Chapter 59 #2
“What else can it be?” she said. “You don’t look at me, don’t smile, don’t speak a word to me unless you’re forced to.
I’ve had men shrink from me in revulsion before, so you needn’t work so hard to try and conceal your dislike.
I left men who despise me on my dragon’s back before and I can do it again. ”
“I don’t…” My heart was beating too hard, too fast, drowning out everything else but her, and wasn’t that a relief? As I stared at her, it felt like it came rushing to the surface. “I don’t hate you, Fern.”
Some little niggle at the back of my skull knew there was something else I should be doing, but this girl had decided to open the floodgates and now I was helpless to do anything else but let it rush you.
“What else could it be?” she asked as she stepped closer.
It felt like she was staring into my very soul, stripping away my defences one by one.
“Why else would you shrink back if I get close to you?” I looked down and saw my body was instinctively flinching away.
“If you won’t even show me the same courtesy you would a serving woman, what other explanation is there? ”
Gods, no… I thought, right as I surged forward.
Clapping my hands down on her arms brought the sweetest rush of relief, because finally I was touching Fern.
That wasn’t enough. I towered over her, forcing her to crane her neck only for my own head to drop down.
A tiny swipe of my thumb along her arm was the only movement I managed, right before the words came rushing out.
“If I look away, it’s because I must force myself to stop from staring.
If I shrink back, it’s because I’m terrified you’ll see just how fucking much I crave your touch.
” Her eyes widened. “If I neglect to say good morning, or how are you, or to talk about the damn weather, it’s because I know if I open my mouth I’ll start confessing how I feel and… ”
I’d excused myself from replying before due to having a dry throat, but it didn’t stop me now.
“I’d tell you that my eyes are drawn to you first over all other people. That if you’re in the room, no one else exists. That my mind has recorded every single one of your expressions in minute detail.”
“What?” Fern went to pull away, but that wouldn’t do. “That can’t be—?”
Dain, Argent said, but I couldn’t focus on my dragon, not now.
“Here.” That damn journal was yanked free of my tunic and thrust into her hands.
“You don’t believe me? Well, look at this.
” Her palms smoothed over the battered leather cover, and it was almost as if I could feel the same caress on my skin.
“How do you tell a woman that you’ve been dreaming of her since you were a small child?
That your visions of her were the only companions you had growing up.
That you recorded every dream, every vision in that book, terrified of forgetting a single one. ”
Dain, we— Argent pushed.
I couldn’t pay him any mind, because something broke in me when she cracked the cover, flicking through the first few pages.
No one had ever looked at my journal, no one.
Hiding it from my blood brothers consumed my waking moments, right up until the point they died.
My childish drawings were terrible, little more than scrawls, but I was willing to bet it wasn’t my lack of skill that had her gasping.
“That when you were a boy, you thought of the girl in your dreams as just an imaginary friend, but when the visions persisted past childhood and on, becoming a young man, they changed. That whenever times were hard, and you feared you might not make another day, you lost yourself in the dreams of the girl…”
A lump the size of my fist lodged in my throat, but I swallowed past it.
“The girl that loved to spend long summer days up in a tree, reading book after book. The girl who struggled to learn to draw under her mother’s cruel tutelage, only to surpass her in skill. The girl who walked across fields, her beagle puppy at her heels.”
“Sniffles?” she said in wonder.
“Sniffles.” I nodded. “He was white with brown ears and a black—”
“Patch over one eye.” Her slow blink made me think she understood. That fact she wasn’t running from the den screaming had a small spark of hope flaring to life.
“He was your best friend, following you everywhere when you went for long rambles, right up until he died of old age.”
A little snort, then her eyes growing shiny let me know that things weren’t going as well as I’d hoped. A single tear rolled free, and I followed its fall obsessively.
Like I did everything else.
I was right. Fern felt like my visions were intrusive. The drawings repelled her, and why not? Who would be happy being observed their entire life by an invisible presence? No one, that’s who. My abilities had my own family shrinking back, so why not—?
“You had… visions of me?” she asked.
“I’m sorry.” Backing up felt good, right. Get distance, that’s what my heart demanded. This was about to blow up and me with it, so I needed to get as far away as possible. “If I could’ve stopped it, I—”
“You saw me?” She didn’t wait for an answer, flipping through the pages now. “Gods, that was when I first learn to ride. That was the ball where no man wanted to dance with me…?” Fern looked up at me sharply. “You saw me.”
“Couldn’t do anything else,” I croaked out, my entire body tense. Just get this out, I thought, then go. “Vision after vision and every single one of them was of you. I watched you, obsessed over you…”
My eyes fell closed.
Dain—!
Just let me get this out, brother, I told my dragon. Then we can go.
“Loved you.” If I didn’t open my eyes I could say it. “With every beat of my heart. With every fibre of my being. Fern, for so long you were the only bright part of my life, and gods damn me, I couldn’t stop from warming myself on your glow.”
Turning on my heel saved me from seeing her reaction. Just make for the doorway, I thought furiously. Get on Argent’s back and…
So why was I turning around. Her stricken expression was a knife stabbed directly into my heart, but I lent into the pain, rushing back to Fern.
“Fuck it…” I growled, grabbing her shoulders and yanking her closer only to stare into her eyes. If this was the last night I’d spend in my girl’s presence.
I’d steal the kiss I’d longed for since the moment we walked into the keep.
My mouth came crashing down on hers, moving by instinct.
Her muffled cry was swallowed down by me as I deepened the kiss.
Gods, she was so soft and small and I needed her so damn badly.
Perhaps that’s why my arms wrapped around her.
Lest she try to pull away, but instead her hands went up and smoothed across my chest. Her lips parted, letting me in, and that was the point I was lost.
“Only you.” I ended up mumbling the words against her lips, not her neck. “Gods, Fern, all there is is you.”
“How touching.” We jerked apart in time to see the general come walking into the den.
He slow clapped as he approached the two of us, then came to a stop, riders at his back.
“It appears my intelligence was correct. The silver rider was going to kidnap the Lady Fern, forcing her and her dragon, Auren, to follow them out of the keep.”
Noise from the outside world came flooding back in. Dragons were roaring, men shouting, and I was moving. Placing my body in front of Fern’s, I made clear they’d have to get through me to get to my girl.
“No one is kidnapping—” I growled.
“Take this Dain to the stockade,” the general said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “And someone else can escort the lady back to her room. I’ll need a few trustworthy riders stationed outside her suite to ‘ensure her safety.’”
Brother, they have Lance as well as Kael and Lorien, Argent told me. I tried to tell you.
Don’t worry, lad, I replied, right before I drew my sword free. We’ll fight—
“No!” Fern rushed into the space between the general and me, then held up her hands.
“No, don’t get into fight over me. You can’t be hurt, Dain.
” There wasn’t much she could say to stop me, but that was it.
Her hand clutching at mine was a far more effective deterrent than this general. “You can’t.”
“Best to listen to the lady.” That smug bastard. I wanted to wipe the smile right off his face. “We wouldn’t want you to come to any harm.”
“If I did, where there was once the keep of the Royal Riders,” I said. “There would only to be rubble left.”
Just say the word, brother, Argent growled and some of the riders had the good grace to go pale, because Slate and ‘Fang emerged from their dens as well.
“That’s just what he wants.” Fern looked from me to the general. “To have you lose control of your beasts. Then he can declare the silver dragons a threat to the country and hunt us down. We’ll find a way to get free of here.”
The general smirked as he tried to take her arm, but as I lunged forward, she jerked it away, glaring at the man.
“Auren will never mate any of your dragons,” she snapped, and a roar from the gold dragon confirmed that.
“And I would never consider an offer from any of your riders, but if you wish to confine me to my room like a child?” Her nose rose high in the air.
“Then I will go, but this is a gross abuse of your power, and you know that.”
“I’ll get you out of here,” I promised her. “Whatever it takes.” My vision started to double, triple, making clear another vision was incoming. Riders muttered at what no doubt was my eyes going milky pale. “No one will hurt you, Fern. Not while I draw breath.”
The general went an alarming shade of red, but he held his tongue until Fern was escorted from the mountain, then he turned to me.
“Are you going to re-sheathe that sword or do I need to put you down like the dog you are?”
I grinned. One thing my family had gifted me was the ability to bear any blow without reacting.
Slowly walking past the man and towards the very large group of riders, I said, “Wouldn’t that be convenient?
Sure you don’t want to manufacture some situation here to give your riders an excuse to draw a weapon on me? ”
Watching the man’s jaw tighten was very satisfying. The whites of his eyes showing as Argent throat began to rattle was even better.
“No, I don’t suppose you would. No one knows the stink of fear more than I do, and you…
” I shot him a backward look. “Reek of it.” Turning to the riders, I held out my wrists.
“Take me to my brothers and then all of you can spend some time thinking about what you are doing. I don’t know the credo of the Royal Riders, but I’m fairly sure it doesn’t involve locking up your fellow riders. ”
They did just that, though.
“Fuck…” Lorien pushed himself away from the wall. “What the hell happened? Lance came in here, tried to get us out, but then they—”
“Alerted the general,” I finished for him. “I had a vision.”
“Didn’t think to warn Lance about that?” Kael asked. “Pretty sure the lieutenant is cooling his heels in the general’s office right now.”
“I…” Sinking down onto the thin bed, I couldn’t keep it back. My lips still burned from kissing Fern’s, and Kael’s eyes narrowed, as if he could see the evidence of it. “I got distracted.”
“With Fern?” He sat down beside me and Lorien also drew near. “Tell me she’s free and clear of here. Tell me at least she got away.”
“No, she stopped me from cutting a swathe through the riders. She thinks that’s just what the general wants.”
“What the man wants is us in the stockade,” Lorien said with a frown. “And now he’s got it. Lance is only up in his office because the man thinks he can still get the lieutenant on side.”
“The general better hope Lance doesn’t.” Kael glanced around at the stone walls of the stockade. “The only thing keeping us in this cell is a reluctance to turn the entire corp against us, but that changes if Lance switches sides.”
“Let me think.” My elbows went to my knees as I sank my head down, willing my eyes to go out of focus. The flickering at the edges of my perception grew more pronounced. “And see if my visions can tell us what to do next.”
“Look hard and look deep, brother,” Kael growled. “Because one way or the other, we’re leaving this place and Fern with us.”
His voice faded away as I sank deeper into the vision.