The Dragon King and His Human Mate

20. Crave

| Anastasia | 

Standing under a willow after a long swim at the waterfall had become my new favorite thing to do in this trapping island. The view from there was so beautiful, I couldn't get enough. 

Yet in the same time it gave me a sense of loneliness. And sadness.

Especially when Vladimir's dragon wasn't around. It didn't matter that he wasn't able to talk to me, I loved his company. It felt like he could communicate with me only through his eyes, which was strange in the first place.

Was it a dragon thing?

Or was it only with me?

I wished for the last.

From what I had heard, shifters' animals wouldn't normally like to claim other people but their mates. They couldn't physically want other people but their mates.

However his dragon seemed to like me. More than like me, actually.

He seemed happy with me.

And it wasn't making things easier at all in my head. 

Deciding was becoming more difficult with the each passing day. I missed my family terribly much, and not only them. I missed my people; I missed balls, and sneaking out of the castle with Harry and pretending we were simple villagers. I missed books, and playing instruments, and training, and writing.

I missed everything a normal human being would do when they weren't forced to try and survive in a desert island.

Yet there was no mistake how my mind couldn't wrap around a future without Vladimir, no matter how much I tried.

I tried picturing myself living like I had done for my whole life, before everything would go upside down; yet it couldn't last more than a few seconds before I'd start dreaming about how life would be if we'd both be able to get out of here.

Would he want to be with me under different circumstances?

If he was still a king, would he choose me as his queen?  If he had everything his heart desired, would he feel the same?

Because I was terribly scared I would. I was terrified I would be able to put him before everything else in my life, and not even regret it.

And I couldn't allow myself to do that. Not when I wasn't sure he'd do the same. Not when I knew if his mate would still be alive, he'd choose her in the blink of an eye.

Hell even dead I couldn't compete to her.

I let those thoughts that were torturing me for days out of my head. It didn't matter what he felt, I couldn't let my feelings get the best of me. I wouldn't put my whole life at risk for him.

I tried concentrating on mixing the paints made of strawberries and blueberries and god alone knows what other. For the first time, I was trying to paint by myself. Vladimir's painting lessons had done almost nothing good, I was still extremely bad at it. But strangely I enjoyed it. Yes, it could unnerve me sometimes, but I enjoyed it. To some extent, at least.

The rushing of the wind all over my body and the shadow covering the sunlight was enough to tell I had a gigantic dragon at the top of my head, but I was used to it by now.

His reptile eyes bored into mine and immediately a shiver ran down my spine. I couldn't stop but think of the way his human eyes switched into these icy reptile ones whenever he was turned on. Whenever he pleasured me and made me come using his mouth or his fingers.

But only them, though.

I knew what he was doing. I knew he wanted me to beg him. To push me to the edges, make me feel helpless. To get me to the point I'd admit staying here with him for my whole life just so he could give me what I wanted.

And by god I was on the edge of breaking multiple times by now. Screaming at the top of my lungs how much I wanted him to fill me up entirely and dominate me and dirty-talk in my ear all the things he would do to my body.

What did that say about me as a strong young woman who just a few weeks ago would give up everything for her people? What did that say about me being independent and self-collected and reasonable?

Wishing for a bloody old dragon to devour my whole body wasn't exactly the example I had tried to set up for myself.

I sighed.

Completely distracted by my thoughts about him, I hadn't realized until now how he was standing there in front of me for minutes, waiting so I could say something.

However I only forced a smile on my face and looked away, reminded at how I had ridden his mouth and screamed out his name this morning. Only a few hours ago.

Hell where was my self-control when it came to him? Where was my inner-strength? 

God this was so embarrassing.

A low sound came out of the dragon's mouth and I could tell it was some sort of a chuckle. Even his dragon was an arrogant insufferable jerk.

I rolled my eyes. "Couldn't stay without me a few hours, right dragon?" I tried teasing him, even though I could feel the burn on my cheeks. Why did my body have to betray me every time?

An approval growl left his mouth this time and I couldn't help but giggle. Before I got lost in his beautiful strange eyes for a few seconds.

"Can you keep looking at me, please?" I softly asked as I took the paintbrush on my hand, an idea popping in my head. "When I go—" a roar cut me off immediately. "If I go," I corrected myself this time, "I want to have your eyes with me. They're so beautiful I don't want to ever forget them." Suddenly, my voice had turned out sad at only the thought that there would come a day, perhaps years from now, when I'd be far away, and these memories would start to vanish with time.

I couldn't let that happen. I would never let myself forget him, no matter what the future held for me.

For us.

If there would ever really be an us.

His eyes filled up with sadness. Desperation.

I tried smiling up at him but he suddenly started rubbing his gigantic head affectionately in my little body in comparison to him. As if he was pleading me to never even think of forgetting him.

And I could do nothing but wrap my arms around him.

"Can you give me a ride, dragon?" I asked. "I'll have plenty of time to paint your beautiful eyes later."

********

| Vladimir | 

I couldn't help but repeat her words in my head. The fact that she wanted to have a painting of my eyes with her. Did she really want to go away from me?

I knew what I was asking was a lot. I knew that.

I knew I was asking for her to leave everything behind. I was asking from a princess to spend the rest of her life in an island, far away from her home and her family, with someone that could be human for only an hour everyday.

Honestly she had to be insane to even consider that.

But I knew the bond she felt to me. I felt the bond to her too. 

I couldn't give it a name as yet, but I knew she wanted me. Whether she wanted me as much as I wanted her, I couldn't tell. But I knew she did and I knew a part of her wanted to give everything up and be mine. Fully mine.

I only had to convince that part of her, which was buried deep down and she wasn't willing to accept she had it as yet.

"Anastasia?" I was surprised to see her sat down on the sand, the waves of the ocean playing with her feet. I placed a blanket on her shoulders and she covered herself with it. It was not like her to stay here at the ocean when the sun hasn't set up yet. It could be freezing for her human body. But she didn't seem to mind it tonight.

I placed a kiss in her lips but she didn't give it back with the same passion she had done the past few days. She looked a little bit lost.

"What is going on in that beautiful mind of yours?" I asked, and she gave me a smile that didn't reach her hazel eyes.

"Just things," she answered.

"Things like me, perhaps?" I teased.

She shrugged. "Yeah. Yeah, things like you." Her eyes met the horizon where the sky met the sea. "And other things as well."

"You know you can talk to me about everything, right?" I stroked her cheek with my hand and when I thought she was going to push my hand away, she leaned her head on the palm of my hand and closed her eyes. As if she had craved my touch for years.

That swelled my heart with happiness.

"Vladimir?" She whispered.

"Huh?" I kept caressing her cheek a bit more, watching as she loved that.

"Would it be the same... if I wasn't the chosen girl?" Her question shocked me instantly. "If there was another girl who would be able to survive and be here instead of me right now, would you ask her the same? For her to stay and choose you instead of everything else she had left behind?"

"No, of course not." My eyes widened. "Of course not," I repeated for her as I cupped her face with the palms of my big hands. "I wouldn't want anyone else, Anastasia. Hell I never thought I would want anyone after my mate died. It's because it's you. Only you. I swear."

"You don't know that," she tried pushing my arms away but I held them on her face still. "You've been alone for more than a century—"

"Ana, no." I forced her eyes to look into mine, the little smile on her face not going unnoticed. "Do people call you Ana?" I asked, amused.

"Only my family."

"Then I'll call you Ana too. It's cute," I told her and this time her smile shone the whole island. "It doesn't mean I won't call you by your full name when you come for me, Anastasia."

She shivered. "Vladimir," she scolded. "I'm being serious."

I chuckled. "Yes Ana I know. And I'm answering you seriously as well; no, I wouldn't want to be with everyone just because I have had a miserable life alone. It's you that I want."

"But Cordelia—"

"Cordelia is dead." I couldn't believe my own ears as I said that. "No matter how much it has hurt, no matter how much I have grieved for her; I know a part of me has always grieved because of the guilt." She blinked her eyes, probably trying to wrap her mind around everything I was saying. "I've come to realize that recently; since you came here." I sighed. "I came to realize that it was guilt that has eaten me inside. And loneliness. But I'm finally... you're finally here. It's selfish but I can't stop myself from wanting you and—" Her mouth covered mine instantly, in a starving kiss. Like she couldn't get enough of me.

"I want you," she breathed out between bruising kisses. Getting the clothes off her body, taking my hands in hers and putting them on her already bare skin. Making my c**k jump in a split second. "No, I need you. I need you everywhere." It was almost a cry as she threw her body fully at me. "Please, please Vladimir just— just take me. Right now."

Oh how much I wanted that.

My body was crying out for that. Crying out for her. But I needed to make sure she wasn't saying that only at the heat of the moment. That she wouldn't regret later.

"Ana... are you sure?"

"Yes." She left a trail of sweet kisses on my chest that made me jerk my hips instinctively, meeting her pelvis. "Yes I want you to f**k me so I can get you out of my system. I need to get you out of my system."

Surprise and amusement took over me, before I chuckled lightly. "I'm not that easy to get out of a system if I had made my way there, Anastasia." I grabbed her jaw almost harshly and forced her gaze on me. My dominant dragon side jumping out of nowhere. "You know you're just lying to yourself, right? Your body will only crave for me more after tonight."

She ran her hands through my hair and lowered my head on her naked beautiful breasts. "Then make me crave you even more. I want to crave you more."

"As you wish, sweet girl."