The night air bit at Ash's bare skin like a reprimand. He stood shivering on the flagstone path, bits of hedge still clinging to his butter-blonde hair, the ghost of Ignis's claws burning crescent-shaped promises into his waist. Every inhale carried the faint, lingering sweetness of that damned aphrodisiac, making his blood feel too hot and his thoughts too loud.
He should leave. He should absolutely, one-hundred-percent, turn around, find the nearest servant's door, and pretend the last hour had been a fever dream induced by bad wine and altitude sickness.
Instead, Ash looked up at the third-story window he'd just been ejected from. The light was still on. A tall silhouette moved behind the sheer curtains—Ignis, probably fixing his robe with that infuriating regal composure while his daughter stood there playing innocent.
Ash's lips twitched despite everything.
"Threw me out a window," he whispered, half-laughing, half-horrified. "Actual Dragon Lord and he yeeted me like yesterday's garbage."
The memory of Ignis's broken moan when Ash had licked his horn flashed behind his eyes. The way those golden eyes had gone molten. The desperate sound he'd made when Ash kissed his horn. The strength in those clawed hands, holding on instead of pushing away. The kiss that had tasted like smoke and pride and something far more dangerous.
Ash pressed a hand to his chest, feeling his heart still hammering like it wanted to claw its way out and fly back up there.
"Okay. New plan," he muttered to the moon. "Don't die. Don't get executed for defiling the Dragon Lord. And maybe… figure out why the hell I want him so badly it hurts."
He slipped through the gardens like a thief, barefoot and shirtless, avoiding the main paths where patrolling dragon guards with wings and bad attitudes might spot him. By the time he reached a side entrance used by servants, his teeth were chattering and the bruises on his sides throbbed in time with his pulse.
A young dragon maid with pale green scales on her cheeks nearly dropped her tray when she saw him.
"Your Highness—?!"
"Evening," Ash said, flashing his most disarming, princely smile even though he looked like he'd lost a fight with landscaping. "Mind if I borrow a cloak? Or a shirt? Or… directions to my chambers without being seen?"
The maid stared, then squeaked and hurried off, returning moments later with a plain dark cloak that smelled faintly of cedar. Ash wrapped it around himself gratefully.
He made it back to his guest wing without further incident, though he was fairly certain at least two guards had seen him and chosen, for whatever draconic reason, to pretend they hadn't.
Once inside his rooms, Ash collapsed face-first onto the massive bed piled with furs and silk. The aphrodisiac was still simmering in his veins, low and insistent, but the cold night air and the hedge had taken the edge off enough that he could think.
Mostly.
He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling painted with constellations he didn't recognize.
"I was supposed to seduce the daughter," he said aloud to the empty room. "Marry her. Save the empire. Live happily ever after as the clever transmigrator who fixed the plot. Not… whatever the hell that was."
Not falling stupidly, instantly, catastrophically in love with the final boss.
Not discovering that the terrifying Dragon Lord of Night had the most sensitive horns in existence and made the prettiest sounds when kissed properly.
Ash groaned and dragged a pillow over his face.
He wanted to sleep and just forget about it.
He didn't sleep.
He lay still in the massive four-poster bed, staring at the canopy, replaying every second of that encounter until the moon completed its arc across the sky and the first pale fingers of dawn crept through his curtains. The aphrodisiac had faded mostly from his system, leaving behind only the memory of heat—and the cold clarity of what he actually wanted.
You're an idiot, he told himself for the hundredth time by now. A complete, self-destructive idiot. You came here to save your empire, not fall for the dragon who's supposed to destroy it.
Yet.He wanted me. Even without the incense, he wanted me.
The thought sent a shiver down his spine that had nothing to do with the morning chill.
By the time the sun fully crested the horizon, painting the western cliffs in shades of amber and rose, Ash had made a decision. He couldn't undo what happened. He couldn't pretend it didn't matter. But he could—maybe—find a way forward that didn't end with his empire in ashes and his heart in pieces.
First step: the council meeting.
---
The Grand Hall of the Draconic Palace was a masterpiece of intimidating architecture. Obsidian pillars rose toward a vaulted ceiling lost in shadow, their surfaces carved with the history of dragonkind in swirling, ancient script. Braziers of dragonfire—blue, green, gold—lined the central aisle, casting dancing light across the assembled nobles. And at the far end, on a throne carved from a single piece of volcanic glass, sat Ignis.
The Dragon Lord had recovered his composure completely.
Dressed in robes of deepest midnight, threaded with silver that caught the firelight like scattered stars, he looked every inch the untouchable monarch. His obsidian horns gleaming subtly on his head, and his golden eyes—sharp, cold, utterly devoid of the previous night's haze—surveyed the hall with the patient attention of a predator who knew nothing could threaten him.
Ash felt those eyes pass over him as he took his place among the human delegation. No pause. No flicker of recognition beyond what courtesy demanded. Just the smooth, impersonal gaze of a ruler acknowledging a foreign dignitary.
Ouch, Ash thought, keeping his expression pleasant. Really committing to the cold shoulder, aren't we?
Seraphina sat on a smaller throne to her father's right, looking bright-eyed and oblivious in gown of sunset orange. She caught Ash's eye and gave him a tiny wave, which he returned with a subtle nod.
The council droned on. Trade routes. Tariffs. The delicate dance of negotiating terms between species who'd spent most of their shared history either ignoring each other or trying to set each other on fire. Ash listened with half his attention, the rest focused on the dragon at the head of the table.
Ignis never looked at him.
Not once.
And somehow, that hurt more than any glare or snarl could have.