Page 87 of Throne of Ice and Blood
Reaching up, he wraps a strong hand around my wrist and yanks my hand down from his chest. “This conversation is over.”
“No, it’s not. This is the third time now. First, you saved me when Jeb and Tommen attacked me in my room during theAtonement Trials. Then, you saved me again when I was about to be killed by a wolfbear out in the thorn forest. And now, right when I was about to get killed by a group of dragon shifters, you magically show up again.” I hold his gaze with dead serious eyes. “How did you know that I was in danger and where to find me?”
He releases my wrist and starts stalking away towards his bedroom.
“Don’t you dare walk away from me!” I scream at his back.
He just keeps walking.
“How did you find me?” I yell again.
He flexes his hand as he stalks away.
A snarl rips from my throat. Lurching forward, I close the short distance between us again and grab his arm. With all my strength, I yank on it, spinning him back around to face me.
“How did you know that I was in danger?” I shout at him again. “How did you know where I was?”
“Because you’re my mate!”
I jerk back as if his words had been a physical hit. Releasing his arm, I stagger a step back while the air seems to freeze in my lungs. My head is ringing. And everything else is unnaturally silent.
Draven stands there just one step in front of me. His chest heaves as if he has sprinted across half the continent. And the utter desperation on his face as he looks at me strangles what little air I had left in my lungs.
“What?” is all that makes it out of my mouth. It’s barely more than a broken whisper.
“You’re my mate.” Draven drags in an unsteady breath and then slowly shakes his head. “When Jeb and Tommen attacked you, when the wolfbear attacked you, when those four assholes attacked you tonight… I could feel your fear.”
“You can feel my emotions?”
“No, I can’t feel all your emotions. I can’t even feel all your fear. Right now, I can only feel the strongest of your emotions. Which is the sheer undiluted terror that comes when you’re about to die.”
My heart is beating so hard that I can barely even hear Draven over the loud pounding in my ears.
“That’s how I knew you were in danger,” he continues. “And where to find you.”
I stare back at him. I can’t remember if I have been breathing, so I drag in a deep breath. Apparently, I hadn’t breathed in a while because my lungs expand in relief. I force in another breath while the massive bells inside my skull continue clanging.
“Because I’m your mate,” I finish for him, the words coming out in a strangled whisper.
That pain and desperation flicker across Draven’s face for a moment. Then he repeats, so softly that my heart aches, “Because you’re my mate.”
Staggering another step back, I grip the dark grey armchair next to me for support. My fingers dig into the soft cushion as I force air into my lungs while my mind keeps spinning.
I know about the concept of fated mates. Two people who are destined to be with each other and who share a deeper connection than just normal love. Two souls drawn to each other in some epic bond. While I have never actually talked to a fae who has found their fated mate, both our race and dragon shifters have them. Though they’re much more common among the dragon shifters. And I had no idea that a cross-species connection was even possible.
And most importantly, Ihatethe concept of fated mates. Free will is too important to me. I hate the thought of someone else, some other power out in the universe, deciding who I can and can’t love.
“No,” I blurt out. It comes out as a desperate sob. “I’m not your mate! I don’t want to be your mate!”
Pure hurt pulses across Draven’s face. He swallows but says nothing.
And part of me knows that I should feel bad about that. Part of me knows that what I just said was cruel. But that part of me is currently suffocating underneath a tidal wave of utter panic and devastation.
All my life, I have lived by someone else’s rules. I have never had any freedom. For anything. I haven’t been allowed to choose my job or my clothes or where to live or even when to eat. Everything has been controlled by someone else. So the thought that someone else, some mystical power, has chosen who I’m supposed to love threatens to destroy me.
I can’t breathe. I want to rip my heart out of my chest. I want to bawl my eyes out.
After an entire lifetime of having no choices, no say in my own life, the knowledge that even my ability to choose who to love has been taken from me is going to break me.
