Summer of Frost (Forever Fae #3)(55)

“That’s for damn sure.” He laughed. “Don’t be mad, but I already gave Drake the fatherly lecture.”

Annoyed, I pulled out of his grasp. “What did you say?”

He shrugged. “Nothing much really, just that if he hurt you I’d come kill him.”

Shaking my head, I chuckled. “If he hurt me, I’d kill him.”

He kissed me on the forehead. “That’s my girl.”

Meliantha spotted me and waved me over to her and Kalen where they were both holding onto the babies. I kissed the little ones on the cheeks, and noticed my brother gawking at me with a smirk on his face. “What is it, Kalen?”

“I was just thinking about something. When you and Drake have babies, will they come out looking like dragons?” he joked.

“Um … I hope not, and anyway, I don’t see myself as the domesticated type yet.” One day I would love to have kids, but I knew I wasn’t ready for them yet. Drake and I had too many adventures to explore.

Meliantha giggled. “You say that now, but I’m sure things will change. You’re in luck, though; I don’t see Drake being the domesticated type either. Congratulations, by the way, and I’m glad you made it home safely.”

I gave her a sideways hug since her daughter was bundled in her arms. “Thank you, and I’m glad I did, too.”

My eyes then found Ariella and Brayden who were both on opposite sides of the room. I felt sorry for Ariella because even though she was smiling and playing with little Merrick, I knew she had to be upset over my brother obviously steering clear of her. He had to feel the connection, but being how he’s always been, Brayden was the only man in my family that found love as a weakness. Yes, he had women every now and again, but he kept them a secret when he did. I just happened to always catch them leaving his place in the middle of the night. I hoped Ariella could melt that heart of his before she killed him, but the chances were slim of that giving the death stare she gave him across the room. Hopefully, they both would come to their senses.

Once I acknowledged everyone, I finally ambled over to Drake, whose heated gaze had me melting. He pulled me over by the arm and pressed his lips firmly to mine. “Watching you yell at our mothers was priceless. I think everyone’s jaws dropped when you did that.”

“I don’t know why I did it, it just came out and I kept going with it.”

Drake draped his arm around my shoulder. “Well, you did great with them. So how about we get this meeting started?”

I nodded, eager to get it going. “Sounds like a plan to me.”

Drake glided to the middle of the room and spoke, grabbing the audience’s attention. “Thank you all for coming. So many things have happened over the past couple of days, and I knew we needed to discuss them in private. We don’t know who to trust, so for now, anything important needs to be discussed with only us.”

Nods and murmurs of agreement filled the room. Drake continued once he had the approval from the room, “You all know about Alston already, and that he was the one who took Sorcha with the dark sorcerer’s help. Ariella is the next one on his target, so we need to make sure she’s well protected. I know more will be discussed once we plan her Guardian Ceremony. However, something happened last night with Sorcha that concerns us all. The dark sorcerer came to her in her dreams.”

The room crackled with dangerous energy as soon as the dark sorcerer was mentioned. Drake eyed me and nodded toward our families, signaling it was my turn to talk about the dream. I joined Drake in the middle of the room and explained, “When the dark sorcerer got my power, he must’ve acquired my ability to dream walk. Basically, he wanted me to pass along a message to everyone. He has a mortal army ready to fight, and with that mortal army will come a slew of iron weapons, and we all know what that can do to us. He also said he’s hidden the scroll where no on other than he knows where to find it.”

Calista stepped forward. “How are we going to defeat him if we don’t know how? We all know our guardian weapons can hurt him, but that’s it, they don’t kill him. The scroll was our only hope. There has to be some kind of spell that could lead us to it.” She turned and addressed Elvena, “Surely there’s something, right?”

Elvena had her eyes trained on me with a sly grin on her face. She answered Calista, but kept her gaze pinpointed on me. “I’m not aware of a spell to do that, child. Although, for some reason I suspect the new Summer Queen has something up her sleeve, and I mean that literally.”

Frozen, I stared at her in shock, my heart pounding in my chest. How did she know that? Drake leaned over and whispered in my ear, “What is she talking about?”

Elvena smiled and waved her hand in the air, impatiently. “We’re waiting, child. You weren’t planning on keeping everyone in the dark now were you?”

“How did you know?” I asked her, stuttering in disbelief.

“I could sense it the moment you walked in the room.”

Drake furrowed his brows in confusion. “Have you been keeping secrets from me?”

“Yes, but I wanted it to be a surprise for when we were all together.” I laughed and slowly pulled the hidden object from underneath my sleeve and held it in the air. Gasps reverberated through the room, along with cheers of excitement. They all knew what it was.