Page 14 of Dreams and Dragon Wings (Clean Fairytales for Adults #2)

The steps grow louder. Closer.

“I’m fine—” I start to say before a warm, strong body that is very male and very much not Reginald Lockhart rounds the corner and slams me against the column, knocking the air from my lungs. Pinning me in place.

Confusion crashes into fear as rough fingers seize me by the chin and jerk my face upward, leaving me staring into steel-gray eyes.

“Are you trying to start a war?” King Friedemar growls, his breath hot against my ear. “If you wanted more of my attention, all you had to do was say.”

“What?” I gasp, wrenching my face from his hold.

The king’s features contort into a look of irritation.

“I despise when women play coy,” he coldly informs me. “You know exactly what I mean.” Before I can react, his head ducks low until the tip of his nose is nuzzling against my throat, breathing in deep of my perfume. “You know exactly what you are doing to me.”

Those words vibrate through me, husky and dark. Dangerous.

The Air presses in close in reply. No, not Air—Aether. And with it, the voice returns, a whisper that skims across my thoughts and yet speaks directly to my heart. That single word again:

? Run. ?

This time, I don’t question it. I don’t think. I just act.

I jerk my knee upward and strike the King of Briarhold in the groin.

Friedemar staggers backward with a hiss of pain. “Why, you little—”

I don’t stay to hear the rest.

I dash down the dark corridor, guided only by my own glow. Ragged breaths rattle past my lips. Panic claws at my throat, desperate to be loosed.

Just up ahead, I spy Lord Reginald stepping out of the ballroom, clearly looking for me. Relief crashes over me. My legs tremble, threatening to buckle as I race toward him—my one ally.

“Reggie!”

He turns toward me at once, his eyes ticking across me. He has no reaction to my glow beyond a single blink.

Perhaps Papa once told him of my strangeness.

But when he looks beyond me, his stance shifts. His expression hardens.

“Get behind me, Miss Weaver,” Reggie calmly instructs.

I scramble to comply, ducking behind him. Using him as a shield.

“Please, we need to leave,” I quietly plead, tugging at the back of his coat. With my free hand, I finally wrench free the amulet in my pocket and slip it around my neck.

The effect is immediate. My glow winks out, as if a candle has been snuffed. And just in time. I flash a glance to the left and find myself staring into a ballroom full of wide-eyed onlookers.

We have an audience.

“Please, Reggie,” I beg again. “Let us go.”

“Your Majesty,” Reggie calls out, his tone tense yet diplomatic. “I believe there has been some misunderstanding. Do excuse me my rudeness, but I will be escorting Miss Weaver and her mother home now.”

I try to remember my breathing exercises. In through my mouth. Out through my nose.

I stroke a fingertip against Bene’s amulet, grounding myself with the subtle grooves ridging that scale, before I tuck it beneath the neckline of my gown. Hiding it from view.

Lord Reginald is here. He will be able to get me out of this bizarre situation. Even men like Friedemar are inclined to listen to the wisdom of other men.

Now I finally see why Bene always spoke so poorly of his fellow prince when we were young.

But when I chance a peek around Reggie’s shoulder, my stomach plummets to the floor.

King Friedemar stalks toward us, his eyes shadowed, his mouth twisted into a displeased sneer. “No,” he snarls, his voice cutting through the corridor like a blade. “There has been no mistake.”

His gaze finds mine. In the scant light cast by the lanterns, I see it—his eyes.

Not warm, not regal, but dark. Unhinged.

“Aurelia Weaver is mine, ” the king ridiculously declares, as if I am some prized object to be claimed.

A disbelieving laugh bursts from my throat.

But Reggie isn’t laughing.

“Go,” he urges me as he pulls free the rapier at his hip—a decorative blade like the sort all gentlemen wear. I am not even sure he knows how to use it. “Find your mother. Leave.”

Now it is Friedemar’s turn to bark out a laugh. “You dare threaten your king, old man?”

Reggie calmly counters, “I dare protect my intended from the unwanted advances of another man.”

The king’s amusement dissipates in the next breath. His eyes flick between Reggie, me, and the golden mask I still wear.

“Guards!” he shouts. “Arrest this man for treason.”

I shake my head and hastily back away, but it’s too late.

Booted feet pound down the corridor. Shouts echo. I frantically turn back toward the ballroom, where all those people still stand, still watching.

Doing nothing.

“Help!” I scream, all in vain. Because no one moves to help us. No one tries to stop King Friedemar’s madness.

They just stand there and watch as the royal guards descend on Reggie with weapons drawn, as steel clashes against steel. Vaguely, I’m aware of my mother pushing her way through the crowd. My eyes catch hers. I see her lips move, but I don’t hear her words.

All I hear is the guards shouting to arrest her, too.

“No!” I scream, lunging toward the ballroom.

Fingers wrap around my wrist like a vice, snapping tight, bruising flesh.

I cry out in pain as I am wrenched backward and around to face Friedemar again.

“Your glamour doesn’t fool me, Jewel,” he hisses. “I smelled you for what you are the moment you entered the palace.”

Jewel. Bene spoke about those once. They were a type of fae, were they not?

An extinct type of fae.

“You’re insane,” I accuse, struggling against Friedemar’s hold.

He ignores my attempts to free myself and drags me onward down the hall—like a stubborn donkey on a lead—and into the foyer as more shouts echo behind us, as the sounds of battle fade.

My heart clenches. Reggie. Mama. They are in danger.

And all because of me.

Desperate, I sink my fingernails into the back of Friedemar’s hand. I claw at him, breaking skin, drawing blood. He grits his teeth but ignores me further. If only I had a blade like Lord Reginald. But I do not.

Helpless. I am helpless.

Threads of magic glitter just out of reach, taunting me with my uselessness. If I could, I would use them to free myself. But I can’t.

“I am a woman, not a Jewel!” I cry.

But even as those words escape me, my mind reels back in time. To the garden. To Bene. To the first time we met.

To the moment he said to me, “I’ve smelled plenty of girls before, and you’re no girl.”

A dark shadow passes over my heart. Is Friedemar right? Am I something… else?

Did Bene know what I am?

Did Bene… keep the truth from me?

No . He couldn’t. He wouldn’t. I wrote to him after my glow first began. I asked him directly if he knew what I was. And he said he didn’t.

But he sent the amulet to help mask my glow all the same.

Friedemar laughs again—a cold, cruel sound.

“Please,” he sneers. “Save your lies, my dear. I know good and well the prize I have just won. So, scream all you like. Claw me to your heart’s content.”

When he next looks at me, the gleam in his eyes turns my stomach. It makes my skin crawl. I know I have to get out of here before it is too late.

Especially when Friedemar whispers, “But they will do you no good. You are mine, now, Aurelia Weaver. Mine .”