7. Chapter 7
AMARIA
We followed Dreadscale through the crowd.
The platform dropped into carved stone steps—wide enough for three to walk abreast, worn smooth by generations of boots. Warriors flanked us, boxing us in tight against the cliff edge. An escort that felt more like a perimeter.
The stairs hugged the cliff face, winding down until they dumped us onto a main thoroughfare suspended over the drop.
This level was all function. Stone walkways connecting platforms. Dragons overhead, banking between perches.
Smoke rising from forges built into the cliff face.
The clang of metal on metal. The shouts of workers hauling cargo from massive nets that hung beneath returning dragons.
A port. That's what it reminded me of. The same controlled chaos of ships coming and going, goods being loaded and unloaded. Just vertical instead of horizontal. And with a lot more fire.
Wind whipped between the towers, finding every gap in my freshly cleaned leathers. But beneath my boots, that warmth still radiated—the mountain's heartbeat, pushing up through the stone.
We passed a group of children. They stopped their game to stare. One pointed at Eryndor and made a slashing motion across his throat. His companion grabbed his arm and dragged him away, but not before he threw a glance over his shoulder that weighed me, measured me, and marked me as a threat.
"Charming place," Maxx muttered beside me. "Very welcoming. Love the murder-children."
"Quiet." Dreadscale didn't turn around.
Maxx quieted.
The steps led to a gaping maw hewn from the mountain itself. Wide enough for two dragons to pass through side by side. Sconces lined the walls inside, flames guttering in the draft. The glow caught the drifting smoke, painting the tunnel in amber and deep, shifting shadow.
We entered a tunnel that stretched ahead and branched into smaller passages.
Dried grass and hay lay scattered across the floor, softening our footsteps and lending a faint sweetness to the air of smoke and stone.
Heavy wooden doors banded with iron lined the walls, each one nearly identical except for the symbols carved into it—some marking system I didn’t recognize.
"Guest quarters." Dreadscale stopped at an intersection. "The council will want to speak with all of you tomorrow. Tonight, you rest."
Morrha appeared at his shoulder. She carried a ring of iron keys.
"The priestess and the illusionist—there." She pointed to a door on the left. "The broken one—" She looked at Caden, the hard lines of her mouth softening a fraction. "Healers will come for him within the hour. He stays in the recovery chamber, third passage down."
Caden went rigid, but he nodded.
"And..." Morrha's gaze landed on Eryndor. Then me. "The false prince."
"He'll need quarters," Dreadscale said.
"He'll need a jailor." Morrha's voice was flint. "You vouched for him. But you are not a nursemaid, Dreadscale. You have other duties now that you've returned."
"Then assign him a guard—"
"We don't waste warriors on Crown dogs." She stepped forward, keys jangling. Her eyes fixed on me. "You are the Rupture, yes? The dual-marked?"
I held her gaze. "Some call me that."
"You came with him. You claim him as yours?"
Claim—the word felt like a lock snapping shut. Final and binding. Behind me, Eryndor had gone very still.
"He's with me," I said. "If that's what you're asking."
"Then you keep him." She pressed a heavy iron key into my palm. "If he leaves this room without you, we kill him. No warning. No trial. Understood?"
"Understood."
She turned and pointed to a door at the end of the hall. The last one. Furthest from the entrance.
"There."
Maxx caught my arm as I passed. "You going to be okay in there? With him? Given the whole..." He made a vague gesture that somehow encompassed our entire impossible situation.
"We'll manage."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I have."
I walked to the door with Eryndor shadowing me three paces back. The key turned with a harsh scrape, and the door swung inward.
The room was small. Stone walls, stone floor, stone ceiling. A single brazier sat in the corner, embers glowing low, casting light but no warmth. A narrow window had been carved into the far wall—an arrow slit that offered no view, only a thin line of grey and a biting wind.
And in the center of the room: one sleeping platform.
Wide enough for two. Piled with furs. Clearly designed for a bonded pair who wouldn't dream of sleeping apart.
I stared at it.
Eryndor stepped through the door behind me. Stopped.
Neither of us said anything.
The door swung shut at our backs. The lock clicked into place from outside.
For a moment, neither of us moved.
Then Eryndor reached for the buckles at his waist.
I unstrapped my weapons in silence and laid them by the wall—steel leaving my body piece by piece while the room grew tighter around us.
The sound of leather sliding loose off him was obscene in the quiet. Too small. Too ordinary. He unfastened one strap, then another, setting his weapons carefully against the wall like each movement required thought. Like if he moved too fast, he’d cross the room. Or I would.
I turned toward the window. Bad choice. The arrow slit gave me nothing but wind and stone and the faint reflection of him behind me—his hands working at the ruined clasps of his armor, his hair damp against his neck, his jaw tight enough to break.
Three paces away. Might as well have been a whole kingdom.
He pulled the last strap free. The armor shifted from his shoulders with a soft scrape, and I heard his breath catch when the fabric beneath tugged against a wound.
I almost turned.
Didn’t.
His voice came low behind me. “You’re allowed to look.”
I laughed once, without humor. “I’m really, really not.”
He exhaled, and the sound went straight through me.
I turned before I could stop myself.
He was still half-armored, one strap loose across his chest, dark hair falling into his eyes, throat working like he was swallowing down the same impossible hunger.
My foot shifted forward. Barely an inch.
Too close.
The Marks woke before I could think to step back and my skin prickled.
Eryndor went still, his whole body on alert. A predator who'd just caught a scent.
Three feet between us. Maybe less. I could smell him—steel and storm. Every nerve ending I had lit up at once with excruciating, and delicious, pain. The kind of delicious pain that made you stupid.
My body remembered what my mind kept trying to forget. The way his hands felt on my waist. The sound he made when I kissed him—desperate and starving. The heat of his mouth. His teeth. The way he'd said my name like it was the only word he knew.
I closed my eyes. You can stop fighting. Just for a second. Just feel—
Just feel… just one second…
"Amaria." Low and rough.
I didn't open my eyes. If I looked at him, I'd move. If I moved, I wouldn't stop.
I could feel him without seeing. The weight of his presence. The shape of the air he displaced. If I reached out— just a few steps and my hand would find the fabric of his shirt. The heat beneath. The heartbeat I knew was pounding as hard as mine.
"I know." The words scraped my throat.
Neither of us moved.
The hearth crackled. Cold air slipped through the cracks in the stone and raised the hair on my arms. Somewhere deep in the mountain, a dragon rumbled.
Every inch of me ached. The hollow place where the bond used to live screamed loud enough to deafen me, but the silence beneath it was worse. My body was betraying me, opening up, making room for him like it had already decided the outcome and left my mind out of the vote.
Come closer. Come back. Crawl inside me and stay there. Fill up all the places that have been empty since—
My breath hitched.
"I can't do this." I wasn't sure who I was talking to anymore. "I can't stand here and want you this much and not—"
"Then don't stand there."
My eyes flew open.
He hadn't moved. Hadn't closed the distance. But his eyes—dark, burning, ruinous—
“I can’t touch you,” he said, each word measured. “But I can watch you fall apart from here. And when I finally can, I’ll know exactly where to begin.”