Dawn of Cobalt Shadows (Burning Empire Book 2) by Emma Hamm (free novels to read TXT) 📗

“I want to.”

“Don’t. I already know, habib albi.”

The words were Bymerian. She didn’t recognize them, and didn’t think she’d ever heard another Bymerian say them before.

Picking her head up from his shoulders, she quietly asked, “What does that mean?”

He didn’t reply. Instead, Nadir reached up, stroking a thumb along her jaw. He moved up and touched a gentle finger to her furrowed brows. The wrinkles eased under his touch as he smoothed the worry and fear away.

“Ya hayati,” he whispered, touching a fingertip to her lips. “Ya amar.”

“Nadir.”

He smoothed his hand along her jaw, tunneling beneath her hair. His other hand at her hip pushed her forward. He pulled her into him and slowly pressed his lips to hers.

She sank into his kiss, remembering a time when they hadn’t worried about war or violence. They’d only worried about each other and what they might think. His tongue traced her lips, and she allowed him to delve into her mouth while feeling as though he were sinking into her soul.

Sigrid had always wanted a man who would challenge her as a husband. She hadn’t wanted the sweet man who’d died at the altar for her. The one who would have worshiped her steps and whispered sweet nothings in her ear.

She’d searched her entire life for this man. A monster who would devour her, body and soul. The one who would choose to tear her apart, only to stitch her back together exactly as she was, because he wouldn’t change a thing about her person.

But he was also the one she couldn’t have. The forbidden fruit who lived in a kingdom which hated hers. The sultan of a people who wanted to see her own destroyed. The man who hated what they were, but loved her with every fiber of his being.

Her claws dug into his shoulders as she kissed him back with all the emotion in her heart. She loved him. She loved this man so much it hurt sometimes. An ache that never left her chest, no matter how long she was away from his side.

The fires of his soul burned inside her. Perhaps, in the year they’d been apart, that fire had dimmed to an ember, but it had never gone out.

She feared it never would.

They broke apart, and Sigrid took a deep breath. “I fear your love will render me to ashes.”

He leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers once more. A chaste kiss, one that tasted like tears. “A dragon cannot burn.”

And yet, she feared she could.

The world was not prepared for them. It never had been. And if her time with the ancient’s had taught her anything, it was that the world had no place for creatures like them. They were from a time long past...

Sigrid didn’t know what the future held, and she wasn’t certain she wanted to find out.

She reached up and placed a hand against Nadir’s face. “I’m afraid of what we might do,” she whispered. “I’m afraid of what will happen if we go back to Wildewyn.”

“So am I.”

“Then why would you give up being a man? Why would you even think about letting the dragon take control?”

He pulled her forward again, this time pressing their foreheads together. She felt him take a deep breath, his ribs touching hers. “I told my mother, the one who birthed me, the leader of the Alqatara, that I would become a god king. That I would lead my people out of the darkness and into a new time.”

She licked her lips. “The ancients said there was a prophecy. Of a dragon coming back and saving everyone.”

“Then maybe this is the prophecy. Maybe now is the time when we take our place in this world and becomes gods after all. You’ve said it before. We have no place here when all other Beastkin are simple beasts. We are immortals who are supposed to be dead and yet, we live.”

“I don’t want to be a god.”

“Neither do I, my love. I just don’t think we really have a choice in the matter.”

This was the man she knew. The longer he talked the more his voice deepened and the honeyed tones of the man she loved disappeared in the wake of a dragon.

His was the crumbling of mountains. The deep burble of a frozen lake and the thundering call of an oak as it fell. The man she loved, the one she knew in the very bottom of her soul, had disappeared.

Sigrid pulled back to stare into those slitted eyes. “Are you going to give him back to me?”

Nadir, or the dragon that was inside him, shook its head sadly. “I don’t know how.”

“You should be one and the same.”

“We are,” the graveling voice responded. “In a way. He is within me, part of me, but he is not the dragon and I am not the man.”

She remembered the creatures within the ancient stronghold. Half man, half beast, stuck between the change forever because of… something.

Why hadn’t she learned?

Someone scrabbled at the door, working through the lock with a small tool. Nadir tensed between her thighs, but Sigrid held him down as she scented the air. The smell of frozen water made her smooth her hands over his shoulders.

“It’s Eivor,” she whispered.

“The beast you brought with you?”

“The woman who can help you,” she replied. “She’s part beast, part human. She speaks with souls, or at least, she thinks she does. We can help bring the two of you back together. It doesn’t have to be a fight for control.”

“It does,” he replied. “And I’m sorry for it.”

With a swift movement, Nadir scooped his arms under her bottom and stood. She’d never had a man pick her up so easily. Sigrid held onto his shoulders, only releasing them when he strode out of the pool and set her down.

“What are you going to do?” she asked, her eyes remaining fixed on his face and refusing to traverse his body as water dripped