Chapter 30
Ever
I PITCH FORWARD AND AESON catches me. I feel so heavy all of a sudden, and my blood can’t decide if it wants to boil or flash freeze. Pins and needles crawl all over me, and I can’t help the whimper that escapes when Aeson collects me in his lap and tries to examine me in search of what’s wrong.
“What’s happening, Claws? Tell me what you’re feeling, exactly.”
I start to shiver and Aeson presses his hand to my forehead and then my cheek.
“Herm!” he bellows, alarm ringing in his voice. “Tell me, Ever?.?.?. tell me what’s wrong,” Aeson pleads, panic setting in his features.
I groan, but it comes out in pieces thanks to my chattering teeth. “It’s crawling under my skin, stealing my strength,” I finally grit out. “It’s everywhere. This gnawing ache, like my bones are grinding together.”
“Shit,” Aeson snaps, and then we’re moving.
I close my eyes and press my face to his chest, inhaling his scent like it’s the antidote to whatever’s wrong with me.
“Was it the Healer or the food?” I ask, trying to figure out how I missed it.
I didn’t feel amazing after the injection, but it definitely got worse after I ate.
I thought I’d built up a tolerance to a number of poisons, thanks to Iker and the other wyverns.
It’s just my luck someone would hit the mark on their first try.
“It’s not poison,” Aeson declares, like he’s reading my mind.
“Feels like poison,” I grunt, my breaths too fast and too shallow.
“Start the water,” Aeson orders, and I open my eyes to see who he’s talking to.
“Why are we in the bathroom?” I mewl, distracted and confused. Shouldn’t we be running for the infirmary? Unless?.?.?. “Dammit, I knew I shouldn’t have let that Healer bitch give me a shot,” I growl, but I’m feeling too shitty to properly berate myself.
“You weren’t poisoned, Claws. Your affinity is indurating your scale armor,” Aeson tells me calmly, and I grunt an objection.
“My affinity would never; we run a classy joint up in here,” I argue weakly, gesturing to myself.
Herm chuckles and steps away from the giant tub that’s now filling with water. “It’s probably too late for the herbs, but I can send Jori for them if you want.”
“No, I’ll use the bond. I’ll call if I need anything else,” Aeson instructs.
“I’ll be here if you need anything,” Herm reassures, and the comforting look he offers Aeson makes my chest ache.
My thoughts drift to Enslee, and I try to recall a time we were ever like that.
There’s always been love—and we’ve been there for each other as much as we could—but the days of only supporting one another died when our kindred did.
After that, it was all about surviving, and carrying everyone else on our shoulders.
The love didn’t die, but life started pulling us in all kinds of directions, and I think we lost something along the way.
“Ever?” Aeson calls, pulling me from my thoughts. “Can I take your clothes off? You’ll be more comfortable as soon as we’re in the water.”
I nod, and in a flash of heat, Aeson and I are skin to skin.
“Did you just burn my clothes off again?” I complain, and the smile that spreads across his lush mouth would send my heart into hyperdrive if it weren’t already flip-flopping around in my chest thanks to my affinity undulating at my scale armor, or whatever Aeson called it.
“It took me a long time to learn how to burn without destroying,” he tells me as he steps down into the steaming water that now fills the massive inground tub. “I promise to only use it when absolutely necessary.”
Aeson lowers us until my head is the only thing sticking out of the water, and the instant relief almost makes me cry.
“Fuck the stars,” I groan as the aching discomfort drops from bone-gnawing to lightly sore. I close my eyes and take a moment to revel in the respite.
“That should help,” Aeson assures, and I tilt my head back into the water until I’m weightless and floating.
Deft fingers release my bun, and I moan at the welcome release of pressure at the back of my head. “Thank you,” I sigh tranquilly, and Aeson guides me deeper into the water.
“I should have anticipated this might happen,” he rumbles, and I can hear the censure he’s aiming at himself. “The Healer said you’re metabolizing magic faster than she’s ever seen. I should have realized that meant things would hit you harder than the average drake.”
I open my eyes. “What do you mean?”
The room is dark, with the exception of small, floating, flickering flames that now dance above the edges of the sunken tub. It’s the kind of intimate shroud that makes you want to spill your secrets because you know the shadows will keep them and the dim light will treasure all of your truths.
“Your affinity and body are building your scale armor,” Aeson supplies, and I feel him sit and then relax against the tub before he pulls me to him.
Water ripples and eddies as Aeson presses my back to his chest. He tilts my head until it’s pillowed on his shoulder and wraps a thick arm around my stomach to hold me in place.
His cock floats between my thighs, his legs cradle mine, and I know I should be panicking, but I’ve never felt more comfortable in my life.
“Usually it takes weeks to build your scale armor. There are signs that kindred know to look for: aches, flashes of sharp pain, itching across your body that you can’t alleviate.
When the signs are there, we can do things to help make the transition easier.
But sometimes an affinity will rush the process, and it can be very painful before and after without help.
” Aeson pauses and runs a gentle palm down my arm.
“You were hurting, but you didn’t say anything. Why?”
I shrug, my shoulders brushing over his chest.
“I was achy and uncomfortable, but it wasn’t a big deal. Even when it started to get worse, it never really dawned on me to say anything. I wasn’t keeping it from you; I just didn’t think it was worth mentioning.”
I feel his growl before I hear it, and the resonant sound swoops through me and chases even more of my aches away.
“For future reference, it’s worth mentioning,” he declares while his arms tighten around me as if to punctuate the statement.
“I’ll take that on board,” I quip, and out of nowhere, Aeson splashes me.
“Hey! No drowning the invalid,” I taunt, but I can feel his smile against my temple, and it has mine peeking out from the shadows to see if it’s safe. “So how long do we play mermaids?” I ask, and my dimple decides to join the fun.
“A couple of hours, maybe through the night. From what I understand, you’ll feel a surge of magic, and when you reach the peak, you’ll call your scale armor, and from there, the worst is over.”
“This didn’t happen to you?” I ask.
“No, I had a few aches and pains for a month or so, and then one day in my Accords class, my armor just exploded out of me.”
I laugh, trying to picture it. “Were you shocked?”
“No, relieved, actually. I was a bit of a late bloomer, and I was tired of Lorn and his friends teasing me all the time,” he confesses with an easy laugh.
“Pretty sure I have you beat. I just might be the latest bloomer to ever bloom.”
Aeson’s laugh lengthens and the sound of it starts to peel back the layers of protection I’ve placed against the bond. A comfortable silence stretches between us while Aeson traces the edge of my ear with his nose and sighs like he’s surrendering to something.
“Ever?” he asks, and I dozily hum an acknowledgment. “You said it ‘feels like poison.’ How do you know what poison feels like?”
I tense, and I know he feels it, but he doesn’t say anything else as I study the flickering flames encircling us.
“After my kindred died and there was some semblance of a camp in The Scorch, the wyverns started training us. Exposure to small doses of poison was part of it.”
A shiver moves through Aeson and his chest starts to move faster beneath me. “They’re dead. All of them. If I ever see them again, there will be no mercy.”
I let the threat float between us. I should defend Iker and the others, explain all the ways they saved us and taught us to survive in a world intent on our demise, but I don’t have it in me right now.
And it doesn’t really matter anyway—what’s done is done, whether Aeson understands it or not.
There’s no going back. There’s no changing anything.
“Is that also why you sleep on the floor?” he presses after a while. “I saw a mattress in your container, but here you won’t?.?.?.”
I blow out a breath and shake my head. “No, that’s?.
.?. When the Tainted transferred me to Newden, my cell wasn’t like the others I’d been in before.
There was a bathroom and a bed. It had fluffy pillows and soft blankets, the kind I used to dream about in The Scorch, but it was a trap, a very obvious one.
And I knew if I gave in—even a little—somehow it would end in my losing everything.
Maybe not that day or the next, but Wistan was patient, he wanted me to give in, he wanted me to go willingly.
I had such little control over anything, but I could control never going near the fucking bed. ”
Aeson’s chest moves in time with mine as though he’s purposefully syncing our breaths. His hold on me grows even tighter, but it’s exactly what I need to not float off into the abyss of memories, to not lose myself to the rage and grief that haunts my dreams and stalks every waking hour.
“When you brought me here, I took one look at the bed, and it felt like the same trap. So I just kept sleeping on the floor. It seemed the safest.”
“Ever, I—”
Out of nowhere, heat floods my limbs, and a strange tingle erupts everywhere, surging under my skin like a livewire.
“I think it’s happening,” I gasp in alarm. “What do I do?”