A Destiny of Dragons (Tales From Verania #2)(20)

“He’s probably really annoyed,” I said, staring at the bookcase. Behind it, there was a room encased with magic that only Morgan or I could break through. In the event that something happened to the both of us, the King would wait for a sign from Randall before attempting to leave. He didn’t like hiding away very much, but he knew the reasons behind it. Especially in the face of the unknown.

“Undoubtedly,” Morgan said, moving toward the bookcase.

“Do you think he’s—” I started to say but was cut off when Morgan pressed the spines of seven books in quick succession, leaving behind green glowing fingerprints that flared, then faded. There was a large click and the sound of gears grinding together. The bookcase shifted forward, the large hinges groaning as it opened.

“What’s he doing?” Ryan asked, coming into the office and closing the door behind him. “Why’s he letting them out? We don’t even know what’s happening yet.”

“I don’t know,” I said. My mother and father stood off to the side near one of the fireplaces, whispering furiously at each other. They must have felt me staring at them, because they immediately stopped talking and waved at me frantically. “You ever get the feeling that people know more than they’re saying?”

Ryan snorted. “Hate to break it to you, but that’s pretty much the life I lead these days.”

I glanced at him, only to find him watching my parents with a small smile on his face. It did traitorous things to my heart, to see him watching them as he did. After the whole… debacle that was our fucked-up courtship, my mother and father had invited Ryan out to lunch, telling me in no uncertain terms that I was not allowed to join them. Four hours later, they returned to the castle looking smug, whereas Ryan was pale. None of them would tell me what they spoke about, only that Ryan said my mother was the scariest woman he’d ever met in his entire life, and that it also had turned him on a little bit.

“Damn right it did,” my father had said. “Why, I bet even Sam—”

“Nope,” I’d said, cutting that off before it went too far. “Absolutely not.”

But since then, there’d seemed to be an understanding between the three of them. Sure, Ryan still stuttered and blushed his way through conversations with them, like he was nervous and was still trying to find out the best way to impress them. But they treated him just like they’d treated Tiggy and Gary when I’d brought them back from the Dark Woods: like he already belonged to them. He didn’t have anyone else to call his family. His mother was gone, his father only gods know where. He never had any brothers or sisters. And my parents knew this, which is why they loved him the way they did. It gave me feelings that I didn’t even know what to do with.

Like right now.

I sighed dreamily.

“You’ve got that expression on your face again,” Ryan said. “I don’t even have to look at you to know.”

“I would have so many of your babies,” I whispered fervently. “You don’t even know.”

Ryan started choking quite loudly, but everyone ignored him, used to his weirdness by now.

There was a door on the other side of the bookcase made from the wood of an ash tree. It was said that it’d been given by the Meliae, a sort-of wood nymph, hundreds of years before when the castle had been constructed. The Meliae had disappeared into the realm with the elves, leaving behind little tendrils of magic. Dimitri and his fairies were descendants of the Meliae, though they refused to ever talk about it. Fairies were secretive assholes, and I didn’t expect that to change anytime soon.

There was an ancient sigil carved into the door, even older than the tongue of magic in which we spoke. Morgan said it’d come from a time when people lived only in the trees, reading bones and stones like they were able to tell the future. It was two lines forming a peak like a mountain, with an off-centered S shape in the middle, bisected by three slashes. I did my best not to touch it, as it always made my skin feel like it was vibrating unpleasantly.

Morgan traced the sigil, the same green glow following his fingertip. Once he’d completed the sigil, another lock clicked and the door swung open.

Inside was Good King Anthony of Verania and his son, the Grand Prince.

Both of whom did not look very impressed.

The King was a barrel-chested man with long flowing white hair that fell on his broad shoulders and a kickass mustache that I had to hear Gary wax poetically about at least once or twice a week. Granted, it wasn’t that much of a hardship, and if I’d met the King in another life, I’d probably have no problem in calling him Daddy.

Not that I told anyone that.

Ever.

Except for Gary and Tiggy, because let’s be honest, I told them everything.

Which, of course, meant they told the King. In the middle of him hosting a dinner with all his heads of state. To say the silence that followed was shocking would be an understatement. Morgan’s face had been in his hands, Justin had been disgusted, the King smiled widely, all while Ryan looked like he was conflicted about his duty to protect the King versus wanting to demand they fight for my honor right then and there. The sex had been really damn good that night. With Ryan. Not with the King. I couldn’t even look at the King without blushing for the six weeks that followed, especially when he would wink at me every time he saw me.

He wasn’t winking now, though.