What a Dragon Should Know (Dragon Kin #3)(116)
Izzy’s mouth dropped open and her eyes widened. “You blue haired—”
“That’s it!” Talaith stood between the enormous blue dragon and her daughter. “Separate. Separate! You’re both irritating me!” Talaith took a deep breath. “Fearghus, go to her, but approach her carefully. Think of it as battle fatigue. Go slowly, don’t startle her, don’t rush her. Take it slow and easy. Understand?”
“I understand. Now I just have to figure out where she’s gone.”
“We’ll fly until we find her.”
Talaith shook her head at Gwenvael’s suggestion. “She’s going to go where she feels safe.”
“Even if she doesn’t remember?”
“She knew to protect the babes. She knew her horse. Fearghus, she’d go where she feels safest. Where she’s always felt safest.”
Fearghus’s smile was small, but there. “Dark Glen.” He nodded, knowing he was right. “She’d go to Dark Glen. She’d go home.”
Dagmar was asleep on the large bed she’d found in one of the caverns. She placed the babes down first on the fur, surrounding them with protective pillows in case she rolled over while she slept. Once done, she stretched out lengthwise on the bed and that was the last thing she remembered until she sensed someone near her.
Before opening her eyes, she went for the small dagger tucked into her girdle and sat up. But as she tried to focus on the man in front of her, the dagger slipped from her fingers and spun away.
Thankfully the human male was quick of hand and caught the blade before it slammed into his forehead. Squinting, she leaned in and winced. “Sorry, Fearghus.”
First she gets his mate killed, then his twins almost get killed, and now she was throwing knives at his head.
“I am teaching you how to use that damn thing,” a voice said behind her. “You’re bloody hopeless with it.”
Dagmar could barely make out that gorgeous body in brown leggings and long gold hair, but she knew her Gwenvael. Jumping off the bed and into his open arms, she gasped out, “I’m so glad you found us!”
Gwenvael hugged her tight against his body so her feet didn’t touch the floor. “I’m glad we found you.” He kissed her cheeks, forehead, and chin. “Are you all right? Are you hurt? Tell me you’re all right.”
“I’m fine.” Although she had the irrational desire to cry. “I’m not hurt. And the babes are fine.”
“And where is Lady Madness?”
Without moving her head from the wonderful spot on his shoulder, Dagmar pointed in the direction she remembered Annwyl going. “She and that stallion from the underworld went that way. She said she’d be back. I decided not to take it as a threat.”
Fearghus sat on the bed, stroking his hand across each babe’s head. “The lake is in that direction.”
“Considering she’s positively saturated in Minotaur blood, that would make sense.”
Gwenvael put her back on her feet, but before stepping away from her, he placed the sweetest kiss on her forehead. “Before my brother goes off after his crazed mate, think you can tell us what happened? The more we know, the better he’ll be able to deal with Annwyl.”
Dagmar nodded. “Yes. Of course.” She sat down on the bed. “First off, Fearghus, I must apologize.” And that’s when the first tear fell.
“Dagmar?”
“It’s all my fault, Gwenvael. All of it. I only wanted to help, but instead I nearly wipe out your entire family!”
Gwenvael crouched in front of her, taking her hands in his. The simple feel of his flesh against hers, his thumbs rubbing across her knuckles, calmed her down almost immediately.
“I want you to listen to me well, Dagmar Reinholdt,” he said. “No one’s blaming you for anything.”
“Yet.”
Dagmar and Gwenvael looked at Fearghus.
“Did I say that out loud?” Then he winked, and Dagmar almost started to cry again, even while he got her to smile.
“Ignore him, Beast.” Gwenvael grabbed a straight-back chair and sat down in front of her. He took hold of her hands again. “Now tell us everything.”
She kept it clean and direct, no emotions tossed in. No mentions of her own mother and the desire to prevent the twins from going through what she went through herself.
Instead, she told them as she would have told her own father. In plain words, with “none of that fancy analyzing you do” and that her father hated.
Fearghus stayed on the bed, near his babes, his eyes constantly straying over to them. Neither spoke while she did. Neither asked questions. Instead they waited until she finished.
“I know the babes are hungry,” she said when she was done. “But they’ve been surprisingly good-natured about the whole thing and went right to sleep when I put them down. But at some point they are going to need to eat, and either Annwyl has to pull those udders out or we need to get a nursemaid in here because I’ll be of no use. Other than that”—she shrugged—“that’s pretty much the whole story.”
The following silence nearly choked her and she was moments from a good bout of panic when Fearghus leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees.
Clasping his hands together, he said, “I’m sorry. Can we go back for a moment—you bargained your way out of that with socks?”
G.A. Aiken's Books
- G.A. Aiken
- Feel the Burn (Dragon Kin #8)
- Light My Fire (Dragon Kin #7)
- How to Drive a Dragon Crazy (Dragon Kin #6)
- The Dragon Who Loved Me (Dragon Kin #5)
- Last Dragon Standing (Dragon Kin #4)
- About a Dragon (Dragon Kin #2)
- Dragon Actually (Dragon Kin #1)
- Dragon On Top (Dragon Kin #0.4)
- A Tale Of Two Dragons (Dragon Kin 0.2)