Silent Crown: The Masked Prince's Bride-Chapter 299: To Return To Her

Lorraine’s tone dripped with sarcasm, though she hardly paused to consider that she might have just mocked the great Dragon King himself.

Vaeronyx’s eyes narrowed, slowly, deliberately. The cavern held its breath. For a heartbeat, she thought she’d gone too far. But then she noticed the faint curl at the edge of his molten gaze. Not anger. Not offense. Amusement.

Perhaps the great and ancient god understood sarcasm after all.

He didn’t scold her. He merely exhaled, a sound like shifting mountains, and from his nostrils came a stream of smoke that shimmered faintly with embers. The air smelled of fire and iron.

"If that’s the case," Vaeronyx said at last, his voice like distant thunder, "he’ll be fine."

The bluntness of it left her stunned. Her lips parted in disbelief. Then a sharp snort followed, an almost careless sound, accompanied by a flare of orange that illuminated the cavern for a fleeting instant. His shadow stretched long across the stone, immense and otherworldly.

Lorraine bit back the retort rising to her tongue. Did he truly not understand? That her husband was mortal! The ancient blood he once gifted to men had thinned to a fragile whisper through the centuries? That Leroy could bleed, could break, could die?

She said nothing.

Because why should she? Why should she tell a god that her husband, his own blood, was now human, vulnerable, less?

Let him believe Leroy still carried the strength of dragons in his veins.

Let him believe her husband was untouchable.

She had her pride, after all. And her faith.

Leroy would live. He would face armies if he must, and win.

But silence pressed around her, thick and stifling. Too heavy. Too endless. Her nerves buzzed with the need to do something.

"I need fire," she said suddenly. The words slipped out sharper than intended. The dark and the silence gnawed at her imagination, feeding her worry for Leroy until it bloomed into panic.

Vaeronyx tilted his massive head, and when he spoke, his tone dripped with mockery.

"Are you cold?" he asked, feigning innocence. "I did not know the daughters of men had grown so frail... and so fond of their own misery."

Lorraine’s lips twitched. Did this overgrown lizard just mock her?

"I need light," she snapped.

"I see fine," Vaeronyx replied smoothly.

Her jaw tightened. "Well, I can’t see in the dark," she bit out through her teeth.

He didn’t relent. His voice deepened, rich with lazy amusement. "And how," he asked, "does that concern me? Tell me, little flame... how should I make fire?"

Lorraine’s lips trembled, half with disbelief, half with sheer irritation.

Was he serious? His yawning and snorting nearly set her cloak aflame, and now he had the audacity to ask how he might make fire?

Truly, what a heartless, impossible being.

Lorraine stared at him, utterly dumbfounded. For a being so ancient, so terrifyingly divine, Vaeronyx had the audacity to sound... insufferably petty.

She took a step forward, shadows still clinging to her figure, her voice trembling—not with fear this time, but with indignation. "You’re a dragon," she said slowly, as if speaking to a particularly stubborn child. "You breathe fire. You snore fire. You yawned and nearly set my hair ablaze. Do not tell me you can’t make a little light."

Vaeronyx blinked once, unhurried. His massive head tilted, golden horns catching faint glints of his own ember-lit breath. "If I breathe," he said, his voice low, resonant, and dry as stone, "you will be light."

Lorraine froze. For a second, she pictured it, her, reduced to ash and flicker, a passing ember in the darkness. The image was so absurdly vivid.

But his tone, that smooth, deceptively calm, almost teasing tone, made her wonder if the great dragon was toying with her.

"I’ll find some wood, then," Lorraine said, crossing her arms. "You light it up with a spark."

Surely, this divine being, who’d apparently existed since the dawn of the world, had the decency to remember that she was pregnant and injured. It was the gentlemanly thing to do, was it not?

Vaeronyx reeled back, his enormous head tilting as if she’d just insulted his ancestors. "Huh?" The rumble of disbelief that left him could’ve shaken mountains.

Lorraine blinked.

"I am a demigod, and you ask me to make sparks for your little fire?" he said, his voice dripping with offense. He even gave an incredulous snort, sending a puff of smoke curling toward the ceiling.

Lorraine sighed; deeply, dramatically. "My husband would have lit a fire for me by now. And you call yourself a demigod."

The dragon’s tail twitched. His eyes narrowed, gleaming like molten gold. "Then wait for your husband," Vaeronyx said, deadpan, not missing a single beat.

Lorraine just stared at him. Then sighed again, long and heavy. "Truly," she muttered, "I have never met someone so shameless."

Vaeronyx’s massive chest rumbled with a sound that might have been a sigh, or laughter, or both. The faint shimmer of embers pulsed in his throat, casting flickers of gold across the cavern walls.

Lorraine arched a brow. "Oh, so now you can make fire."

"That," Vaeronyx said slowly, his voice rolling through the dark like distant thunder, "was not fire. That was... breathing."

"Right," Lorraine muttered. "And I suppose you breathe lava on full moon days."

His golden eyes narrowed, gleaming with what looked suspiciously like amusement. "You are an insolent little mortal." 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

"Pregnant," she corrected sweetly. "Which means cranky, cold, and completely done with cryptic ancient beings who refuse to be helpful."

Vaeronyx’s wings rustled slightly, scales clinking like metal in motion. "Insolence is not a trait one should display before gods."

Lorraine folded her arms, glaring up at a creature who could have crushed her with a single breath. "And neither is arrogance before a woman who hasn’t eaten in hours."

The dragon went silent. His eyes blinked once. Twice. Then, without another word, he lowered his head until his massive snout hovered just above her. She instinctively backed up against the wall again, clutching her skirt.

A deep rumble built in his chest, a vibration that made the air itself quiver. Then, with a huff, he exhaled a plume of flame onto a small patch of kindling near her feet.

Lorraine blinked, momentarily stunned by the sudden bloom of orange light.

"Oh," she said, blinking against the brightness. "So the mighty Dragon King can light a fire."

Vaeronyx gave a low, guttural sound that might’ve been a growl... or a laugh. "I tire of your voice."

"And only then," she said with a faint, victorious smile, "you listened."

The firelight caught on the edges of her hair, turning the strands into molten gold. Vaeronyx studied her quietly, his head tilting just enough to seem... curious. For the first time since she’d fallen into the cavern, Lorraine felt warmth, not just from the fire, but from the heavy gaze of the dragon who was no longer entirely disdainful.

-----

The roar of the river was deafening. It rushed wild and swollen with melting snow, its silver current streaked with red.

Leroy stood on the muddy bank, his boots half-sunk, breath harsh in the cold air. Across the river, the army gathered like a dark tide, with their armor flashing beneath the gray morning light. The hiss of bowstrings being drawn filled the silence between the gusts of wind.

And he stood alone.

No armor. No shield. Only a sword gripped tight in his wet hand.

He had told her to run. To hide. And she had obeyed, but now, as the army shifted and readied itself, he couldn’t help but think of Lorraine, of her face pale with fear, of the way she’d clutched her belly and looked back once before vanishing up in the peak.

He tightened his grip.

He couldn’t die here, not before finding her again.

The first volley of arrows came like rain. He raised his sword, spinning with instinct, cutting one from the air, dodging the others as they hissed into the earth beside him. His pulse hammered. Then came the riders.

They crossed the river, with hooves splashing through the water, the sound a thunder that shook the ground. Leroy waited. His jaw locked.

And then he moved.

The first horseman reached him, blade swinging. Leroy ducked low, caught the man’s leg, and tore him down from the saddle. A swift, brutal slash of steel meeting flesh, and the rider didn’t rise again. Another came. Leroy turned, drove his sword through the man’s chest, pulled it free before the next could strike.

He moved like a storm given form—fluid, fierce, unstoppable. Every breath of mist that left his lips came with the heat of his blood. The river’s spray caught the light of his blade, turning it to silver fire.

Still, they came.

Still, he stood.

His muscles burned, his arms trembled, but something within him refused to break. Something older than his name, older than the banners of Bear and Lion—something ancient that pulsed in his veins, waking with every heartbeat.

The commander on the opposite shore shouted, "Hold the line! Surround him!"

Leroy’s lips curved into a smirk. That smile—the same one Lorraine had seen before he told her to run. Reckless. Defiant. Beautiful in its madness.

He slashed through the next man that came at him and turned toward the rest, his hair matted with sweat, his face streaked with blood and river water.

"Come then!" he shouted, voice echoing through the valley. "If death wants me, let him cross this river himself!"