The Dragon of Cecil Court (The Treasure of Paragon Book 5) Read online

  Raven stumbled to the pile of garments. She held up the smallest of the sets. The tunic and wide-legged pants were black with embroidered flowers and colorful dragons. “This feels like silk.”

  “Vilt, I’m sure. Mommy dearest wouldn’t approve of anything less in her presence,” Tobias said.

  “What is this all about?” Raven asked. “I get why she took my power, but why dress us up if she plans to execute us?”

  Gabriel sighed. “Mother has always had a yen for the dramatic. She’ll want us looking our best for the Highborn Court before she beheads us.”

  Raven hadn’t heard the name Highborn Court before, but the meaning seemed clear enough. “You think she’ll execute us in front of the Paragonian aristocracy?”

  “Not just Paragonian,” Gabriel explained. “The Highborn Court is the wealthiest and most powerful families from the five kingdoms. Each of them also belongs to lesser courts in their own kingdoms, but the Highborns reign over them all. They are Eleanor’s greatest supporters, the ones who benefit the most from her keeping her hold over the five kingdoms and the most likely to want to maintain the status quo.”

  Tobias gathered a cobalt-colored tunic and black pants from the pile and began to dress. “She wants something more than our heads. Call it a hunch.”

  Gabriel swore under his breath. “I don’t know whether to hope you’re right or wrong. I’d like us all to live to see another day, but if she’s keeping us alive for a reason, her motives are surely nefarious.” He snatched up the remaining pair of black pants and the emerald tunic. After dressing quickly, he spread his wings and wrapped them around Raven to give her privacy while she changed.

  “Thank you,” she whispered. It was impossible to believe that she’d given birth only two days ago. She ran her fingers along the white scar that ran from her ribs to her hipbone when she removed her dress. Although she’d been magically healed, it looked like she’d been disemboweled using a dull shovel. On top of loose skin and the added weight of a recent pregnancy, her abdomen sagged and rolled like something out of a horror movie. Even healing magic couldn’t fix that. And her breasts hurt. Why did her breasts hurt? It wasn’t as if she needed to nurse the egg.

  “Beautiful,” Gabriel said.

  She raised her gaze to his and found nothing but warmth and more than a little male heat in his eyes. She pressed a kiss under his jaw, then dressed in the pants and hip-length tunic, which tied with a belt. There were no shoes provided. Well enough. The cool floor felt good in the hot room.

  “It’s best not to offer any information,” Gabriel whispered in her ear.

  She knew exactly what he meant. “I know.”

  A wave of heartbreak overcame her, and she swallowed the lump in her throat. He meant she couldn’t talk about the baby. Words did not need to be spoken for her to know that denying the egg’s existence was their best course of action right now. Aborella hadn’t seen the egg. She couldn’t prove Raven had given birth to a living heir. That meant silence was their best option, followed by a convincing lie that the pregnancy was unsuccessful. But she couldn’t stop her heart from aching. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

  He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her temple. “Someday things will be as they should be.”

  She met his gaze, hers misty with unshed tears, and knew in her heart that if he had any say in it, they would be.

  Four guards returned, opening the cell door and ordering them to follow. Without another word, they ushered them down a lengthy stretch of hall and then up, up, up a round staircase. As far as she could tell, they were three stories underground. Raven was relieved when the air grew cooler as they ascended.

  She didn’t miss how Gabriel and Tobias surrounded her, placing their bodies between her and the weapons hanging from the guards’ hips. It was sweet how they protected her, not that it would matter in the end. If the empress wanted them dead, they’d be dead. Every single one of them. And without her magic, there was nothing she could do about it.

  Finally the guards unlocked a door that opened into the palace proper and led them down another polished obsidian hall to a dining room that rivaled anything from Raven’s experience or her imagination. The table was made of a single slab of deep red wood with an odd zigzagging grain that was both exotic and beautiful. The plates glittered solid gold, surrounded by silverware inset with multicolored jewels. At the center of the table, silver candelabra with white candles flickered in the soft light. Everything seemed to sparkle.

  Somehow the combination, worth hundreds of thousands in the human world, came across as gaudy in this one. It was too much. Although she knew the glitz was real, there was so much of it that it looked fake. Along with the polished obsidian walls and the fire blazing in the gilded fireplace, it reminded Raven of a pirate’s banquet, just over the top enough to look like it was a set created by a Hollywood studio rather than an actual dining room.

  The guards who’d led them to the room gestured toward the table. “The empress requests that you wait here. Dinner will commence momentarily.”

  The four guards retreated through the side door.

  As soon as they were gone, Gabriel rushed after them, but the door was locked. They weren’t going anywhere. “Any ideas, Tobias? You were always the smart one, after all.”

  Tobias swaggered to the table and pulled out a chair. “We aren’t getting out of here without playing Mother’s game. My recommendation is that you choose a pawn.”

  Raven selected the chair across from him. Gabriel sat down beside her.

  A chime rang and a voice announced, “All hail Eleanor, Empress of Paragon.”

  The door they’d entered through opened again. Two guards stood at attention as Gabriel and Tobias’s mother walked in. She’d changed into a black gown with a full skirt and long puffed sleeves. Tall and dark, she stood ramrod straight, her perfect skin stretched over the sharp angles of her fine, delicate bones. The massive citrine jewel on her finger pulsed with magic Raven could feel across the room. She was undeniably beautiful but in the way of a wasp. Everything about her came across as deadly and cruel.

  She strode to the head of the table. “It is customary to rise in the presence of the empress.”

  Gabriel glared at her. “What about when the empress is your homicidal mother?”

  Eleanor raised her chin and turned toward her guards. “Leave us.”

  Once the guards were gone, Tobias confronted her. “What do you want, Mother?” he asked in a tone dripping with annoyance. “If you intend to do to us what you did to Marius, you don’t need to feed us first.”

  “You always were so impatient.” She glowered at Tobias. “Even as a child. You could never wait for the end of the story. Always with the questions. Always with another book in your hands.”

  Gabriel crossed his arms. “Is that why you had Aborella bring us here? To reminisce about Tobias’s reading habits?”

  Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “No.” She placed her hands on the back of the chair in front of her. “Believe me, had I wanted you dead, you would be. No, my children, all this time I’ve simply wanted you back.”

  Raven exchanged glances with Gabriel and Tobias. Thank the Mountain, they didn’t seem to be buying it any more than she was. She placed her hand on Gabriel’s thigh under the table and offered her support with a squeeze.

  “Why?” Gabriel’s voice sounded positively lethal. Every hair on the back of Raven’s neck rose to attention.

  Eleanor gazed down her nose at them. “Rebels are organizing. They call themselves the Defenders of the Goddess. We call them DOGs. My spies tell me each of the five realms has contributed to their membership. The basis of their objection to my rule is that they believe I murdered all of you and my claim to the throne is therefore illegitimate. You are going to show them they’re wrong. By supporting me, your mother and your empress, you are going to prove to them not only that you are alive but that you approve of my reign.”

  Gabriel shook his head. “W
hy, by the Mountain, would we ever do that?”

  She met his eyes with an unflinching stare. “Because if you don’t, I will kill Raven, Gabriel. Why do you think her mortality was a priority?”

  Gabriel clenched the edge of the table until his fingers turned white, his talons stretching from his knuckles.

  “Don’t. It won’t help anything,” Raven whispered.

  “Listen to your mate,” the empress said. “I can send Aborella to Earth to track down your young if Raven’s life isn’t enough of a motivation.” She glared at Raven, whose breath hitched. “Yes, I know about the egg. Aborella is a seer, Raven, and a powerful sorceress. If I choose to send her, how long do you think it will take her to find your child? And if you and my sons don’t return to the fold and play your parts, she will destroy it, your sister, and your family.”

  Raven’s chest ached to the point she was sure her heart had stopped. Eleanor wasn’t bluffing. Aborella would do it, and she was helpless to stop her. The smug look on the empress’s face told her everything she needed to know. She would find her child. And she would use threats of violence against her baby or Raven to make them crawl on their knees if she wanted them to. And Avery, poor Avery. Her sister would defend her niece or nephew with her life, without a doubt. Raven couldn’t risk Eleanor going after her.

  Gabriel considered her, painfully remorseful. They both understood they had no choice. “What do you want us to do?”

  The empress selected a bell from beside her plate and rang it longer than was necessary. A team of darkly clad servants swept into the room, one pulling out Eleanor’s chair for her so she could sit down. The others swarmed the table with covered trays. Domes in hand, they left the room as fast as they’d come in, leaving behind a bounty of food, none of which Raven recognized. Their glasses were filled with water and wine.

  “You ask what you can do,” the empress said, running her nail along the lip of her glass. “For now I want you to eat. The rest you will learn soon enough.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Mistwood

  Clarissa didn’t see much of Nathaniel for the rest of the day. After a quick breakfast of her orange and some porridge that, to her surprise, was left for her in the kitchen by one of the oreads, she wandered the estate. Remarkably little had changed since she was last here.

  Including what had once been her favorite room.

  Over the centuries, Nathaniel had been a generous patron of the arts. She’d once called him her muse, but she certainly wasn’t the only one he’d inspired. The gallery room contained the results of those relationships. Master painters, sculptors, composers, and musicians like her had gifted Nathaniel works over the years in gratitude for what he’d done for them either with magic or with money.

  Mozart was once a member of the Order of the Dragon, and Nathaniel had on the wall a framed short composition by the man. There were works by Boucher, Goya, Blake, Gauguin, even one by Cézanne that always took her breath away. There was a Salvador Dalí she was sure few others had ever seen. Sculptures by Slodtz and Carpeaux, including a haunting one of Nathaniel himself as a faun, wings out and with cloven hooves. She’d always hated that one. It made him look like the devil.

  She’d forgotten how many originals he’d amassed. Each one represented a friendship, a person in whom Nathaniel had recognized raw talent and fostered generously. Clarissa used to think it represented the best of him. Certainly she had firsthand experience with his eye for talent and his generous heart. He’d plucked her out of total obscurity, hired her the finest voice coach money could buy, introduced her to the order and taught her to use her magic, and funded her first demo recordings. She owed him so much.

  But there was a reason she hadn’t sent him her first platinum record to hang on the wall. She’d lived here a year before she realized the significance of this room, and it was one of the reasons she’d chosen to leave.

  She’d loved Nathaniel and he, to this day, had been the only one to ever make her feel loved in return. He’d wanted to mate with her, bond with her, marry her. He wanted her, permanently.

  And she’d wanted to spread her wings. The studio had made her an offer no new artist could refuse. When she tried to talk to Nathaniel about it, he pressured her to accept the bond. That’s when this room took on another meaning. Dragons collected things. Nathaniel wanted to collect her. Had she stayed, she’d be his bird in a gilded cage.

  Her phone buzzed in her pocket and she took a peek. Tom. Again. She’d put him off all day. She fired off a hasty text.

  Can’t speak. Resting the vocal cords. Procedure tomorrow.

  Do you know the trouble you’ve caused? Everything’s on fire.

  Tell them all I have a rare acute infection. Refund their money. Handle it. This is your job.

  They want pictures. They want to hear it from you. Rumors are flying. Have you logged on to Twitter? It’s a social media shit storm!

  Gotta go. Doctor wants to see me.

  She turned off her phone. This was only going to get worse.

  Her stomach rumbled. She desperately wanted an omelet like the ones Nathaniel used to make her, with ham and vegetables and that cheese he imported from a village in France. She left the gallery with its complicated memories and jogged down to the kitchen.

  She laughed when she caught her reflection in the stainless steel fridge. Thank God the paparazzi couldn’t find her here. She’d dressed in her sweats and a T-shirt again and pulled her hair into a messy bun. Her face was washed, but she hadn’t bothered with makeup. She’d turned thirty that year, ancient by pop-star standards, and the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and around her mouth were growing more pronounced by the minute.

  Aging did not go well with celebrity. Without her magic voice, she couldn’t even hide the lines under an illusion.

  “Indifferent,” she said to her reflection. The word echoed through her head. Nathaniel was indifferent about her now. There was no longer any risk of him wanting to collect her. Even dragons, it seemed, liked younger women.

  The frying pan was exactly where it had been before, and she placed it on the burner of the Viking range before digging in the fridge for the ingredients she needed. Eggs, milk, black pudding, lardoons, tiny sweet tomatoes… She opened all the drawers in the refrigerator but couldn’t find the cheese.

  She whirled when she heard footsteps behind her, then froze when she saw Nathaniel. There was no hiding what she was doing. Her arms were loaded.

  “Busted,” she said guiltily.

  Nathaniel swaggered into the kitchen like sin personified in a pair of jeans that should have been a registered weapon and a tailored shirt and sport jacket. The light in the room seemed to grow darker with his presence. Not in a bad way. More like he brought the twilight with him. Everything went velvety and smooth jazz. If she glanced up, she might see stars.

  “I can get Laurel to make you something,” he said, glancing at the heap of goods in her arms. Fuck, he barely glanced at her face, instead frowning at the load. He really was indifferent. She bent over and ungracefully emptied her arms onto the counter.

  “I’m craving one of your classic omelets.” She didn’t want to say it out loud, but the oreads never got it quite right. “I can make it.”

  His brows knit. “Then you’ll need some Époisses de Bourgogne. There’s a new wheel of it in the cupboard.” He stormed over to the pantry and returned with the cheese. “Do you remember how to make it?” His expression turned stern. “Bother, I’d better do it. I have standards to uphold, and you always go overboard with the cheese.”

  “You can never use too much cheese.”

  She could have cried from joy as he pulled out the cutting board and drew a knife from the block. He started dicing vegetables like a veritable expert. She climbed onto the stool at the kitchen island and rested her head in her hands. She’d always loved to watch him cook.

  “Would you care for wine?” he asked. “I recommend champagne or a sauvignon blanc with the eggs.”


  “I like red.”

  He raised an eyebrow in her direction. When he spoke, she sensed a tiny bit of venom in his tone. “Far be it from me to come between you and your every fleeting fancy.”

  Odd, she felt a flutter in her chest that she’d spurred that bit of anger in him. Anger wasn’t indifference. She climbed down from her stool and found the wine in the wine cellar off the kitchen, exactly where it had been ten years ago. She selected a bottle. When she returned to the kitchen, she retrieved the corkscrew from the drawer where he kept it without even looking and popped the cork.

  He scoffed. “It’s like you never left.” More bitterness. “I should have rearranged the kitchen.”

  “It’s a perfectly appointed kitchen. Don’t change anything just to spite me.” She took down two wineglasses and poured the wine, then slid one over to him.

  He took an unceremonious and rather large gulp. “There’s a strange and uncomfortable déjà vu about this, don’t you think,” he said gruffly.

  She sipped a bit of wine. “I don’t know, it seems vastly different to me.” She chided herself as soon as the words were out of her mouth. This was not the time for soul-baring honesty.

  “How do you mean?” He glanced back at her, his face impassive.

  She raised her eyebrows. “I’m older. More wrinkles. Less energy.”

  He didn’t say anything but glanced at her quizzically.

  “I have my own money, my independence. Yes, I need your help, but when I leave here, I do have a nest egg to fall back on.”

  He frowned, his spatula working overtime in the pan. “Are you sure that’s true?”

  “About the nest egg? Yes. Four double-platinum albums in ten years will do that for you. Plus you know me, I’ve always been careful with money.”

  “But why do you think you weren’t independent when you lived with me?”

  She snorted derisively. “I was barely twenty when I met you. I couldn’t even drink legally in the States. I was literally singing for my supper in the tubes every evening. I slept in hostels half the time and on the couches of friends the other half. I use the term friends here very loosely.”