Chapter 13
Voices echoing from within the tunnels dragged Carwyn from her slumber. She groaned as she rolled to the side and cupped her aching abdomen. I think my insides are bruised.
Selene had managed to smack her in the gut with the thick length of her tail just as Carwyn was running for a different memory.
It had winded her so badly that she’d pulled her consciousness back from dream walking and had keeled over on her knees in agony.
The ointment she’d lathered on her stomach was already healing her, but it’d take a day, perhaps more, depending on the level of damage done to her.
I knew this would be dangerous, but I didn’t think it’d be this hard. Or take so many tries.
To die in someone else’s mind was to die in the physical world. That was its curse, its drawback. Its sacrifice. To go into someone’s consciousness courted death.
If she fell to her death and didn’t save herself, if she drowned, if she were stabbed. If someone wrapped their clawed hands around her throat and squeezed until her lungs gave out, that was it.
So she was trying her best to be careful.
I just wish the evidence of my wounds didn’t cover my body.
The bruises around her throat were long gone, and the claw marks on her shoulder had healed into tiny, thin scars. She’d managed to escape the night before without a wound, but Selene had almost bitten her leg.
And each time she’d tried to enter the specific memory of Selene’s capture, she’d been met with unrelenting flames.
A feminine yell echoed down the tunnel, and Carwyn blinked open her bleary eyes.
Dream walking provided no rest. She technically wasn’t asleep, even if the other person was deep in slumber. She’d struggled to fall asleep when her gut had been throbbing and had only gotten few hours of rest.
Thank goodness he’s leaving me be. He’d taken away all her tasks, and she couldn’t be more thankful. She was drained of magic, tired, and she didn’t have the will to sort through dusty books or even cook for herself.
Begrudgingly, Carwyn rose to her bare feet to go see what all the noise was about. She winced, held her gut until she was used to standing, and limped for a short while. It didn’t take her long to overhear, even when she hadn’t reached the entrance room yet.
“I have told you, she’s asleep.”
“Heavens, Kier. It’s noon. Wake the little thing up.”
“Once again, no.”
Something stamped against the stone, and the rhythmic clicking that followed gave away that it was a clawed paw. “She promised to speak with me!”
“No promises were uttered,” he argued, just as the back of him came into view, blocking further entry into the main area. “Try a later day, a later hour.”
“But I’m free today,” Aysu grumbled, shaking her narrow head in annoyance, which made the entire length of her body wobble.
Kier’s tone darkened but remained quiet. “I said–”
Aysu perked her head up in Carwyn’s direction. “There she is!”
Kier glanced over his shoulder, and his ruby eyes instantly narrowed into a glare. He snapped his head back towards Aysu. “Yes, because of all your yelling, she has risen and come to see what the fuss is about.”
“Good, now move it.” She shoved Kier in the face, forcing him to the side as she hurried over.
Carwyn smiled weakly and fixed her posture to hide that she was wounded. She nodded her head respectfully in greeting. “Hello again.”
Aysu returned her smile, like she’d found a curious creature she was excited to pet and discover. A moment later her expression fell, and her scaled maw twitched as her smooth brows came together.
“Heavens, little one. You do look as though you need rest.” She snapped her fangs at an approaching Kier. “Such a callous male if you would force her to work to the bone. Look at her, she’s like a mere human – so frail.”
He rolled his eyes as he said, “I’ve done no such thing. She’s also not frail. She’s threatened to kick me multiple times.”
Aysu directed her thin snout towards her once more. “Truly?” And when Carwyn nodded in answer, she grinned wide. “Now that would be funny to see.”
Carwyn attempted to smile in return, but she was completely put off by Aysu’s fangs. Thin and sharp, they were like a needle bush. Better for chomping on little bones and digging through the tough skins of marine creatures.
Kier’s fangs were far less unsettling. Broader, like wolf or cougar teeth, for snapping larger bones.
“You wanted to speak with me?” Carwyn asked, settling her gaze on Kier to assess if that was allowed.
He wasn’t looking at her, seeming to be having a staring contest with the wall. His upper lip was stiff, his eyes narrowed, but his wings were droopier than normal.
“Yes. I’ve formulated a list of questions for you.” Then she waved a forepaw at Kier. “Leave us. Go into your tunnels.”
His eyes slid to Aysu. “Absolutely not.”
“I don’t need to be supervised,” Carwyn snipped at him. She wasn’t a child that needed minding, nor was she a danger to this dragoness!
He rounded his shoulders and lifted his wings and head superiorly. “You are my prisoner.”
“Don’t you have tasks to attend to?” Carwyn retorted with a raised brow.
“Yes, and rather than being allowed to do them, I’m forced to bear witness to females prattling on about their lives. Other dragons would pity me.”
“Then you won’t interfere, Nightmare,” Aysu stated firmly, cutting him a glare. “Or you will learn why they call me the Strangler.”
He waved a paw at her flippantly.
“Yes, yes. Very fearsome,” he drawled, stepping over to a flattened bed of hay to lie upon. “I shall quiver on my seat.”
Through her wide nostrils, Aysu snorted a deep huff at him while her silver eyes narrowed.
“Seriously. When did he become so short tempered?” She brought her gaze to Carwyn.
“Alas, it makes him more handsome.” She smiled brightly.
“Come. The sun is shining and will soon be on the cliff edge. Let us find a comfortable spot to talk there.”
Carwyn peeked around her. It’s been days since I felt the sun.
She quietly followed Aysu while looking out of the corner of her eyes at Kier. His were already on her, intense and watchful.
He better not get all grumpy on me later for this. It’s not like she could tell Aysu no, and he hadn’t put up much of a fight on her behalf either.
Carwyn was excited, even though she was tired and in pain.
There was a dragon here who actually wanted to converse with her.
Not with an edge of hate or anger, but with a quick fondness she felt she deserved.
He may have been easy to speak with the day before, but she’d had a week’s worth of his indifference or annoyance prior to that.
I wonder if she’ll let me touch her scales, she thought, examining the sky blue of them with rapt interest. I’d love to keep one.
Not to use for spell work, but to keep as a fond memory.
She’d sincerely treasure it always... and tease her sisters that she obtained one freely! A small smile curled the corners of her lips. They’d be so jealous.
That’s if she managed to convince him of her freedom so she could go tell them.
As always, the reminder of her captivity dulled the pleasant direction of her thoughts.
With his forearms crossed, Kier laid his head down across his wrists. He was curled on his side for comfort, with his eyes closed and hind legs overlapping each other. He’d been motionless for hours, and he bet they thought he was asleep.
He wasn’t. He was listening intently.
He cared little about Aysu’s tales. He’d heard them all before, and he’d never been overly enthralled by them. Her territory sounded too wet, cold, and dark.
Carwyn’s stories were far more exciting. Even the one where she explained what a scrub board was to the overly curious Aysu, who’d never heard of such a thing. Kier owned one somewhere, he was sure. He had all sorts of human knickknacks.
He’d learned much about her, which is why he’d chosen to stay when there had really been no need. He doubted Aysu would harm her; the dragoness was used to prickly, as their kind were rather thorny. Nothing the witch said would truly provoke such dangerous ire that she’d be frozen alive.
Yet, he’d also had the overwhelming desire to watch over Carwyn in the presence of something greater and mightier than her, as if she required protecting.
She looked rather tiny next to the dragoness, who had coiled herself up like a serpent and towered over her.
Carwyn had taken a seat against the cave wall, alternating between bringing her knees up and sitting cross-legged.
One of her dainty feet was currently visible, and he thought it might be the first time he’d peeked at her toes.
She lives like a peasant, he’d learned.
In some faraway cottage.
Yes, she’d told him such a thing the day before, but it hadn’t truly registered. Humankind was obsessed with wealth and status; it was why dragons believed witches to be greedy.
A dragon might steal a trinket from another’s hoard, but they’d never kill over it. They would trespass, but they wouldn’t attempt to invade a lair to command ownership of it.
Humans would. They would steal, murder, and rape so long as it gained them something. They would destroy if it bettered them. They’d do it just to assert dominance.
Witches were the same. They destroyed for possessions and power.
Her family hadn’t.
They’d remained the same for generations. They’d built their lives up from nothing, and they traded fairly for what they couldn’t do on their own.
He’d already deduced that she had no mate, considering she’d been wandering the wilds on her own, but apparently she hadn’t had many lovers.
Aysu had asked if it was because she was ugly, and Kier had nearly fucking choked because the dragoness had to be blind to not see that she was rather enthralling to look upon.
Then again, seafolk rarely shifted into their human forms, as they drowned without their gills. She might be the only human-formed thing Aysu had ever spoken to.
At least the little witch laughed. She hadn’t taken offense, as if sensing Aysu hadn’t meant anything by it.