can assure you,” he said, voice low, “I fuck like I fight.”

Aemyra felt herself grow slick with his words and her legs parted underneath him. He dipped one hand to his cock, working himself against her already soaked entrance.

“I won’t be gentle,” he said warningly.

Aemyra met his eyes with a savage expression.

“Fuck gentle.”

Her words broke through whatever was left of his restraint and with one hard thrust, he sheathed himself inside of her.

They both uttered a cry, her at the intense stretch and him at her tightness.

Groaning through his teeth, he slowly eased himself back and then in again, the ridge of his cock dragging deliciously against her inner walls.

Fiorean began moving, insistent, rhythmic strokes that landed deep inside of her.

“You are mine,” he whispered in the Seann.

Aemyra would have argued the sentiment if she hadn’t also felt exactly what this was—a claiming. To disagree would have been a lie…from this moment, she was his.

Wanting him undone, Aemyra rolled her hips and pushed her hands against his chest. Her wound protested under the strain, but she managed to flip him onto his back without breaking their joining.

Fiorean’s eyes widened in surprise as Aemyra began grinding herself down onto the length of his cock. She bit her bottom lip with a groan at the feeling of fullness.

The possessiveness in his eyes was enough to light a fire in her blood and she undulated her hips, taking every inch of him inside of her.

Losing herself to the rhythm, she placed her right hand around his throat and pressed down hard.

“I don’t need you to play nice,” she said. “I want you exactly how you are. A scarred, dangerous dragon rider who isn’t afraid to play with fire.”

The flickering embers of her magic had begun to return thanks to her sparse diet and she summoned what she could to her palm while she rocked her hips back and forth, feeling him touch the most intimate parts of her. Fiorean reached up, his own flames flickering as he locked their fingers together. Both of them letting just enough of their shields recede so they felt the pain of the burn.

“You are mine,” Aemyra said into his mouth, echoing his earlier statement in the common tongue and he snared her lip in between his teeth hard enough to bruise.

Fiorean thrust his hips up to meet her with every stroke, one hand clutching the flesh of her thigh, his fingernails leaving half-moon marks in her skin.

Aemyra arched into him again and suddenly Fiorean let go of his fire to pin her once more on her back.

She could already feel herself quickening, and the look of pure fire in his eyes could have turned her body to ash.

Before she had time to breathe, his cock was buried inside of her again. Claiming her body relentlessly, with hard, strong strokes that caressed that delicious spot at her core.

“Fiorean,” she gasped, feeling that great wave about to wash over her.

He buried his face in her auburn curls, biting down hard on the space between her shoulder and neck, his hands still restraining her wrists, rendering her completely powerless beneath him.

“Say my name again, Aemyra,” he commanded, the pain of his claiming bite enough to send her over the edge.

As her entire body shuddered with the intensity of her climax, Fiorean swallowed her shout of his name with his mouth.

Fiorean’s tongue encouraged her through the shocks of her orgasm as he stifled his own final cry, working her through wave after wave of pleasure.

The only sound was their heavy breathing, and the utter intensity of what had just occurred between them. It had been nothing like her few tumbles in the sheets with stable boys and farmhands. Those couplings had been more like animals rutting on a farm. Aemyra had quickly learned that women took more time with their pleasure and had avoided anything with a cockstand ever since.

But she didn’t think that she would ever get enough of what Fiorean had just given her.

Fiorean broke the silence first.

“You’re wrong.”

Confused, she turned to look at him, barely noticing the scar on his face, she was so entranced by his other features.

“What?”

He smirked. “You definitely know how to ride.”

Aemyra’s mouth dropped open in surprise before she found her lips turning upward in a smile that mirrored Fiorean’s own. A true smile that illuminated his whole face, and soon she found herself laughing until her stomach hurt as she lay beside her husband, the two of them forgetting the troubles that awaited them outside of this bedroom, if only for the night.