Chapter twenty-nine

Lucian’s POV

She looked so guarded and I knew it was my fault.

Tessa sat at the dinner table in a short, emerald green dress, sipping a glass of wine from the ancient’s wine cellar.

My father kept all the expensive wine, and I was getting worried about my mate.

She wasn’t used to this type of wine.

Dragon’s wine was brewed specially for dragons. Because dragons had thick skin, it takes them three times as long to get drunk and feel the kick of alcohol from normal wine.

This wine was from the ancients, a goblet of wine could allow any human or wolf, to pass out from the kick of alcohol.

Tessa was on her third goblet and already laughing around the table with my father, his advisors, his little tramp, and Samantha.

Samantha.

She was old news. When I’d ran for it at sixteen, the first year was very difficult because Samantha was supposed to be my SoulDragon. Or, to put it simply, my dragon mate.

As I grew, the dragon side of me faded away slowly until I was left with the dragon voice. My dragon, Rialbi (meaning Dragon Lord), grew into the voice of my wolf and at the age of eighteen, both species merged into one.

Through the merge, I was paralyzed for three days in the two-week merge and I couldn’t move.

After the merge, my wolf had dominated my mental capacity, and the two species had made an agreement.

My dragon stayed with me, but in the shape of a giant wolf and over the years had imprinted scales on the body of the wolf.

Back to the story, Samantha had been my dragon mate, but no longer was she. Because the wolf dominated, I chose to carry out my life as an Alpha of a pack I built with my bare hands, but being a wolf meant having a mate.

I remembered the first day I’d seen my mother after the final merge at eighteen.

“Mom, I don’t want you to send me a mate,” I told her in a serious voice.

She looked at me as if I’d gone delusional.

“Lucian, you are wolf now, and being wolf means following wolf ways. You might be my son, but that does not change the tradition. You will have a mate. I know who she is right now, but the time will come.” She said, standing up. My mother might look so beautiful, but she had a voice that shook mountains.

“I don’t want to hurt her,” I said as she went to the window of the castle.

“What do you mean hurt her?” she said, looking over her shoulder at me.

“Maxwell will be looking for me and I don’t want someone I love to be hurt by him or any other pack. There’s going to be blood spilled mom, lots of it over claiming land. I don’t want the blood of my mate and pups on my hands,” I said and sighed in defeat. I put all emotion into one word with a beg.

“Please,” I said softly.

She’d agreed. Told me that she’d face the wrath of the wolf council when they’d realized that one of the Alpha’s hadn’t received their mate.

But I guess she has a reason behind it all. Sent me my beautiful mate and I swore to protect her if it would be the death of me.

She glowed in the dim chandler light but seeing her beyond tipsy made me slightly uneasy to the stomach. It made me see red.

Clearing my throat, I pushed away from the table and stood up, adjusting my tie.

“I and Tessa should be heading back to our room now. Got an eventful day tomorrow. Don’t we darling?” I said, gritting my teeth at the end.

Her eyes sobered up and she knew instantly that I was serious.

“I guess we do. Thank you all for the wonderful evening.” She said and wrapped her arm around mine.

Everyone mumbled their good night’s and as soon as we entered the hallway, she looked up at me with big eyes.

“Why are you cross with me?” She slurred slightly and stumbled little. I helped her straighten and decided to just pick her up and throw her over my shoulder.

“I told you to take it easy with the wine,” I told her bitterly and she shifted slightly until she was comfortable, her head hanging behind me lazily.

“It wasn’t even that much,” she argued and sighed softly.

“I’m sorry, Lucian,” She said, and my footsteps echoed on the stone flooring.

“It’s okay Tessa. This is not your little dog's play place back home. This is real life. Dangerous people lurk this side of the world, dragons are sly at incapacitating their next prey,” I told her and found the door to our room.

I unlocked it and slipped in.

I dropped her on the bed and took her shoes off. She instantly curled into a little ball and closed her eyes. Her soft snores weren’t far behind and I knew she was sleeping.

I made sure the door was locked and took a quick scan of the room.

It looked exactly the same as I’d left it. Odd stones that I found as a kid lined the shelves in the display case and all my notebooks from my teen years were still stashed in the wooden drawers of the desk.

I looked at the desk and sat down in the chair that had been too big for me as a young teen. Now, it fitted me like a glove.

I pulled out a notebook, the last one I’d written in before leaving.

I flipped open the book to my last entry, the night I’d left.

03 March 2002

I leave tonight, they’ll be looking for me but where I’m going, they won’t find me. He won’t find me.

Father hit me again today. Gave me another blue eye and a cut behind my shoulder. Hurts like hell but I’ll manage my escape, I’ve been planning it for years now.

Mom will be overjoyed to have me there for a year. My wolf is slowly coming back now and I’m getting a little scared because, in two years, the dragon and wolf living inside of me will fight for dominance.

I hope my wolf wins. He’s strong and powerful. I don’t want to come back. But if my dragon wins, I’ll be forced to come here, live under the dragon laws.

I don’t want that.

Anyways, the castle is asleep now. It’s time to move. I’ll be back. I know I will. But not anytime soon.

Lucian Blackstone.

I fought a wave of tears and slammed the book closed. I got up and pushed away from the big desk.

I stripped down to my boxers and slid in bed next to Tessa. Maybe it was safer if she didn’t know what went on before I was a wolf.

I kissed her forehead and allowed her soft breathing to be my lullaby.