Page 3 of The Sapphire Dragon Prince
Azurus ended our kiss and leaned back to study me with a kind smile. I could see how much he longed for our bond to form and for me to desire him. It tore me apart that I could not give him what he wanted.
But he did a good job of sounding cheerful when he said, “Why don’t you get out of bed and have a quick bath to wash away the specters of the night? Then we can dress and go downstairs for breakfast. Rufus said something about bringing Tovey and the eggs over to join us this morning. I think the others are coming, too.”
I smiled. “I would like to see the eggs.” Pretty much the only thing that settled my soul these days was playing with my brothers’ eggs. They were the epitome of innocence and trust.
“Come along, then,” Azurus said, standing and offering me a hand.
With the intensity of my dream fading fast, I felt mostly embarrassed as I got up and went about my morning ablutions. Azurus returned to his bedchamber to prepare for the morning so I had a few minutes alone to take care of everything I needed to do to make myself presentable for my brother and Azurus’s.
I loved having my brothers nearby. For so much of our lives, we had relied on each other for everything. I’d been able to keep my meek, anxious nature under control when all six of us were together, even though our father inflicted terrible things on us. But since Tovey and Selle, and now Leo, had moved into the magical world, my fears had grown too difficult to control and I missed them too much.
Even now, once I’d washed and dressed and spent a few minutes sitting in the morning sunlight just breathing, then as Azurus and I went downstairs and joined the rest of the family in a large room that served both as a dining room and socializing space, I felt fear.
“Misha! There you are,” Tovey said. He stood from the huge bowl-like structure everyone was gathered around and stepped to the side so that he could greet me with a hug. “It’s so good to see you.” When he let me go, he stepped back to study me, then said, “Are you sleeping well? You look a little piqued.”
“I’m fine,” I lied with a tight smile.
“We’ve got plenty of food for breakfast,” Tovey’s mate, Rufus, told me, a look of concern on his face that was as genuine as if he’d been born my brother. “Would you like tea?”
“I can fetch your tea,” Azurus said before quickly touching my back and heading over to the table, where tea things and a huge amount of food were set out.
“Thank you,” I told him, my smile still in place, though I could feel my anxiety growing with all the sudden attention coming my way.
“Come and see the eggs,” Selle said, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. His mate, Gildur, had the power to correct Selle’s vision, but Selle insisted on continuing with his glasses, saying he didn’t feel right without them. “They’re so entertaining when they all get together.”
I moved over to the large bowl. It was some sort of portable nest for the eggs. It was lined with silk cushions that seemed custom-designed for dragon eggs. All four of my brothers’ eggs were nestled together within the silken folds. Tovey and Rufus’s twin ruby eggs were the largest, though Selle and Gildur’s golden egg wasn’t that much smaller. Leo and Diamant’s glittering diamond egg might not have been as large as the others yet, but it had a sort of powerful presence about it that made me think Leo’s child would be the leader of that particular group of my nephews or nieces.
“They are sweet,” I said, watching the eggs quiver and pulse.
None of the eggs were near to hatching yet, but they definitely had life to them. I couldn’t feel it because I was not thepapa of any of the eggs, but Tovey, Selle, and Leo all insisted to me that they could feel the eggs interacting with each other.
I couldn’t feel it. I wasn’t a papa. The way things were going, I never would be.
I had my fated mate, but my body refused to go into heat so that I could mate and have babies. I couldn’t even bond with my dragon, who I knew was falling in love with me, though I hadn’t done anything to deserve that love.
I was broken, and after the nightmare I’d had, I didn’t think I would ever be fixed.
“Here,” Leo said, scooping his egg out of the nest and turning to me. “Why don’t you hold him for a while?”
I gulped and would have refused, but the way Leo thrust the egg into my arms gave me no choice but to embrace it and cuddle it close. I could feel the egg’s warmth and caring innocence as I held it against my chest, but those feelings only broke my heart. It was like the biggest part of me, the part I was meant to be, was missing, and there was nothing I could do to find it.
“You’re certain it’s a boy, then?” Emmerich, one of the dragon brothers who I knew was fated for my brother Rumi, but who had yet to claim him asked.
“With a papa like Leo, how could it not be?” Diamant laughed, clapping a hand on Leo’s shoulder.
“I don’t know,” Selle said as he stroked his and Gildur’s egg in the nest. “I’ve met some fearsome women in my time.”
“I’ve no doubt,” Leo said with a shrug. “But I had a vision of this little warrior when he was still inside me.”
He spoke as if seeing visions of your future children was something ordinary. I’d had no such visions. It had to be a bad sign.
“Are you planning to leave your egg behind when Cousin Osric makes another attempt to take the throne in a few months?” Tovey asked, crouching beside the nest again. “I hatedleaving my eggs in someone else’s care back when they were first borne.”
“If Osric needs me, I will do whatever it takes to fight by his side,” Leo said. “It will be the most important fight of any of our lives, and we must win.”
“I’ve no doubt Cousin Osric will succeed against Father,” Tovey said with a serious look at his eggs. “I just fear what sort of a battle it will end up being.”
“It will be the battle it needs to be,” Diamant said, beaming proudly at Leo. “And we will be there with swords drawn.”
