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  The voices of the judges echoed back to him as he walked to the corridor. He turned back for a moment, staring at his erstwhile favorite with scorn. Her lips tightened, and she dropped her gaze to her hands.

  “Do you still sing, Leida?”

  Her eyes glistened in the muted light as she again met his gaze. “Sometimes,” she whispered.

  “Is it still a siren’s call?”

  He was puzzled by her smile, humorless and melancholy. “No, my lord.”

  He shrugged, turning away again. “I thought not. I should have

  known.”

  He didn’t stop as her voice carried to him, drifting with the shadows in the hallway. “You did know, Magnus. Long before I did.”

  Dragons were an avaricious lot, the accumulation of wealth an instinctual urge bred as deeply into them as the will to survive. They held their own code regarding their treasures, bartering with each other for some priceless bauble or stealing outright from rich humans. But where humans were concerned, the pendulum did not swing both ways. Humans who stole from dragons usually faced a gruesome and violent death.

  Leida had been fully aware of the risk when she took the small ring from the heap of coins, jeweled girdles, and tangled necklaces that made up the pillow on which Magnus rested his head when in dragon form. She knew he would miss its presence upon returning to his caverns, likely more sensitive to its absence than to hers, but she couldn’t help herself and dropped it into the small purse tied at her waist before sneaking out of the caverns while the other servants slept. She had expected his anger at finding it gone. She had not counted on his abiding need to hunt it and her down in order to return it to his possession.

  She rubbed her eyes, exhausted from fear, worry and lack of sleep. As the time following Magnus’s exit lengthened, she found a place near the entrance and sat down on the hard floor to wait. He had seemed unmoved by her plea, showing little expression save a faint, scornful twist to his lips as he commanded her to rise. In the mind of dragonkind, she had committed the unthinkable crime—humiliated her master by stealing from him. He might well demand her death, administer the killing blow himself. Leida prayed the ring’s recovery and her willingness to admit her larceny might earn some small mercy from him.

  What had he said? She’d robbed him of that which he held most dear. The remark puzzled her, for in her memory he had only shown a marked preference for a ruby-encrusted crown and a jeweled girdle he’d been fond of draping over her naked hips once their relationship had deepened in its intimacy.

  Leida blushed, recalling the long evenings when he’d taken his human form and reveled in the feel of her against him, beneath him, her only clothing the delicate girdle. She had not forgotten what he tasted like or how he felt beneath her fingertips, and if the slow throb still lingering between her thighs was any indicator, her body not only remembered but continued to crave him. He held her life in his hands, yet she could think of nothing beyond the hot taste of his tongue, the way he gripped her hips to hoist her against him, the hard curve of his erection as he crushed her to him. Four years or forty, she still desired and loved him as fiercely as the day she left him.

  Soft footfalls alerted her to the judges’ return. She knew from whence they came. The great caverns belonging to the Dragon King descended far into the earth, hollowed and polished by the passage of the greatest male earth dragon and his pages. Below her feet were soaring chambers filled with astonishing wealth and an aging reptilian king administered to by his dragon pages and a staff of servants comprised of humans and wood sprites.

  She rose slowly, her stomach again beginning to pitch and roll with dread. Magnus followed the tribunal, keeping a short distance between himself and the others. Leida glanced at him, sickened by the unmistakable gleam of retribution in his eyes. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears, and she struggled to hear what the dragon lords said.

  “Leida of the Far Lands, Magnus Silverclaw has chosen to be lenient with you. He has spared your life.”

  It was the oldest judge, the silver-haired one who had first questioned her. A tide of relief surged through her, and she suppressed the urge to dissolve into uncontrollable weeping. Suspicion followed hard on the heels of her joy as the dragon lord held up a hand, revealing a delicate choker made of spiderweb strands of interlocking silver. A lustrous black pearl surrounded by tiny diamonds was set in the middle of the choker.

  It was a beautiful piece, made for a queen or highborn noblewoman of the middle kingdoms. Leida blinked in confusion, frozen in place as the judge approached her and wound the choker around her throat, latching it at her nape.

  It became immediately apparent that the choker was more than an ornament. A crushing weight settled on her shoulders. Invisible but undeniable, it bowed her back, only lightening when the judge removed her manacles. She staggered, reaching up to claw at the slender band.

  Her gaze found Magnus. He watched her, unmoved by her frantic attempts to rid herself of the necklace. “You can’t remove it, Leida. Only I can. It’s iron disguised in silver, a means to bleed you of your magic, much like the manacles.” His lips thinned to a vicious smile. “You wear it well.”

  Leida dropped her hands, curling them into fists by her sides to keep from reaching up once more and trying to tear the necklace away. She had been prepared to lose her magic, but not like this. Not this slow death like blood trickling from a small but fatal wound. Her voice was hoarse, thick with tears as she addressed Magnus.

  “Is this collar my punishment then?”

  His features hardened, their austerity becoming more pronounced as his expression turned grim. “No. That is but part of it. You owe me four years of time, time in which I searched for that which was mine, that which you took. You will attend me, no longer as the favorite, but as the least of my servants, bound to me by adjudication if not by loyalty.” His voice might have brought on ice storms, it was so frigid. “This is your sentence, Leida.”

  A blind panic threatened to swallow her. Not death, but close enough. Slavery and separation from the one she loved most in the world. Four years! He could have said it was an eternity, and it couldn’t have been worse. A red haze passed over her vision, obscuring the faces of her judges who watched her with widening eyes. In the euphoria of her desperation, her spirit seemed to leave her body for a moment, and she watched from a distance as her physical self ignored Magnus’s bellowed warning and bolted for the way that led above ground.

  That muted detachment came to an abrupt end when she slammed into an invisible wall. White-hot pain exploded in her nose, fanning out across her cheekbones and into her skull. There were shouts behind her, Magnus yelling some incomprehensible command. She ignored them, ignored the flow of warmth over her mouth and down her chin, the coppery taste of blood trickling in the back of her throat. Even the pain faded as she threw herself once more against the unseen wall imprisoning her in the cavern.

  She screamed as strong arms encircled her, lifting her clear of the floor. Lights danced across her sight as she clawed and punched at her captor in her bid to break free. It was futile. Even in human form a dragon lord held tremendous physical strength, and Leida found herself face-to-face with Magnus, her arms pinned behind her back.

  Panic and rage still burned within her, making her nearly insensate. Some distant, unemotional part of her heard her growls, almost animalistic, as she struggled in Magnus’s hold. His face was white with shock and fury as he subdued her. Blood smeared his hands. Her blood.

  “Pax, Leida,” he said softly, the words both a command and a spell.

  Leida felt the magic wash over her, a soothing warmth that calmed the terror if not dissipated it all together. Tears followed, making it difficult for her to breathe beyond the blood and mucus clogging her nostrils. Her eyes felt puffy, the pain in her nose blooming to a swelling ache. She blinked slowly at Magnus.

  Where before he had shown her only his contempt, his eyes revealed a stunned dismay followed by a bleak bitterness. �
�When did it come to this, Leida? When did I have to imprison you to ensure your company? And when did you become so desperate to be rid of me that you nearly killed yourself trying?” His voice no longer held the bewitching, bell like tones that so enamored her.

  Blood continued to drip off her chin as she met his gaze, and resolve replaced her fear once more. “I will stay with you for ten lifetimes, Magnus. I will wear this collar and crawl on my belly if you but grant me one last mercy.”

  She did not lower her eyes, but stared hard at him, silently willing him to ask her what that mercy was.

  He didn’t comply, only asking that which challenged her determination. “And if I say no?”

  It was a risk but also the truth. “I will look for every opportunity to gain my freedom, and one day I will die trying. Either way, I will have escaped you.”

  He went rigid, his chest rising and falling against hers. He forced the words through lips thinned to a hard line.. “What more do you ask of me?”

  The stillness between them deepened as Leida took a long breath, caught between the urge to be sick and the relief of unburdening a secret too long held. “Let me retrieve my daughter.”

  She had a child, a girl child. Magnus strode through the woodland concealing the Dragon King’s lair. Thorny brush snagged at his tunic, but he ignored it, focused more on counting each breath he took. It helped him control the seething emotions boiling so close to the surface. Darkness enveloped the landscape, the rustle of night creatures on the hunt loud to his ears. No wandering human would be about, a good thing, as his present state of mind danced precariously on the edge of violence.

  Her words had done to him what no human had ever done to a dragon: rendered him speechless. He’d been bewildered by her desperation to escape the cavern. Had she shot a crossbow bolt into his gut, it wouldn’t have pained him as much as watching her hurl herself against the protective barrier that shielded the entrance from intruders and trapped prisoners. He and the other dragon lords cried out warnings, but Leida either didn’t hear or chose to ignore them and slammed face first into the invisible wall.

  Magnus was certain he’d paused for no more than the space of a breath when she regained her balance, shook her head and threw herself against the shield once more, ramming her shoulder into it over and over until he lifted her in his arms. She’d fought him like a wild thing then, writhing and twisting in his arms with a single-minded ferocity. Had he been a mere human male, she might have broken free, but he held her easily, turning to the startled judges behind him.

  “Leave us!” He bellowed, and they acquiesced, shrugging and shaking their heads in puzzlement. He knew their thoughts, the questions they asked. He asked them of himself. Why be lenient? Why insist on holding on to such a rebellious and obviously unworthy servant?

  He’d turned her in his arms, reciting a simple spell to calm not only her but him as well. Some measure of sanity returned to her gray eyes, and she stared at him, with that same odd mixture of fear and resolve he’d seen earlier. She’d broken her nose, the blood from her injury smeared across the lower half of her face and onto his hands.

  His pride, his dignity, burned to ash before the need for an answer, an understanding of why stripping her of her magic saddened her, but four years of renewed servitude to him sent her spiraling into a state of near madness. Her answer had nearly brought him to his knees. Leida had a daughter, a child she was frantic to return to, one sired by some unknown, filthy, ale-swilling, ignorant peasant.

  Magnus growled low in his throat as he continued down a path leading to a spot where the grass grew high, but no trees blocked the view of the sky. It was a large clearing, large enough for a dragon turned human to turn dragon again. He stood in the middle of the open space and spread his arms wide, emitting a single high note of sound.

  Clothing faded. Blood and bone coursed and stretched, transforming until he no longer saw the trees as towering pillars high above him, but slim reeds of wood, many now at his eye level. His claws dug into the soft earth as he shifted his weight, unfolding great wings to prepare for flight. A powerful surge of muscle and wing lifted him until he hovered just above the tallest trees, the landscape spread out before him in a vast blanket of shadow and shifting moonlight.

  Air swirled beneath his feet as he continued to flap his wings, finding a slow steady rhythm that soon had him soaring high into the cool night. Wind whistled in his ears as he increased his speed, allowing the rush of free, unencumbered flight to clear his head of the muddied, angry thoughts plaguing him.

  Magnus recalled the first time he’d taken Leida flying. It had been a clear night like this one, a bit warmer, and the moon hung full and white, silvering everything below it. At first she had sat on his neck, stiff and frightened, but soon relaxed, her thighs loosening against his scales as she began to enjoy the ride. He kept it tame, a slow easy glide that allowed her to view the countryside from a perspective few humans would ever see. By the time they landed near his home cave, she was laughing, her eyes bright with a joy that sent a sizzle of reciprocal pleasure through him. He’d lowered his head to come eye level with her, fascinated by the animation in her pale features.

  “May we do this again, my lord? Soon?” She clapped her hands together, smiling. “It is magic of the best kind.”

  Magnus stared at her, pleased beyond measure that she had not held onto her fear of flying, but came to enjoy it. “Aye,” he told her, his dragon’s voice rumbling low and silky. “We’ll go tomorrow if you like. But for now, you will sing for me. I’ve a mind to hear a lullaby.”

  She’d smiled and preceded him into his caves where the sweet sound of her singing soon filled the high vaulted chambers and the stroking caress of her hands on his neck soothed him to sleep.

  That memory lightened his mood, eased the hot jealousy burning in his chest. Those had been good years with her, when as his favorite, she sang for him and recited poetry, laughed with him and accompanied him on numerous evening flights. Over time, his affection for her deepened, became more possessive. He’d taken to wearing the guise of a man so that he might dance with her or feel her fingers threading through his hair. She’d always delighted in his human form, saying it reminded her of the first time she’d seen him, a richly dressed troubadour so out of place in the dusty confines of a threshing floor. That day had changed his life, when he’d wandered into a nearby village at harvest time and discovered a rich farmer’s daughter amidst the other villagers, separating grain from the chaff and singing in a voice to make his entire body shiver in reaction.

  It was inevitable that they became intimate. As a dragon, he thought of her as a brilliant, glistening jewel, one that outshone even the most beautifully cut diamond. Of all his numerous treasures, Leida was his most valued, the one in which he took most pride. As a man, he considered her the manifestation of his most brightly faceted dreams, a sultry fantasy come to life as he held her, kissed her, ran his tongue along her skin and buried his cock over and over in the slick, heated depths of her welcoming body.

  Magnus snorted, his breath steaming out of his nostrils as he flew high into colder, thinner air. Yes, they had been the best years for him, but something had changed, a slow poisoning between them that he still didn’t understand. She began making excuses for refusing to sing when he asked her. When he made love to her, she clutched at him with a nameless fear, one she refused to acknowledge when he asked what troubled her. In the month before she stole that trinket from him and disappeared from his life, they’d ceased to converse beyond barely civil words. His frustration and confusion at her continued withdrawal coalesced into anger, and he often stalked out of his cave, desperate to fly and clear his head. For all of his years and the blessing of wisdom that was part of his nature, he was unable to find a way to break that shroud of cold despondency and bring her back to him. His despair, his rage and his sense of failure knew no bounds when he discovered her gone.

  She was returned to him now, bound and accused. The ring
meant nothing more to him than a means by which he could hold her to his brethren’s laws. Her punishments worked to his benefit. Her own meager magic suppressed by the choker, she would be unable to escape him again, and he was far more wary of her now. And he had four years in which to find the answer to the question still eating away at him. Why?

  A thin blaze of color edged the eastern horizon, a signal to return to earth where it was safer from the spears and arrows of men who feared what they didn’t understand. Magnus banked hard to the right, descending at a rapid pace so that his claws shredded treetops as he located the clearing again. An owl, feasting on its catch of the evening, abandoned its dinner, hooting in fright as it flew away from the monstrous creature landing so close to where it perched.

  Magnus folded his wings, softly murmuring the spell to return him to human form. The world around him altered, and he blinked slowly at the change in perspective, the uncomfortable awareness that he was suddenly smaller than most of his surroundings.

  The invisible barrier blocking the Dragon King’s cave entrance was still in place, but the wood sprite guarding it revoked the charm to allow him access. The chamber in which Leida faced her tribunal was deserted, and he traversed the hallway leading to the servants’ quarters. A small, wizened woman greeted him, bowing low and gesturing to a curtained alcove in one of the far walls.

  “She is there, Lord Silverclaw, asleep.”

  He followed her direction and pulled back the curtain. Leida lay on a cushioned bench, stretched out on her side, facing him. The blood was gone, cleaned off by an attending servant. Magnus had been the one to heal her, pressing his thumbs gently against the cracked bridge of her nose. He’d done a good job. Little evidence remained of her self-inflicted injury. A faint swelling along her cheeks, some bruising around her closed eyes. He crouched down next to her for a closer look. The silver choker was both beautiful and repulsive where it encircled her throat. She plucked at in her sleep, frowning as she touched it. Her voice was hoarse as she murmured a name, “Vala,” and Magnus wondered if Vala was the beloved daughter or the man who sired her.