Chapter 14 Branded #2
“I’ve been learning from you lot.” The words come out drier than intended. “Apparently some of it stuck.”
Selene’s laugh breaks the remaining tension. “I told you she was smarter than you gave her credit for.”
“I gave her full credit.” Drayke’s mouth curves. “Auren was the skeptic.”
“I prefer thorough assessment to premature judgment,” Auren says stiffly, but there’s something less cold in his expression when he looks at me. “The Fire-Bringer’s analysis is sound. We proceed on multiple fronts.”
The council continues—logistics, timelines, the endless details of preparing for a war we can’t yet see the shape of. I participate. Ask questions. Offer observations about Valdris’s behavior through the mark, her patterns, her weaknesses.
By the time Drayke calls an end to the session, I feel more like myself than I have in days.
Rurik finds me on the ramparts an hour later.
The sun has climbed high enough to warm the stone beneath my palms, and the wind carries the sharp, clean scent of mountain air.
I’ve been standing here watching the fortress below, the dragons going about their business, the life of the Brotherhood continuing despite the crisis I’ve brought to their door.
“You’re not hiding.” He moves to stand beside me, close enough that our shoulders almost touch. “That’s new.”
“I’m thinking.” I don’t look at him. “There’s a difference.”
“Is there?”
“Hiding implies retreat. Thinking implies processing. One is passive; one is active.”
His laugh is low, surprised. “Lists again. You and your categories.”
“Organization prevents chaos.” The familiar phrase rolls off my tongue automatically, but this time it doesn’t feel like armor. Just truth.
“You know,” he says, leaning his forearms on the rampart wall, “most people find my company either annoying or terrifying. You’re the first one who seems to find it... tolerable.”
“I find it complicated.” I match his posture, staring out at the mountains. “You’re annoying and terrifying and surprisingly thoughtful, all wrapped up in a package that refuses to sit still for more than thirty seconds.”
“Thirty seconds is generous. Selene clocked me at twelve once.”
“Twelve seconds of stillness? That must have been excruciating.”
“Nearly killed me.” His voice carries that familiar lightness, but when I glance over, his expression is softer. More genuine. “You were right, you know. In the war room. About wanting to be part of the decision.”
“I usually am.”
“Modest too.”
“Modesty is for people who haven’t survived what I’ve survived.” The words come out sharper than intended, but I don’t take them back. “Weeks of being treated like livestock tends to clarify your priorities.”
He’s quiet for a moment. The wind shifts, carrying his scent—smoke and something warmer beneath. I’ve grown familiar with it over the past weeks. Familiar in a way that should concern me but doesn’t.
“You were impressive in there.” Rurik’s voice has lost its teasing edge. “The way you handled Auren’s information. Most people would have—“
“Panicked? Run? Demanded someone fix it immediately?”
“All of the above.”
“I considered it.” I turn to face him, finally.
He looks tired—genuinely tired, not the performative exhaustion of someone looking for sympathy.
The past few days have worn on him too. “Three weeks ago, I probably would have. But three weeks ago, I didn’t know how to light a candle without burning down a room. ”
“You’ve come a long way.”
“I’ve had good teachers.” The admission feels strange. Vulnerable. But not wrong. “You, specifically. You and Selene. Even Auren, with his cold assessments and impossible standards.”
Rurik’s eyebrows rise. “You’re including me in that list? I distinctly remember you calling me insufferable. Multiple times.”
“You are insufferable.” I let a small smile escape.
“But you’re also patient. And you ask before touching me, even when you clearly want to do something impulsive.
And you—“ I pause, searching for the right words.
“You see me. Not just the Fire-Bringer or the victim or the strategic asset. You see the parts I usually keep hidden.”
Something shifts in his expression. Goes serious in a way I’ve rarely seen from him.
“Aisling—“
“Let me finish.” The words need to come out now before I lose the nerve. “The council talked about the claiming bond as an option. A way to sever Valdris’s mark. And I know—I know it’s not something to be done casually, that it’s permanent, that it would change everything.”
“It would.” His voice has gone rough.
“I’m not asking for it.” I hold his gaze steadily. “Not yet. Maybe not ever. But I need you to know—“ Deep breath. “I need you to know that when I look at the options in front of me, the idea of being bound to you isn’t the part that scares me.”
The silence stretches. I watch his throat work as he swallows. Watch his hands flex at his sides, the visible effort of maintaining the distance between us.
“What does scare you?” Barely above a whisper.
“That I’m starting to want it.” The confession lands between us, raw and honest and terrifying.
“Not because of Valdris. Not because of the mark. Because of you. Because every time you make me laugh, I feel something crack open in my chest. Because when I wake from nightmares, you’re the first thing I look for. ”
He’s so still. For once in his life, completely motionless. I can see his pulse jumping in his throat, can feel the heat radiating off him in waves.
“Before the dragons,” I continue, because I’ve started this and I might as well finish, “I had my life planned out. Practice in Cork. Maybe a partner eventually. Controlled. Predictable. Safe.” A bitter laugh escapes.
“And then I woke up chained to a stone altar with my blood feeding an ancient evil, and every plan I’d ever made turned to ash. ”
“Aisling—“
“I’m not finished.” I need him to hear this.
Need someone to understand. “When the Brotherhood rescued me, I thought—I thought if I could just get back to that control, that predictability, I could pretend none of it happened. But I can’t.
I can’t go back to being the person I was before. She doesn’t exist anymore.”
“Good.” His voice is rough. “Because the person you are now? She’s extraordinary.”
I force myself to breathe. “You make me want things I’d given up on wanting.”
Rurik moves.
Not toward me—not yet. Just a shift, a lean that brings him closer without closing the gap entirely. “What kinds of things?”
“Companionship. Trust. Someone who sees the worst parts of me and doesn’t run.” My laugh comes out shaky. “I spent weeks being drained by monsters, and somehow the scariest thing I’ve done since then is telling you this.”
“It’s not scary.” His hand rises, hovers near my cheek without making contact. Asking. Always asking. “It’s brave. And for what it’s worth—I’ve spent three centuries running from exactly what you just described.”
“Running toward or away?”
“Both.” His smile is crooked, self-deprecating. “Convincing myself I didn’t need it. That the performance was enough. That if I just kept moving, kept joking, kept burning through everything that got close—“
“You wouldn’t have to feel anything real.”
His breath catches. “You really do see me.”
“I really do.” I reach up, cover his hovering hand with my own, and press his palm against my cheek. His skin is warm. His fingers tremble slightly. “Is that so terrible?”
“It’s terrifying.” He turns his hand, lacing his fingers through mine. “And it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
The kiss, when it comes, isn’t desperate.
It’s soft. Almost questioning. His mouth finds mine gently, carefully, giving me time to pull away if I want to. I don’t want to.
I lean in instead. Let my free hand find the collar of his shirt. Let myself feel his heat, the solid reality of his presence, the fire that rises in my chest to meet his.
This isn’t the clash I expected—not the explosive collision of two stubborn people finally giving in. It’s something quieter. More deliberate. Two people choosing each other with open eyes and honest words.
When we break apart, his forehead rests against mine. Our breath mingles in the space between us.
“For the record,” he murmurs, “when you tried to burn me? Best day of my life.”
I laugh—really laugh, the sound startling in the quiet air. “You’re absolutely insane.”
“Probably.” His thumb traces my cheekbone. “But you like it.”
“I do.” The admission doesn’t feel like surrender. It feels like freedom. “Against my better judgment, I really do.”
His arms come around me then—a full embrace, nothing restrained about it. I lean into his chest, feel his heart hammering against my cheek, let myself be held in a way I haven’t allowed since before the captivity.
“We’ll figure out the mark,” he says against my hair. “We’ll find a solution that doesn’t force either of us into something we’re not ready for. And whatever happens—“
“You’ll be there.” I finish for him. “I know.”
“Insufferably so.”
“I’m counting on it.”
We stay there, wrapped around each other, the wind carrying the scent of smoke and possibility.
The mark on my wrist still burns. Valdris’s presence still hovers at the edge of my consciousness, patient and watchful. The war isn’t over—hasn’t even truly begun.
But standing here with Rurik’s warmth around me, his heart beating steady beneath my ear, I find I’m not afraid.
Not of the queen in my head. Not of the battles to come. Not even of the terrifying, wonderful thing growing between us.
For the first time since the mountain, I believe I might not just survive this.
I might actually live.