Page 92 of His Greatest Treasure

I’d worried for a moment that he had become too much a dragon, too fierce with the raw strength and power that he contained.

Beside me, Alfie’s mother moved. She reached out a hand slowly, as though afraid of what she might feel, and touched Alfie’s cheek. I thoughtperhaps she was just checking he was real. That he was alive.

She had pressed close to me during the fight, and I’d heard her tiny gasps each time Alfie had been hurt. She did not flinch and gasp when her husband was hurt.

On my other side was a woman I knew to be her sister, Alfie’s Aunt Silvia. She had one arm on my elbow and the other on her sister’s back. She was lending us both silent support, being there for us both. I had felt… strange. Protected.

I’d begun to feel safe with Alfie but that had been a small thing, just the two of us. I had never felt the protection surround me like this.

Now both women studied my mate and I let them touch his cheeks and reassure themselves.

Alfie said, “I’m okay, Mother. Are you hurt? Did anyone get you? Are you cross with me?”

It took her several seconds to answer, to swallow and work the words up her throat.

“I’ve been afraid of this day for so long.”

“I won’t hurt you. I know I just killed that dragon but he was hurting Blaze. I asked him to stop, I didn’t mean to kill him, not at first. I didn’t know I was like that. I won’t hurtyou, Mother. I promise.Please don’t be afraid of me. I won’t hurt any of you. I have bonds with you all. Look.”

Alfie gestured between them at the air, but he was the only one who could see whatever he was talking about. I believed he had those bonds, that he felt them and saw them, but that was his talent, not mine.

Regina shook her head. “I wasn’t afraidofyou, I was afraidforyou.”

“But I’m safe now. Nobody else is going to try to hurt us, are they?”

His mother gave a sob and covered her face with her hands. Alfie’s face crumpled and he sniffed back his tears. I could see him getting overwhelmed again. This change had come so suddenly. He was a completely different person with a dragon, a legend, and his clan suddenly looked at him in an entirely new light.

I stepped forward and slid my arms around his waist. He was warm and I could feel the heat of my claiming mark on his chest against my cheek.

His arms held me tightly and they grounded me. I felt that everything would be okay if only I could stay this close to Alfie forever.

Regina was sobbing and couldn’t speak. It was Silvia, Alfie’s aunt, who spoke to us. She had her arms around her sister’s shoulders and she whispered promises to her sister.

“He is alive, Regina. He’ll live. We’ll keep him safe.”

I nodded. “We’ll protect him,” I promised her. If there was one thing I was sure of, it was that I would die to protect my mate. And fire spirits could be powerful when they needed to be. I’d survived this long, hadn’t I?

Regina shook her head. “They will come.”

“Who will?”

“The hunters. Just like they came for Alexander.”

A sort of collective shudder ran through the dragons. Outside, in the open, the wind suddenly seemed chilly.

My reassuring voice wasn’t so reassuring as I asked, “What will they do?”

She opened her mouth to reply but no sound came out. I got the impression that she was slipping into a sort of grief that was deep and long-lasting, beyond words. I grabbedher hands.

“He’s here,” I insisted. “He’s alive. We’ll protect him, you and me.”

It was only when Alfie gently took my hands and held them in his own that I realised I was hot and I’d been burning his mother.

“Sorry!”

She shook her head. I don’t think she’d even noticed.

It was Silvia who explained it to me.

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