Light Dragons 01 - Love in the Time of Dragons

was coming for me. You watched as I pined for him, pined for the love I would give my soul to have, and yet you bound me to you? Why?”
    “I love you,” he said, his eyes glowing with a strange golden light. “How could I let the one thing I love more than life itself go to a madman, a monster who would destroy our sept rather than let us live in peace?”
    I couldn’t look at him any longer. “You say you love me, and yet you ensured that I would spend the remainder of my days a shadow of what I could have been.”
    Constantine reached out for me, but let his hand drop before he could touch me. “You are merely confused, Ysolde, not truly in love.”
    “How do you know?” I lifted my head to glare at him. “How do you presume to know what’s in my heart? You won’t even listen to me! I told you that I loved him, Constantine, and you just told me he would rather see me dead than alive.”
    “You—” he started to say.
    “No,” I said, cutting him off with a sharp gesture. “I know my own mind and heart. I love Baltic. If he had asked me to be his mate, I would have accepted.”
    Baltic smiled, a slow, smug smile.
    “That doesn’t mean I’m not furious with your high-handed dealings,” I told him over my shoulder.
    His smile slipped a notch.
    “Even knowing what he is, knowing what he’s done to our people, to your own family, you would bind yourself to him?” Constantine asked, his voice reflecting the anger now in his eyes. “You would let him use your body, taint your soul?”
    I met his gaze, my own steady. “I would do what I could to bring calm to this troubled time.”
    “You swore fealty to me,” he answered.
    “What choice did I have?” I countered. “You deceived me!”
    He was silent for a moment, pain flickering across his face.
    “If only you had told me the truth,” I said softly, putting my hand on his arm. “I have great respect and affection for you, Constantine. You are a wonderful wyvern, and a generous, loving man. But much as I honor you as such, I would never have pledged myself to you if I had known the truth. You tricked me into becoming your mate simply to spite the man who holds my heart. How can I find happiness with you knowing that?”
    Baltic stepped forward. “Constantine Norka, by the laws governing the weyr, I challenge you by lusus naturalae for your mate, Ysolde de Bouchier.”
    Constantine and I both stared at him.
    “ Lusus what?” I asked.
    “ Naturalae . It has many meanings, but to dragonkin, it applies only to one thing—the ability to steal a mate,” Constantine answered, eyeing Baltic with palpable hostility.
    “It is not stealing if I win the challenge,” Baltic said, striding forward. At a gesture, all of his men but Kostya remained standing where they were. Likewise, Constantine nodded at his guard, who gestured the others back. The dragons spread out until they formed a loose circle, in the center of which the five of us stood. “Do you accept the challenge?”
    “I do,” Constantine said, his stance aggressive. “Ysolde is young and confused. She has not yet had time to adjust to our ways. I am convinced that with time, she will realize what a tragedy her life would have been if she spent it with you.”
    “I dislike being spoken of as if I weren’t standing an arm’s length from you,” I told him somewhat acidly. “I am not invisible, nor am I witless. This is my life you’re talking about, and I demand the right to have a say in it.”
    “You are female,” Constantine said abruptly. “You are young and inexperienced with the ways of dragons. You will allow me to decide what is best for you.”
    “I am the one who found her,” Baltic said arrogantly, swaggering forward until he stood a foot away from us. “I will decide what is best for her, and that is to become my mate.”
    “Does no one think it is a good idea for me to decide what’s best for me?” I asked.
    “No!” both wyverns said.
    I crossed my arms and looked daggers at both of them. “I think you’re both obnoxious. I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want either of you. I’ll take Kostya instead.”
    Kostya’s eyes widened in surprise and something that looked very much like dismay. “Er . . .”
    “Are you trying to make me jealous?” Baltic asked, irritation pulling at his lips.
    “No. If I were, I would do this.” I walked toward Kostya, but he evidently read the intention in my eyes because he backed away from me. I stopped, stomped my