“Miss Delacroix wants to…”
Viggo didn’t have time to finish his sentence because the headmistress chose that exact moment to enter the office.
“Delyse, my dear!” Arms spread wide, she stepped closer to Delyse and wrapped her small body in a tight embrace. “I’ve dreaded this moment just as much as I was looking forward to it.”
Delyse smiled and hugged Miss Delacroix back. Of all the Alma Venus brides, Delyse was probably the only one who had never blamed the headmistress for the education they received here. The middle-aged woman was just doing her job as best as she could. She hadn’t signed the peace treaty, she hadn’t proposed or agreed to the clause which said human brides had to be offered to shape-shifters so they could give them heirs, she was just running a boarding school and offering orphans and abandoned young girls the opportunity to lead a good life in exchange for their freedom of choice. The system wasn’t the best, but people like Monique Delacroix made it work, and that wasn’t an easy job. Sometimes, Delyse couldn’t help but think that the headmistress had been more of a mother to her than Margaret Harington, who had had no objection when her father, Councilor Harington, had suggested they should donate their little girl to a prestigious boarding school. Delyse would never forgive her mother for having abandoned her like that. That was why when Miss Delacroix had taken her in, she had decided to never use her real name again. Lily Harington became Delyse, the future bride of an Alpha shifter who would have enough wealth and power to satisfy her family’s expectations.
“How are you feeling? You are ready, right?” Miss Delacroix released Delyse and held her at arm’s length to look into the girl’s eyes.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.”
The headmistress smoothed down her hair. “Good, good. I always knew you’d do great. You’ve always been so different from the other Alma Venus students. You understand the importance of what we’re doing here.”
Viggo cleared his throat, getting ready to say something, but then he changed his mind and turned to face the window again. The moment was awkward, and the two women’s conversation was making him feel uncomfortable. Delyse was such a wonderful, special young woman, and she certainly didn’t deserve to be forced to marry someone she had never met, only to make her contribution to the peace between humans and shape-shifters. She could have had a normal life if her parents hadn’t decided to donate her. The thought that he was the one who had bought her and was now about to take her away from the only home she had ever known, made him reconsider every decision the Council of the Six Factions had made after the war.
Delyse noticed the small change in Viggo’s posture and attitude, and she tried to wave Miss Delacroix off.
“It’s all right, Miss Delacroix. Everything will be fine, I’m sure of it. This is what I want.”
“Well then… Do you have everything you need?” She looked over at Delyse’s suitcase and cocked a thin, gray eyebrow. “If you can’t take all your things with you now, I can arrange for the rest to be sent to Norway.”
“Oh, don’t worry about it! Claudia was more than happy to adopt some of my clothes.”
The headmistress nodded.
“Really, I have everything I need,” said Delyse. She stepped away from Miss Delacroix and turned to Viggo. She was nervous and scared beyond belief, but anything was better than this long, painful goodbye. “I’m ready,” she said.
Viggo knew she was talking to him, so he turned around, nodded, and went to grab her bag.
“Thank you so much, Miss Delacroix. For everything.” He wasn’t a man of many words, and he surely wasn’t about to thank her for all those times when she had allowed them to spend hours and hours together, talking about the culture and traditions of the dragon-shifters and about Clan Drekinn. He wasn’t about to thank her for giving him the chance to know this young woman better, to fall in love with her when he was supposed to be loyal to his Fyrstur. Such a stupid idea it had been.
They said their goodbyes, and Delyse followed Viggo out of the office, then out of the building. Claudia was waiting for them at the gate, and before she left Alma Venus for good, Delyse hugged her friend one last time and loo
ked upon the medieval structure of the boarding school over her shoulder. This was it. Her waiting was over. She was finally going to meet her destiny, no matter what it was. Maybe she would fall in love with the mysterious Eric and forget all about Viggo. Maybe she’d despise Eric and dream about Viggo’s soft touch for the rest of her life. Who knew? It was a huge risk. But then again. Everything was.
CHAPTER TWO
Clan Drekinn
Since its very beginnings, Clan Drekinn lived in Norway and had complete control over the Svalbard Archipelago. Svartvinge was the largest island, and it was also the one Eric Drekinn, the Clan’s Fyrstur, had chosen to build his impressive palace. As Delyse learned from Viggo months ago, the name of the island, Svartvinge, meant “black wing” in the dragons’ old language. It made sense, since Eric Drekinn was a black-scaled dragon, and dragons, as a faction, were organized in wings, and then clans. If the main Alpha of a clan had siblings, then each sibling had their own wing under their command, and all the wings united under the effigy of the clan and answered, in the end, to the most powerful Alpha. Eric had no siblings, though. Viggo had told Delyse countless times how much he would have wished for his Fyrstur to have a brother or a sister. The clan would have had more chances to stay afloat when the main Fyrstur succumbed to depression and despair.
As Viggo offered Delyse his hand to help her step on the private plane’s airstairs, he showed her the tallest glacier on the island, far in the distance.
“That’s where you’ll meet Eric tomorrow,” he said.
Delyse nodded. She stole a glance at the icy peak, then focused on descending the airstairs with gracious care. She already knew the only dragon who was asleep under the tallest, most massive glacier on Svartvinge was Eric. The other dragons were hibernating under glaciers and mountains on the other islands of the archipelago. Apparently, the Fyrstur had wanted to be as close to home as possible.
“Careful now,” said Viggo as he helped her keep her balance on the icy ground.
Delyse made sure she was secure on her feet, then she let go of his hand. Even through her leather gloves, she could feel the delicious warmth of his fingers. Being so close to him, him touching her ever so gently… it was too much. She had to keep her head clear. She wrapped her coat tighter around her body and watched mesmerized how her breath turned into white vapor the second it left her lips.
“So cold…”
Viggo smiled. “Yes, sorry about that. Dragon-shifters love the cold. We’re beings of fire, and if we were to live in a warmer climate, it would simply be too hot for us. You’ll see it’s very warm inside the palace.”
He led her towards the imposing gates as a human servant picked up her bag and followed them.
“Clan Drekinn has lived on this island long before the Vikings, and even the Migration Age,” Viggo continued, even though he was sure Delyse already knew everything there was to know about the history of the clan. He just needed to make conversation. Any kind of conversation. Repeating things they had already talked about was better than the tense, awkward silence that usually fell between them, giving his mind the perfect opportunity to create scenarios in which he would take Delyse into his arms, kiss her forehead, her closed eyes, her cheeks, lips, jaw, neck… peel the clothes off her amazing body…