Page 26 of Under the Dragon's Spell
"It's alright," Michael said. "Honestly? I'm not sure I fit into this family anyway."
"Nothing's decided yet." I wasn't sure why I wanted to cheer on my competition, but he looked so lost that moment.
"It's fine," he said again. "I'm mostly here out of curiosity. But you… You really want him, don't you?"
I sighed. "I don't know. I feel like I shouldn't. He has this hold on me that I can't explain. I know it's not smart to stick with him, that I should just walk out of here, and yet I stay."
Michael smiled softly. "Maybe it's dragon magic," he mused.
"No. Dragon magic feels different."
Michael raised an eyebrow at me, and I realized that I'd said too much. I wasn't supposed to know what dragon magic felt like. That I did know was what made me special. What Tyrel wanted to keep a secret.
Oops.
"How do you know?" Michael asked.
"Just forget I said anything."
"Don't be like that. Please. You know I'm super curious. What happened? Did he use magic on you?"
"He's probably used magic on all of us," I said before I could stop myself. At this point, what did it matter, really? Michael wasn't going to let this go, but I felt like I could trust him.
Michael's eyes grew wide. "On all of us? What do you mean? I don't feel like I'm under a spell."
"You're not. Not right now, anyway. I think." I couldn't be sure, really. After all, there could be other forms of magic that I couldn't detect. I could be just as oblivious to them as Michael was to what I had experienced. "Tyrel and his mother, they can make you do things when they look at you. You'll think you're doing it because you want to, that it was all your idea, but that's not true."
"How do you know this?" he asked again. Approaching the bed, he looked at me expectantly before sitting down next to me.
"Because I can feel it," I confessed. "Tyrel tells me that's unusual, but I can feel when he tries to use magic on me, or when his mother does. It's like this voice in my head that doesn't quite sound like my own."
"But the rest of us don't notice it? At all?"
"Tyrel says he's never met another human like me. I'm not trying to brag, but yeah… He also says his mother can't know." I shot Michael a sharp look.
"Don't worry. She won't find out from me."
"She can make you do whatever she wants, so don't even give her a reason to suspect you might know something."
"Alright." Michael held his hands up in front of himself. His expression grew thoughtful. "You figure Tyrel likes you because you're unusual?"
"That's probably the reason. I wish it was more than that, but I don't know. Our first meeting, he told me I fascinated him because of my powers."
"I see." Michael let his gaze wander through the room, as if he was looking for something, but then he returned his attention to me. "You got any idea why you might be different?"
"Honestly? No." I'd never felt special in any way. Just a run-off-the-mill omega like any other.
"I know this might sound silly, but do you want to know why I'm so drawn to dragons? Enough so that I chose to come here?"
I had no idea where he was going with this, but… "Sure. I'd love to know."
"It's probably just legends, but I love the idea of fated mates. The whole concept."
I swallowed. Part of me liked that idea, too. But it was silly. We each made our own fate, no matter how much the romantic in me wanted to believe differently. "That does sound very much like fairy tales."
"In the legends, a dragon's mate cannot be touched by his magic."
"Oh, it touches me alright." Got me damn hard, too. Even just thinking about it made heat rise in my cheeks.
