Chapter 14 #3
“That’s the one. You remember it,” he says, pleased. “She told me you would meet your heart’s desire on Porthcurno beach one day.” A tingle runs down my spine. “Well, I dismissed it as a slightly batty lady who’d had a few too many Pimm’s, but it’s funny, isn’t it?”
I shake my head. Surely it can’t be…
“Did she tell you her name?” I ask softly.
“Well, it’s funny you say that. She said her name was Morveren Trewhella.”
I want to laugh out loud—this bloody magic world.
My dad carries on speaking, “And it’s funny because each time I read you the story of the Mermaid of Zennor, I thought of her. It was the mermaid’s name, wasn’t it? And didn’t she run away with a Cornish man called Trewhella?”
“She did.” I shake my head. “I have to go,” I say breathlessly. “I’ll ring you later.”
“Bring him home to meet us,” he says. “Love you, darling.”
“I love you too.”
I click the phone off. The path hits the beach at last, and I step onto the sand, breathing a sigh of relief at being on firm ground, and looking around in vain search of my dragon. I can hardly see a foot in front of me. I hesitate, sending my senses out to him and feel an immediate tug…
That way.
I strike off to my right. Objects loom out of the murk, and the sound of the sea is muffled, but I walk on.
The sense of urgency builds, and I pick up speed.
The wind buffets me, and I edge close to the water line where the fog isn’t so dense.
Suddenly, I hear singing. It’s faint but so beautiful that it makes my heart stutter.
Women’s voices rise in a song. I can’t work out the words, but the melody makes my blood pound.
It’s wild and so magical I can almost feel it in my teeth.
The fog suddenly clears, and I gape at the sight in front of me.
I’m standing in the middle of the cove. The sky is grey, but the water is a light turquoise colour, turning to navy near the rocks.
On the rocks, there’s movement, and I watch open-mouthed as figures raise their hands over the sea.
They’re Mer, I realise—incredibly beautiful women with long, dark hair.
Their tails are a muted turquoise that echoes the ocean, and even as I watch, the song rises and the sea surges beneath their fingertips as if obeying their call.
I stumble as my feet hit a rock, and at once, in a flash of colour, they’re gone.
“No, please don’t go,” I call. “Come back. I need your help.”
A dark head bobs up. “Cary?”
“Oh my god, Melusine,” I say, stumbling onto the rocks and walking to the edge to look down at her.
She smiles and calls out, “Come back, sisters. ’Tis the dragon’s mate.”
Heads bob up around us. “The dragon’s mate?” one breathes, looking at me as if I’m something she found in a zoo. “I thought he’d be taller.”
Another shakes her head, her violet eyes gleaming. “I thought he would look hardier. The dragon is very robust.”
I sigh, and Melusine grins at me. “Nevertheless, he is the reason that I am accepted at court. He and the dragon.”
“Ooh, Sigurd,” one of her sisters breathes. “Such a pretty man.”
“Nay, he is taken,” Melusine says firmly. She turns to me. “Sigurd contacted the prince this morning. He interceded, and I am to have a stay of time and the freedom to choose.”
“I’m so pleased. What will you choose?”
“Both,” she says simply. “I want homes in the sea and the land. We shall see what happens when my powers are fully in effect. Either way, I will have Robert.”
“Have you seen Sigurd?” I ask.
Her face sobers. “Yes, he was here earlier. Cary, he does not look well.”
Worry surges in me like the tide. “I need to find him.”
“If he is still at the beach, he will be at the far end. He likes to sit on the rocks on days such as these and listen to our song but still gives us our privacy.” She shakes her head, her smile affectionate. “Such a one, that dragon.”
“Over there?” I ask, pointing.
She nods. “Good speed,” she calls, and the women all dive down. There’s a flash of green as one of their tails breaks the surface, and then they’re gone, and there’s only me, the sea, and a mournful wind.
I set off down the beach. I’m stumbling and half running now, the urgency beating in my body like those great wings of his. I seem to run forever, slipping on the sand, my hair wet from the sea spray, and my breath coming in pants. Then I see him.
I stop dead, the surge of relief so great it makes me weak. He’s sitting on the rocks barefoot and dressed in jeans and a hoodie, his long hair loose and blowing in the breeze.
“Sigurd?” I croak.
His head turns, and then he jerks and rises to his feet. “Cary?” he says in consternation.
“I came back,” I manage to get out, and he jumps from the rocks. In two long strides, he’s in front of me, and I throw myself into his arms. The fresh surge of relief is almost painful, and I struggle to get closer, aware of him doing the same thing.
“Oh my god, I found you,” I breathe. Then, in the next breath, I snap, “What have you done to yourself?”
He looks terrible. He’s grey and he looks pale and diminished, somehow. His hair is a faint shade of red, and even his tattoos appear grey. He looks like a living shadow.
“Why are you here?” he says wonderingly.
“I came back,” I say simply. I’d imagined so many different ways of communicating what I feel for him, but in the end, the words fall from me, simple and true. “I fell in love with you, Sig, and I don’t want to be apart from you. I love you.”
He sucks in a breath, and I watch as jubilation fills his face. Then I gasp as the grey vanishes. The colour comes back to him like a flame licking over old newsprint, burning over him until he’s once more my vibrant redhead, the colours of his dear tattoos and runes restored.
“You’re you again. My dragon,” I say, and he pulls me into his arms, hugging me so tight I feel my ribs creak. But I don’t protest. Instead, I hug him back just as tightly, letting everything that he is to me fill my heart.
“I love you too, my Cary. Du betyr alt for meg,” he says, and joy fills me like church bells pealing and sounding all through my body.
He kisses me, and it feels like the same flames are coursing across my skin, filling me with warmth and love and sparkling like champagne in my bloodstream.
His arms fasten tight, and his scent weaves around me. I gasp as sparks and lights twine around us like a line of fairy lights. They twinkle, and I inhale the smell of gingerbread, rich and warm. “Sigurd,” I say and then nothing more. At this moment, his name is everything.
“Elskling,” he whispers.
The lights flash and glitter, and I feel a wave of memories wash over me—a small child playing in the snow, the first sight of a strange, green land, an endless parade of friends and comrades.
I’m seeing his memories, I realise with a shock.
Emotions suddenly flow over me like a wave—love, lust, longing, and pure unadulterated happiness.
I’m feeling his emotions, and it humbles me that they’re directed at me.
“My Cary,” he breathes, and the lights bind around us tighter and tighter until I hear a deep, resounding snap that’s quickly echoed by a grumble beneath the earth. The lights disappear, and that’s when I feel it—a tug deep inside me. It’s a tether to my dragon.
“The lights?” I whisper. “What are they?”
“’Twas our bond settling,” he says in an awed voice. “That is what our bond looks like.”
“It was so pretty.”
He kisses my head and, if possible, hugs me even tighter. “Not as pretty as my mate.”
The wind tugs at our clothes, and the gulls wheel and dip above us in the grey sky. But I’m warm all over, and I could swear I feel my heart pulsing. It feels like I have the sun inside me.
“What is this feeling?” I whisper.
“’Tis the bond. It began last night with the knot, but now we have declared our feelings and so the mating ritual is complete.” He looks down at me. In his eyes are twin flames, making the golden depths sparkle. “We are true mates, and we are tied now. Will you stay?”
I pinch him gently. “I will always stay. Where else would I go without you?” His eyes close in relief, and I hug him again because I can.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I whisper.
“I did not want you tied to me because of the idea of the bond. I would have you free and happy.”
“I’m still free, aren’t I?”
He nods immediately. “Think of the bond like a wedding ring, but a million times stronger. It ties us together in ways you cannot imagine. I will always know where you are, and you will know the same, because we are linked. But you are still you, and I am still me.”
“And you are never securing my happiness at the expense of yourself again. I don’t think so,” I say grimly, and he laughs, the sound rich and vibrant. “If you had gone over to the Sunlit Lands, I would have followed you.”
“Why?” He seems to be holding his breath.
“Because an adventure just isn’t an adventure without my dragon.”
“Mayhap that is truly what soulmates are. Two halves of the same whole. I will always seek your happiness.”
“And I’ll always seek yours,” I finish. “How lovely.”
His face fills with so much love and happiness that it humbles me. “I have so much I wish to show you. So much more of this world that you do not know.”
“But you will live forever if you want.” The thought of me passing and leaving him behind makes me speechless for a moment.
But then I notice his eyes have grown wicked. “What’s up, my Sig?” I ask.
“Ah, Cary. You too can live forever if you choose. You are my mate. I have knotted you, and your blood calls to mine. We will be together forever, and then one day we will choose to move to the worlds beyond this one.”
I gape at him until he finally reaches out and closes my mouth helpfully. “And what happens in those next worlds?”
His eyes gleam gold. “Me, you, and magic, of course, elskling.”
I wrap my arms around him and lean into his sturdy strength. My wild Viking. My sweet dragon. “Well, I think that sounds like my version of perfect,” I whisper.