Mine.
“I don’t know what that means.”
The creature did not answer with words, but with visions. She saw herself enveloped in black flames, the magic becoming part of her. Then, a new life form growing within her, black dragonfire growing more powerful with every beat of his or her tiny heart.
Her dragon’s magic. Hers and Ryker’s.
“My children will be like you? What you are?”
I choose you. My soul. My power. Yours. I protect. Love. You become immortal. Dangerous. Powerful. Magic. My children. Mine.
“Why? Why me?”
Mine.
Katy allowed her question to fade away. Did the why matter when she wanted Ryker with every cell in her body? When she knew he wanted her? Would it be so bad to have their future children be powerful, immortal, magical creatures? Protected by not only this dragon, but an entire clan watching over them? They would be beautiful and strong. Fierce. Unafraid.
Something she realized she’d never been, not a single day in her life.
She looked into the dragon’s eyes. He watched her, waited for her to make a choice. “What if I say no? What happens then?”
We go.
She saw his intention clearly. He would carry her to safety and then disappear from her life. Forever.
She knew what he truly meant, thanks to Erik. He would sacrifice himself to the executioner’s blade. Some Dark Elf would stab him in the heart, and the black, magical blade would take the dragon’s life.
Tears gathering in her eyes, she watched in growing wonder as the dragon settled along the ground just as Erik’s dragon had done. His large, black head nearly within reach, his eye resigned and weary.
“Ryker.” She stepped forward and wrapped as much of the dragon’s head in a hug as she could manage, leaned her entire body against him. She rubbed his cheek and the ridge near his eye, smiling when he rewarded her with a deep rumble she felt not just through the ground, but everywhere she pressed against him. “I am yours, Dragon.”
The dragon shuddered at her words. Slowly he lifted his head and turned to look at her.
She stood perfectly still as the dragon’s jaw opened, fire visible in the back of his throat. If he was going to roast her, there was nothing she could do about it now.
“Go ahead, Dragon.”
The dragon took a long, deep breath and then…fire. Black flames. Magic sparkling all around her. Her body tingled, caressed by a hundred unseen hands, her very insides flooded with warmth and health.
She breathed deeply, every hurt, disappeared. Every scar, vanished. Life itself flooded her cells, and she felt the earth in her bones, sensed the very stars. The wind wrapped around her in a gentle hello, and she knew she would never walk alone again. She was dragon, one with all life. One with the earth and the stars, the mountains and the trees. Every bird in the sky spoke to her. The wind itself whispered in her ear.
Deeper still, she knew the moment the dragon’s magic touched her womb, left a spark that would ensure any future children would be dragon as well.
The black flames wove around her. Eternal. Dragonfire. She raised her arms to the sky as a feeling of joyous freedom filled her being.
Ryker appeared, strode toward her inside the flames. He was naked, his body hard and ready.
She reached for him. Leaped into his embrace. “What about the flames? Why didn’t the dragon stop them?”
Ryker threw back his head and laughed with pure joy. “The flames are coming from you now, love. They’re coming from you.”