Mated to the Earth Dragon (Elemental Mates 2)

Curiously, she followed Damon into the narrow passage. When they ducked out again on the other side, the sight before her took her breath away.

A natural spring had formed a deep pool, hollowing out the rock for what must have been centuries. The water was a clear blue, mirroring the sky above them. All around the pool, verdant grass grew. There was no sound to be heard but the song of birds, and the musical sound of falling water in the distance.

When she turned her head, she could see that at the lower end of the pond, a rivulet began. It formed a tiny river as it made its way past the encircling rocks there, and, by the sound of it, formed a small waterfall on its way down the hill.

“It feeds the lake you saw when we arrived,” Damon murmured. “But I prefer this place for a bath. This is the spring the town was named for.”

“Dragon Springs,” Autumn breathed. “It’s gorgeous!”

“It’s why the first dragon of my line settled here. Fresh water, a g

orgeous valley—and a cave hidden in the hills where he could hide his treasure.”

“Treasure,” Autumn echoed faintly, thinking of the movies she’d seen.

Piles of gold as large as a dragon—was that just a thing the movies had made up, or was it all real?

Damon nodded earnestly, although there was a distant gleam in his eyes now. They hadn’t gone full metal again, but there was a tinge of the dragon’s power in them.

“Every dragon has a hoard,” he murmured. “Treasure we’d protect at the cost of our lives. No one has ever seen my hoard. And no one ever will. Except for my mate.”

Autumn drew in a shocked breath at the way his voice had gone all dark and husky.

There was an answering throb deep inside her, his need for her filling her with fire—or was it her own need for him, which she could feel sizzling through the invisible connection between them?

It nearly took her breath away, and she found herself reaching out a hand to touch him. She needed to touch him, to feel him—the force driving her was impossible to resist, stronger than anything she’d felt before.

At her touch, Damon gasped, his pupils so wide that his eyes looked nearly black. Even as she watched, she could feel the heat fill his eyes, turning them the hue of molten gold as his powerful heart throbbed against her palm.

“Sorry,” he gasped. “I didn’t know it would feel so overwhelming...”

It was the exact same thing she’d felt before. It had drawn her to him from the moment she’d first seen him rise from the Blue Lagoon, gleaming and wet, like an ancient viking warrior.

All the same, even though the feeling was familiar, it had suddenly gained in strength—so much so that it almost seemed like she was drawn to him like a magnet. She couldn’t take her hand off him even if she wanted.

Of course, the thing was that she didn’t want to stop touching him. She wanted to undress him and press her lips to every single of those intriguing ridges of his abs.

But she also wanted to know what the hell was going on.

“More dragon magic?” she asked, swallowing as she watched her fingers inch towards one of the buttons of his shirt.

Damon shook his head. “Not quite. I didn’t think... It’s this place. I’m bound to the earth, and I’m bound to this land. There’s a strong bond between a dragon and the land he’s claimed as his own. I think the land feels the bond between us. It’s a fragile mate bond. And the land wants the full bond of the mating. Close your eyes; listen. You’re my mate. You’ll hear it, too.”

Autumn gulped, her body aflame with need for him.

It wasn’t scary because she knew it was her own emotions. She’d wanted him like this before, after all. But now everything was so intense that even his heartbeat against her palm made her tremble with overwhelming need.

It got a little easier to bear when she closed her eyes.

For a moment, everything was dark. Then there was a golden gleam—a string of light shining in the darkness, connecting her to Damon. It surged with heat, pulling her towards him.

She didn’t resist. She allowed herself to be pulled against Damon. Even as he wrapped his arms around her to hold her close, his breath hot against the sensitive skin of her throat, she felt a different power show beneath the gold of their bond.

In what she’d thought was nothing but darkness, she now saw whirls of green. The more she relaxed into Damon’s embrace, the golden bond between them pulsing, the easier it was to see the colors that had begun to swirl all around them through the darkness.

There was the bright green of new grass, the dark green of fir trees, the brown of fertile soil, and the gray of stone and rock. There was the gleam of amber, the russet of chestnuts, and the silver of birch trees.

It was all around them, swirling as if in some beautiful dance. It drew ever more tightly around them, as if to encourage the fragile bond gleaming between them.