Page 39 of The Dragon King's Pregnant Mate

"Stay?" Calliope’s voice is barely a whisper. "Just…I'm so cold."

The words twist something in my chest. Perhaps it is my heart. Perhaps it is failing, after all this time. I settle beside her, pulling her close against my side. She burrows into my warmth like she used to, back before chains and crowns came between us. Her head fits perfectly beneath my chin, as if she was made to rest there.

"Sleep," I tell her. "I'll keep watch."

She makes a soft sound of protest, but exhaustion is already pulling her under. Through our bond, I feel her consciousness fading, feel that strange warmth inside her pulse stronger as she drifts off. Her fingers stay tangled in my cloak, as if afraid I'll disappear.

I press my lips to her hair. Even now, after everything, the urge to possess burns in my blood. To lock her away somewhere safe, where nothing can ever hurt her again. To burn anyone who tries to take her from me.

But I remember too well how that ended last time. Remember the look in her eyes when she realized the pretty cage was still a cage. Remember waking to find her gone, taking half my soul with her.

So instead, I hold her gently. Let her choose to stay close, to trust me with her vulnerability. Try to believe that maybe, this time, it can be different.

The fire burns low, and somewhere in the endless dark beyond our shelter, enemies gather. But for now, I have her in my arms. For now, she's choosing to stay.

It will have to be enough for me.

Chapter 19 - Calliope

The old fortress rises from the mountainside like the bones of some ancient beast, its walls black against the endless white of snow. Wind howls through empty arrow slits and crumbling battlements, carrying echoes that sound almost like voices—soldiers long dead, still standing their eternal watch.

I barely notice its grim majesty. The world has narrowed to the next step, the next breath, the desperate need to keep moving despite the weakness that threatens to drag me under. Our child's magic pulses within me like a captive star, growing stronger even as it drains what little strength I have left.

"Almost there." Arvoren's voice rumbles against my side where he supports most of my weight. Steam rises where his dragon-heated skin meets the frozen air. "Just a little further."

The words swim in and out of focus as darkness crowds the edges of my vision. How long have we been walking? Hours blur together, marked only by the endless rhythm of stumbling steps and the child's strengthening presence. Sometimes I think I hear them in my dreams—not crying, but singing, their magic harmonizing with mine in ways I don't understand.

We cross what remains of the outer wall, ancient wards crackling faintly beneath the ice that coats every surface. The sensation sends shivers down my spine that have nothing to do with cold. This place remembers what it once was—a bastion against the horrors that lurked in the peaks beyond Kaldoria's borders. Now it stands empty, its only sentinels the wind and snow.

"Here." Arvoren guides me through a half-collapsed doorway into what must have been the garrison's main hall. The ceiling has partially caved in, letting pale light filter through gaps in tumbled stone, but the space is dry and defensible. Faded banners still hang on the walls, bearing sigils I don't recognize—Houses long forgotten by history.

My legs finally give out. Arvoren catches me before I can fall, lifting me as easily as a child. The world spins lazily as he carries me to a relatively intact corner, where old furs still line stone benches built into the wall. The military precision of the ancient garrison's construction protected this small shelter from the worst of the elements.

"Your fever's worse." His voice seems to come from very far away as he settles me on the furs. His hand feels shockingly hot against my forehead—or am I just that cold? "Whatever Ulric did to you…"

"Not him." The words scratch my throat. "Not anymore. It's…"

But I can't finish. Can't tell him that it's our child's magic taking its toll, growing stronger as they grow within me. That every day I feel them more clearly, their power mingling with mine until I can hardly tell where one ends and the other begins.

The last thing I see before exhaustion claims me is Arvoren's face, lined with worry in the dim light. Then darkness sweeps in, carrying me down into dreams.

I stand in Ulric's study, heart pounding as he circles me like a predator. Snow falls endlessly outside the arrow-slit windows, and the cloying sweetness of tea coats my tongue.

"That child you carry," he says, his voice honey-sweet but edged with poison. "Do you really think my brother will let either of you live once he knows? A child with that much power…he'll see it as a threat to his throne. To his control."

The scene shifts, dissolves, reforms. Now I'm in the Sanctum at Millrath, where Arvoren and I were married. But the glass walls show only darkness beyond, and when I touch them, they're warm as blood.

"Mine," Arvoren's voice echoes from everywhere and nowhere. "My wife, my queen, my heart's greatest weakness…"

The words overlap, tangle, become something else: "My possession, my prisoner, my chain…"

But then another voice cuts through the darkness—my grandmother's, though I haven't heard it since I was a child. She stands before me, though her form shifts and flows like smoke on water.

“The old magic stirs," she says, and her voice carries the weight of mountains. "Powers long sleeping begin to wake. The child you carry…they will reshape this world, for better or worse. But first, you must choose. Trust or fear. Love or control. The future hangs by a thread of ice, little one. What will you make of it?"

***

I wake with a gasp, the dream fragments clinging like frost to my skin. The hall is darker now, though a small fire burns nearby, casting dancing shadows on ancient stone. Arvoren sits beside me, his expression unreadable in the flickering light.