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ONE

“ Y ou still do not know your worth,” Valerius whispered to Caden. His voice was filled with concern.

Iolaire chose well, Raziel muttered. Why does the boy doubt himself?

Caden does not see himself as we and Iolaire do, Raziel. He has no idea of the power he wields outside of being a Dragon Shifter, Valerius explained.

Were we ever so unsure? Raziel wondered.

It was a surprising thing for his very confident Spirit to ask.

We were perhaps never wise enough to doubt our worthiness, Valerius admitted.

I am very wise. Raziel flapped its massive wings.

Of course.

I have always been wise. You… you are learning, his Spirit preened.

Undoubtedly.

But just like Iolaire, I chose well too, Raziel said, its voice soft, but there.

Thank you, old friend.

“Everything feels so fragile now,” Caden breathed. “It’s not felt this way since… Well, I don’t know. But so much is at stake. I just can’t help but think someone else would have helped you more than me.”

“No one could have, Caden. You reached me. I will have to somehow help you see how important you are to me,” Valerius said.

Caden gave him a rather watery smile. “You already have. Thank you. For everything.”

“There’s nothing to thank me for. If anyone should be thanking anyone, it’s me who should be thanking you,” Valerius told him as he drew the backs of his fingers down the tender column of Caden’s throat.

“I’ve made things difficult for you though, haven’t I?” Caden grinned a little impishly.

“You’ve made things interesting . And it has been a long time since I even wanted to be interested in the world,” Valerius confessed.

Caden twirled wet fingers in Valerius’ hair. “I remember when you were just an image on television or the net. Someone so far away from me. Untouchable. I can’t believe I could make such a difference to your life.”

“You’ve made me see the world a little differently.”

“And you’ve made me see the world a lot differently.” Caden cracked a grin.

“We will keep being that different lens for one another,” Valerius promised.

Caden’s arms slid around his neck. “So we’re supposed to go down to dinner soon and watch heads explode as Jahara offers her suggestion of one large territory.”

Valerius couldn’t hide his grin. “Yes, I suppose. That will almost be amusing.”

“Only almost?”

“Since you took Mei and Illarion’s ability to shift away for the next 24 hours, you have reduced the amount of fun to be had unless they decide to have a cage match in their human forms on top of the dining room table,” Valerius replied dryly.

Caden guffawed. “I was worried that they were going to destroy this place with their big Dragon butts. Iolaire agrees that would have been disastrous for the grill and it really wants to have you feed us meat again.”

“By hand?”

“Absolutely.” Caden leaned in closer.

That would have been bad, Raziel muttered. Our place to feed would have been violated by the Green and Red Dragons!

Indeed. A terrible tragedy would have occurred.

You are not being serious! Raziel muttered.

I am very serious about our BBQ.

Raziel blew black smoke at him. But Valerius couldn’t quite care when Caden was looking at him as if he was far more interesting than meat .

“But right now I’m hungry for something else,” Caden teased.

“So am I.”

Valerius covered Caden’s mouth with his. The hot water from the shower sluiced around their lips and dribbled down their chins. It almost tickled. Caden’s hands drifted down to Valerius’ pants. Valerius felt him undo the button and then those clever hands tried to tug them down… except they wouldn’t go down. Caden tugged some more. Valerius decided to help him. Both of them were wrestling with his pants. Their kiss ended.

Caden asked with an amused glint in his eyes, “Valerius, how did you get into these? They’re like painted on you.”

Valerius frowned too. They had been loose earlier. He tipped his head back and groaned. “Leather shrinks when it gets wet.”

There was a moment’s silence from Caden then, “So we can’t get them off until they dry?”

“If we wished to get them off in one piece we’d have to wait. But I am not a patient man,” Valerius said as he effortlessly ripped the pants apart at the seams. “These were one of my favorite pairs too.”

Caden let out a peal of laughter then. Considering that Valerius had his shirt and boots still on with strips of the black pants hanging on out of them, he doubted he looked sexy. The shirt was silk and could have been unbuttoned, but he simply ripped open the shirt, the buttons flying everywhere, before toeing off his soggy boots. He spread his arms wide.

“Better?” Valerius asked.

“Everything is always better with you. But I have to know. How can you have a favorite pair of leather pants when you’ve got like 100 pairs, which are exactly the same?” Caden’s lips were twitching as he asked that. Valerius expected more laughter to burst out of him in a second.

But he wanted a different sound from Caden. He stepped up to Caden and reached around him. He grasped one globe of Caden’s buttocks in each hand and squeezed . Caden let out this hiccupy type sigh and the pupils in his eyes went wide.

“I can have a favorite pair of leather pants because,” he paused and squeezed Caden’s ass again, which had that wonderful sound escaping through the young man’s parted lips, “good things happened to me on the day I wore them.”

“What good, ah, thing happened with that pair?”

Caden’s gaze on his mouth was not because he was fascinated with what the Dragon King’s answer was. Valerius leaned down so that there were mere millimeters between their lips.

“I met you for the first time,” Valerius murmured and kissed Caden.

The young man moaned into his mouth and his legs were up and wrapping around Valerius’ waist. Valerius grinned as he felt their cocks duel between them. He pressed Caden’s back against the cool rock of the tower and heard the young man hiss at the temperature change. For an ice Dragon Shifter, Caden enjoyed warmth far more than cold.

Valerius ground his front between Caden’s spread thighs. He was already very hard and leaking. Caden was just as needy. They could easily climax just by grinding against one another. But that would hardly be as satisfying as being inside of Caden. The heat. The tightness. The way Caden’s body cradled his sex like it was meant to be there.

He blindly felt for the bath gel. He should use lube--and he would remember to keep some down here next time--but he wouldn’t last running up to the platform where his bed was and returning. His cock was already straining towards Caden as if it thought it could spear inside of the young man all on its own.

Caden’s fingernails raked down his back. The burn of those nails was washed away with the water. But there was a primal need in that touch. He found the plastic container and it nearly slipped from his grasp. He crushed the plastic in his hands and like the pants, the bottle was destroyed. The scent of sandalwood filled the shower. His hand was covered in amber gel. Caden let out another laugh, this one husky as much as delighted.

“Eager?” Caden breathed as he licked the shower water from Valerius’ neck and left shoulder.

“Always.” He hardly recognized his own voice. It was a growl of need and desire. Caden’s legs were unwinding from his waist and he was getting down. “What are you doing?”

“Making this easier,” Caden said as he almost coquettishly turned his back on Valerius.

He placed his hands on the back of the wall, allowing the shower spray to run down his naked body. Valerius followed the path of the water as it began on the top of Caden’s blond head and then ran down his neck and along the young man’s spine before taking one of three paths. Down one buttcheek, down the other or along the crevice between the two. Valerius swallowed as he imagined what was in that deep valley between the globes of tender flesh: the opening to Caden’s body.

Caden arched his ass up so that it was outside of the direct spray. The water pooled in the hollow of his spine and ran off his sides. He looked over his shoulder at Valerius almost challengingly. There was that white glow in his eyes and Raziel surged forward in his chest. He slammed a hand over his heart.

If we shift here, Raziel, we will destroy the BBQ. Iolaire does not want that , Valerius found himself babbling.

Hunger… Raziel rumbled.

His Spirit had never acted this way. It wasn’t just that Raziel was trying to shift them, but more to break down some other wall. He met Caden’s gaze and he could see Iolaire behind those eyes.

Make us one, Raziel stated.

Valerius’ eyes were led to that tempting, teasing ass that was so prettily raised. He swallowed as his mouth was flooded with saliva. He went to Caden. His one hand was still full of gel even though most of it had oozed between his fingers and was washed away by the shower water.

Caden reached back and parted those golden globes, while still keeping his ass lifted, to reveal that pink swirl of muscle that Valerius longed for. He reached with his amber coated hand and allowed the shower gel to drip down between those cheeks. The golden liquid dribbled down over Caden’s anus, which opened and closed.

Valerius’ slick fingers trailed down from the top of that crevice slowly along the soft, mostly untouched flesh. Caden’s eyes hooded and a shiver ran through his body. Valerius’ fingers circled Caden’s opening. He did not move quickly even as he felt the pressure of Raziel against his chest’s inner wall.

There was a delicate tracery of ice that started to form on the top of Caden’s spine. The crystalline-like structures glittered before being swept away by the hot water. Despite the ice, Caden felt incredibly warm to him. As hot as a furnace. Or maybe he was simply burning .

His skin felt like it was a thin crust over a molten lake. He had never felt more present and yet about to fly apart. It was the shift in that moment where he was neither man nor dragon. Caden was in the same state. They were man and dragon.

Valerius pushed one finger into the center of Caden’s opening. There was resistance. There always was even when the body was as willing and ready as the mind. The gel made his hands so slick though that he was soon inside. Caden shivered and more frost formed on his arms and the backs of his hands. His eyes glowed blue-white and Valerius was sure that his were red like the embers of a raging fire.

His finger sank into Caden up to the knuckle. Caden let out a sigh of pleasure and arched it back, which caused Valerius’ digit to sink in even deeper. He moved it inside of Caden, relishing the silky insides of the young man’s back passage.

Caden’s hands were back on the wall as Valerius began to finger him. He felt Caden’s back passage tighten with pleasure, trying to keep him inside, trying to find that sensation of fullness. Valerius drew nearer so that his body was practically on top of the young man’s. His heat hit Caden’s cold and there was a burst of steam.

He couldn’t see through the shroud of white. But he didn’t need to. Instead, he acted by a sense of touch. He added a second finger to the first. He drove both fingers inside and drew them apart as he pulled them out, stretching Caden’s tight opening. A third finger slid inside and he dragged them all out with excruciating slowness until only the tips were inside and Caden’s opening threatened to snap shut behind them. Caden whined and forced his ass back to recapture those fingers.

Valerius leaned over Caden’s body. His mouth was nearly even with the cusp of Caden’s left ear. He let his breath--so hot that it dried the water--trickle out and banished the frost that stretched out like tattoos along Caden’s neck and shoulder.

“Hold on, my love. I will make us one,” Valerius murmured, his voice dark and deep and coming from his very bones.

Caden let out a soft whine that caused Valerius’ cock to leak precum. He swallowed again as words became impossible. He plunged his three fingers into Caden up to the hilt. Caden bore down upon them. It was like having his hand in a vise and he imagined it around his cock. That imagining had a pulse of need go through him. More water turned to steam. His skin was almost perfectly dry as the water simply evaporated in an instant. He wasn’t sure if he imagined that his chest was burning with hellfire.

He drew his fingers out of Caden completely. Caden trembled and gasped when he did so and needily drove his ass back against Valerius’ groin. Valerius let out a short laugh of need mixed with frustration.

“I must make myself slick or I will hurt you, my love,” Valerius said with a desperate hitch in his voice.

“Need you,” Caden breathed and snow swirled around both their bodies.

It instantly evaporated when it touched Valerius’ skin, but the snow-kiss helped cool him down enough that his hands only shook a little as he slicked himself with the remaining shower gel.

He positioned the head of his cock--almost purple with the swell of blood--against that still tight opening. But neither of them could wait any longer.

Make us one.

He wasn’t sure who said that. Was it him? Raziel? Caden? Iolaire? All of them?

Valerius plunged inside Caden’s body with a reckless abandon. Caden’s hiss of pleasured-pain though had him holding himself exquisitely still.

“Did I--”

“No, it’s good. Need this,” Caden assured him.

But still Valerius did not move. Instead, he peppered Caden’s shoulders, the back of his neck and the top of his spine with kisses and licks. He tasted snow on his tongue. Frost melted away under his lips. His teeth made drag marks in ice.

He allowed his hands to move from Caden’s hips all the way up his back, melting away the frozen covering that encased Caden in a protective sheet of frost. Caden groaned and arched his back into Valerius’ hands as huge slabs of ice fell from his bare skin and crashed to the floor where they shattered into a million pieces and swirled down the drain.

Valerius sank another inch. He was fully seated inside of Caden now. His cock tingled as he felt his own heat mix with Caden’s coolness. There was a prickling sensation on that tender skin that had him curling forward as his orgasm threatened to surge within him and overcome all his self control. He rested his forehead against Caden’s spine and just breathed to let this moment pass.

Caden reached back with one hand to grasp one of his. They threaded their fingers together and he put those joined hands over Caden’s heart. He could feel the thump of it like a bird beating at the bars of a cage. He pressed another long kiss on the very top of Caden’s spine. Caden’s heart stopped galloping and took on the rhythm of his own, which while fast, was not so violent.

Valerius then began to move inside of Caden’s body. The young man’s back passage clung to his cock like a second skin. Even with all of the slickness of the gel and the stretching, Caden was still so very tight. But he was also large. He knew that there would be pain so he distracted Caden by lightly biting his shoulder. Caden let out a moan as his tongue bathed the hurt even as his hips pulled back and then pistoned forward.

Caden’s heart rate began to speed up again as the rhythm of their lovemaking took on that primal beat. The thrust. The slap of skin against skin. The withdrawal that left only the tip of his cock inside before it hurtled forward once more. Heat built up between them until it was impossible to know where he ended and Caden began. They were one. A being of pure pleasure.

The young man looked for him and Valerius was there. They were kissing. Tongues and teeth meeting and breaking apart. Lips clinging to one another. Fire and ice. Plumes of steam surrounded them, acting as another lover to caress their skin.

The beat of their hearts joined the slap of his balls against Caden’s ass. Their staccato breathing joined the band. Moans interspersed that and grunts and mewls and indescribable sounds of lovemaking that no one would mistake.

Valerius was practically breathing in Caden’s skin as he leaned over the young man’s bowed form and rocked their bodies together. He could no longer bear to draw almost all the way out of Caden. To be separate was simply wrong . Instead, he shifted in and out by inches and then pushed deeper. He ground his front against Caden’s ass, needing to be deeper, more fully seated.

Caden pushed back with equal ferocity. He wanted them to be as close as possible for when their orgasms came. Those were not far away. Valerius could feel the thin crust over the lake of fire inside of him cracking. Caden glittered like an ice fairy. A vision that would lead men into the wastes of the frozen north. A vision to drive men mad. But this vision he had caught. It was his. No one else’s. And the fire inside of him would burn away all this ice and Caden would be tender and exposed and his .

The steam boiled around them as the crust of control shattered. Valerius held Caden tightly to him. Their mouths searched for each other for a kiss. Their bodies were fused together.

The orgasms--when they came--seemed to pull out every ounce of cum from within both of them. They wrung them dry. Valerius let out a shout as his seed was spilled inside Caden’s silken insides. Caden’s cum splashed their joined hands and painted the wall with pearlescent streams. Steam and snow swirled around their joined bodies as Caden bore down on Valerius’ cock to get that last spurt inside of him. To capture that last trace of essence.

Hands still joined, bodies still connected, they sank down to the floor of the shower as the water poured over their heads and they kissed. Slow, long kisses as the aftermath of their lovemaking pounded through their veins.

Valerius’ eyelids had fallen shut at some point, but he could see both Raziel and Iolaire. The two dragons had their foreheads pressed together. Their eyes were closed too. They were purring. Raziel’s black wings curled around Iolaire, protecting the White Dragon from everyone and everything.

Later, after they had recovered, dried themselves off and dressed, Valerius and Caden had gone down to the dining room, hand in hand. They had said nothing though Caden had been humming happily. Valerius found himself smiling like a fool, except he felt anything but foolish.

When they opened the doors to the formal dining room with its three-tiered chandeliers and fabulous golden chairs with rich red upholstery, they had expected to find the other Dragon Shifters shouting at one another over the first course.

But there was barely any discussion. The room was mostly silent.

In fact, the other Dragon Shifters were staring out the doors that were open to another protected square and the night outside. They were all staring at a beautiful sight. Across the starry sky was what looked like a curling strand of ice crystals and wrapped around it was what looked like an equal strand of red ones. Not only could everyone in this room see them, but everyone in Reach could and maybe farther than that.

Caden squeezed Valerius’ hand in his. Valerius looked down into Caden’s face. He could still see Iolaire’s as well. He pressed a kiss to Caden’s forehead before turning back to the other Dragon Shifters.

Valerius’ voice was clear and certain as he asked, “So are we ready to save the world?”