Page 7 of The Forbidden Dragon King (Shadow Kings #1)

“Actually, you’re my Alpha, and I’m your Omega.” I can’t believe that I’m talking back to Bard, in fact, that I’m talking to him at all.

But since this feels like I’ve just been given a second chance at life, fuck it.

An indifferent expression falls over Bard’s face.

When he pushes himself to his feet, I try to avoid noticing the fact that his cock is now level with my mouth.

“You’ll be the dead Omega,” he says, “if I take you back to the court with me. Mother will kill both of us.”

I bite my lip, taking a risk.

My hands are clammy; I hardly dare meet his gaze to confess.

“Bard, I…I like you. You must have noticed. We both enjoy studying and rune magic. W-w-we’re not the same as the others.

I know that you’re…and I’m… But I’m not wrong am I?

We could make this work as mates. You can feel my soul now. This is fated, or?—”

I flinch at Bard’s harsh laugh.

“Do you hear how ridiculous you sound? Fated? ” Bard towers over me, crossing his arms. “I’m the prince, and you’re some freaky orphan servant who stalks me. We’ve never spoken to each other. I mean, what would we even have to talk about, really?”

My heart shatters.

I blush like all the blood in my body has flooded to my cheeks.

I surge to my feet, ignited to passion. “ You fucking claimed me .”

Bard looks troubled. “I told you, my wolf?—"

“Coward,” I hiss .

“Yes,” he drawls, although he’s shaking. “I probably am. Sometimes, however, a kingdom is worth some personal cowardice. You may learn that.”

My brow furrows in confusion. “This has happened. We’re pack now. What are we going to do about it?”

Why is he acting like this?

Was he always this much of an asshole? Have I been blinded by love?

My heart may be bleeding, but Bard is now my Alpha. At a deep biological level, I need his touch, scent, and his love.

His frosty act is making me sick.

Bard looks me up and down like I’m no more than a calculation in one of his books to be solved. “What are you wearing?”

His sudden snarled question makes me jolt.

I glance down at myself.

Shit, Bard’s cloak. Admittedly, that does back up his stalker argument.

“To be fair,” I reply, “freaky orphan servants like me don’t get given warm cloaks like this one. It looks better on me anyway, right?”

Bard growls, launching himself at me, wrenching the cloak and breaking the wolf clasp.

“Give it back.” He drags the cloak off my shoulders, panting hard and clutching it in his fist. “This is why Mother and Father would never accept you. You’re a thief.

Do you even know how Omegas should act? Were you taught nothing about your dynamic?

On the moon, is that my stolen rune magic on your dress? ”

My cheeks burn with humiliation. My eyes sting with tears.

Still, I point defiantly at his bloodied spear, which I dropped on the floor. “I also took your special spear. I’m not only a thief; I’m the best thief in the Moon Court.”

Bard closes his eyes for a moment, before he opens them again. They’re flashing with fury, as he hurls his tattered cloak down on top of the spear.

I can sense his anger through the bond.

Good.

I hope that he can feel both my heartbreak and the hate that’s now sheeting through me where once there had only been love.

Yet was it ever true love?

I’d never known Bard, I realize that now.

I’d fallen in love with a fantasy that I’d spun in my own mind. He’d never been real.

We both stare at each other, breathing hard.

Bard is the first to look away.

“I’m the prince,” he says, quietly. “But I can never be your mate.”

“I hate you…I fucking hate you…” I say, low and heartfelt, and he winces. “But you’re the only Alpha I have.”

“I can change that.”

To my shock, Bard reaches for my wrist, snatching it before I can stop him.

He pushes his own wrist with the crescent moon soul mark against mine.

I realize what he intends to do a moment too late.

“No,” I scream. “Don’t, please, don’t… ”

“I reject this bond.” Bard’s voice is flat and dead.

He’s not even looking at me but only where the crescent moons are touching each other and writhing on our skin, as if the blood beneath them is bubbling up in an attempt to resist. Now, we both howl in agony.

It’s like fire is burning through my blood, bones, and soul. “I reject this bond.”

“Bard,” I try one final time, as the marks bubble and burn.

Bard is sweating and holding onto me like I’m the only thing stopping him from falling to his knees.

Finally, he meets my gaze.

I feel the man’s emotions who I’ve spent my entire life dreaming would be my Alpha for a single moment longer — regret.

Then he whispers, “I reject this bond.”

It’s like a barrier slamming down between us forever, cutting off our emotions and souls.

“No…” I weep.

My inner Omega howls in devastation at being rejected by her Alpha.

I have never felt so alone.

When Bard finally lets go of my wrist, both our knees buckle and we crash to the floor. I cradle my wrist, staring at the ugly scar where once the pretty moon tattoo had been.

I can never be claimed by another wolf shifter Alpha, no matter how long I live.

This is my mark of shame.

I really am an outcast now .

When Bard attempts to reach for my arm, I skitter back from him. Barely able to draw in breaths or see where I’m going through the blood caked in my eyelashes, I stumble toward the cave’s exit.

I have to escape from Fang Kingdom, Bard, these feelings.

Myself.

I can hear Bard running after me, and panicked, I limp faster. I break out of the cave onto the ledge.

The fresh, cold air slaps across my face. All at once, everything that has just happened feels frighteningly real.

Then I duck in shock, when a giant shadow swoops over the moon.

What the fuck was that?

I crane my head back and stare in amazement at the most gorgeous and terrifying sight I’ve ever seen: a giant, golden dragon with glowing amber eyes swooping across the nighttime sky toward me.

King Aurelius, of the Draca Kingdom!

He glitters more brightly than the stars, as if he is the awoken sun battling the moon for the control of the sky.

He looks just like the Golden Dragon Emperor of legend from the cave painting, only more fearsome. Horns curve from his head, and the scales down his long tail glint like sunlight. Shadows armor his sinuous back and around his head; they disintegrate from the tips of his wings like ash.

My heart leaps.

Aurelius truly has come on the night of the Mate Hunt to save me. I never believed in that tradition. He may be late but he’s here.

I raise my hand to my throbbing forehead.

Or have I hit my head hard enough to be hallucinating? Is this the impact of the broken bond?

Then I jump, when I hear a roar from the far distance, and a second, then a third, ruby dragon with their dragon riders fly through the nighttime sky over the Unseelie Kingdom borders.

Aren’t ruby dragons the warrior members of Aurelius’ army?

They’re readying for war.

I slump to my knees. My hair hangs over my face.

Of course, Aurelius isn’t here as part of the Mate Hunt to save me. Does he even know that it’s happening tonight? Does he care about the rituals of the kingdoms that he conquers?

He must be here because he’s about to fight a battle with the Shadow Fae.

Or launch an invasion…

Is that why Bard is skulking in the caves, spying? But for which side?

My heart speeds up, when I think of my lavender eyed Shadow Fae King. Is he safe? Already caught?

“Spark, get back in here.” Bard yanks on my arm, trying to pull me into the safety of the cave.

I’m not going anywhere with him anymore, however, and I’m definitely not listening to the man who broke his bond with me .

Yet his use of my nickname shocks me. What is he trying to stop me from seeing?

What’s he so frightened of?

The Second Fae War?

The dragons?

King Aurelius?

When I turn and punch Bard in the nose, his nose breaks with a satisfying crunch of bone. Bard hollers, falling back onto his ass.

Funny how getting to know an Alpha helps you to both get over a crush and your unwillingness to fight back.

“Don’t ever fucking touch me again,” I snarl. “You may be a prince, but as an Alpha, you’re knotless.”

I narrow my eyes at Bard, when he simply raises his hand and points behind me.

Oldest trick in the book.

Then my face becomes ashen, when freezing air batters my neck, giant wings flap, and suddenly, claws clamp around my waist.

I scream.

I am yanked into the air backwards, caught as the prey of the Shadow Dragon King.