My Taboo Harem!

There had been a time when she would have watched every woman approaching Phei with the suspicion of a guard dog who had recently discovered knives could wear perfume. She had raised him, protected him, watched danger gather around him before he possessed the power to recognize it.

That instinct did not disappear simply because he had awakened.

But there was a difference between protection and control.

Melissa had no intention of becoming a dictator who decided which women were permitted to enter his orbit and which ones must remain outside it.

Phei clearly wanted Dravenna:

The hunger between them was not subtle enough to require investigation, and Dravenna’s own love and promise as Phei as her one and only Mate had survived years, distance, secrets and whatever impossible duties had kept her away.

Why would Melissa sabotage that?

’My Phei now knows how to make his own choices.’

He could decide whom he desired, whom he trusted and whom he refused. His youth did not make him helpless, and his power was not the only reason Melissa believed that. She had watched him read people, forgive when forgiveness was deserved and become cold when kindness was being mistaken for weakness.

He would choose.

Melissa could advise him, warn him and, if necessary, beat someone with an expensive bottle for his sake.

’But I would never choose for him.’

Besides, Dravenna was not bad.

’Infuriating, certainly... arrogant beyond what should be medically survivable...possesses a face that becomes intolerably smug whenever Phei looks at her for too long but not bad.’

In truth, Melissa hoped Phei would succeed in drawing Dravenna completely to his side.

’Away from mom.’

That thought carried far more weight than the playful rivalry between them.

Dravenna was Phei’s mate. Whatever secrets, duties or ancient arrangements surrounded her and Chaos, that truth remained at the heart of everything she had done.

After speaking with Hayashi and Ashworth, Melissa finally understood more about the critical years in which Dravenna had disappeared from Phei’s life. She had not abandoned the Mate she’d promised herself and neither had not forgotten the promise she had made beneath that old tree, ridiculous and impossible as it had sounded at the time.

She had protected him in the only manner available to her.

Melissa had remained at Phei’s side every day, raising him, feeding him, comforting him and standing between him and every danger she could see but... Dravenna had been absent from his sight, yet moving through the shadows beyond it, guarding paths he never knew existed and bearing responsibilities Melissa had not been permitted to understand.

One woman protected him through presence.

The other protected him through absence.

Both had paid so much for it.

Melissa would never admit the new light in which she respect the Dean to Dravenna’s face.

Certainly not.

Respecting the Jade Dragoness privately was already dangerous enough; thanking her directly would be intolerable.

’Why should I thank Dravenna for protecting her own mate? That is her responsibility isn’t it?

Dravenna would probably smile with those unbearable jade eyes and say something smug enough to turn reconciliation into assault before the afternoon began.

No, gratitude could remain unspoken.

For now.

Still, Melissa suspected their old friendship would eventually return.

It would not return gently. Nothing between them had ever been gentle. Their affection had always carried elbows, insults, threatened violence and the occasional expensive object being introduced to the wrong wall.

But it would return.

’Hopefully.’

Together, Melissa and Dravenna could accomplish far more than they ever had while divided. Their strengths had always fitted together in dangerous ways. Melissa possessed patience where Dravenna preferred force, while Dravenna could move through threats Melissa was unable to reach without exposing herself and her vulnerability.

Though their combined force they would never equal Melissa’s elder sister.

The First Princess was a monster disguised as family, a woman whose very competence had bullied reason into lowering its voice. Comparing anyone to her was unfair in the way comparing ordinary storms to the end of a continent was unfair.

But Melissa and Dravenna together could come close.

Closer than either would manage alone.

Perhaps that had always been the shape they were meant to take around Phei. One beside him, one beyond his sight. One offering warmth, one carrying the blade. Both watching different horizons so the Dragon between them could grow without being devoured before his wings opened fully.

Melissa released a long breath.

Across the hall, Phei was leading Catrina toward the doors.

Most of the others had already gone ahead, their excitement carrying into the corridor in bright voices and hurried footsteps. Catrina walked beside him with a nervous smile, while Phei lowered his head to say something that made her laugh and relax almost instantly.

Melissa’s expression softened.

Then her eyes moved to Sienna.

She followed the others at a measured pace, dressed in deathly green, her phone still resting in one hand. Nothing in her expression openly revealed excitement. Sienna would probably deny possessing such an undignified emotion even if someone opened her chest and found it sitting there with written identification.

But Melissa saw it.

There was a faint energy in her step, a quiet attentiveness to what awaited them.

’She is looking forward to the day.’

That alone should have warmed Melissa.

Instead, another feeling followed:

Unease.

Something about Sienna had changed.

Melissa could not name it without pressing too closely upon a matter her instincts warned her to approach with care. It was not merely that Sienna seemed stronger, although she did. Nor was it only the sovereign violet of her eyes or the way the air around her had begun carrying a depth that did not belong to ordinary power.

’She seems more mature.’

That sounded absurd when applied to Sienna, who had already behaved with the cold composure of someone who considered most human emotions inefficient paperwork.

Yet the difference remained.

Her silence felt older, her gaze lingered differently; even the way she moved near Phei possessed a new awareness, a private certainty that had not been there before.

Melissa watched Sienna pass through the doors after him.

The girl did not look back.

But for one brief moment, as Phei turned to check that everyone was following, Sienna’s violet eyes met his; something quiet passed between them.

Something intimate enough that Melissa felt it without understanding it.

Her breath caught.

Then Sienna looked away and continued walking, her face returning to its usual beautiful indifference.

Melissa did not press her awareness any farther.

Not yet.

She had learned long ago that secrets surrounding the Ryujin Tiamats rarely remained small once touched. They opened into caverns, prisons, dead gods, ancient grudges and emotional disasters nobody had scheduled time to survive.

So she let Sienna leave.

Behind Melissa, the mature women were already beginning to discuss where they should spend the afternoon. Maya had started offering several increasingly detailed suggestions. Roxanne was laughing. Patricia looked more relaxed than Melissa had seen her in days, while Adriana listened with the strange expression of a woman discovering that belonging could arrive before formal permission.

Mother reached over and touched Melissa’s hand.

"You are worrying too much, my dear."

Melissa glanced at her.

Mother smiled knowingly.

Melissa looked once more toward the doors through which Phei, Dravenna, Sienna and the others had disappeared.

"Yes," she admitted.

Then she turned back toward the women who had chosen to remain:

"But perhaps today I can worry comfortably."

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