The most expensive woman in recorded history was running a fever high enough for a dragon to notice.

He had prepared for many things tonight. An unconscious wolf princess burning alive from his own flame was not on the list.

He carried her through the obsidian halls of Drakencrest keep.

Guards straightened as he passed. Fists to their chests.

"Your Majesty."

By morning, the guards would tell their wives. By noon, their wives would tell the market. By dinner, he’d have kidnapped a fae queen from a volcano and she was carrying twins.

He didn’t spare them a glance. In his defense, he hadn’t acknowledged anything that wasn’t her in roughly twenty-four hours.

He shouldered open the door to the chamber across from his own. Enormous bed, stone hearth, arched windows overlooking the mountain range.

A room fit for royalty. He walked to the center of it, looked at the bed, looked at the door, and looked at the distance between this room and his.

"Yeah. No."

The fastest real estate decision in Drakencrest history. He turned around, walked back across the hall, and kicked open his own door.

Then he laid her on his large bed, which she occupied roughly twelve percent of.

"Guinevere."

She didn’t move.

"Guinevere." Louder. Direct. That voice worked on generals, diplomats, and even Ryker roughly forty percent of the time.

It did not work on her. She didn’t stir.

Her breathing was shallow, and the heat coming off her skin had increased since they’d landed.

"Fuck."

His dragon grumbled low in his chest. A sound that meant wrong. A sound that meant fix it.

Maddox: Get me Aldric. Now.

Aldric, the royal physician, arrived in under four minutes. The man was seventy, grey-haired, and moved with the unhurried efficiency of a healer who had treated dragon kings for two generations.

He asked zero questions when he saw the girl in the king’s bed. Then pressed two fingers to her wrist. His brow furrowed.

"Why isn’t she waking?" Maddox asked from the foot of the bed.

"She’s burning up. Which, in a dragon’s bed, is usually a compliment. This isn’t." He trailed off, and glanced up at Maddox. "Her energy reads like someone shuffled three decks together. What is she?"

A fair question that Maddox was also still working on. The running list included: white wolf, knife-catcher, cave-dweller, and princess.

"She’s a wolf. That information stays in this room."

"Understood, Your Majesty." Aldric paused, his fingers still resting on her wrist, "The short version: wolves can’t fever. The long version: she is ... One of those statements has to be wrong and I’m not comfortable with either option."

Everyone kept telling him what wolves don’t do. Guinevere kept doing all of it. He was starting to think she hadn’t read the manual.

Aldric moved his hand above her body without touching, tracing the air an inch from her skin.

"Traces of a flame signature. Your flame, Your Majesty." Aldric glanced at her neck. "This fever only happens after a full marking, which I don’t see. Either you marked her somewhere not visible or we have a new problem."

Maddox didn’t react.

"I didn’t mark her. But she’s my fated mate."

The healer’s look of genuine surprise was the first Maddox had generated in the last day that didn’t involve an urn.

"There’s no example in history of a fated mate without dragon blood. Ever."

"I am aware. Last night, I pushed my flame to her in front of two hundred witnesses. I’m not mistaken."

"That’s..." Aldric stopped himself. "Either she is running fire she was never built to carry or she has dragon blood."

"If she doesn’t have dragon blood, what will happen to her?"

"Humans die and fae die. That’s documented. Wolves have never been stupid enough to try. Present company excluded."

Aldric prepared the syringe with the steady hands of a man who had done this a thousand times. Maddox watched with the steady focus of a man who would break those hands if they missed.

"To help reduce her fever. It won’t solve it, but it will increase her chances of survival."

Maddox’s dragon didn’t like that and neither did he.

"I can take her to the healing ward and notify you when she’s through the worst of it."

"No." The word filled the room. "She stays in my chambers."

"Then I will treat her here. But I’ll need to check on her every few hours."

"Done."

"Might be worth mentioning, skin contact might help."

Maddox already knew that.

"Thank you, Aldric."

The old healer nodded, and left, closing the door behind him.

Maddox pulled a chair to the bedside and sat. The fire in the hearth crackled low. She breathed. He watched.

He sat in the chair for less than five minutes before the fever radiating off her became unbearable.

Her cheeks were flushed crimson against the white sheets. Sweat beaded along her hairline despite the cool mountain air drifting through the cracked window.

He stood. Hesitated.

This was crossing a line he had no right to cross tonight.

His dragon snarled low in his chest, impatient. She is ours. She burns because of us. Fix it.

Maddox dragged a hand down his face, then moved.

He leaned over the bed and carefully slid one arm beneath her shoulders, lifting her just enough to reach the laces at the back of the gold-accented dress. The fabric was delicate, expensive, and completely inadequate. His fingers worked the ties with surprising gentleness for hands that had snapped necks and commanded fleets.

His father had conquered three kingdoms. He was conquering lace ties. Different era.

The dress loosened. He peeled it down her arms slowly, revealing the delicate line of her collarbones, the curve of her breasts. He kept his eyes on her face the entire time, watching for any flicker of awareness. None came.

He pulled the silk the rest of the way off, leaving her in nothing but a bra and thin scrap of undergarment. A faint gold emanated under her skin. His dragon color and flame manifestation.

Maddox exhaled sharply.

He stepped back and stripped down to his briefs, preparing to climb into bed with the unconscious wolf princess he’d bought at auction only twelve hours ago. His grandfather’s portrait on the far wall seemed to be judging him. He ignored it.

He climbed onto his massive bed, and gathered her against him — skin to skin — pulling the heavy furs and silk sheets over them both. One arm slid beneath her neck, the other wrapped around her waist, pressing her body to his chest. Her legs tangled naturally with his.

Heat poured off of her into him like a living furnace. It felt like he was literally taking it from her, which he realized after a moment, that he was. Through the matebond, the building discomfort that’d been bleeding from her lessened dramatically.

She made a small, unconscious sound in between a sigh and whimper, and nuzzled into the crook of his neck.

Maddox went very still.

Then his lips curved on their own into a smile he had no business having.

She was unconscious. Fevering. In his bed. And he was smiling. He needed professional help.

The current between them ran stronger now that nothing separated their skin. Sparks danced where they touched. The matebond was showing off and he was gladly letting it. His dragon purred in the back of his mind like a damn house cat.

Safe. Warm. Mine.

His dragon’s vocabulary had expanded. Progress.

He tucked her head more securely beneath his chin, one large hand splaying across her bare back to hold her closer. The gold veins beneath her skin seemed to brighten slightly, syncing with the pulse of flame beneath his own ribs.

"You’re going to be all right," he whispered against her hair, voice rough. "I’ve got you now."

Maddox closed his eyes. Skin to skin. Flame to flame.

Medical necessity. Doctor’s orders. He would stay like this until the fever broke. Or longer.

He fell asleep in under one minute, peacefully, like a man who had won.

Somewhere across the sea, a wolf king was not sleeping.