Fall of Embers: A Rejected Mates Romance (Fall Mountain Shifters Book 6) Read online

  Fall of Embers

  Fall Mountain Shifters Book Six

  G. Bailey

  Fall of Embers © 2022 G. Bailey

  All Rights Reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental and formed by this author’s imagination. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is written in British English, therefore some spellings might differ.

  Cover Design by Rebecca Frank

  Edited by Polished Perfection

  Created with Vellum

  Her Guardians Series

  Her Fate Series

  Protected By Dragons Series

  Lost Time Academy Series

  The Demon Academy Series

  Dark Angel Academy Series

  Shadowborn Academy Series

  Dark Fae Paranormal Prison Series

  Saved By Pirates Series

  The Marked Series

  Holly Oak Academy Series

  The Alpha Brothers Series

  A Demon’s Fall Series

  The Familiar Empire Series

  From The Stars Series

  The Forest Pack Series

  The Secret Gods Prison Series

  The Rejected Mate Series

  Fall Mountain Shifters Series

  Royal Reapers Academy Series

  The Everlasting Curse Series

  Map

  Contents

  Description

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Nakoa of the house of Mnemosyne

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Tarrent Bloodsong

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Nimue “Nimmy” Windshire

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Afterword

  18. Bonus Read of Crescent Wolves

  Description

  I was trained to be the dragon king’s mate. His pure, blessed by the gods, fire queen.

  But my fate was never to be his.

  My name is Serendipity Fall, and I’m one of the only wolf shifters living with a bunch of immortal dragon shifters in a city I can never leave. I’m the fated mate of the dragon king—Draycian of the house of Mnemosyne—and on the first full moon after my nineteenth birthday, I will be bound to him in a mating ceremony.

  But I don’t want a mate.

  I don’t want the dragon king god who rules my hometown from his golden castle. I don’t even know what he looks like. All I know is, anytime I mention his name, everyone blanches in fear.

  He is a monster.

  I have a plan to escape from his city and find my real family. To be free.

  I won’t be his fire queen, because in the darkness of the embers, I found him:

  The dark wolf I crave.

  We will be together, even if our love is going to destroy everything.

  Even if it brings the Wolven gods down upon us all.

  This is a full-length reverse harem romance novel full of sexy alpha males, steamy scenes, a strong heroine and a lot of sarcasm. Intended for 17+ readers. Book six of eight.

  Prologue

  Arawn of the Vanir.

  “There will come a day, torturer of the Vanir, that you will regret this.”

  My words echo around the dark walls of my new prison. The only other sound is the dripping water down the wall and the squeaks of the rats running into their holes. I know I will be here a very, very long time.

  Time is nothing in the flames.

  His gold hair shines like our creator as he steps into the light, looking down on me. He has always looked down on me like dirt. He looks down on everyone who wasn’t her.

  Or his dead betrothed.

  How sad that was, when her blood spilled on my hands right before I turned her to ash. I smile at him, at the memories.

  “I will not kill you, Arawn of the house of Mnemosyne, as rotting in here is a suitable punishment for what you have done,” he growls, embers flickering out of his lips. His body shakes, the only sign I’ve truly destroyed him by killing her. By killing all of his family and everyone he has ever loved.

  I rise, smirking in the darkness. “I will be freed, and you will never, ever escape me. This is temporary.”

  “May the Wolven gods find you,” he curses me, his eyes flashing gold. “Because no one else in this world is ever going to help you escape.”

  I watch as he walks away, his gold wings spreading out before he takes off, and the room goes dark. No matter where he hides, I will find him.

  I curl myself into the embers in my soul, letting the room burn with my fire until I can only see flames. In the flames, I see a female wolf with a coat of ice-cold snow and a fiery heart that could burn even the coldest winter into summer.

  One day she will free me.

  Together, we are going to turn this world into nothing but ash and ice.

  Chapter One

  A glimmering gold blade presses against the soft skin of my neck, and I grin. “Should I be impressed that your immortal old ass actually won this time?”

  Nakoa growls as he lowers his blade, and I turn to face him. Nakoa is my guard, promised to the old gods themselves to protect me from any threat, which according to him, is my own clumsiness more than anything else. He might be right. In every aspect except this. I’m good in a fight. Usually. Sweat pours down my back, my forehead, and literally everywhere as I pick up my dust-covered sword my guard knocked from my hand. The gold metal glistens in the daylight shining in from high above the city, highlighting every bit of silver, gold and diamond crystals littered around the tops of the buildings. When I was a kid, I thought they were stars. I soon learnt that the real stars are in the sky outside—somewhere I will never be able to go if he gets his way.

  “Coming from the pure, blessed by the gods, fire queen, who always leaves her right side open and therefore would die if a real enemy attacked,” Nakoa replies. Cocky immortal dragon shifter.

  Pure.

  Blessed by the gods.

  The dragon king’s fated mate.

  I hate every single one of those titles, and he knows it. They control my life and make every action of mine heavily judged. I just want to be free. I want to see the stars, breathe the fresh air and find out what the world is really like. If Nakoa can see the betraying thoughts going through my mind, he doesn’t comment on it. “Talk to me, Serendipity.”

  “You only use my full name when I’m in trouble,” I counter, and he laughs. Nakoa is my best friend, even if he would deny it.

  I look up at the sunlight, watching how it highlights everything in our city. The city of Mnemosyne. Hidden away from the world, with me locked in here with it. The cavern ceiling is tall, suggesting we are inside an enormous mountain, and it has hundreds of large and small holes that pour in the sunlight. The spiralling tower buildings stretch up from the slums of the city, like diamond pillars with the mirrors lining the sandstone to reflect light.

  The city is beautiful in the day, but it’s not
when the city is at its best. This isn’t my favourite time to view it. It’s at night, when the stars hang high above the sky like beams of light, shining silver beams down onto the buildings, reflecting their silver light everywhere. Every building, house and structure was designed to make the most of the starlight, and it is my favourite part of my home. The city that burns starlight.

  “I love my home, Nakoa, but...I want to know what is out there,” I whisper.

  Nakoa places his large hand on my shoulder, and I look up into his dark, mud brown eyes. Nakoa is a handsome shifter. There is no doubt about it, with his tanned skin, muscular form, and long black hair that is shiny even in the darkest of rooms. I remember Nakoa always training me, teaching me to fight, looking after me. He’s not the only one in my life, but he’s my best friend, and I know I wouldn’t be the person I am without his guidance. Once, a few years ago, I realised I had a crush on him, but I soon realised that he wasn’t going to feel that way about me, so I pushed those feelings down as far as I could. The dragon shifters are waiting for their mates, and they don’t date; they don’t do anything but exist.

  Personally, I think it’s a giant waste. A city full of sexy dragon shifters with no females to claim as their own.

  “Death is out there. It waits for you, Serei,” he gently replies. “It’s not... The people out there are not like us. We live in peace.”

  “My mama—”

  “Yes, but she is the queen of millions of wolves. Don’t think that one day a year really gives you a good look into her life. There is a reason you are here,” he tells me. I shake my head, but he steps in front of me, placing his hands on my shoulders. “I know you have a million questions, like any normal nineteen-year-old would have, but just wait a little longer. Our king will tell you everything.”

  I resist the urge to pull a face at the affection in his tone for his king. I glance at the castle that is at the top of the city, looking over all of us with its tall glass windows and dauntingly high towers. Home sweet home.

  It’s also his home. The dragon king...my fated mate and the male I’ve never met. At least I can’t remember meeting. Aunt Reine and Nakoa claim I did meet him when I was a young child and that he saved my life.

  Before stealing me from my mother and leaving me in this city while he disappeared off to the old gods know where.

  “This is all about the ceremony tomorrow, isn’t it?”

  “You’re excited, but I am not. I am—” I pause, looking for the right word. “Frightened, Nakoa. I don’t know him.”

  He smiles at me. “Serei, you are wild and fierce and powerful in ways you don’t even know yet. You face the males in this city with your head held high, when most people would fear a thousand-odd male dragon shifters. You’ve always been so brave, taking no shit from anyone. Tomorrow will be no different.”

  “They are all big teddy bears,” I say, waving off his grip and walking to the edge of the sandpit we use for training.

  Nakoa laughs deeply. “I’ll tell Aedh and Morcant that, shall I?”

  I roll my eyes, but my lips twitch. Aedh and Morcant are the biggest males I’ve ever met, twins, and they are built like rocks. With scary attitudes to boot.

  We go silent as I watch my home. I do love this place despite my fears about the ceremony tomorrow. I’ve known about the ceremony since Aunt Reine told me on my eighth birthday. I’m the fated mate of the dragon king—Draycian of the house of Mnemosyne—and on the first full moon after my nineteenth birthday, I will be bound to him in a mating ceremony. What I didn’t realise at eight was, when I got older...I’d want a choice.

  I don’t care what the old gods chose for me. I don’t care that he has waited thousands of years to find me.

  I just want to make my own choice.

  “He’s a good male, and you are both well suited, in my opinion,” Nakoa claims. “Stubborn and, well, more stubborn. Perfect match.”

  “Asshole.”

  “Language,” he replies with a smirk.

  “Now you sound like Aunt Reine,” I tease, and he knocks my shoulder with his, making his necklace bounce, the fire-red symbol catching my eye. Nakoa can say whatever he likes, but I’ve never met this dragon king, and I have absolutely no interest in becoming his mate tomorrow.

  “You told me once that Mnemosyne was a goddess, and on her deathbed, she unleashed her magic into the world to make the first dragon shifter,” I say.

  Nakoa nods. “Yes. I am one of the youngest shifters, as you know, but that is in our history books. You’d know more if you read those over the books your mum brings you.”

  “Mama has taste and brings me fantasy books,” I reply. “Fantasy is just what I need to escape sometimes.”

  “Why did you ask about our goddess?”

  “I want to know something. Why I would be destined for a dragon shifter when I’m a full-blooded wolf?” I hedge. “Why me?”

  And how do I get out of it?

  “Fate wove our stories before we ever existed, Serei,” he softly replies. “You can’t fight it.”

  Like hell I can’t.

  I lift my sword up in the air. “Come on. I’m bored and we have another two hours until the sun sets.”

  “No,” Nakoa firmly replies. “You have a big day to get ready for tomorrow, and I promised Reine that I’d send you back early. I don’t want to get in her bad books, not even for you, Serei.”

  I pout. “There is no way I’m going to be able to convince you, is there?”

  He winks at me. “Your Aunt Reine is more frightening than you.”

  I chuckle. Yes. Yes, she is.

  Aunt Reine is the mother of two of my mama’s mates, and an aunt to her growing up. When I came to live here, she came too. Aunt Reine told me that a city full of stubborn, immortal dragon shifters wasn’t all that different from her old pack. That male shifters are the same, be it dragons or wolves.

  Somehow, she has all these mighty dragon shifters doing her bidding. It likely has to do with the fact she and I are the only females in the city. There used to be two older females who lived here, but they died when I was young. Other than Breelyn, my godmother who visited for a year when I was a child, it’s always been just Aunt Reine and me.

  “I’m half tempted to go and hide in the city just so you get in trouble,” I reply, making him laugh.

  “I’d find you. I always do,” Nakoa replies. He might be cool, but he is still an overprotective male at heart. I put my sword back on the metal holder with the other weapons and pull on my brown leather boots. My dark red dress falls to my lower knees, cut at the sides for easy movement and stitched with gold thread. It shimmers in the light when I move, and it has the brilliant magical ability to block any attack. All my clothes are made of the same material and created by Torrix. He has amazing design skills, though it took me years of begging to convince him to make me some leggings and tops. The dragon king’s mate should only wear dresses, he used to say, until I proved him wrong. Or annoyed him enough to give in.

  I quickly retie the end of my braid, which has come loose, and push it over my shoulder where it falls to the middle of my back. Strings of gold are braided into my hair, gifts from Nakoa for my birthdays over the years. Each thin string of gold is meant to give me luck. He said it was an old tradition of the dragons.

  Grabbing my gold cloak, I pull it around my shoulders and brush off some of the sand on my dress before heading back up the path to where Nakoa is waiting for me. I eye his red and black leather laced with gold string. I want to wear leather one day.

  “So, when are you heading out?” I question. Nakoa leaves the city once every few months, and I don’t get to know what he does, but he always comes back with something new for me. “Because...some of that lovely vermillion paint would be appreciated.”

  He looks down at me. “With the mating ceremony tomorrow, I won’t be leaving anytime soon. We will need to be on guard more than ever before.”

  “Why?”

  He looks away
from me. “It’s best King Draycian explains this to you.”

  I wave as we pass seven shifters doing run drills around the edges of the city, and they all incline their head back to me before running past and down the steps. The sand-covered stairs eventually flatten into a space right under the gold archway made of two dragon tails wrapped around each other in the middle. The heads of the dragons lie at either side of the stairs, their giant wings spreading out across the stone cliff. I touch the head of the gold dragon on the left, like I always do, and Nakoa smiles at me.

  Despite this being a city full of dragon shifters, I rarely see them actually fully shift. Most of them prefer to shift their golden wings to make it easy to travel around the city, but I know they can fully shift their entire bodies into dragons that are the size of a building. They can also change their forms into any animal they have met, and most prefer to change into wolves when they are around me. I’ve always guessed it’s their way of trying to make me feel better and to give my wolf a pack.