Treasure Of Dragons, Royal Dragons Book 1 Chapter 78

Ria

I am sitting on the living room couch. The guys just told the kids. The boys are trying to be strong, but are hugging their dads. The others are all trying to crawl up into my lap. I'm trying to hold and comfort everyone. Some are turning and accepting comfort from Isobel who's grieving like we are.

I'm now rather numb. After losing my shit it was like everything just turned off. Every time I catch a glimpse of the golden cuff on my wrist I think about throwing myself off the battlements that day.

I remember what I felt then, and have felt a thousand times since then. Can I condemn my daughter for following the path I tried to follow? I don't, not even a little. I am destroyed that she felt that way. That I wasn't there to hold her and love her and try to make it better.

I had seen her reaction to Anthony during the video, and I had known. Things had not gone the way the Escarras, and even my mates, had expected them to.

She had felt broken and violated. She viewed what happened as a rape, and it destroyed her. One of the hardest things will be not being able to even try to kill the Escarras for what they did to my baby. This cuff on my wrist won't let me.

I know the guys may be angry, but they have absolutely no room to judge or feel angry truthfully. History has simply repeated itself, only she succeeded, when I did not.

I am very worried that Mari may very well follow in her footsteps if she manages to actually wake up from her self-imposed, very necessary, dissociation. 

Elizabeth is missing and no word has come that she's been found. I think if any of my daughters could survive in those circumstances it would be her though.

I continue to comfort and love my children. I am not sure what we will do from here. I am lost. I end up going to the nursery to feed Sarah and check on the little ones.

She's awake in her crib, playing with her toes, and babbling. She smiles and gets all excited as she sees me. I carry her to the rocking armchair with the ottoman. She's enthusiastically eating and I am just mumbling nonsense and singing to her as I gaze at her. Monica is actually in the next room with Jeremy and Dillon. 

None of the guys hunt me down and I'm grateful. They had talked about them and the older boys shifting so their dragons could deal with their feelings. 

I couldn't do that right now, but I could hear my dragon lamenting and crying inside. I found myself torn about offering her comfort. 

I mean she is me in a way, but her instinct to mate with the guys has perpetuated so much of this bullshit. She has always felt like the evil twin kind of thing. So now, I am not sure how to feel.

All I know is my daughter is dead, and I will never see her again.

Ash

I am on my way to find my mate. We received a call from the Escarras and I have to let Ria know what’s going on. They are bringing Desiree’s body home to us for us to bury her here in the family plot. That’s where my parents are located. I have to stop and pause and take a deep breath. That was never anything I thought I would have to think about. The idea that they are bringing my daughter’s body home for us to bury.

She was right. I was adamant that she wasn’t and wouldn’t be. We thought we knew best, and that everything would simply work out. I guess perhaps, we should have learned better from our own failure with our mate. Things have never magically worked out through all these years, and soon to be 20 children. 

I guess that should have taught us that there is no making up for the horrific beginning of a mating. There is no getting over it. There is no getting past it. You don’t just suddenly get forgiven and then everything is puppies and rainbows. We fooled ourselves into thinking so many years ago, that when we felt forced to mate Ria, she would forgive us when she discovered why we had done it, and met our people. 

That’s never been the case. She never forgave Natalia and she never once had a friend here until Isobel. Then we had to threaten Isobel to get her back to our bed. Even then if her dragon doesn’t come forward, even if we force it and touch her, she won’t respond, and she hates it and us the whole time. 

We had convinced ourselves that the only reason Ria had reacted as she did was because of her past. That without that everything would be completely different. Now, I have one daughter who killed herself, just like her mother had tried to do, one daughter who is physically here, but she is gone, and we don’t know if she will ever really come back from this. Then Elizabeth, who just walked out into a blizzard and is missing, not to mention all of the other things the Landry’s have told us about what happened after they left here. We have been shocked to say the least. 

I had been with Drago the day we confronted the girls in Elizabeth’s room speaking about having their wombs removed to make them unable to breed, and therefore not sellable. Drago had tried to refute what she said, but she very articulately explained how we had exactly sold her, and her sisters. Now we find out that they weren’t just talking about it. Elizabeth actually had a surgical procedure to remove her uterus. So, she will never be able to have children, no matter what. Of course, if we never find her I guess that’s a moot point. 

I pause again. How do I plan a funeral for my 18-year-old daughter? The one who killed herself because we forced a mating on her that broke her. 

How do I explain to her mother that the Escarras, who no doubt she blames for this, will be bringing Desi’s body to us? She can’t hurt them because of the bracelet, but I know she’ll wish she could. I also have a feeling that some of our boys, especially Brand, will have a hard time being anywhere near them without resorting to violence. He was so close to the girls, he is taking this so incredibly hard. 

How do I possibly help my family through this?