17. Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Seventeen
Felix
The wind was cruel at this altitude.
I hunched deeper into my cloak as we descended from the ridge, my pony carefully picking her steps down the slope.
Drake rode ahead, Eva’s limp form cradled in his arms like something breakable.
He hadn’t said a word since the Vyrmin fell.
Not when I called his name. Not when I checked his wounds.
Not even when I told him she would live.
He was holding her like silence might stitch her back together.
I tried not to watch too closely. Gods knew I wasn’t the sentimental type, but something about the way he moved—coiled and barely holding it together—made it impossible to look away.
He didn’t look like a man returning from victory.
He looked like a man who had lost something vital and hadn’t figured out how to breathe without it.
We reached the edge of the valley and found a narrow cave tucked behind a thicket of thornbrush.
Shelter. Privacy. Drake dismounted with a fluidity that shouldn’t have been possible for someone bleeding from three places.
He carried Eva inside like she weighed nothing.
Like she was a memory already fading from his grip.
I followed, my palms already glowing with warmth. He laid her down so gently it almost broke me.
“She’s stable,” I said softly, kneeling at her side. “No broken bones. Rift burn. She just needs rest.”
Drake didn’t answer. He was crouched beside her, blood drying on his hands, his brow furrowed like he was waiting for her to vanish the second he blinked. His eyes were the kind I’d only seen once before—on a mother who lost her child and hadn’t yet accepted it.
I reached for a salve, giving him a moment. “She’s breathing, Captain,” I said after a beat. “You can stop holding your breath now.”
He didn’t laugh. Didn’t even blink. Just dragged a shaky hand through his hair and muttered, “This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“You getting clawed in the back or her puppeteering a monster into stabbing itself?”
His jaw clenched. “She nearly died.”
“But she didn’t.”
He finally looked up at me then—and I saw it. That thing beneath the anger. The fear. The… depth of it. I’d known him a long time. Known what he was like under pressure, in grief, in rage. But this?
This was new.
I shifted, lowering my voice. “You okay?”
His answer was immediate. “I’m fine.”
“Bullshit,” I said simply.
He turned away, standing like he could shake it off with motion. Pacing. Clenching and unclenching his fists.
“She’s strong,” I said after a moment. “You’ve seen it. I’ve seen it. You don’t have to shoulder it all.”
He stopped pacing. “It’s not about that.”
“Then what is it?”
He hesitated.
Something in him wanted to answer. I saw it—right there in the silence between breaths. But whatever it was, he swallowed it back like it might poison us both.
He crouched near her again, watching the rise and fall of her chest like it was the only proof the world hadn’t ended.
“She’s just… different,” he finally said. “It’s not what I expected.”
I nodded slowly. “You mean how she somehow made a fucking Vyrmin kneel like a trained dog?”
His lips twitched, almost a smile. Almost.
“No,” he murmured. “I mean… how I can’t think straight when she’s around. And how that fucking terrifies me.”
A beat of silence passed. There it was.
I sat back on my heels, studying him. Watching the lines in his face that hadn’t been there a week ago. The way he looked at her—not like she was beautiful, though she was—but like she was gravity and he was fighting not to fall.
“Drake,” I said gently. “I’ve seen you flinch through broken ribs. I’ve seen you stand between a child and a burning field. I’ve never seen you look at someone like that.”
He stiffened. “Don’t start.”
“Start what?”
“Whatever you’re thinking.”
“I’m thinking,” I said, keeping my tone even, “that maybe something’s happening you don’t understand. And maybe instead of fighting it, you should?—”
“Drop it.” His voice cracked like a whip, sharper than intended.
I didn’t flinch. Just nodded. For now.
But I watched him settle beside her again, not touching, just… anchoring himself near her like proximity might make sense of all this. He didn’t know what he was feeling. I wasn’t sure he could name it. But I could see the shape of it forming.
This wasn’t mission loyalty. This wasn’t lust. This was something ancient. Something patient and possessive and quiet as a knife in the dark. And it was going to wreck him.