Page 142 of The Dragon Queen Complete Series Collection

Chapter 141

“Time to get up, cadet.”

I blinked my eyes, then groaned into my pillow. My pillow groaned back because I was lying on Ged’s chest, but neither of us could resist Soren’s voice. Everyone in the expansive bed yawned, stretched, and then rolled out of bed.

Everyone but Draven.

His hair lay like a fan of black silk across the pillow, but it was his position, his proximity, that caught my attention. He lay on the far edge of the bed, facing the wall, and that’s what protected him from our movements. Brom lay closest to him, but the gap between each man may as well have been a crevasse. Brom’s eyes flicked open and he barely made a sound as he looked back over his shoulder at the prince before climbing from the bed.

“Brom…”

I moved towards my husband and saw his expression change. He still looked tired, far too tired, but he smiled when he saw me.

“Good morning to you, wife.” That title was said with just a little irony. “Ready for a long ride? We’ll be in the saddle for most of the day.”

It was then that Draven’s eyes opened. For just a second, he stared at the walls, but whatever he saw there wasn’t enough to keep him awake. His eyes fell closed again, and he sighed, snuggling back into his pillow. We were given no such luxury, snatching a quick breakfast as we walked through the castle kitchens, the cook handing us all bread rolls stuffed with meat and cheese, along with a basket full of supplies. Glimmer snapped the slices of steak tossed her way out of the air, swallowing them before rushing out the door and towards the courtyard where all the other dragons waited.

We were travelling to a far-flung estate wedged between the borders of Tharfield and Skane. Belonging to neither duchy, it was assiduously ignored by each duke, because it was the territory owned by the broader branches of the king’s own family. Draven couldn’t trust anyone else to do this job, not until he could be sure of who the Duke of Harlston’s co-conspirators were. We were to go and retrieve his cousin and bring him to the capital to give an accounting of how much dragonfire they possessed.

“So who is Her Highness riding with today?” Flynn asked. I saw some of the man I loved in the way he offered me his arm with a smile, and part of me wanted to accept, if only to keep him in this good mood and to be there when he crashed again.

“Don’t get in the saddle with that idiot,” Soren said, stroking his dragon’s head. “Wraith is the most steady of all the dragons.”

Glimmer moved closer and my heart couldn’t help but clench when she raised her muzzle. Wraith’s massive one stretched out carefully to touch hers.

“And the slowest.” Ged grabbed my hand and twirled me around like we were at a country dance. “You want to ride on Cloudy for certain.”

“Glacier beats Cloud Raker two times out of three,” Flynn shot back as he hauled himself into the saddle.

“And how does Obsidian fare?” I said, turning to Brom.

“He’s ready to serve you.” There was something so serious about my husband’s expression. He seemed to realise that, shaking his head and then gestured to his dragon. “We are always ready to serve the queen-in-waiting.”

“Not her.” I stepped up to Obsidian’s flank, rubbing my hand on his scales in thanks as he offered me his foreleg. “Not today.” I stared back at the palace for a second. “We will be free of titles, or obligations, bar one.” When I settled into the saddle, Brom moved behind me, the sensation a familiar one. Glimmer was sitting on Obsidian’s neck, trilling in anticipation. The big dragon looked back with a snort, seemingly amused by this. “Today we’re just Pippin.” My hand covered his when it went around my waist, my finger tracing the shape of his wedding band under his gloves. “And you are just my husband, Brom.”

“But for how long?”

I don’t think he meant for me to hear that, it coming out as barely a sigh. There was no opportunity to interrogate further. His hand went up and he gestured forward, Obsidian already moving. I clung on tight, Glimmer already flapping her wings in anticipation, as the massive black dragon launched himself into the air.

“Brom…”

This wasn’t the place for heart-to-hearts. The wind whipped away my words before I could get them out, and yet he leaned forward. The press of his body, the prickle of his beard against my ear, it was all familiar, and yet it had a feeling of stolen pleasure. Before, we were forced to creep around the keep, hiding what we were to each other, but now…? Now, I was to be the king’s intended. I felt a pang of disloyalty, but to whom?

“Speak, Pippin.” Brom’s voice came out far more commanding than he intended to I think, the roar of the wind forcing him to say the words with his whole chest. I felt the need to answer him, but everything I needed to say was a messy tangle, each point trying to force its way out first. His hand slid down, coming to rest over my diaphragm. “Breathe first, then speak.”

He was my wing commander right now and I could trust him, trust that he knew what had to happen next. I sucked in a breath, my chest feeling tight as I let it out again.

“What do we do?” That was the simplest way to express the turmoil inside me. “How do we go forward? I mean…” As a strange collection of people, our relationships complex and enmeshed. “As husband and wife.” I figured I may as well start there. “I don’t want a divorce.” His grip on me tightened almost to the point of pain but it wasn’t in response to a shift in angle from Obsidian. The dragon flew on and on with powerful sweeps of his wings. “I want?—”

“You’ll always be my wife.” How I needed to hear those words. “Always. No king, queen, emperor, or the gods themselves can take you away from me. It may have been a rushed thing born of necessity, but when I stood with you before the priest…” I saw it then, our hasty wedding in the tiny chapel, the light streaming in through the stained glass, turning his dark hair reddish. I turned then, staring back at him as much as I could. “It felt right.” That certainty I saw in his eyes, perfectly unwavering, I needed it. “Like something I’d been waiting my entire life for.”

“I as well.” I tried to smile, glad for my goggles, because perhaps they hid the tears that filled my eyes. “The way forward is clear. Draven must be married to the woman bound to the dragon queen, but why…?”

A small, childish part of me could see it, not just Brom standing before a priest, taking my hand in marriage, but Draven too. Each one of our hands clasped the other, as we vowed to love, honour, and cherish each other. That triad expanded as the rest of my men stepped forward. Each one of them would wear a ring I gave them, claiming each one as mine.

Just as they did me.

“Because the populace recognises Draven as king, and as his wife, they are invested in the idea that any child you bear carries his blood. Polyamorous relationships fell out of favour when Gloriana was deposed, used to explain her inadequacies as a ruler.” He stroked my cheek, the leather of his gloves no fit replacement for skin-to-skin contact. “For him to introduce… what we are to the people during such a time of upheaval? The Duke of Harlston, gods, any number of people, would use it as a means to delegitimise him as king.”

So we were doomed. I turned back to stare at the endless sky, cloud after cloud passing us by.

“I just need you to know my heart,” he said. “Because that remains unchanged. Nothing Draven, Raina, gods, anyone, could do will change how I feel. Courtiers will mock me, people will talk, but I will wear this ring forever, even if I’m forced to move it to my other hand.”

“I will do the same.” For a moment there was quiet between us, but it would never last long. It was never just us two, but three. “What of Draven?”

You’ve barely looked at him since you heard the news, I wanted to say. Your body angles itself away from him. You don’t hold him like you would me if I had experienced the same horrors.

“Try not to worry too much about Draven and me.” I let out a little snort at that and he pressed a kiss to my neck. “Or not more than usual. He is as he always was: arrogant, always assuming others will go along with what he wants gladly.”

“Perhaps that needs correcting?” I suggested.

“You assume he will hear me?” I could feel Brom shaking his head. “Then you truly have a different kind of relationship with him than I do. I’m not sure if he even sees the man I am now, cares for him at all. In his head, I’m still the boy with stars in his eyes, unable to stop myself from following the beautiful prince around. Why would he think otherwise? I’m still following him, even into this madness.”

“You are much more than a follower,” I said, rubbing his hands with mine. “So much more. You command our wing, keep us safe, find a way forward when given impossible directives, and keep your head even when we lose ours.”

“So that’s the draw for you?” I could hear the smile in his voice. “My level head? Well, then listen to this advice from your wing commander. It would be a tempting thing to try to manage the emotions of all the men dancing around you, Pippin, but it is a fool’s errand.” His arms surrounded me, holding me close, and up here, so far away from the earth, the palace, all of it, I could lean back into it. “Be the queen in earnest. Force each one of us to pay you fealty in every way we can, proving we are worthy to take a place by your side. Like young Glimmer.”

My eyes jerked around to catch the moment my dragon launched herself off the neck of Obsidian. I screamed in earnest, ready to throw myself after her, but her wings flapped out, keeping her abreast of Obsidian. A whoop from below made clear that there was no need for concern.

I am a dragon , Glimmer told me. I fly. There was something almost reproachful about her tone. And my mates, they will never allow me to fall. Cloudy, Glacier, and Wraith all moved into formation, some below Glimmer, some beside her. This seemed to funnel the air stream towards her, helping her stay aloft. You should allow yours to do the same.

But it was more complicated in my case, I wanted to argue. It felt like each man needed something from me and I didn’t have enough of me to go around. Ruminating on that helped the hours pass, and it wasn’t until Brom moved in the saddle that I knew we’d reached our destination. He retrieved the flags we’d been given last night to signal that we had permission to land, and it became clear why as we descended.

A great castle had been built, but it was the only grand thing here. No fields of crops, no rolling hills of grass appeared when we dropped below the clouds. The land was barren, desolate, providing an unrelieved plain of brown in contrast to the citadel. That’s what it was, I soon realised, as two massive ballista swung around to set us in their sights.

“Gods above…” Brom muttered, gesturing with the flags madly, but I couldn’t watch that. My eyes were trained on the gleam of the ballista bolts, sure they’d be shot forth and into us seconds later.

This is a bad place , Glimmer said and I could only agree, the dire state of Draven’s family seat coming into clearer focus. She had been resting on Obsidian’s neck, but he rumbled as she clawed her way towards me and into my arms. We should not have come here.

And yet, we had. Draven had given us an order, and we’d followed it to the letter, landing outside the citadel walls, the dragons instinctively clustering close around Obsidian and Glimmer.

“Who are you?” A man snapped as he rode up on a black horse. His hair was close cropped, his eyes narrowed down in the customary squint of a man who worked on the land, but the blue was terribly familiar. This was Draven’s cousin, I was sure of it. “What are you doing here?”

“We come from the king.” Brom dismounted slowly, aware that more and more armed men were surging behind our interrogator. He pulled out a scroll that bore Draven’s seal and then went to hand it over.

“I’m fairly sure Magnus wouldn’t send a bunch of riders out here.” The man’s eyes narrowed as he took me in. “Especially a woman.” He saw Glimmer for the first time. “And a young queen dragon. What the hell has my uncle gotten himself into this time?”

The others were going to answer, but I stepped forward, unfazed by the stiffening guards.

“He’s dead. Raina’s hold on him was broken when she was eaten by Zafira, and there wasn’t enough left of his mind to keep him alive. Draven will be king.”

“So you must be his queen-in-waiting.” His smile was a close approximation of Draven’s, though there was a reckless edge to it that the prince lacked. “I’m his cousin, Stefan.” He slid from his horse and held out his hand. “And you are?”

“Pippa, soon to be queen of all Nevermere,” Brom said, stepping closer, and Stefan seemed to take in the ring on my hand, then my husband’s. “Bondmate of the queen dragon, Glimmer and…” His hand landed on my shoulder. “My wife.”

“Well, it appears there’s a story to be told.” Stefan took the scroll finally and broke the seal, scanning the contents. “Righto, lads, escort these fine dragon riders inside.”