Dragon Claimed: A Dark Kings Novella Read online

  Gemma issued a bark of laughter. “Seems like Druids, Fae, humans, and Kings have been co-existing for some time.”

  He’d never thought of it that way. “I’m no’ sure I’d call it co-existing.”

  “Humans live together and fight constantly. That’s what all of us are doing, no matter what species we are. But I’m curious. Why did the Fae come here?”

  “Civil war between the Light and Dark destroyed their world. I suspect they followed the humans here, but that’s just my speculation.”

  She blew out a breath and lightly caressed his chest. “I think you might be right. Where does this leave me? You say I’m a Clacher, but I have no magic.”

  “I’m no’ sure. I’m hoping the Druids here on Skye might be able to help.”

  Gemma nodded her head. “We’ll see. Do you have any idea on what happened to my family?”

  “I think it was a Druid or a Fae. It was a Druid who wiped out the Clacher line, but that Druid is long dead.”

  “Someone else could have taken up the mantle,” Gemma said.

  Cináed twisted his lips. “That’s certainly a possibility. Corann, the leader of the Skye Druids, is pretty knowledgeable about the goings-on. If he can no’ help us, then we’ll have to go another route.”

  “Sounds good. So, when are you going to tell me that you’re a Dragon King?”

  He blinked, taken aback by her words. “What?”

  “It’s obvious,” she said. “The way you spoke about the Kings, your knowledge of them. That wasn’t a story passed down. You lived it. And then there’s your tattoo.”

  Cináed stared into her blue eyes.

  “You should have told me. I would still have listened to the story. Then you could have told it from your perspective.”

  “I did,” he murmured.

  She leaned forward and put her hand on his cheek. “You kept your feelings out of it. But it was there in your eyes and the set of your jaw. I felt your pain when you described the dragons going over the bridge to another realm. I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

  He shrugged, unsure of what to say. “It’s done.”

  “You will always carry it. Just as I’ve carried all of what happened to me so long ago. Maybe that’s why I feel such a pull toward you. You understand me.”

  “Or it could be something else entirely,” he said as he tugged her down for a kiss.

  She lay out alongside him and moaned. “Or it could be something else entirely,” she repeated.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Magic. The word swirled through Gemma’s mind while she slept securely in Cináed’s arms. It was also the first thing on her mind when she woke the next morning.

  She wasn’t surprised to find that Cináed was already awake. He rolled her onto her back and gazed down at her. The fanciful part of her wanted to call the look wonder, but she might be reading too much into it.

  “Damn, you’re beautiful,” he murmured and smoothed her hair back from her face.

  Her heart swelled. Being with him was everything. He made her feel special and cared for—and it had nothing to do with him being a Dragon King and everything to do with the person he was.

  “I’d like nothing more than to stay right here in this bed and make love to you all day,” he said.

  Gemma ran her fingers along the scruff on his cheek. “Me, too. I’d give almost anything if the outside world wouldn’t intrude.”

  “If that’s what you really want I can make it happen.”

  The fact that he not only offered but actually could give her that made her fall for him even more. “Maybe after we sort through my history we could return?”

  “Absolutely,” he replied with a grin.

  “I guess that means I need to get up.”

  “That would probably be wise since Corann is here.”

  Her heart missed a beat. “The Druid leader? He’s here? How?”

  “He’s a Druid.”

  As if that explained everything. Then again, maybe it did. Gemma had a lot to learn about Druids. She sat up as Cináed moved off the bed to stand. “How did he know we were here?”

  “That was probably Merrill.”

  “Merrill is here?”

  “He’s been with us the entire time.”

  She scooted to the end of the bed and grabbed for the bag of clothes she had brought. “I might have been preoccupied and distracted, but I would know if there had been another person with us.”

  Cináed tugged the shirt over his head and pulled it down before fastening the dark denim. “He’s been in the water. This entire area was his domain.”

  “Water?” She gave a shake of her head. “Dragons live in water?”

  “Dragons live everywhere. Some of us prefer mountains, some deserts, some forests, some water, and everything in between.”

  She swallowed and began to dress. “So when you said you and Merrill went diving, you didn’t mean with scuba tanks.”

  “Nay. We’re able to go down to depths no mortal ever could on their own.”

  “I see.” She inwardly gave a shake of her head as she quickly finished getting ready. After brushing out her hair she pulled it into a ponytail.

  Then she faced him. “I’m ready.”

  He walked to her and pulled her into his arms for a slow kiss. “I doona know what we’re going to learn, if anything.”

  “I can handle it,” she assured him. And she hoped she could.

  He gave her a nod and took her hand as they walked to the door. Cináed opened it, and waited for her to step through. As soon as she did she spotted a man with his back to her. He had stark white hair, and was a little bent with age. The man turned and faced them, showing his long white beard and the staff he held in one hand.

  “It’s Gandalf,” she said before she could think better of it.

  Cináed laughed, and the man joined in.

  “Ah, my child, many have called me that,” he said as he walked toward them. “I doona mind at all.” He stopped before her and looked her over with his eyes full of knowledge and secrets. “You must be Gemma.”

  She glanced at Cináed and nodded. “I am. I’ve never met a Druid before. I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t this.”

  Corann threw back his head and laughed. “I like your honesty. We’re going to get on well.”

  “Come inside so we can talk,” Cináed said.

  “Yes, yes,” Corann said. “More weather is coming our way.”

  Gemma looked to the sky but saw only blue with the occasional white cloud. But who was she to argue with a Druid? She fell in step behind Corann. The entire time Cináed kept a hold of her hand. She liked that.

  Once inside, Cináed directed her toward the table where Corann already sat. She pulled out one of the chairs and swallowed nervously. When she realized Cináed was making tea she wished she was the one doing it so she wouldn’t be sitting there so awkwardly.

  “We’ve met, you know.”

  Her gaze jerked to the Druid. “We have?”

  “You were just a wee thing. I helped your parents buy the isle believing, as your father did, that you all would be safe there.”

  Gemma wanted to believe him, but she wasn’t sure if she could. It didn’t make sense really. She wanted answers, and Corann was giving them to her. Yet, it almost seemed too easy.

  Cináed set cups down on the table and filled each of them with tea before he sat next to her. The entire time, no one spoke.

  It was Corann who broke the silence. “I didna contact you all these years because I knew you wouldna believe anything I had to say, Gemma. Your father spent his life hiding, as did every member of his family before him. He expected to continue like that, and he intended to let the line die out with him. Then he met your mother. Their love was undeniable, and with that realization, he knew he had to reevaluate his life.”

  Gemma’s hand suddenly grew cold. She wrapped her hand around the cup, letting the warmth seep into her. “You helped my family?” />
  “I did,” Corann said with a nod of his white head.

  Cináed grinned as he nodded. “You’re the Ben Sinclair I found through the documentations.”

  Corann smiled. “The verra one.”

  “If you were such a good friend, then where were you that night they disappeared?” Gemma demanded.

  Corann’s eyes lowered to the table as he let out a sigh. Finally, he lifted his gaze to her. “I wish I had a proper answer, but I doona. You can plan every detail, but there will always be something that doesna go as you expect or hope. The night your family disappeared, we were attacked here.”

  Cináed’s brows furrowed deeply. “You were? By who?”

  “I doona know.”

  Gemma snorted at that, looking between the two men. “You can’t be serious. You’re a Druid, and you don’t know who attacked you?”

  “No.” Corann sat back in his chair and made a face. “No amount of our magic was able to decipher who the culprits were.”

  “They used magic to hide themselves,” Cináed guessed.

  Corann nodded his head of white hair. “They did. For a moment, I thought it was the Kings.”

  Cináed gave him a flat look. “We wouldna do such a thing.”

  “I realized that soon enough.”

  Gemma asked, “That leaves who, then? Fae or other Druids?”

  “Aye,” Cináed said.

  She leaned forward to pour milk into her tea. “What does each have to gain from attacking here?”

  “It wasna just here,” Cináed said. “It was your isle as well.”

  Corann drank his tea and set the cup on the table. “No matter how I’ve looked at the attack, I always came back to your family, Gemma. Whoever did this knew I was helping you, which seems unlikely since I kept that confidential from everyone. But there is no other connection.”

  “They wanted to keep you away from helping Gemma and her family,” Cináed said.

  “That’s right,” the elder Druid mumbled.

  She felt the eyes of both men on her. “If you’re hoping I have some answers, I don’t. I was a child.”

  Cináed’s hand covered hers. “We doona think that. Tell Corann what you saw that night.”

  “You saw them?” the Druid asked as he sat forward, eager to hear more.

  She winced. “Not really. And there was just one.”

  Corann’s white brows drew together as his forehead furrowed. “Only one?”

  Gemma didn’t miss the exchange between him and Cináed. “At first, I didn’t see anything. It was just something I felt. It made even my dog shake.”

  “Evil,” Corann said.

  “This was at the dock where my parents and Kyle had been, but there was nothing there. The storm continued to get worse and the waves were growing higher. I wanted to go out on the dock to see if I could see the boat, but there was something there. So I ran. It was the lightning that showed me the silhouette. I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman. When I fell in the water, it came to the edge, waiting for me. I knew it was there to kill me, so I held my breath as long as I could before I surfaced. It must have believed I died, because it wasn’t there.”

  The Druid shook his head, squeezing his eyes closed briefly. “Oh, dear child. I’m so sorry I wasna there to help.”

  “My family is dead, aren’t they?” Gemma needed to know. It felt as if everyone had tiptoed around the issue. It was time to ask the difficult question.

  Cináed squeezed her hand. “I believe so, aye.”

  She had long suspected that, but hearing the words caused emotion to choke her. When Cináed pulled her toward him so he could wrap his arms around her, she didn’t stop him. They remained like that for a long time while the three sat in silence.

  Gemma finally lifted her gaze to meet the sad eyes of Corann. “Are there Druids powerful enough to have accomplished what happened here on Skye and my isle?”

  “There are two I can think of,” Corann said. “One is mated to a Dragon King, but at that time, she would have been only a child herself.”

  “And the other?” Gemma asked.

  Cináed said, “Isla.”

  Corann gave a single nod. “She wasna involved.”

  Gemma hated being excluded. “Who is Isla?”

  “She’s married to a Warrior,” Cináed said.

  “A what?”

  Cináed’s face creased in regret. “I might have forgotten to mention them. They also have magic from the primeval gods inside them.”

  “What Cináed is trying to say is that Isla was with Hayden at MacLeod Castle. I went to Isla and asked her if she had anything to do with the attack after it happened. She didna, nor did any Druid at MacLeod Castle.”

  Cináed blew out a breath. “Is there any other Druid with such abilities that you doona know about?”

  “There is always that chance. I’m no’ all seeing.”

  Gemma’s head was beginning to ache. “If it wasn’t a Druid, then it has to be Fae.”

  “It can no’ be,” Corann said harshly.

  He then rose to his feet and walked to the window to gaze out of it. Gemma slid her eyes to Cináed, hoping he might shed some light on what had just happened.

  “Corann and his Druids guard the Fairy Pool here on Skye. The pool is the gateway to the Fae. They’ve had a connection for as long as there have been Druids here and Fae on this realm,” Cináed explained.

  Now she understood. “If it was a Fae, then that means they betrayed you, Corann.”

  “Yes,” he murmured. He turned to face her. “I’ve no’ wanted to believe that possible, but it looks as if it might verra well be.”

  “Why though?” Gemma asked.

  A muscle in Cináed’s jaw clenched. “The Others.”

  Corann’s eyes narrowed. “Why would they worry about the Clachers?”

  “That’s a verra good question,” Cináed said.

  Gemma shook her head in frustration. “What are the Others?”

  “A group of Light and Dark Fae and mie and drough Druids who have taken up a quest to destroy the Dragon Kings,” Corann explained.

  Gemma met Cináed’s gaze. “Why would they care about my family? We had no connection to the Kings.”

  “That we know of,” Cináed said.

  Chapter Nineteen

  They were missing something. Cináed was sure of it. If only he could figure out what it was. Corann had done wonders in filling in some of the blanks, but it wasn’t enough.

  “Take me back to the isle,” Gemma said.

  Cináed was shocked at her statement. “Why?”

  “I want this ended. I want to know it’s over.”

  Corann put an arm on the table and cocked his head. “What are you thinking?”

  “I’m thinking that if I go there and let it be known that I’m back, whoever came for my parents will return.”

  Cináed was having none of that. “And then they’ll come for you. That’s no’ a good idea.”

  “It’s because you and Merrill will be there,” she said.

  He wished he had some argument to dissuade her, but she had a point. If he and Merrill were hiding in the water, they just might get whoever had come after her family. It was a big maybe, however.

  Corann then asked, “And what if no one comes?”

  Gemma shrugged her shoulders. “Then no one comes. But as you said, everyone in my family has always hidden, and they came after my parents and brother. I got away. Don’t you think they’d want to finish the job?”

  “She’s got a point,” the Druid told Cináed.

  Cináed knew it, but he wasn’t so sure he wanted to give voice to his thoughts. By Gemma’s own admission, she had barely gotten away the first time the entity came for her. Fate had favored her that day, but would it again?

  Especially now that the Kings knew Usaeil, Queen of the Light, was part of the Others? If she got wind of Gemma...or worse, if she was the one who had gone after Gemma’s family, then there would be little t
hat prevented Usaeil from getting to Gemma this time.

  Was luck on their side this time? They had reached the isle unseen—or so he hoped. More troubling was why this entity had allowed Gemma to live.

  “I think we’re playing with fire,” Cináed cautioned.

  Corann’s eyes narrowed on him. “What are you no’ telling me? I know all about the Others from Rhi.”

  “There is something we’ve intentionally no’ told you.”

  “Then I think you might want to rectify that.”

  Cináed shook his head, feeling Gemma’s eyes on him. “I can no’. It’s for your own safety.”

  The Druid slowly sat back. “You know some of the Fae involved with the Others.”

  It wasn’t a question. Cináed nodded, letting the leader of the Druids know at least that much.

  “I understand,” he said.

  “Hold on,” Gemma said as she looked from one to the other, her pale blue orbs landing on him last. “Did you just nix my plan?”

  Cináed drew in a breath and tried to find the right words. “It willna be safe.”

  “I want to know who came after me that night. I want to know if they did indeed kill my family. I think I have that right.”

  “You doona understand the full power of the Others.”

  She raised a brow. “Are you afraid of them?”

  “Nay,” he stated more angrily than he wanted. “I know what they can do. Their combined magic is greater than that of a Dragon King’s.”

  “And that’s never been done before,” Corann added.

  Some of the wind went out of Gemma’s sails at that point. “Still, you’re guessing this is a Fae, and you’re guessing that it’s the Others. Don’t you want to know who it is and why? Don’t you want to see if it is the Others and what connection my family has to the Kings?”

  Damn her for pointing that out. Cináed wanted to tell her no, that none of it mattered. But the Kings needed all the information they could get on the Others. So far everything they had was bits and pieces they picked up along the way.

  Corann caught his gaze. “I can be there, and if need be, I can bring some Druids.”

  “That would only complicate things,” Cináed said.

  Gemma shook her head in obvious confusion. “How? Wouldn’t the more people that were there to fight be better?”