Wolf Princess Sold to the Dragon King novel Chapter 41

Chapter 41: Two Can Mating Roar, Brother

The roar that came out of him was not planned. It ripped from his chest in a draconic register he hadn’t used since his first territorial challenge, low and massive and vibrating through the scales of the dragon he was standing on.

A challenge roar and mating roar in the same. For a woman that he wanted and didn’t know why. Broadcast on the open frequency for every dragon in the sky to hear.

He would kill every single one before he let one of them take her.

Maddox heard it. His climbing faltered for exactly one second. Then his wingbeats doubled and the gold light pouring off his scales went from bright to blinding.

Ryker: Sterling. Did Kael just—

Sterling: Yes.

Ryker: Did he just challenge Maddox Drakencrest for a mating claim?

Sterling: Yes.

Ryker: In this day and age? You’re joking.

Sterling: Apparently not.

Kael didn’t have time to regret it. The fae moved.

The nearest one hit Guinevere from the side like a bolt of dark lightning, tackling her to the dragon’s scales with a speed that didn’t belong to anything with a physical body. Its weight pinned her flat, its fingers locked around her shoulders. Its mouth opened wide enough that Kael could see the fangs extending, elongating past the jawline, dripping with something black and luminous that sizzled where it hit the scales.

It wasn’t attacking her.

It was trying to bite her. To mark her. To claim her in the old fae way, the blood rite that predated every treaty and every alliance and operated on a biological imperative Kael had read about in texts he’d assumed were exaggerated.

They were not exaggerated.

He moved on instinct. His blade cleared the sheath in one motion, and he brought it down through the fae’s neck with the clean, committed stroke of a man who did not have time to deliberate. The head separated. The body went slack on top of Guinevere, black blood spraying across the dragon’s scales in an arc that caught the wind and scattered.

He grabbed the fae’s body by the collar and kicked. It rolled off the dragon’s back and dropped into open air. The head followed, tumbling end over end into the cloud cover below.

He pulled Guinevere up by the arm. Her gold eyes blinked once. Twice. Still empty. Lights were on. No one was home.

Two more fae were already diving towards them, fangs out, wings spread, the humming rising to a pitch that made Kael’s teeth vibrate in his skull.

"Sweetheart." He positioned her back against his chest, blade out. "If you could make that gold shield again, now would be the time."

Nothing. Her hands stayed dark. Whatever had been fueling the orb was recharging, and the woman in front of him was an unconscious passenger on a dragon in the middle of a sky full of creatures who wanted to eat her, claim her, or both.

He had started this morning with one war, one hostage, and one functioning alliance. He now had three wars, one unconscious gold-eyed woman, zero allies, and challenged the most powerful dragon shifter on the continent for a woman that was supposed to be a hostage. Leverage. Nothing more.

His strategist brain filed a formal objection. His dragon overruled it.

The day was trending downward at a rate that defied strategic modeling.

The challenge was out. On the open frequency. Permanent. Irrevocable. Every dragon in the sky now knew that Kael wanted her, and every dragon in the sky now knew that Maddox was going to kill him for it.

Maddox broke through the cloud line below them. Gold scales. Gold eyes. No formation. No hesitation. Just a man who had heard another male challenge for his mate and was ascending with the singular, world-narrowing focus of someone who intended to end the conversation permanently.

Kael looked up at Maddox. Looked down at Guinevere. Looked at the two fae closing in with their fangs out.

"Right," he said to no one. "New plan."

The dark fae’s humming turned into chants.

The clouds above them darkened from grey to black in the span of three words.

Below, the battle fractured.

Compelled dragons with black eyes lurched in the air, their puppeted flight paths disrupted as the mages controlling them split their attention between the original battle and the fae mutiny above. Choreographed formations dissolved into chaos. Two compelled dragons collided, spiraling downward in a tangle of wings and limbs.

Maddox’s formation punched through the gap.

Ryker: What the hell is happening to Kael’s line?

Sterling: The fae have turned on him, and are acting independently.

Ryker: Acting independently toward what?

Sterling: Her.

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