Page 10 of The Dragon Queen (Ember: Queen Of Dragons #6)

STORM

Unsurprisingly, Rafe is the first to react, once Ember tells us her plan. "No. No fucking way--"

"I don't like it, either," Ember interrupts. She's standing tall, but tension radiates through our bond. "But there's no other good option. I have to learn a few decades' worth of Shadow Dragon magic, and we basically need to rally together an army if we want to defeat the Shadow King."

"Totally doable," Rafe insists, but he's clearly bluffing.

And Ember calls him on it. "In less than a month?"

So he tries a different tack. "Remember the last time we were planning to split up? After the summit got bombed, when me and Juju both wanted to head home?"

She winces, crossing her arms, and glancing at Jianyu, who seems torn between calling Rafe out on using that ridiculous nickname and basically agreeing with him. "That was different," she says.

"How?" Rafe asks, incredulous. "I was going one way, and Juju was going another, and we asked you to choose, and do you remember what you said?"

She softens slightly--but only slightly. "I refused."

"And I refuse now." Rafe's eyes are alight with determination as he gestures at each of us--Jianyu, Malik, and me--in turn. "We're a team."

"Of course we are." Her voice cracking, she drops her arms to her sides. "Don't you see? That's why I know we can survive this."

Rafe looks around again. "Back me up, guys. This is crazy, right? She can't send us all off like this."

Because that's what she's proposing. She'll stay here and train with Rook and Rhiannon, and we'll each sneak back into our respective kingdoms to find other sympathizers--dragons who are willing to join us in our fight to stop the Shadow King.

Jianyu's jaw flexes. "As much as I hate to admit it, Rafe has a point." A hint of vulnerability seeps into his gaze. "I don't like being away from you any more now than I did before."

"Neither do I." She glances around at the rest of us. "You know that."

"Of course we do," I agree.

Even when we're apart for a few hours, there's a pull at the inside of my chest. I don't breathe right until my mate is close to me again. I know it's the same for her as it is for me.

She smiles at me in appreciation before her mouth evens back out again. She fixes her attention on Rafe. "When I refused to be separated, we were freshly mated--and you two were basically constantly trying to kill each other."

"Lightly maim," Rafe mutters in correction, as if that makes all that big of a difference.

She rolls her eyes and barrels on. "Our bond wasn't strong enough to withstand any serious time apart." She looks to us each in turn with pleading in her eyes. "But after everything we've been through...everything we've shared... Can't you feel it? Nothing could separate us now. Not a thousand miles or a hundred years."

"That doesn't mean I would like to try it," Malik interjects.

"What other choice do we have?" she asks, our bond jittering with the strain inside her.

And I hate this. I hate that we have to make these kinds of decisions--that we're faced with this kind of evil.

I hate that her destiny weighs on her the way it does. I hate that she isn't free to choose what s best for her. What would make her happy.

But that destiny brought us together. I can't question it.

I won't question her.

"I don't want to leave you." I reach for her hand, and she lets me take it. I relish the contact, soaking in the feeling of her warm palm against mine.

I'm going to miss it.

"But," I continue, preempting the others before they can misunderstand what I'm trying to say. "I trust you."

I trust in her leadership--and in her heart.

"I trust her, too," Rafe protests. "Just--"

I ignore him, staring into my mate's eyes. "If you really think this is right, then I support you."

She blinks, a sheen appearing in her gaze. "I am a giant, never-ending pit of self-doubt," she admits. She darts glances at her other three mates. "Seriously, if any of you have a better plan, I'm all ears."

Nobody speaks up. Even Rafe draws his mouth into an unhappy--if mercifully silent--line.

"Then we split up," I hear myself say. The words tear me apart, but there's a resonance in my bond with Ember. This is the right call.

"Your vote is worth no more than anyone else's," Jianyu intones.

Rafe nods, crossing his arms and flexing his biceps. "Maybe less."

"Guys..." Ember implores.

"He didn't have to see you when we first found you," Jianyu reminds her, and yeah, great, as if I didn't feel guilty enough. "You were shattered."

Ember's side of our connection ripples with shame and doubt. I try to shore her up the best I can, but my own self-loathing threatens to rear its ugly head.

"Storm broke my heart," Ember says, and it's a punch to the gut. She recovers quickly, though, and I force myself to continue standing my ground. "But he's atoned, over and over again."

"I'll keep atoning--for the rest of our lives."

She squeezes my hand before letting go. "I thought we'd moved past this."

She s saying it to her other mates as much as she is to me.

I want to agree with her--to keep moving on. "I'm glad they brought it up, actually."

"You are?" Rafe asks.

My heart hammers in my chest, my throat tightening, but I swallow past the constriction. "I've been apart from Ember. For months." I meet her dark, haunted eyes once more. "They were torture."

"You are really not helping your case," Malik warns.

To Ember, I declare, "Every minute we were separated hurt."

"Storm..."

"I know that you were in more pain than I was."

She shakes her head. "That's not what I'm saying--"

"But we survived the worst possible separation, brought about because I was a shithead, who gave more loyalty to my traitor father than to the woman I loved."

"Can't argue with that," Rafe quips.

"We can survive this." I take her hand again, and the love vibrating through our bond is almost overwhelming in its force. Confidence fuels me, even though beneath the surface I'm already anticipating the longing. "I don't want to be apart from you," I repeat. "But I believe in what we have. I believe in the mission. And I believe in you."

With that, I pull her in closer, and she comes so willingly, allowing me to fold her into my arms. I kiss her wet mouth, drinking in every moment of contact like it might be my last, because for the next few weeks, it probably will be.

She kisses back with the same intensity, pouring my love and my anticipation of loss right back into our connection. And it's like that last, awful time, when we said our goodbyes before the Air Kingdom Emergence. Before my father and Fury discovered us and she was torn from my grasp.

But this time, I know I'm coming back. We'll be together again, stronger than ever.

"Shit," Rafe mutters under his breath. "Fine, I believe in you, too."

"I know." With a soft, sad laugh, Ember pulls away from me and lets Rafe drag her into a possessive kiss of his own. When he's done, she looks to Jianyu.

"I don't like it," he says again, "but I accept it."

"That's all I can ask." She kisses him, too.

Malik reaches for her last, and he draws her into the deepest kiss of all, clutching her to his chest, his tattoos flickering with liquid blue light. "Two weeks," he says darkly. "Two weeks to gather our allies and bring them here. Not a day more."

It's not enough time, but it's as long as I can imagine being away from Ember without losing my mind.

"We'll talk every day," she assures us, melting into Malik's arms.

"We'll only have a couple of weeks after we return to prepare for the Shadow Moon, I remind her. "That's not much time to find the crown, go get it, and organize a plan of attack."

She reaches for me, and I go to her, drawn in as ever by the magnetic pull between us. It burned me with its heat before we were bonded, and now it's all-encompassing, too powerful to even try to resist.

But I will. For her, I'll go anywhere, do anything.

Even leave.

"We'll make it work," she promises, but her voice quavers. She's putting on a strong face, but her insecurity is an undeniable wobble in the electric aura surrounding her.

"Of course we will." Jianyu is on the other side of her, her hand in his as he kisses a soft, wet line up her arm.

She shivers, but in a good way, this time, the pleasure of her mates' touch crowding out the uncertainty and the doubt.

She glances at Rafe, though, and he huffs out a breath. "Fine, fine. I'm on board--but just so we're clear, I fucking hate it."

"We all hate it." I brush the backs of my knuckles down the side of her neck, feeling the tender pulse beating just beneath her skin. Memorizing it. "But we do what we have to do."

I've sacrificed my own happiness in the name of duty before. Once, I sacrificed Ember, and it was the worst fucking decision of my life.

But now I'm sacrificing time with Ember for Ember.

Her gaze connects with mine, mournful in a way that tears at my heart, but so full of love that I can bear the pain. "Thank you."

My throat catches, and it takes all my will to keep my tone even. I cup her cheek, trying so hard to be gentle when all I want to do is hold her tight and never let go.

I say the words I couldn't before. "I'm going to miss you so fucking much."

I crash my mouth to hers, pushing all the love and longing and acceptance swirling inside of me into our bond. She kisses back with an intensity that steals my breath and helps to heal the hole already forming in my chest.

As we kiss, Rafe is peeling her clothes from her body. I can't get enough of her skin. Our mate-bond connection is a living thing in my blood, demanding satisfaction. It twists me up inside, turns me inside out.

My own clothes seem to fall away. Her other mates are disrobing, too, and just a few short days ago, the weirdness of sharing her would have been distracting. Now it just adds to the fervor; being with her while three other men are grasping at her body and murmuring words of love and devotion only strengthens the depth of feeling swimming through our link.

She curls her hand around the back of my neck, rubbing her bare breasts against my chest. Rafe is behind her, and Malik is kissing her neck. Jianyu skates his hand down her side.

Together, by some unspoken agreement, we steer her back toward the bed. Rafe shifts out of the way, and I set her down on the soft surface, and then her legs are falling open. I settle between her thighs, and it's too much, too fast.

"Go on," she babbles, "I'm ready--so wet for you--need you--"

And how can I resist? I drive inside, her body so sweet and warm and tight--Christ, how can she still be so tight? We've pushed her to the absolute limits of what a woman can take, and she's kept going and going.

Fully sheathed within her, I kiss her mouth, soft and deep. Love flows through the bond between us, echoing and redoubling over and over and over until it's a force of nature unto itself.

I lose myself in the soft push and pull, driving into her at a speed that keeps the edge of ecstasy just at bay. Our kiss is broken by Jianyu caressing the side of her face. He feeds her his cock, and she tightens around me. Rafe holds her legs open, murmuring filth about how he can't wait to lick my come out of her pussy, while Malik caresses her breasts, and it's all too much.

One touch of my thumb against her clit, and she's arching into me, her wet flesh pulsing all around me, and I take another half dozen strokes before the blinding white-out of oblivion carries me away.

As our orgasms wash over us, our bond tightens even further. There's no stopping it, no breaking it, no breaking us.

Nothing could erase my love for her.

Even if I'm half a world away.