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Rune
Luke was as angry as I’d ever seen him. Even when he was battling against the wolves outside I hadn’t seen or felt this level of fury from him. He was nose to nose with one of the wolves and the dragon holding the dog had stepped away, ready to let Luke have at it. I also felt Luke’s frustration. We should have known a wolf clan or colony was so close to us.
I picked up Emily from the table she was laid out on after I untied her, and her head fell limp on my shoulder.
“Luke let’s go, we have to get her out of here,” I said and he took two heaving breaths before he ordered the warriors to take the three wolves as prisoners.
By the time we emerged from the bunker we saw that the injured dragon outside had made a call to the castle and trucks had been sent to pick us up. Getting to the castle was a blur, I was focused on Emily and hardly even wanted to lay her down in one of the SUV’s.
Luke and I stayed by Emily’s side until we got to the castle, where she was taken to her bedroom to be looked over by a physician. King Lucas, my father, as well as Fredrik called a meeting in the council room.
“We want report of what happened,” King Lucas said without any preamble, he was pissed and he had every right to be.
“Emily was actually kidnapped from the cabin. We made a search party and tracked her on foot. It turned out that she was taken by shifters...wolves,” I said and the news took a moment to settle in the room.
“You brought prisoners with you correct?” King Lucas asked and we nodded.
The three wolves were brought forth and forced to kneel in front of Lucas.
“Will you cooperate in being questioned?” my father asked them and the three shifter males actually nodded.
“Look we’re just a colony of canine shifters, we came over from Europe a few generations ago and were content in living amongst the humans mostly. Then we heard the rest of our race were organizing attacks against the dragons and our king wanted us to join in and help weaken your race. We found out about the cabin because we saw some of your kind go there a few times. We only wanted to ransack it, but then we found the woman there and we took her as bait. We knew someone would come after her. We just didn’t know how important she was or how many would come for her. You guys took out most of our colony.” Surprisingly the wolf was very forthcoming and told us everything we needed to know.
“What you gave her, is it harmful?”
“No, it’s just a solution they came up with back home, it stops shifting and if given in large enough doses can keep a shifter unconscious. What’s in her system should wear off in a few days. She’ll be fine.”
“Why are you being so forthcoming?” Fredrik asked the wolf and he shrugged.
“Self-preservation, we haven’t got much else right now. The king only reached out to us for a chance to be officially recognized as a wolf shifter colony. Since most of us are dead now we’ll mean nothing to him when word gets back,” he answered honestly and Fredrik snorted.
“Alright, send them to holding, we’ll question them further later,” Marx ordered, and then all eyes were on Luke and I.
“So who did Emily choose for a mate?” King Lucas asked.
Luke and I glanced at each other and hesitated.
“We are both bonded with Emily,” I answered eventually and the king was taken aback.
“Truly? How extraordinary, it’s so rare you will find a triangular bond. Not only are they bonded each with the princess, but they share what we call a brother bond,” Fredrik spoke up and I remembered something like that in our histories. It was good that the dragons would be coming together soon, there was so much of our history and culture that needed to be mended.
“So she would have a husband and lifelong consort...” King Lucas mused and Fredrik chuckled.
“It must have been an interesting night then,” he said and King Lucas gave him a bland look.
“Depending on Emily’s condition, we will ensue with a ceremony. Soon after she’ll be crowned. I hadn’t realized that she was ready to rule until we had that meeting with Helena the other day,” the king ended the meeting and we all, went to see what the physician had to say about Emily. He had just stepped out of her room and stopped short when he saw us.
“How is she?” Luke asked and the physicians disposition was positive.
“She is fine, sleeping at the moment, her mother is there with her. I recommend that she simply sleep off the serum that was administered. There have been no adverse effects that I have observed thus far, but once she wakes I will return to assess her.”
As soon as he stopped speaking Luke and I entered Emily’s room and found her tucked into bed, her mother sitting next to her.
“You both are idiots,” Queen Elise said when we saw her. “But you found her before they could do anything more damaging...so I have to thank you.”
“Queen Elise, we should have never left her and you’re right. But believe me, it won’t happen again,” Luke said and she sighed.
“I certainly hope so, considering what is ahead of her during her reign.”
We went to stand by Emily’s bed, Luke and I barely left the room until Emily woke up two days later. Her eyes were bright and alert and she looked at us both as if we were her favorite people in the world. Then her eyes swept the room and her expression became confused.