“Jane,” he said, as patiently as he could. “You have not yet quite grasped exactly how many people there are on land. The chance of you finding your mate here is-“
He realized his sister wasn’t listening. As if in a dream, she was walking away from him, eyes locked on someone in the crowd.
“What’s up with her?” Neridia asked curiously, coming up to his side along with Chase.
John stared after his sister, barely able to believe what he was seeing. “Apparently, my sister has just found her mate.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake. His inner human buried its face in its hands with a groan. It took us two years, and she does it in two minutes?
“Your sister? That’s your sister?” Chase’s black eyes widened. “Bloody hell, is she heading for Hugh?”
She wasn’t. Jane pushed straight past the startled paramedic. In all the crowd, she only had eyes for…
John abruptly felt as if he’d just been sucked down by an undertow.
“Him?” he spluttered. “My sister’s mate is, is…him?”
A little distance away, Reiner Ljonsson was walking towards Jane with a stunned, wide-eyed expression.
“No,” John said, as the pair joined hands. His own fist clenched. “No. No. No. Absolutely not. This is-”
“None of your business,” Neridia said firmly.
“But-“
“This is your Empress speaking, John.” She poked him in the side. “What’s wrong with him, anyway?”
“Oh boy.” Chase let out a low whistle, shaking his head. “Now there’s a long story. Ask Griff about it sometime.”
“Well, given that he was at Griff’s wedding, it must have worked out all right in the end.” Neridia folded her arms, glaring up at John. “You will not interfere with your sister’s happiness. Understand?”
John stared morosely at his sister. Even from this distance, it was obvious that she was practically radiant with joy. Reiner was gazing at her as if she was a priceless diamond. His usual scowl had been wiped away, replaced by pure wonder.
John sighed. “They are true mates,” he said reluctantly. “And whatever Reiner did in the past, it is true that my oath-brother trusts him now. It is not my place to stand in their way.”
Chase glanced at him, eyebrows rising. “You have changed.”
“And if he is not worthy of her,” John added, “I shall personally skin him and wear his mane as a hat.”
“Though not that much,” Chase concluded. He brightened. “I just thought of something. She’s a sea dragon, right? And he’s a lion shifter.”
“Oh, is that what he is?” Neridia narrowed her eyes at Chase. “Why are you smirking like that?”
“Think about it,” Chase urged, his evil grin spreading wider. “Sea dragon. Lion. So their kids will be…?”
They both looked at him blankly.
“Sea lions!” Chase yelled, and collapsed into helpless laughter.
There was such a thing, Neridia decided as she poked through her dressing-room for something to wear, as having too many pearls.
No there isn’t, her inner dragon said promptly. One either has all the pearls, or one does not. And we do not have all the pearls.
Neridia grinned to herself at her dragon’s reproachful tone. It was still miffed at her for having sold a few of the smaller pieces from the royal hoard to finance the purchase of this house. The sea dragons in her entourage had been even more shocked.
“No one needs a literal mountain of treasure,” she said to her inner dragon now, as she’d told the other dragons then. “And it’s not like we don’t have plenty left over.”
She pointedly looked around her dressing room, which would perhaps be more accurately described as a treasure room. Her human clothes were vastly outnumbered by ornate caskets, each one overflowing with gold and jewels. And this wasn’t even a hundredth of her personal hoard.