A princess is a product. A beautiful, well-bred mare to be paraded before the finest stallions, her worth measured in the weight of the titles and lands she can secure. Tysha had learned this lesson at her mother's knee, and she had perfected it.
She stood on the sun-drenched terrace, a vision of maidenly grace in a gown of pale rose silk, a perfect smile pinned to her lips. Before her, the Duke of Stonehelm was pontificating about his prized war-hawks, his jowls quivering with self-importance. He was a fat, sweating man, old enough to be her grandfather, with a laugh that sounded like a pig rooting for truffles.
And he was her mother's latest, greatest ambition.
"Such a fascinating creature, the gyrfalcon," Tysha said, her voice a soft, musical chime. She widened her eyes, a trick she'd perfected, to feign a rapt, girlish interest. Gods, he smells of stale wine and regret.
"Indeed, Your Highness!" the Duke boomed, preening under her attention. "A bird of noble blood, you see! Like your own fine House. It takes a firm hand, a will of iron, to master such a beast."
Her mother, Queen Sirenyth, placed a delicate hand on the Duke's arm, her own smile a masterpiece of hopeful desperation. "My Tysha has always had a way with beasts, Your Grace. Her own dragon, Lunthyss, is utterly devoted to her. She has a gentle but firm hand."
A firm hand, yes, Tysha thought, her smile never faltering. Firm enough to wrap around your fat throat and squeeze. She wanted to laugh at the absurdity, the sheer, clumsy transparency of her mother's maneuvering. The Belly Queen, the court called her, and it was apt. All her plans were born of a desperate, grasping hunger.
Tysha had her own plans. Grand, intricate, beautiful plans that made her mother's ambitions look like a child's game played with pebbles. The Duke of Stonehelm was not the prize. He was a pawn. A large, ugly, useful pawn.
"A woman who can command a dragon can surely command the heart of a great man," the Duke said, his piggy eyes roaming over her, a slow, greasy appraisal that made her skin crawl. He was imagining her in his bed. The thought was so vile it was almost amusing.
"You flatter me, Your Grace," Tysha said, dipping into a perfect, graceful curtsy. She let her gaze linger on his for a fraction of a second, a silent, false promise. "A princess only hopes to be a worthy companion to a man of substance."
It was the perfect line. Vague, respectful, and utterly meaningless. The Duke puffed up his chest, thoroughly charmed. Her mother beamed.
The performance was over. Tysha felt a familiar, suffocating claustrophobia. The smiles, the silks, the endless, cloying dance of the court. Sometimes, it felt like it would swallow her whole. She needed air. She needed… something else. A different kind of power. A different kind of release.
"Mother, Your Grace," she said, her voice still the perfect melody of a dutiful daughter. "If you will excuse me. I promised Lunthyss a flight before sundown. She grows so restless if I neglect her."
"Of course, my dear," her mother purred, already seeing the ducal coronet on Tysha's head. "Do not let us keep you."
Tysha gave them one last, dazzling smile, a final curtsy, and turned, walking away with a grace she did not feel. She did not run. A princess never runs. But every step was a flight from the cage they were so determined to build around her.
***
Her dragon's roost was her only true sanctuary in this palace of lies. It was a smaller, more isolated cavern than the main Roost, set high on the western cliff face, accessible only by a winding, private stair. The air here was clean and sharp, tasting of salt from the sea below and the faint, metallic scent of her dragon.
Lunthyss was a creature of moonlight and shadows. Her scales were the color of polished silver, her wings tipped in obsidian that drank the light. She was not a beast of fire and fury like her half-brother Roen's brute. She was a silent hunter, a ghost of the sky. She was beautiful, and she was a killer.
Like me, Tysha thought, a flicker of genuine affection warming her as the dragon uncoiled her long, elegant neck and nudged her head against Tysha's shoulder. The touch was gentle, the massive head a comforting weight. Lunthyss's presence was a shield, a silent, powerful guardian against the ugliness of the world below.
She stroked the dragon's sleek, cool scales, her carefully constructed mask of the perfect princess finally falling away. Here, she did not have to smile. She did not have to pretend.
"He was a pig, my love," she murmured into the dragon's ear. "A fat, grunting pig who thinks a title makes him a king."
Lunthyss let out a low, rumbling purr, a sound of perfect, reptilian agreement.
"He is not the one," she continued, her voice a low, fierce whisper. "But he will serve his purpose."
A soft footstep on the stone behind her did not startle her. She had been expecting him.
"Speaking of ugly beasts with titles."
Lord Valerius Whitlock stepped out from behind a pillar of rock, a shadow detaching itself from the greater gloom. He was older than her father, his dark hair streaked with silver, his face a grim, unsmiling mask. He was not a handsome man. But he was the Lord of the second most powerful house in the kingdom. And he possessed a quiet, unnerving stillness that she found far more compelling than the boorish posturing of younger men.
"Your Highness," he said, his voice a low, gravelly thing. "Playing with your pet."
"She is not a pet, my lord," Tysha replied, not turning to face him. "She is a queen. She simply allows me to share her throne."
"A dangerous sentiment for a princess," he observed, coming to stand beside her. He did not look at her. He looked at the dragon. "It breeds ambition."
"Ambition is the only thing that keeps us alive in this court," she countered, finally turning her head, her green-blue eyes meeting his dark, unreadable ones.
The air between them crackled with a familiar, dangerous energy. This was their game. A different kind of game than the one she played with her mother. This one was sharper. More honest, in its own perverse way.
He reached out, his hand, surprisingly gentle for a man of his age and station, and cupped her chin. He tilted her face up to his. "You smell of desperation," he said, his voice a low murmur. "Your mother's, or your own?"
"I smell of roses and duty," she shot back, her voice laced with ice. "As all good princesses should."
A faint, humorless smile touched his lips. "I prefer the scent of a woman who knows what she wants."
His thumb stroked her jawline, a slow, possessive gesture. The sensual tension that always hummed between them coiled tight in her belly. This was not about love. It was not even about lust, not really. It was about power. About a secret they shared. About the brief, intoxicating release from the gilded cage she was forced to inhabit.
She leaned into his touch, her eyes half-closing. "And what is it you think I want, Lord Whitlock?"
"The same thing I want," he whispered, his voice a rough caress. "Everything."
He did not kiss her. That was not their way. He was a man of specific tastes, and she was a princess who understood the value of control. Instead, he led her to the back of the cavern, to a small alcove hidden from the main entrance by the massive, silver curve of Lunthyss's sleeping body. The dragon was her shield. Her accomplice. Her silent, scaly chaperone.
Here, in the shadows, he knelt before her.
He did not speak. He simply looked up at her, his dark eyes burning with a hunger that was not for her heart or her mind, but for the raw, defiant power she represented. He was a lord, but she was a princess of the blood, a dragon rider. Here, in this one, specific act, she was the one in command.
His hands found the hem of her rose-colored silk gown. He gathered the fabric, his movements slow, deliberate, almost reverent, as he pushed it up, past her knees, past her thighs. The cool cavern air was a shock against her bare skin.
She stood still, her back pressed against the cold stone, her hands resting on his shoulders. She watched his face as his gaze fell upon the dark curls at the juncture of her thighs. A flicker of raw, possessive hunger in his eyes.
He leaned in, his silver-streaked head disappearing beneath the folds of her dress. His breath was hot against her skin, a prelude to the pleasure he was about to give.
And then his mouth was on her.
A sharp, electric shock of pure sensation shot through her. His tongue was skilled, insistent, a masterful instrument of pleasure. He licked and teased and tasted her, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of her thighs, holding her in place.
Tysha gasped, her head falling back against the stone wall. The carefully constructed mask of the perfect princess shattered into a thousand pieces. The cynical, calculating mind fell silent. There was only this. This raw, undeniable, physical reality.
It was not love. It was a reclaiming of her own body, a violent, carnal protest against the men who sought to own her, to use her as a broodmare for their own ambitions. The Duke of Stonehelm wanted her womb. Lord Whitlock, here, now, wanted only her pleasure.
A low moan escaped her lips, a sound of pure, unadulterated release. Her fingers tangled in his hair, her nails scraping against his scalp. Her hips began to move, a slow, instinctive rhythm against his mouth.
He drank her in, his hunger insatiable. He devoured her cries, his tongue a relentless, wicked thing. She was a storm, and he was the earth, taking all she had to give.
The pleasure built, a tight, coiling knot in her belly, until she could think of nothing else. It was a fire, burning away the lies, the silks, the suffocating weight of her own ambition.
She arched her back, a final, guttural cry torn from her throat, as the release, when it came, shattered through her, a wave of pure, white-hot bliss. She shuddered, her body trembling in the aftermath, her legs weak.
He stayed there for a long moment, his head resting against her thigh, as if in worship. Then, slowly, he rose to his feet.
He looked at her, his face grim, his eyes burning with a dark, possessive fire. He was a man who had just tasted a queen.
She looked back at him, her breath still ragged, her body still humming with the aftershocks of her release. The princess was gone. In her place was a woman who knew the taste of power, in all its forms.
He reached out and gently wiped a stray tear from her cheek with his thumb. A tear of pleasure, or of rage, she did not know.
"One day, Tysha," he said, his voice a low, chilling promise that was also a prophecy. "It will not be a Duke's coronet on your head."
He took a step back, melting into the shadows of the cavern.
"It will be a crown."