Maddox Drakencrest had kissed a woman four times before she’d learned his real name. He was aware of the optics.

Make that five.

For medical reasons, that woman was lying on top of him in the exact spot he put her eight hours ago.

The Gods themselves couldn’t have made him move.

Ryker, however, could. And he did at dawn.

Ryker: Maddox. Raid on the eastern ridge. Three hours out by air. They hit the supply caravan coming in from Ironhold.

He spoke with the subtlety of a man who knew exactly what he was interrupting.

Maddox: Casualties?

Ryker: Two of ours. Six of theirs. We need you in the war room in ten.

He let out a slow breath. The one morning in a decade he actually wanted to stay in bed.

Maddox: On my way.

He pressed another kiss to the top of Guinevere’s head. Automatically. His mouth moved on its own like kissing her hair was a habit he had built over years.

Her fever was still there, but much better. The gold shimmer beneath her skin had quieted to a faint glow.

Then he noticed her wrists. Rope burns were visible with silver marks layered underneath.

His eyes flared dragon gold momentarily. He swallowed it down, then lifted her wrist carefully and pressed his lips to it. The kiss was gentle in a way that felt entirely unlike him, and the contradiction between what he was feeling and what his mouth was doing almost made him laugh.

"What am I going to do with you?" He pressed his lips to her forehead, lingering for one second longer than he meant to.

Having a mate was easy. He didn’t know why everyone made it sound so difficult. The only thing that had changed was his sleep quality. Drastically improved.

The raid would take four hours at most. She’d been asleep for twelve. By his estimate, she had at least another four in her.

He’d be back before she opened her eyes. Simple. They’d continue from where they left off, which was her asleep on his chest.

Timing was everything, and he had to hand it to himself, his was impeccable when it came to her.

✦✦✦

Wrong ceiling. Warm. Missing dress. The trifecta of waking up in a situation that required immediate assessment.

Fucking hell. She was wearing a lace thong and strapless lace bralette.

The bed was the size of a small country. The sheets were silk, the furs were real, and the pillow under her head smelled like pine and something darker that her wolf recognized as male and safe.

A woman was sitting in a chair across the room, boots propped up on a low table, scrolling through a leather-bound book. Long black hair.

The kind of woman who looked like she could start a fire with her opinions alone.

Guinevere’s voice came out rougher than she expected. "Where am I?"

The woman’s head snapped up. Her gold eyes narrowed on Guinevere, and the book closed with a soft thud.

"I’m sorry. Who the fuck are you? And why are you in the king’s private chambers?"

The words took a full second to land. When they did, they landed with velocity.

Private chambers. King’s bed. Missing dress. Strange woman. Her brain assembled the facts into the worst possible narrative at record speed.

The furs had slipped to her waist when she sat up, and she grabbed them back with the speed of a woman who had been through enough public humiliation for one week.

Her brain finally caught up. The flight. The cloak. She didn’t remember anything after closing her eyes in the sky, which meant at some point between then and now, someone had carried her, put her in this bed, and removed her dress.

Her face heated.

The woman across the room watched Guinevere’s expression go through every possible variation of horror and then burst out laughing.

"Oh my gods, your face! I am a horrible person," she wheezed. "My brother sent me to sit with you while he handles a raid on the eastern ridge. I’m Blair Drakencrest and that was the best thing I’ve seen in a month."

Guinevere pulled the furs higher. Her voice came out very flat. "You’re the king’s sister."

"Guilty."

"And that was a joke."

Blair grinned, tossing her legs off the table and standing. "I was going to keep a straight face longer, but your eyes went so wide I thought you might launch yourself through a window. I had to put you out of your misery."

Guinevere’s throat tightened.

"Here." Blair tossed a folded garment onto the bed. "One of mine. It’s called a zip suit."

Guinevere picked it up. The material was soft, expensive, and felt like it was built for someone who intended to move in it. "Thank you."

"Don’t thank me yet. It’s going to be slightly too big on you." Blair gestured towards a door on the far wall. "Bathing chamber is through there. I’m giving you twenty minutes because Aldric, our head healer, will be here at the top of the hour and I am not the kind of sister-in-law who makes a sick woman keep a healer waiting."

Guinevere blinked at her. "Sister-in-law."

"Figure of speech. We’ll see how it shakes out." She winked.

Guinevere slid out of the bed carefully, clutching the furs around her until she could reach the zip suit. Her legs felt less steady than she wanted them to, but she made it to the bathing chamber without stumbling.

She did not look back at the bed. She did not think about who else had been in it or the pillow that smelled like him.

Twenty minutes later, she stepped back into the bedroom.

The zip suit fit the way Blair had predicted. A little loose in the body, but still hugging her tightly.

Her hair was damp and curling on its own naturally.

Blair gave Guinevere an approving once-over.

"Much better. You look less dead."

The door opened. Aldric stepped in with his leather case.

"Princess. Good morning." He bowed, which Guinevere was unprepared for, and set his case on the small table. "We weren’t expecting you to wake today."

Guinevere blinked at that.

"You had a fever," the healer added, but didn’t elaborate further.

Comforting. Apparently her being conscious was a surprise. She was going to need more information about what happened between the sky and this bed.

He frowned, examining the burns left over from the silver, but mercifully, he didn’t say anything.

He reached into his case and produced a small glass vial filled with something.

"You’re still running a fever. Do you feel alright?"

She took the vial and downed it in one pull. It was infinitely better than any tonic she’d drunk in Lunaris, and tasted like honey and cloves. Immediately her insides felt better.

"Thank you. I feel alright."

Aldric watched her set the empty vial down. "Forgive me, princess. You’re shaking. I can see it from here."

She glanced down. She was, in fact, shaking. Her body had been making decisions without informing her all week. This was the latest.

"You should take it easy today. Bed rest, fluids, nothing strenuous. Your body is—"

Blair cut him off. "I have her, Aldric. Go. The princess is in the most capable, most attractive hands in the Keep."

Aldric looked at Blair. Then at Guinevere. Then at the bed the king had slept in with the woman he was calling his fated mate.

He bowed again, this time shallower. "Very well, Your Highness. Mindlink me if she feels unwell." 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Mindlink. That answered that question. Given how coordinated they were last night, Guinevere assumed dragons mindlinked. But this confirmed it.

He left, closing the door behind him.

"Come on, Princess. Let’s get some air. You’ve been vertical for twelve minutes and I’m already bored."

Blair led her out of the private wing, through a larger corridor lined with tall arched windows overlooking Drakencrest.

The city was sprawled from the base of the mountain, rooftops catching the late morning sun. She had never seen a dragon city before. It was beautiful.

Then it happened. Her wolf spoke to her for the first time in her life.

Home.

Guinevere went very still.