Darkest Flame

“I need to change how I look.”

 

 

“By cutting your hair?” he asked incredulously.

 

She pulled at the end of her braid. “It’s just hair. It’ll grow back.”

 

“There willna be a need for you to take such action,” Kellan said as he turned on his heel and walked out.

 

Denae shook her head after he left. Kellan was certainly enigmatic. If she didn’t know better, she would think he didn’t want her to cut her hair.

 

“It’s just hair,” she repeated, though she didn’t want to cut it either. Her father had always loved her hair long. He used to gripe every time she cut it.

 

Now that she was healed, Denae found it difficult to stay in her room. She wanted to explore Dreagan, and possibly get a closer look at a dragon.

 

She wanted a closer look at Kellan. Just what did he look like as a dragon? And was she brave enough to find out?

 

*

 

Rhi sat back on her chaise longue and surveyed her newly painted fingers and toes. The light-up-the-night shade of glistening coral—named Bright Lights-Big Color—was going to look great with her new dress, and the black-and-silver stripes were a great accent.

 

No one knew of her little hideaway, not even her queen. It was where she came to get away, a place she didn’t have to share with any of the other Fae.

 

And the best part—the Dragon Kings would never be able to find it.

 

“Jessie really outdid herself this time,” Rhi said to herself about her nail tech.

 

Rhi laid her head back and closed her eyes. There was nothing for her to do. She could look in on Phelan and Aisley, but she had just spied on them the week before. It wouldn’t be long now before her queen wanted Phelan and Aisley to visit for more than an hour.

 

Until then, Rhi was going to leave the couple alone to enjoy themselves. A huge weight had been lifted off the shoulders of all those from MacLeod Castle with the death of Jason Wallace—a drough, or evil Druid, who had been trying to kill the Warriors and Druids.

 

She wished she could tell Phelan and the other Warriors that peace would enter their lives, but she couldn’t. Because there was a disturbance in the air that wouldn’t shake loose. And it was pointing directly at Dreagan.

 

For weeks, Rhi refused to even think about the interfering, inflexible, mulish Dragon Kings. After all that had happened between the Kings and the Fae, Rhi knew better than to get involved.

 

But there was a history there, one that no matter how much Rhi wanted to forget—she couldn’t.

 

“I’ll go see the Kings for him. Only him.”

 

She closed her eyes as she thought of their all-too-brief affair. How exciting it had been, how glorious.

 

How incredible.

 

He had said it was because they were supposed to be enemies, not lovers. But Rhi knew it was because …

 

She couldn’t even think it, because if she did, she would splinter into a million pieces all over again. It didn’t matter what happened in the middle or how happy they were. All that mattered was that he left.

 

And she had found her hideaway.

 

For months Rhi hadn’t left her refuge. Not even when her queen called to her, pleading for her to return. Not even when those pleas turned into demands.

 

A Fae wasn’t supposed to have a broken heart for a Dragon King.

 

It wasn’t that Rhi was embarrassed because she had given in to the temptation for a King. She didn’t want to hear the other Fae bashing the Dragon Kings as they always did. When she finally did return to court, someone had begun a tirade on the Kings, and her lover’s name was mentioned.

 

Rhi would have killed the Fae who dared to slander him if it hadn’t been for her queen, Usaeil. Even now, hundreds and hundreds of years later, Rhi still pined for him.

 

Did he still feel their fiery passion?

 

She wished she could believe that, but since he hadn’t tried to contact her, the truth was staring her in the face.

 

“Why then should I tell the Kings what I suspect?” she asked herself.

 

Rhi sat up and shifted her legs over the side of the chaise. Other Fae would ignore the urgings, but she couldn’t. Just as she hadn’t been able to stop from helping Phelan when he needed it.

 

She had a duty as Queen’s Guard to follow her instincts. Because even though it might lead to the Kings, that meant whatever was in the air was liable to affect every magical being. Including the Fae.

 

“But I hate the Kings,” she murmured.

 

It was a mutual loathing, one that grew as time went on. And with both sides being immortal, things were only going to get worse.

 

Rhi stood and walked onto the porch as the sun sparkled off her metal wind chimes. It was a beautiful day that was about to be ruined with a visit to Dreagan.

 

With a long sigh and a wistful look at her beautiful coral dress, Rhi let her sanctuary disappear as she thought of Dreagan.

 

*