Chapter 38
________
KATALENA
No.
No no no, this wasn’t supposed to happen. This couldn’t happen.
Sirrus looked down at me, and I knew. Because he wasn’t moving and I saw him struggling to do so. I looked at Endre, and then Zovai. They were frozen like statues, forms shaking with the effort to move.
My mind went blank with fear.
I knew.
I had known and yet I’d hoped and still the echo of damning words in my ears wouldn’t go away.
Honored ones, this isn’t right, Idroal said. The girl has done nothing. Even before you ordered her death by the Heirs’ hand, she had done nothing but be born into this world.
HOW MANY? Aeghi roared. How many dragons were murdered still in their eggs? Or stolen to be bred into those abominations they now use? Where was the clemency the innocent deserved then?
I couldn’t look at Varí. If I looked at Varí I would break apart, and if I was about to die…
My breath shuddered anyway.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”
Idroal argued more, but I didn’t hear it. I was too busy looking at them. “I love you,” I said. “Impossible that it is. Strange as it is, I love you. And whatever it was that called to your dragons, I hope that you find it again. I hope you don’t remain alone.”
My voice cracked, tears flooding my eyes. I couldn’t do this.
Lena. Endre’s voice, full of pain.
I turned away from them and looked at the dragons above me. All I felt was their malice and their anger, and I didn’t care that I was weak and frail and would look like exactly who they wanted. Facing death in the moment was different.
“Please.”
The dragons said nothing. None of them. Not the Elders and not the ones standing and watching.
For the first time, I saw the spire of wood they’d erected, rising into the sky. Oh, stars.
The roots writhing at the bottom of the tree reached for me and wrapped around my arms and legs, dragging me forward. I fought them as hard as I could, scratching and nearly biting.
Those vines belong to a dragon, human. You just vowed never to harm one on purpose. Would you break your vow so quickly?
Tears burst through what remained of my mask. I sobbed, pain sinking through my chest. That was the only reason they let me make the vow in the first place. So they could kill me without a fight.
LENA. Zovai’s voice roared through my mind. So loud and so raw, I saw dragons in the corner of my eyes shudder with its power. They fought their bonds. All of them did.
“Don’t,” I said. “Don’t make me watch you die too.”
Endre lifted his gaze to his father. They were black with fury. If you do this?—
It is already done.
If you do this, I vow on the Fallen I will find a way to kill you.
The vines pinned me against the wood, tightening to the point of pain. I couldn’t move. All I could do was look straight forward. At them.
Dry, rasping laughter shook the air, and Sirrus’s father spoke next. How did you imagine this would play out? That we would allow you to mate with a human? A traitor? Risk the legacy of the dragons to mortal children?
Lena. Sirrus called me. Even from here I could see the way he looked at me. The way all three of them looked at me. I won’t say it. Not for them. But I feel it.
I closed my eyes one last time. “I love you.”
Flames rushed for me.
My dragons roared. Their cries mixed with the scream of blasting fire and the heat so intense it rendered me breathless. I’d never felt what it was like to live inside a flame. Even as I waited for the pain, there was something glorious about it. Acute and beautiful. An extreme nothing else could conquer.
The pain never came.
I inhaled, the heat searing my lungs, and still I could breathe. My heart pounded in my ears louder than the sound of the flames. I opened my eyes.
Golden fire colored the world. Swirling paths of color painted over everything, and my dragons, staring at me with both horror and awe.
The wood behind me began to burn. My clothes flashed and disappeared. The dagger still strapped to my thigh melted, and the metal burned my skin, though the flames did not.
I hurled the harness away before it did more damage—my arms were free.
I stared at my hands, glowing with the fire.
Deep down, I had known this. Had sensed this, though I didn’t know how to put a name to it. Every time I accidentally touched a pot bubbling with a potion and it didn’t bother me. When Varí thought he burned me, but his flames missed. Even the bath with my dragons that should have had me blister. The flames that Relkym tried to use came close enough to harm a human.
And yet none of them touched me.
Suddenly Endre was there hauling me from the fire and into his arms. He pulled his shirt over my head, covering my nakedness in front of so many, and his purr rumbled beneath my ear.
“Mate,” he murmured. “They can’t touch you anymore. No one can ever touch you again.”
I blinked.
What?
What is the meaning of this?Mizyn asked, fury plain in their voice.
Light laughter sparkled. Eloith. Surely you remember, Mizyn. I suspected. Few humans have features such as she does.
Behind me, Zovai pressed against my back, Sirrus at my side. They all surrounded me, holding me so tightly I thought I might faint.
I wanted them closer.
A tiny chirp trilled and Varíslammed into my shoulder. He crawled into the neck of Endre’s shirt and stayed there, purring and chirping. My eyes teared up. “Hello, friend.”
It has been centuries since a human has come to Doro Eche, Idroal said. But even those centuries have not erased your memories. The human mate of dragons can be revealed only by dragonfire. Though usually in a less… explosive fashion. They sounded amused.
Peeking around Idroal’s shoulder, I looked at them. They smiled and nodded.
Mate.
I was their mate.
How was that possible?
Everything settled into place with a resonance I felt. The moment they touched me, they knew. On a level deeper than any of us consciously knew, our very atoms drawn toward the other.
The humans who disappeared. Were they mates? Perhaps they couldn’t simply tell the world what they were and where they were going, instead choosing to disappear without a trace.
A thousand and one questions rattled in my mind. I didn’t know where to start and I also didn’t care because I was alive and they were holding me and I never wanted it to stop.
Endre turned away from me and snarled. I felt his power unleash as much as it could. The only dragons it would not touch were the giants behind us. You know the law. A dragon’s mate cannot be touched. If anyone does so, we will happily remove your head from your body, and you will not be returned to ashes.
Then he turned to the Elders. Sirrus and Zovai turned with him. This will not be forgotten.
You dare say that to me while you bear the scar of a traitor?The center of Cieso’s chest glowed like he might try to kill me again.
I was alive. I was alive.
We all know why he bears that scar, Sirrus said. And it has nothing to do with betrayal.
Aeghi snarled. We will not accept this.
Zovai leapt forward and burst into his dragon form, hurling fire straight into the air. I do not give a fuck what you accept and what you don’t. She is our mate. OUR mate, and you will not touch her. As for the rest of it, think carefully. Your memories might have faltered in your old age, but ours have not. He looked over his shoulders at the crown. And your subjects’ memories have not. Whether or not they will speak of it.
I tried to take a step toward him and my knees went to jelly. Sirrus caught me and boosted me up onto Z’s back. In seconds they were all beasts shimmering in the dying embers of both fire and the day. Flying away with me.
Their mate.