The Dragon's Match

XI

XI

＊*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚ ˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚＊

If the endless screeching, the profane litany of befouling terms and cuss words, weren't indicative of the fury his unwitting heartmate harboured, then the shattering of a priceless antique ornamental urn against the wall just above his head certainly was.

Having yet to shift back into his human form, Aëghan huffed an annoyed breath and hunkered low to the slate stone floor of the ruins he had deposited Lillian within. The courtyard was large enough to accommodate his substantial size, and though once it had been the derelict foundations of what appeared to be a medieval castle, he had transformed the space resplendently.

Presently, however, the distressed female he had taken from Ravensfield seemed intent on destroying all that he held dear.

Tucking his wings close to his lithe body, Aëghan bounded through the high archway that would eventually lead to a spiral staircase and up into the rooms of the building. Here, he ducked behind the wall like a coward and compelled his muscles and limbs to shift and shrink, to revert back into his human form, until he stood naked and freezing against the cold stone wall while Lillian wreaked havoc in the adjoining courtyard.

Another resounding explosion splintered the air, the aching sound of porcelain shattering across the stones making him wince inwardly at the needless destruction. It had taken him weeks to acquire the priceless artefacts Lillian Adams was so intent on destroying- the pottery formed part of a collector's dream, intricately beautiful and ageless at once. Despite it belonging to human history, Aëghan could appreciate the value of art and luxury, and he was certainly not averse to indulging his epicurean tastes.

"Take me back!" Lillian bellowed, and something else violently met its demise. "Aëghan! I command you to take me back this instant!"

Perhaps, he conceded with a worried frown, he had acted rashly. Perhaps he had misread her words that had appeared magically upon his tablet, so acute to his senses as he writhed and curled within himself tethered and restrained upon his bed that they felt branded and seared into his very flesh as they appeared.

Take me away.

Is that not what she wrote? And on his very profile...

"You fool! You idiot!" Lillian raged, and Aëghan realised that he would need to take action and take it soon lest she raze his home to the ground. "Do you have any idea what you have done? Have you lost your damn mind? I command you to show your face, come and face me like a man so I may gut you from navel to nostril!"

The composed, frigid duchess he had witnessed before was gone apparently. Aëghan sighed audibly, a shiver running under his skin. He needed clothes, or a robe, firstly to ward off the sodding chill and secondly... to hide the damn mark that banded his upper arm.

"My lady," he drawled loudly, tilting his head to the side where the arched entrance to the courtyard would carry his voice to her, "I am most certain that if I were to face you in your present condition, I may very well be plucking splinters of glass from my flesh for weeks to come."

She snarled incoherently at that and something else was shattered most viciously.

Gods.

Either her words were a lie, or she had not intended that he ever read them. But that hardly explained her all-consuming panic at meeting her multitudinous suitors- the snivelling and vile males that sniffed at her heels for snippets of her attention like rabid hounds. The jealous rage that had coiled in his gut had been intolerable and he had endured it for as long as he could.