Page 125 of The Dragon Warlord

“Or maybe being addicted to having sex with River is glorious. I don’t know why I complained in the first place.”

“And we were doing so well. Go to bed, Omega. I’ll see you tomorrow evening.”

Praise the Gods and the good spirits alike.

I’m quick to shed my clothes and climb into bed with River. I take him one more time—how many times does that make just today? Seven? Eight? A lot. Snuggled around him, all the bullshite with yet more bonding crap is far in the background.

“You’re missing them,” he says, pushing sweaty hair off my face. “I know you always do, but tonight it was stronger.”

He’s referencing my tears at the dinner table.

“Yeah. Least I’ve got you, honeycake,” I say, nuzzling my face into his neck. “And you’ll be happy to know that I’ve already been learning from this little experiment of ours.”

“You have?”

I nod. “I’ll never even think about leaving you behind again. Where you go, I do.”

He smiles. “I’ve learned something too. You never would have been able to leave me. You would have tried for me, Tristan, I know you would have, but it wouldn’t have happened.”

“I don’t know what I was thinking. Leaving you is like saying I’d leave my left arm behind.”

I still don’t know definitively about bonds. What the dragon lord told me tonight gives credence to the theory about bonds controlling the omega and alpha pairing at its whim to keep them together.

But being here with River feels like the rightest thing I could be doing. I’m not confused about anything when he’s in my arms with his head rested deep into my neck where he likes to be.

21

River

I’ve been waiting for it to happen. Tristan wants to claim me in front of everyone, but we both want it to happen organically. When hehasto. When he can’t hold back anymore. I have a thousand fantasies as to how it will happen. Maybe someone will attempt to challenge his claim on me. I mean, okay, that’s the kind of stuff that only happens in alpha and omega fiction books, no one would ever challenge the Warlord’s claim in real life, but it’s a fun fantasy.

He'd get all feral. He’d want to throw me down, rip my clothes off, and show everyone how well he fucks me. Gods that would be brilliant.

Something more realistic would be an accidental touch of his bonding bite as it happened before. That could happen during practice. It has happened. The number of times it’s almost happened is more than that. Now that he’s promised he won’t hold back, he can take out his rage via his cock up my arse. It’s win-win because it will soothe him and be fucking hot.

"Head in the clouds, Omega Kanes?” the ice dragon says. Tristan finally convinced him to come to practice over breakfast. The Warlord paired us together so that he’d feel as comfortable as possible. He hasn’t used a sword since he arrived here, and no one knows if he’s ever used one, including him. His muscle memory suggests that he has. The way he walks, almost like a prowl, speaks to a warrior’s past. If he was a warrior in his past life, his sword skills are rusty. I don’t have to pay much attention to thwart him, which is why I’m able to daydream about Tristan’s amazing cock during these exercises.

“A bit, yeah.”

“Gods you’re gorgeous with your head in the clouds. If you were my omega, I’d never let you leave my bed.”

I freeze. No one is supposed to speak to me like that. I peer around for Tristan because if he heard that … I’m not sure what he’d do. Tristan is well across the field, yelling at one of my brothers. For once, I’m glad for such a distraction.

Leif has been here for three and a half decades now. He’s had time to learn our customs. Tristan had a lot of it down in four months because he wasn’t given another option. Surely, Leif knows this much, but then again, he doesn’t leave his rooms a lot. When you don’t interact with other dragons, you don’t pick up on as much etiquette.

I’m going to have to tell Tristan, but maybe waiting until later is preferable?

“I’ve said something wrong, haven’t I?” he says. He’s quite the attractive fellow. He’ll make some omega very happy one day.

“Yeah. You can’t speak to the Warlord’s omega like that. It’s inappropriate. I wouldn’t advise talking to anyone’s omega like that, but how you’d like to conduct yourself is up to you.”

“Fuck. I’m sorry. That was … gah.” He drops his sword. His hands fly to his hair, screaming as he yanks, and drawing everyone’s attention, including Tristan’s.

He storms over. “Leif.” Tristan places a hand on his neck and feeds him some calming magic until he’s settled again.

“Thank you, Warlord. I’m okay now. I was talking to your omega and then suddenly there was a stabbing pain through my head.”

Done helping Leif, Tristan takes the opportunity to pull me to him by my jacket. He rubs noses with me—the family I love you—and presses a quick kiss to my lips. “This one has the same effect on me, but probably for different reasons. Go to the healer’s tent and they’ll check you over.”