A Ruin of Roses (Deliciously Dark Fairytales 1)

I liked the ending, but I still think he’s doing it wrong, my animal muttered grumpily.

I smiled and shoved her down. An echo of Nyfain’s dragon vibrated within me until the feeling receded. He seemed just as annoyed.

“Can you feel my animal?” I asked Nyfain, pulling my arms from around him. “I mean…more than just her presence. Can you feel her mood?”

He constricted his arms around me, trying to keep me put.

“Let me up,” I whispered, then snagged one more kiss. Feeling my heart ooze just a little.

My eyes snapped open, and I staggered out of his embrace. No, no to the heart-oozing thing. Admitting to liking the guy was one thing, but oozing hearts and what that might mean was entirely another. He was not someone I would be developing deep feelings for. I couldn’t afford to lose my heart to him any more than I could let myself be claimed by him.

His gaze tracked me like a predator. He leaned back against the chair with a wince.

“You don’t have the energy for…any of that. I shouldn’t have…” I grabbed the pitcher and filled it with water, walking around to his back.

“Given me the best blowjob I’ve ever had?” he asked lightly. Shivers coated my skin, and I gritted my teeth against the pride warming my middle. “Shown me that no sex salon in any of the kingdoms could compare to you?”

“I don’t need flattery. That’s not happening again.”

“I love when you make promises. The challenge to help you break them makes it all the sweeter.”

So he was a gloater. Damn it.

I poured water over the claw gashes, only a small smear of blood running down his back. He hadn’t overdone it. I added more salve to make sure they’d heal quickly.

“As for your animal, I can feel her better than you can feel mine, clearly. I can only feel traces of your—her moods, though. Only when your emotions are heightened in some way. That ability has probably been subdued by the curse.”

“So it was normal back in the day?”

“To a degree,” he said vaguely.

I put everything away and brought over a drying cloth. “What does that mean, to a degree? To what degree? How does it relate to us?”

He stood, using the back of the chair for a brace while I dried him. “All these questions.” He sounded annoyed. “Aren’t you well read? There are books about it.”

“There are books on the history of shifters, on animal types and their rarity—things like that. That was all before the curse, though. Those authors assumed people knew the fundamentals of being a shifter. There aren’t any books about that.”

“In my library, perhaps.”

“Right. Well. Someone hasn’t granted me entrance to their library.”

“Yes. Because someone ran away before I could give her a rundown.”

“Fine. Well, when you come to escort me to the everlass fields, will you bring a book that explains it so I don’t need to trouble you with my questions?”

“And how do you assume I’ll carry it? They don’t sew knapsacks for ground-bound dragons.”

“Carry it in your mouth.”

“And risk getting it soaked through with my spit? If you want to check out a book, you’ll need to move back to the castle.”

I huffed in annoyance and braced a hand on my hip. Instead of forcing me to come back, he was trying to lure me. And then, once I got there, he’d be back to telling me in one breath he wanted to lick my pussy and in the next he wanted to lock me in my room.

I rolled my eyes and went for the door. “Get yourself into the house. Better yet, crawl back to the castle like you planned to do earlier. Maybe a lesson on being humble will be good for you.”

“I’ve had plenty of lessons on being humble. I certainly don’t need one from you, princess. And if you don’t help me back—”

I slammed the door behind me before he could deliver the threat. He was impossible. Impossible! He was like two opposites sharing a skin—come here, go away. Although maybe that was a natural result of sharing his skin with a dragon.

I wished he’d just say that, though. Or try to explain himself. This couldn’t be the way of all shifters. It just couldn’t. If it were, the orgies would have been worse than the ones hosted by the demons, and I was fairly sure those hadn’t been a thing back in the day. I was definitely missing something here.

I wondered if Hadriel would tell me. Or if there was, indeed, a book about it.

Of course, I’d have to go back to the castle if I wanted to seek out either form of confirmation, and once I went back, that was probably it. I wouldn’t be able to escape again.

18

The next morning, I woke up facing the window, and was surprised to feel a strange sense of melancholy. There was no reason for it. It had actually been a really great evening after Hannon rescued Nyfain from the wash-up shed.