Roc was… amazing.

Razzy sat on the slopes outside the lair, watching her lover perform lazy swoops and spirals above her. She’d woken before him this morning, surprising given that he’d woken her several times in the night to take her again.

Each time had been different, from hard and fast up against the rock wall of the bedroom to slow and sensual as he spooned her from behind. Gentle and loving as she sat in his lap, his big hands stroking her skin softly, to hard and primal as he took her on her hands and knees, large hands holding her hips. She shivered at the memory, still feeling the imprint of his hands on her skin, her body heating already at the thought.

Roc was an amazing lover, and sex with him… it was better than she’d ever thought sex could be. Almost as good as having her dragon back, almost as good as flying… even if she never got her inner animal back, even if she slept for the rest of Razzy’s life…

Before she could complete the thought, a raucous cry made her look up as a wyvern flew up into sight. He hung in the air for a moment, wings spread to catch an air thermal, obviously communicating with Roc, and then abruptly wheeled and dropped back out of sight over the ridge.

She was already standing when Roc dropped out of the sky above, snapping his wings open to stop abruptly just above her.

Come, he spoke directly into her mind. A boy has been found on the slopes. We must retrieve him.

“A boy?” she asked, a foot on his side and a hand hooked around his wing almost before his clawed feet had touched the ground. Easily, she boosted herself up, sliding between his spine ridges as easily as if she’d been doing it all her life. “What do you mean found?”

She wasn’t sure her voice carried to him as he leaped upward, beating his massive wings in a breath-stealing standing take off. A smaller wyvern wouldn’t have been able to, and she’d never heard of a dragon doing it… pride swelled in her chest at what her man was capable of.

They leave them on the slopes below, he replied, taking them above the ridge to sail between two peaks before gliding over the meeting plateau. As they flew, other wyverns dropped from their eyries above to join them. Within seconds, they were surrounded by a horde of wyverns, flying silently until the mountainside was all but blanketed with leathery wings. En masse they sped down the mountains until rock gave way to scrub bushes and then grass.

“Leave them? Why?” There was no way he should have been able to hear her voice above the rushing wind, but somehow, he did.

Because they are born like us…wyverns.

Before she could ask what he meant, he banked sharply and wheeled on a wingtip to land softly in the grass. Within a heartbeat, he’d shifted, an arm around her waist as he lowered her to the ground. She looked at him curiously, but his eyes weren’t on her. Instead, his gaze was fixed on a figure in front of them.

It was a boy with the loose-limbed gangly build that said he was on the verge of manhood.

“What do you mean… he’s born like you?” she asked softly, her feet now on the ground. For a moment their gazes connected and she saw right down to his soul.

“There are no wyvern females,” he said in a rough voice. “So we take females from other clans or disguise ourselves to go into the villages for a night or two. The children we sire… some are female, some are normal.” He paused and ran a hand through his hair, his expression tight. “But some only seem normal. When they reach puberty, the first signs of their emerging beast starts to show… and they are left here for us.”

“Their mothers abandon them?” she asked in shock, a frown creasing her brow as she looked quickly around. There was no one else on the slope as far as the eye could see. No one for the boy to be with. Surely they hadn’t left him here on his own? Surely no mother would be that cruel?

Her heart twisted as she realized that yes, he was alone. There was no one with him… they had left him. Her gaze collided with Roc’s again and it hit her. He, too, had been left on a slope like this. Torn away from his home and family and dumped because he was different than them. Because people feared what he was.

“Oh my god…” she whispered, her heart breaking for both of them. For the boy going through it… and the man who had… to all boys left like this. She couldn’t do anything for them, but she could do something for this boy. Taking a step forward, she willed him to look up.

Usually this is the point they all freak out and run, Roc said mentally. Their villages scare the shit out of them with stories of us, so when they’re dumped here… told they ARE one of us, it terrifies them. Especially because they can’t shift at first.

The boy sat, huddled up with his arms around his knees. As though he heard her mental urging he looked up. His face was tear stained and went pale as soon as he saw the grim-faced men and wyverns around him. The terrified squeak he gave spurred her into action and she took three quick steps forward, dropping to her knees to put herself on the same level he was.

“Hey…” she said softly as she sat down. “I’m Razzy… what’s your name?”

He peeked up through a dirty fall of hair, bright blue eyes wary. For a moment she was reminded of Roc but pushed the thought away to focus on the boy in front of her.

“Haki.” His voice was so low that Razzy had to lean forward to hear the whisper of sound.

She smiled welcomingly. “Hey, Haki. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

He didn’t reply, just watched her, but as he did, his shoulders dropped a little. Good. As long as he was focusing on her, he wasn’t worried about the large, grim-faced men who surrounded them.

You’re doing great, Roc rumbled in approval, silent behind her. She didn’t give any indication she’d heard him, keeping her gaze on Haki. What should she say? She knew nothing about wyverns at all, other than what she’d learned over the last few days. But he didn’t look like a wyvern. If anything, he looked exactly like all the dragon boys she’d ever seen…

Smiling again, she tilted her head. “I’m hungry. How about you?”

As expected, he grinned quickly, the expression a little sheepish. “Starving. Always am. You got food?”

Roc? He didn’t need the mental prompt. Roc was already squatting down beside her, his body language nonthreatening.

“We’ve got plenty of food up in the mountains, son.” His voice was a low rumble as he held out his hand. “If you want to come with us…”

Haki’s eyes flicked from Roc to Razzy and back again. “You’re a…a… one of them, aren’t you?” When Roc nodded, his eyes widened again and he drew back, but almost as quickly, the panic in his eyes subsided. “The village elders said you roasted people on sight and ate them…” His gaze flicked to Razzy. “But she’s not a…a…”

“Wyvern, lad,” Roc filled in, smiling a little. “No, she’s not. She’s a—”

“I’m a wyvern-mate,” Razzy butted in quickly, not wanting to complicate matters by revealing she was a dragon. If Haki couldn’t tell what she was, then perhaps it was best to leave it at that. “I ride on Roc’s back when we fly. Do you want to try it?”

“He’s settling in nicely.”

Roc grunted as Arnor spoke up next to him, the other wyvern’s approach almost soundless. Had he not been Roc’s closest friend and his loyalty without question, Roc would have had to watch his back. But there was no way Arn would ever betray him. He followed the other male’s gaze over to where Razzy sat with Haki, the boy’s face alight as the two spoke.

“She’s good with him. Really helped him settle in. He managed to call shift energy last night,” Arnor carried on. “Almost broke scale as well. He’s doing a lot better than some of the others.”

He didn’t need to elaborate. Life on the peaks was tough, and some youngsters just weren’t cut out for it. The scattered bones at the bottom of some of the valleys were a silent testament to that. Those who didn’t throw themselves off a cliff before their beasts had fully emerged had to contend with learning to fly and then dominance challenges. Some never made it to adulthood.

“She’s amazing.”

Arms folded over his chest, Roc had to admit he hadn’t been paying attention to the young boy Razzy had taken under her “wing.” All he could see was his beautiful mate and hear her words from yesterday ringing in his ears.

I’m a wyvern-mate.

She’d named herself his mate, not a dragon. Pride and something else, something deeper and warmer, filled his chest. While he didn’t like that the words indicated she’d given up on her dragon heritage, the fact that she’d named herself as a wyvern-mate…

He loved her.

He blinked as the knowledge filled him, prompted by his inner beast. They loved her and had from the moment they’d seen her in Alyx’s palace. That had been why he’d kissed her and carried her off to his lair, not just because he was a wyvern and that was what they did. He loved her and had known it instantly in his heart of hearts, even if his brain hadn’t allowed him to process the feeling for what it was.

He had to tell her. Now.

Straightening up, he made to take a step forward when the sky blackened.

“What the fuck?” he murmured, looking up. There was no way a storm could have come in that fast. He’d have smelled it on the breeze, have felt the cold and damp coming in on the winds. But it wasn’t a storm above them. Instead, hundreds of leathery wings blocked out the sky.

Dragons.

Roc’s lip curled back as shouts of alarm filled the plateau, the wyverns there all looking up.

“EVERYONE FREEZE!” he bellowed, a clear ring of authority in his voice as he strode across to stand in the middle of the rocky expanse, looking up. Shifted wyverns clung to the rocks they’d been about to launch themselves from while those in human form ringed Roc, all looking up as a single dragon broke from the masses above to glide down and land in front of Roc. Great golden eyes glared at him for a moment before the shift took him, and it was undeniably a him, from beast to man.

“Roc, I assume?” the arrival asked, his voice almost as deep as Roc’s himself. The aura of power and command that clung to him told Roc who he was even before Razzy threw herself into the guy’s arms.

“Vikter!” She hugged him quickly and then pulled away to look around. “What are you doing here? With everyone?” She frowned as she looked up. “HEY! You stop that right now, Jerat!”

Roc looked up, spotting a smaller dragon with his chest puffed out, ready to breathe fire at one of the wyverns frozen in place on the top of a peak by his order to stay put. The dragon rolled an eye at Razzy and wheeled away, hiding in the mass of dragons flying overhead.

Jealousy raged through him and he wanted to storm over and drag her out of her brother’s arms to hold her in his own. The need to claim her, to prove to all that she was his filled him, hot in his veins as he met the gaze of the dragon leader.

“I am Roc,” he confirmed with a nod. “To what do we owe this pleasure, dragon?”

Tension spiraled as the two stared each other down. Vikter lifted an eyebrow.

“I would have thought that would be obvious. I’ve come to take my sister home after you stole her away.”

Roc snarled, his lips curling back from his teeth in warning. “Over my dead body.”

Vikter’s snarl was no less menacing.

“That can be arranged, wyvern,” he spat, the last word dripping with disgust. “You think I would allow my sister to mate with a lowly fucking worm like you? Not a fucking chance. We’re leaving, and Razzy is coming with us. Now.”

Roc felt more than saw the tension in his clan around him, the slight move forward, even from Nesren and his ilk over in the corner. Every set of wyvern eyes was focused on Vikter and the dragon horde above. They were with him, and together, they could take on the dragons…

His gaze fell on Razzy, her lovely eyes wide as she spoke urgently to her brother, her voice too low for him to hear. Her expression was filled with fear, her gaze flitting from him to the small figure of Haki, standing next to Arnor with a grim look on his little face.

The weight of responsibility, of the crown he hadn’t wanted, slammed down on Roc’s shoulders. They could take on the dragons, yes, but if they did, how many would die. Haki was too small and couldn’t shift… Johan over on the other side of the plateau was still healing. They would never survive. Even Razzy, with her sleeping dragon, was at risk in an all-out battle.

And a battle for what… for him to keep his mate by force?

“Razzy…” he looked at her directly, keeping his voice low even though he wanted to rage and order her back to his side where she belonged. Where her dragon, if it was awake, would know was her place in the world. “Come here, love. Please.”

She looked at him and then at Vikter, whose expression was forbidding and closed. For a second, he thought she would free herself from her brother’s clutches and come to him, but tears filled her eyes. In the half-second before she shook her head, he knew he’d lost her.

She didn’t want him… didn’t want a wyvern for a mate. Despite her pretty words yesterday, when push came to shove, she was a dragon.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered but he ignored her, looking directly at the dragon king.

“You got what you came for. Now go,” he ordered, his voice harsh and cruel to conceal his breaking heart. “Leave. If any dragon is left in these mountains by midday, then I will extend no mercy.”

And with that, he turned and walked away from the woman he’d been stupid enough to allow himself to love.