Page 37 of The Gold Dragon Prince
“And where is this lovely omega mate of yours?” Mother asked, still smiling and radiating goodness and love.
Panic knotted in my gut all over again. “Saoirse grabbed him and forced him into the cruel world,” I said. I cleared my throat, remembering that I was a dragon and her agent. I straightened and clasped my hands behind my back so that I could report, “Saoirse plans to usurp King Freslik. Once she assumes rule of the cruel world, she intends to mount an army of King Freslik’s people to attack you.”
Mother nodded as if I’d told her the weather was turning a bit cloudy. “What has this to do with your mate?” she asked.
“Selle is King Freslik’s son,” I reported.
“And do you love him?”
Her question took me so much by surprise that I gaped at her as foolishly as Manfred was.
“Yes.” I gusted out my answer. “I have never known love like that before. Selle is everything. He is wise beyond his years and brave beyond his circumstances. I know he will make an amazing father to our egg, to our brood. It feels as though half of me is missing without him by my side.”
“Then why are you here with me instead of in King Freslik’s castle saving him?” Mother asked.
I blinked. “Because my first duty is to you,” I said, though it hurt to feel that way, like I was betraying my heart. “Because you summoned me.”
Mother took a step back. “Go,” she said. She raised her hand in a casual gesture, and a wide, swirling gateway opened to one side. “Go and save your omega. When that is done, you will return here with him and with Saoirse, and we will settle this matter once and for all.”
She glanced to Manfred, who, by the look of him, didn’t realize a doorway had been opened. I wouldn’t have to worry about what to do with him while I retrieved my love and completed my mission.
“I will end this as quickly as I can,” I said, moving toward the doorway.
“You will have help,” Mother said just before I stepped through.
I imagined she meant Argus, but there was no time to ask. As soon as I passed through the door and into what appeared to be a hallway in King Freslik’s castle, the sweet, calm feelings I’d had in Mother’s throne room vanished and the anxious urgency I’d felt before returned.
“Selle,” I whispered as my sense of him through our bond flared large within me. “Selle!” I called out, louder, and began to run in the direction I felt him to be.
I arrived in the doorway of King Freslik’s throne room just as the entire company attending the king roiled with confusion. I could feel Selle at the center of the agitated crowd filling the room, though I could only see glimpses of him, surrounded by his brothers, as everyone from Saoirse to Freslik to some of the guards snatched and grabbed at my beloved.
Anger filled me, and without worrying about the consequences, I leapt into the air, assuming the smallest versionof my dragon form. I soared up to the ceiling, then turned in a circle and roared at the people below, spitting fire down on them that sent high and low scattering.
“It’s a dragon! Run!”
The already chaotic scene in the throne room burst into absolute panic as men and women ran for the doorway. They jammed together, impeding everyone’s escape. A few of the nobles dashed for the windows, trying to escape that way.
“Gildur, get down from there,” Argus’s voice sounded within me, scolding and irritated rather than alarmed. “Do you know how difficult memory erasing magic is?”
I spotted my brother in his councilor’s disguise below and frowned at him, but I followed his suggestion and descended, resuming my human form.
More than half the courtiers had managed to escape, which was for the best in the end. I was able to march straight up to the cluster in the center of the room.
Saoirse and King Freslik were the last two left reaching and grasping at Selle, or more accurately, at our egg.
“It’s mine!” Saoirse insisted, clawing at one of the princes, who stood valiantly to defend Selle. “I worked for it! I earned it!”
“He’s my son, so everything he has is mine,” King Freslik insisted, trying to beat his way around two of the other omega princes.
“Stay away from me!” Selle shouted from the center of the scrum, where he was curled over, protecting our egg with his body. “It’s a child, not your prize. Gildur!”
He spotted me approaching the melee and cried out my name. I felt his shock and joy and relief as if a hot blast of air had hit me.
“I’m here for you, my darling,” I said.
Whether it was surprise at my appearance or Argus’s magic, Saoirse and King Freslik both lurched back, giving the omega princes space.
“You!” Saoirse gasped, her eyes going wide at the sight of me. “You cannot be here. I neutralized you!”
