Free Blood of the Wolf by Brynn Paulin

help your temperature adjustment. Your body will soon acclimate, and you’ll be quite comfortable here.”
    That gave her pause. It certainly didn’t sound as if he planned to kill her. At least, not right away.
    “Why am I here?” she repeated.
    Tawren sighed and crossed to an armoire she hadn’t seen before. He opened it and withdrew a bulky, crimson-colored dress. She eyed it. It had to be several layers of thick velvet and she wondered how it would feel if she put it on. Warmer than the thin button-down she wore now. She didn’t want to remove this shirt. It smelled of Lucan, and was all she had of him.
    “I’m claiming you,” Tawren answered.
    “Like hell.”
    “I’ll make it like heaven. Far better than that Dragon could have provided.”
    “ That Dragon was my husband,” she spat.
    Tawren shook his head. “Strange. You don’t bear the mark of a mate. I checked.”
    What the hell? She drew the shirt closer to her, and backed further away. What had he done to her?
    “On your arm,” he clarified as if she were a small, stupid child. “You know nothing of Dragon mates?” He laughed. “How amusing.”
    His eyes started to glow blue and terror strung through her. This was the look of a killer. He’d eliminate her as he had Lucan. Once more, sorrow hollowed her out. Lucan was dead. Again. Wrenched from her life when she’d only just regained him. Now, she’d be killed, too. At least, she’d find her ending with the man she’d always loved.
    Tawren shot out his arm and a stream of dark-blue light shot out. It wrapped around her, cold but not painful. It pulled her back in his direction and propelled her onto the settee where she’d awoken. His other hand lifted and a separate bit of power pulled one of the pelts around her.
    He took a seat across from her and crossed one leg over the other, his eyes going back to their normal dark color.
    She forced back her mournful tears, knowing she’d cry plenty as soon as she was alone—if she lived. She wouldn’t give this man, Djinn, whatever, the pleasure of seeing how deeply he’d wounded her, how much he’d taken from her.
    “The mark of a Dragon mate,” he said. “You don’t have it. The intimate contact with him should have brought it out.” With a sweep of his hand and a slight glow of his eyes, he brought up a hazy image of an arm with a light-colored, filigreed tattoo wrapping it from the back of the hand to shoulder.
    Yeah, she would have noticed that. Still, the Djinn could be lying to manipulate her. She and Lucan belonged together. Some mark couldn’t dictate that. Lucan would have known—
    The memory of the way he’d hidden their hands behind them when they’d spoken with Janos contradicted her initial thought. He had known. He hadn’t let it stop him.
    “But,” Tawren continued, “I can feel you’re a Dragon mate, and you must have ingested some sort of Dragon blood. It’s the only way your wounds could have healed right before my eyes. No matter. It will leave your system soon. I won’t let that taint deter me.”
    “How benevolent of you,” she muttered.
    His eyes glowed fiercely blue and suddenly he was crouched before her, merely disappearing then reappearing in a blink. His fingers gripped her chin. “Make no mistake,” he growled. “I mean to claim you. A Dragon mate is fated to unite with a Dragon. Not if someone else takes her first. Many of my people are turning to a new race order. My order. Killing women who bear the mate markers isn’t necessary. We’ll take you for our own—”
    “You hate humans. Your people have made that clear.”
    That self-serving smile returned. “A means to an end. How will the Dragon-kind react when they learn their future is laced with Djinn blood? We mean to procreate to spawn a new race. The Dragons will not tolerate our ilk, and it will mean their end.”
    Bile rolled into Meda’s throat. And it meant, he intended her to be his slave. How much farther into unreality would