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None of us had.

Her face holds me. I can't seem to stop looking. Her hair is spread across the pillow, long and dark blonde and tangled with melting snow. Her features are delicate, but her chin is stubborn even in sleep. Color is starting to creep back into her cheeks. Her lips are soft and parted.

I want to know her name.

And what her voice sounds like when she isn't screaming for help. What makes her laugh. What makes her angry. Where she was going, and why she was going there alone, and who let her.

The wanting is so strong it unsettles me. Almost as much as my dragon does.

Rhydian leans forward suddenly. He breathes in, slow and deliberate, and then goes very still, before inhaling slowly again.

"Zarek…" he says quietly.

"I know."

"She's in heat."

"I know."

"Her first one, I think." He swallows. "Gods help us. It's her first."

I'd known since the ridge. Some part of me had known. But hearing him say it out loud is like having a torch dropped into a barrel of oil.

My dragon surges up so hard I nearly double over.

It doesn't want to sit on the edge of the bed and watch her sleep. It wants to wake her. It wants to drag those blankets off her and bury myself inside her and fuck her until she's heavy with my child. It wants to mark her, claim her, make certain every creature on this mountain knows exactly who she belongs to.

My hands curl into fists on my knees.

No.

Her scent is everywhere now. It's soaked into the blankets. It's in the air. Warm and sweet and maddening, and every time I draw it in, my control slips another notch.

By the fireplace, Kaelen has started pacing. Three strides one way, three strides back. His fists are clenched, and his shoulders are rigid, and every time he turns, his eyes flash gold.

"Kaelen," I say.

"I'm fine."

He isn't. His dragon has always been closer to the surface than mine or Rhydian's, and it's been getting worse every year that’s passed where we haven’t found our mate. If this is tearing at me, I can only imagine what it's doing to him.

Rhydian tries to smile. "Well. This is going to be fun."

Nobody laughs.

"Can't even manage a pity chuckle?" he asks. "I'm dying over here."

"You're not the only one," Kaelen growls.

Rhydian's smile slips. He drags a hand through his copper-colored hair, and I can see his jaw working. He's hurting just as much as we are. He's just better at hiding it.

I make myself stand up. I put distance between my body and hers, though it feels like tearing something inside of me.

"Listen to me," I say. "Both of you."

They look at me.

"She's our mate. We all know that. Our dragons know it. But that doesn't give us the right to claim her."