Chapter 38 #2
“Excellent flying, tighter wingspan on the dive! Darian, slow the ascent, your flame vector was clean, but your left side wobbled!”
Commander Dareth watched from a raised platform, arms crossed. “Vornokh and Nyxariel,” he said quietly, “are getting their riders to sync.”
Caelira nodded once. “They’ll lead soon.”
Above, Thorne angled closer, his voice dropping into that private hush they’d started using when the world fell away, and it was just the two of them.
“You feel it too, don’t you?”
“What?” Thaelyn said, heart pounding.
“The dragons. Ours. Us. They’re not syncing by chance. They remember their previous time together.”
Before she could speak, a first-year student lost control in the upper ring.
Their dragon pitched sideways, and they were plummeting.
Thaelyn turned, breath locking in her chest. Vornokh dove like a spear, wings tight.
Thorne lunged down, precise and cutting, while Vornokh caught the falling dragon’s tail in time to stabilize it. Gasps echoed from the sky.
Below, Caelira nodded once. “That’s why we train.”
“You look good up here, Thaelyn,” Thorne commented.
Thaelyn snorted. “Try harder, Dareth. That was barely flirtation.”
“You’d know if I was trying harder.” He smirked. “I wasn’t flirting,” he said innocently. “I was stating tactical observation. Your form and posture have improved.”
Her brows lifted.
Thorne barked a laugh. “You finally stopped flying like your ass was on fire.”
“You set my ass on fire, you menace.”
They flew until the sun passed the peak, sweat soaking leather and hands blistered from reins.
As the sky drills closed, the cadets circled low toward the landing tier, wings drawn tight.
Breathless, flushed, and wide-eyed, they returned to the ground one by one.
Vornokh landed in a thunderous quake of talons.
Nyxariel touched down a beat later, smooth and regal.
Thaelyn dismounted and pulled off her gloves; her fingers tingled.
“You flew clean,” Thorne said, approaching with a tilt of his head.
“You flew cleaner,” she said softly.
“No,” he said, voice low, just for her. “We flew as one.”
She looked up at him, lips parted, something warm and dangerous flickering in her chest.
Professor Caelira’s voice cracked across the stone. “Again at dawn tomorrow. Formation syncs, high wind drills, and midair target tests. You did not survive the bond just to glide. You will become worthy.”
Commander Dareth folded his arms behind her. “Dismissed.”
Dragons roared behind them.
The dragons had long since settled into their cliffs.
Their roars faded into rumbling breath, deep and distant as thunder sleeping beneath stone.
The wind had lost its bite. Thaelyn walked beside Thorne down the path that wound from the upper fields toward the dormitories.
The scent of pine, smoke, and cooling stone lingered in the air.
Her leathers were stiff with salt and wind.
Her braid had mainly come undone, and damp strands clung to her neck.
Her boots were coated in dust. Her arms ached from the long flight and drills, but there was something warm and restless stirring in her chest.
Thorne walked close, his hand brushing hers once, then again.
The third time, she caught his fingers and laced them through hers without looking. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t let go either.
“You’ve got a smug look on your face,” she said, voice low.
“I have a look?” he asked, tilting his head slightly toward her.
“Yes. It’s the same one you wear after a sparring match when you know you landed a hit but pretend you didn’t.”
He glanced at her sidelong, his mouth tugging into a crooked smile. “And what makes you think I’m not just enjoying your company?”
She snorted. “Because you’re Thorne Dareth. Your version of ‘enjoyment’ usually involves teasing me until I threaten you with bodily harm.”
He made a sound of mock offense. “Threaten? You threw a dagger at my head last week.”
“You deserved that. You said my stance looked like a drunk goat in a windstorm.”
“I stand by it,” he said lightly. “Your left foot was drifting. I only said ‘drunk goat’ to make sure you remembered.”
She laughed, shaking her head. “You’re unbelievable.”
“Admit it,” he murmured, voice softer now, “you like having me around.”
They reached the split in the path where the torchlight pooled golden across the flagstone. Ahead, the tower where the female cadets bunked stood silent. Behind them, the academy walls glowed faintly under the fading sky. Thaelyn slowed, the flickering light casting shadows across her face.
Thorne studied her, his gaze sharp and searching but no longer guarded.
There was something earnest there now, something raw and honest. “I meant what I said earlier,” he told her.
“You were incredible up there today. The way you flew with her. Nyxariel isn’t just responding. She’s resonating. That’s rare.”
Thaelyn shrugged a little, embarrassed by the weight of his praise. “She makes it easy.”
“No, she doesn’t,” he said, stopping entirely now, tugging her gently to face him. “She tolerates almost no one. Even Vornokh barely earns more than a growl some days.”
“I’m starting to think you only like me because our dragons do.”
“Hardly,” he said, stepping in closer. His voice dropped lower. “Everything changed the day at the palace for me, and it’s not because of the dragons or the bond.”
She looked up at him, heart knocking against her ribs. “You’ve got a strange way of showing it.”
“I know,” he admitted. “I want to make a real effort to show you. I’m trying.
” He raised their still-linked hands and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.
The warmth of his lips lingered long after he pulled away.
Her throat tightened. Then he smiled, a flicker of mischief again slipping past the emotion.
“You know,” he said lightly, “you don’t have to limp all the way to your dorm just to scrape off dragon dust and pretend your braid didn’t try to strangle you mid-flight. ”
She narrowed her eyes. “What are you suggesting?”
“My new room,” he said. “I was reassigned for safety. Come clean up in my room. I’ve got extra towels, clean water, and no roommate now. We can eat together, away from the others, in the eating hall. It’s late, and I know you’re hungry.”
“You want me to come back with you,” she said, lips twitching, “to bathe, eat, and what, let you undress me by torchlight?”
His brows rose. “Tempting offer, but no. I’ll behave. Mostly. Unless you ask otherwise.”
Thaelyn snorted. “You are the least trustworthy man I’ve ever met.”
“And yet, you’re still holding my hand.”
She looked down at their joined fingers. “Damn it.”
He laughed. “Come on. I won’t bite. And if you need a guard to keep the towel bandits away, I’ll station Vornokh outside the bathing room.”
“I don’t think I need a dragon, and he wouldn’t fit anyway. I could disembowel you just fine with a spoon.”
“I know. Stubborn, independent, and so sassy.”
Thaelyn hesitated, but her smile broke through, slow and reluctant. Her eyes flicked up to meet his again.
“One condition,” she said.
“Name it.”
“You get the dinner from the eating hall and bring it back to the room. And after my bath, you give me a back rub and rub my sore arms. My muscles hurt so bad from all the flying.”
He laughed, head tilting back, voice rich with amusement and something warmer.
“Deal,” he said. “Come on, Stormborn. Let’s pretend we’re normal for one evening.”
Hand in hand, they turned away from the dorm tower and walked down the torchlit path together, toward firelight, food, and something still unspoken, but rising like wings behind them.
His dorm was tucked into the upper edge of the riders’ tower.
The door creaked open into warmth, fire already crackling in the hearth, shadows dancing against the stone.
The room was expansive, clean, and barely lived-in.
Weapons lined the walls in perfect order; his bed was perfectly made.
In the connected bathing room, the copper washtub that was in the corner was steaming faintly under a window cracked just enough to let in a wisp of fresh mountain air.
Thaelyn toed off her boots and stretched her arms, letting her muscles groan in protest.
“You planned this,” she said, nodding at the drawn bath.
“I always plan for emergencies,” Thorne said, pulling off his gloves. “And I suspected you’d eventually stop pretending not to like me.”
She flicked water at him from her hair. “Arrogant.”
“Accurate.”
He moved to grab fresh towels and a bar of soap that smelled faintly of mint and pine.
“Do you want me to step out?” he asked softly.
Thaelyn studied him for a moment, then shook her head. “No. I want you to stay.”
She stripped off her outer layers without hesitation, ignoring his sudden stillness, and slipped into the tub with a sigh that shuddered out of her lungs. The warmth wrapped around her like a second skin, easing aches she hadn’t realized she carried.
Thorne hesitated only a second longer before undressing and sliding in behind her. The water shifted around them, lapping at collarbones and shoulders. His legs bracketed hers. His arms circled her slowly.
No heat. No urgency. Just presence.
She leaned back into him, resting her head against his shoulder.
“I didn’t expect this,” she murmured.
“What?”
“You. Here. Like this.”
“I wasn’t sure you’d ever trust me enough when you weren’t injured to let me get close to you again.”
“I didn’t,” she admitted. “I thought you were cranky, overbearing, and just another royal brat with a dragon and a superiority complex.”
He chuckled. “And now?”
“Now,” she said, reaching for the soap, “You still are all those things, but you’re also just a man who is showing me more and more that you want to be beside me.”
She turned in the tub, straddling his lap.
“Careful, Thaelyn, you might get more than you want if you straddle me like that,” he said low.