The ceremony takes place in the shape of a hexagram, with a raised platform in the middle and all the people are stood inside in the shape of the points. I stand alone with my guards, in front of them as they stand sentry behind me. I see Catrina in the point next to me, with an older man and two teenage boys behind them. There are twenty or so other people here, all inside the points, and we are mostly silent as we wait for the happy couple. The wind blows my dress and hair to the side a little, making me shiver. Its freezing but no one is wearing cloaks. The floor is marked with white powder that is mixed into the grass to make the outline for the shape. The platform has an arch made of three points, raised to meet at the top, and they have white flowers and little white lights wrapped around the pillars. Hanging from the middle of the archway is a small white stone, a mating stone that must be present for all matings.

“I don’t know much about the stone, what is its purpose?” I whisper to Korbin, who is stood closest to me. I don’t even remember the name of them.

“Dragon stones are said to be found when you need them, and can be discovered anywhere. They are said to appear when a true mating is well deserved. When love mixes with fate,” he whispers quietly, “or that’s what I was told.” I turn to face him, seeing my own longing reflected back in his gaze. He clears his throat, stepping back a little, and I turn away. I have to stop looking at him, at all of them like this...like they are mine.

“They are mine,” my dragon whispers adamantly.

“You can’t collect them, we have discussed this,” I tell her.

“We can,” she insists, and I don’t reply to her.

I don’t have the chance to respond anyway, as three women standing inside one of the points near us begin singing the River Song. The song is deep, beautiful, and full of magic in a way that makes you never want to stop listening to it. I watch silently as the couple we are waiting for walks out of the trees and to the archway. The woman is beautiful, with long red hair and wearing the prettiest dress I’ve ever seen. It’s white, with gaps on her ribs, and flows out at the bottom. There are green leaves stitched up the sides, circling around her in the design and match the green leaves that are plaited into her long hair. The man has red hair also, a leather suit on, with a green shirt. They look amazing together, but they hardly notice us watching them. They don’t take their eyes off each other as they walk up to the platform. They stand in the middle, both of them staring at each other like they are seeing their whole world. It scares me this could have been me and Jace, doing something I never really wanted. They say mating links your blood to theirs, creating a bond so deep that you never want to be away from the other person. And linking my blood with anyone, scares me. It’s not only the bond that is forged in front of us and the exchange of blood, but sex is also a requirement to mating. Thank god we are more modern now, and don’t have to watch that. Jace told me of a story he read about how it was custom for royal dragons to watch the mating, the entire mating, to make sure it was valid. So gross. An old man steps out of one of the points, walking up the platform and stands in front of them.

“The ceremony will begin,” he says once the music stops, and there’s a silence that stretches.

“Please say the ancient words to each other,” he says, and the woman starts off first.

“Link to the heart, link to the soul. I pledge my heart to you, for you, for all of the time I have left. My dragon is yours, my love is yours, and everything I am, belongs with you,” she says, smiling when her partner leans forward and wipes a tear away from just under her eye. He repeats the same words, and then the old man pulls out a dragonglass dagger from his cloak.

“Please hold out your hands, like practised,” he says, and the woman holds out her left, and the man his right. The man cuts a line across the woman’s palm, and then the man’s before putting the dagger away.

“Light and dark, good and evil, and everything that makes us dragons, please bless this mating. We bless you,” the man says, and the couple link their cut hands as we all whisper.

“We bless you.” A light shines out of them, shooting up into the crystal, and it glows brightly as the couple look on in a daze. We are all silent as the light flashes once, and then bursts out in streams in every direction, leaving sparkling little light drops that fall from the sky. We all clap and cheer, and I can’t help the smile that lights up my face when I see the happy couple kissing in the archway. It was a true blessing.

“The magic of Dragca has blessed the newly bonded. Let us dance and drink to celebrate their future happiness,” the old man says, and people cheer more as I turn around to see my guards. They all are watching me, the light dropping around me must make me look strange or something, as they seem a bit dazed.

“Guys? Let’s get some food? I’m starving,” I say, and it snaps them out of it.

“You’re always hungry, Doll,” Korbin is the first one to speak, and steps away from me.

“Not always, just most the time,” I shrug, walking out the hexagon and towards the rows of food laden tables that people are going to.

“I’m going to run a check on the left side of the party, if you can take the right?” Dagan asks Korbin, who nods, but pauses, looking between Elias and Thorne at my side.

“I will watch the princess, don’t worry,” Elias says, his husky tone sending shivers through me that I try to hide. Why does his voice have to sound better than melted chocolate?

“I’m here also,” Thorne snaps.

“I can handle them both, go,” I interrupt, and they all look at me with little smiles.

“I’m sure you can, doll, but give a shout if you need any help,” Korbin says and walks off behind Dagan who shakes his head at him. I head for the food, filling my plate with all the amazing food they have. Thorne and Elias get their own plates, adding twice the amount of food onto theirs as I do mine. And they say I’m always hungry? I pick up some little white cakes, with snowflakes on the top of them.

“I haven’t had these since I was a child, they were my mother’s favourite,” I say, not really knowing if I’m talking to Thorne or Elias. It makes me almost home sick to look at the cakes. It reminds me of my mum sneaking us into the kitchen, where we would steal some of these before the cook noticed. We would run back to my room to eat them, giggling the entire time. Her laugh could light up an entire room, and then she was just gone.

“I remember these, they are called snowdrops, right?” Thorne asks me, and I nod, sliding one onto his plate.

“You should try one, they are so sweet,” I say and look away before he can reply to me. I hurriedly try to swallow the emotions that attempt to crawl up my throat. I grab an orange looking drink off the side at the end of the buffet, and look around at the seven or so tables surrounding the little dance floor in the middle. The three singers are performing a song I don’t recognise, but it’s amazing mixed with the sound of the piano that one of the girls is playing perfectly.

“There,” Elias nods his head at an empty table in the middle. I follow him over, taking a seat next to him, and Thorne sits on my other side.

“I forgot how amazing the home cooked food is here,” I comment, used to the snacks from the castle. Even though Jules use to cook me amazing food, it was never like this. I bite down on the quiche, and then eat some of the purple fruit pastries as I watch the people dance.

“Do you want to dance?” Thorne asks me, and Elias growls.

“We are paid to watch her, not dance and flirt with her,” he snaps, and I turn to glare at him, pushing my chair out and standing up.

“I’d love to Thorne,” I say, walking away from the table and hearing Elias grumbling behind me as Thorne catches up with me. We walk into the throng of dancers, and Thorne stops, looking awkward for a moment. Finally, I wrap my arms around his neck, and he slides his hands on my hips.

“You look nervous,” I comment, looking up at him as we sway to the music.

“Not nervous, it’s just maybe Elias is right,” he states slowly. I feel him lean forward, pressing his lips ever so gently on my forehead. I don’t know if they even touched me because they are gone so fast.

“That you’re not paid to dance with me? Is everything you do around me because you get paid?” I demand, stopping the dance, and moving to walk away when Thorne pulls me against his body, holding me tightly to him.

“Look at me,” he demands as I just let him move my body to the music. When I won't comply, his hand slides under my chin, forcing me to look into his hazel eyes.

“I’m not here because I’m paid. I’m not dancing with you because of money. I don’t even know why I’m dancing with you, and that makes me nervous,” he admits, his thumb slowly tracing circles across my cheek.

“I make you nervous?” I say breathlessly. What is it about him that makes me like this?

“You make me forget why I’m here, forget everything, and I fucking hate it as much as I like it,” he says, moving his head closer to mine as I’m left feeling like all the air has left my body.

“I don’t know what to say to you Thorne,” I admit.

“Nothing, I can’t hear you say anything because this–” he begins to say when he is shoved out of my arms, and I fall backwards. I lift myself up to see Elias on top of Thorne, lifting his hand and he punches Thorne straight in the face. The music dies off, the girls stop singing, and everyone gets quiet as we watch them fight.

“That was too fucking close to her,” I hear Elias say.

“Jealous?” Thorne replies, his tone mocking, and nothing like I expected to hear from him. He punches Elias and jumps up. Thorne charges into Elias, and both of them smack into the stage, where the girls scream, scrambling to get out of the way.

“Stop!” I shout, running towards them as they punch each other, rolling across the stage. When I see Elias getting his daggers out of his jacket, I know this has gone too far. I hold my hands up, calling my dragon ice and shooting it at them, wrapping it around the bottom half of their bodies as they try to charge at each other. They both look in complete shock when they follow the ice covering their legs all the way back to me, and I lower my hands.

“Enough,” I say, and they both growl. Elias hands light up with fire just as Dagan gets to the stage. He jumps up on it, and grabs Elias by his jacket. Elias and Thorne quickly burn their way out of their ice holds, both of them looking moments away from attempting to kill each other again.

“Take her back to the castle Kor, I will deal with them,” Dagan demands as Korbin puts an arm around my shoulders and turns me away from the guys.

“What happened?” Korbin asks as we walk towards the house. I don’t have an answer for him, so I don’t say anything as Catrina runs to catch up with us.

“Thank you for coming, and we won’t speak of what happened. May I have a word alone with you before you leave?” she asks after bowing low, her eyes drifting to Korbin who pulls me closer to his side.

“I trust Korbin, whatever you want to speak to me about, can be spoken in front of him,” I tell her gently, and she gives him a nervous look before speaking.

“The seers speak of the curses falling, and here you are, so close to your dragon guard. I will make sure no one speaks of the clear signs of how close you are to them, but I do want to warn you princess,” she says, and Korbin stands straighter, almost growling. I doubt that helps to sway her opinion of how close we all are. We are friends, I think anyway, and we certainly aren’t anything more. But then I think of how Thorne looked at me as we danced, how difficult it is to take my eyes off Elias, and how much Dagan annoys me in that sexy way of his. And then there is Korbin, who is confusing and yet amazing. When these guards should be nothing to me, they are becoming everything in such a short amount of time. I feel like I’ve known them forever, not just the one week.

“Nothing is going on–“ I argue, and she shakes her head, letting my weak sentence drift off. I doubt she would believe me anyway.

“All curses will fall, and people fall with them. I don’t want to see ice dragons fall with the last of the curses. Be careful,” she says and then walks past me, whispering. “With both your heart and your life,” and I turn to watch her walk away, wondering how right she might be.