Black Crown (Darkest Drae, #3)(93)

Retracing my steps to my room, I asked Tyrrik, Is everything okay? What’s happened?

He didn’t respond, but I could feel his urgency through our bond.

Not that I needed the extra motivation. The walls became hazy as I released my Drae power to aid my speed. I burst through the door, and Tyrrik blurred as he leapt from the bed to meet me.

I dropped the knife just before he crashed into me, the force throwing us several feet back. He cradled the back of my head, preventing it from crashing into the stone as he pressed into me.

Whoa.

Tyrrik muttered under his breath, and I only glanced at his heated gaze before he crushed his mouth to mine.

Surprised by his desperate drive, I struggled to respond. He growled possessively and then trailed kisses down my neck while he inched the edge of my tunic upward with his hands. He stroked up and down my thighs, kneading from my hips to my waist as he repeated, “Mate.”

“Wait, Tyrrik. What’s wrong?” Chills danced over my skin with his feral want. He’d always been measured and careful with me before, but this . . . This wild need felt animalistic.

He nipped my lower lip, and I opened my mouth to him. Our tongues tangled, and he pulled my arms overhead, trapping my wrists in his grip. Foggy desire pounded through our bond, clouding my mind with his singular focus.

He pushed my neck to the side.

“Tyrrik,” I gasped. “What’s happening?” This wasn’t him. Something was wrong. I felt the pressure of his fangs on my skin, not just anywhere but on the exact space where he’d first touched me. Over our mate mark.

He bit hard and I shrieked, his teeth piercing my skin. Hot fire coursed through me, making me moan with the surging swell of desire.

Mine, he growled.

“I-I.” I clung to the wrongness of a moment earlier and pushed back. “No, Tyrrik. Stop.”

Tyrrik stilled.

Holy-drae-babies. I blinked through the fog and croaked, What’s going on?

Ryn?

Who else would it be? I clutched the side of my neck and swam through some serious waves of I-want-to-jump-Tyrrik. You just bit me!

His mouth dropped. I bit you? He seemed genuinely horrified.

The tremor in his voice made me freeze and my heart pound. An ominous weight pressed on my chest, and terrified of what I might find, I turned my attention to his Drae energy, my abdominal muscles clenching as my stomach turned. I studied his onyx power, comforted when I saw only rich black. Even so, I said, Please tell me you remember what just happened.

He ran his hand over my hair, stroking my head and back. His heart pounded in his chest, never slowing, even minutes later. “Yes, at least I think so.”

What’s the matter? I asked. Talk to me, please.

Look over my powers again, Tyrrik said suddenly. Scour every twist of my energy.

Al’right. I turned inward to my lapis lazuli energy and followed the glorious strands of onyx to Tyrrik’s Drae. Why are you so worried that you bit me?

I bit you on your mark? he said to himself. What was I thinking?

His question made my stomach flip, and my attention on his strands sharpened. And just what does that do?

Draedyn is alpha. If he got in somehow, he replied, hedging. Then he was behind that.

I stopped looking for the oily green energy of my father and pulled my vision back. I couldn’t find any trace of him, but that wasn’t to say he hadn’t been and gone. Why would Draedyn want us to dance the maypole?

I put myself in my father’s disgusting shoes, trying to reason like a sick tyrant. Why would he want me and Tyrrik to dance the maypole?

The answer hit like Jotun’s fist.

“He wants us to have Drae babies,” I gasped. That was the entirety of his plan, I was certain of it! Not only did he want Tyrrik and me out of the fight, he wanted us to grow the Drae population.

My voice shook with fury as I asked, Take me back. What do you remember?





36





Tyrrik flashed images through our bond. He’d been asleep. His guard was down. He’d awoken at the first intrusion in his mind, at the powerful “suggestion” from the alpha. Tyrrik’s initial call for me had been in the split second he’d known what Draedyn was doing, and then I’d burst through the door, and Tyrrik’s only thought, compulsive instinct, had been to make little Tyrriks and Ryns.

All of that was replaced by Tyrrik blaming himself for being too weak to resist.

Anger, fiery hot, pulsed, and in an instant, turned into a roaring inferno of rage.

“Draedyn,” I yelled, seizing the emperor’s emerald power in my own. What did he plan to do if Tyrrik and I did have children? Take them for his own? Raise them in his soulless image?

I followed the strand of emerald power to his core and hurled a blast of my raging fury at him, going further than I’d ever dared to go. Returning to my mate, I wrapped our Drae energy in my Phaetyn net.

“It’s not your fault,” I grumbled, opening our bond wide to let Tyrrik see the only anger I had was with my father. I scooted to the edge of the bed. The knife was by the door, and I picked up the blade and waved it at Tyrrik. “Phaetyn blood on this one and not mine, so be careful.”

I stormed toward the door. This wasn’t over. I could count on one hand the amount of times I’d been so murderously enraged. He’d gone into my mate’s mind. And I’d left Tyrrik alone as he slept, vulnerable. Not only that, I felt wild protectiveness surging through me at the thought that Draedyn might try to control any future family we had.