Chapter Fifty-Two
Avari
Embracing my dragon, I buried my face against warm scales as she lowered her massive head to meet my eyes.
I felt a sense of completion. I had already gone two weeks without my bonded before, back when River kidnapped me. But it had been different in the Isles. Unable to feel our bond or talk, in its wake was an open chasm that I was certain Anya felt too, given her affectionate state.
‘Living without you was just existing,’ I assured her.
She groaned in agreement. ‘We aren’t meant to be apart. The silence was deafening.’
‘I missed you so much.’
‘I missed you more. You’re the only thing I have in the world.’
My throat tightened. I wasn’t sure how she’d take this. ‘Not for long, though I don’t know whether you’ll be happy about it.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I met a shadow dragon in the Isles. He wants to live with us, wherever that is. He’s lonely too.’
‘And where will we live?’
‘The Isles. The bond didn’t work over distance. I’m hoping that if you’re there, the land will allow it. If it doesn’t, at least we’ll be able to talk, and I’ll just have to train harder to grow shadows. They said that’s when my connections to the outside world will flourish.’
‘I still can’t believe that you have an actual family. I am happy for you.’
Hearing her say it softened something inside me I hadn’t realised was still hard. ‘So am I. They’re not perfect, but they treat me like an equal and care for me.’
‘If they ever try to tear you away from me again, I will burn everything they love,’ Anya threatened.
I snorted. ‘Alec could use a little scorching here and there.’
‘And the others?’
‘Miriam and I are alike. She loves to read and is slightly socially clumsy, too.’
‘You look nothing alike. Like neither of your parents nor siblings.’
‘I know. Maybe it’s a good thing. I’m my own person.’
Footsteps echoed behind me, measured and careful. I didn’t have to look. It could only be him.
‘I don’t mean to interrupt…’ he said softly, the careful tone of someone approaching a wild animal. A smart move, considering my attitude.
Letting go of my dragon, the beast straightened, watching our exchange like a silent witness, eventually suggesting with a glare that I should let her stomp him to death.
‘I just couldn’t stay away,’ River admitted, keeping a few feet of distance between us. I wondered whether it was because of my beast or if he deemed it necessary because of our strained relations.
Silence stretched.
Once succumbed to a sense of longing, I saw nothing wrong with admitting my feelings, ‘I missed it here.’
River’s tense shoulders relaxed at my confession. ‘You’re back now. After we come back from Ortensia, are you planning to go back to the Isles?’
‘Yes.’ How could he think otherwise?
He ran a hand down his neck, kneading it as if he needed a distraction. ‘My court is your home, even if you don’t wish to see me. My land speaks to you; please don’t feel like you can’t stay here.’
‘My family lives on the Isles. I’ll join them there because I want to.’
Changing the subject, he mused, ‘You look so much stronger now. You’ve put on weight.’
‘What the hell did he just say? ’Anya’s voice cracked through my mind, incredulous.
Shocked, I uttered, ‘Excuse me?’
Eyebrows raised, River’s cheeks flushed with warmth as he fussed over an explanation. ‘Gods, I didn’t mean it that way. Just that you look healthier, not as skinny. Not that you’re fat…’
He raked a hand through his hair. Despite myself, I laughed. It felt strange hearing him stumble.
His focus shifted elsewhere. ‘Your fire has grown too. I can sense it, even though it seems subdued.’
‘I drained myself doing something. Ever since I learnt that I couldn’t control my powers because my mother had been draining me, it’s like the mental block that kept me from them lifted.’
‘Then we were right about her being a blood witch.’
‘We were.’
Part of me didn’t want to leave her again. Saying goodbye to my dragon before going to Ortensia proved a sorrowful experience.
And crossing the courtyard with River in a stretching silence, I didn’t feel ready to break it.
We eventually arrived back in the conference room.
He tried to console me, assuring me that I would be back with my dragon in no time, that everything would be fine and I would be safe with the varied entourage at my back.
But his kind words didn’t soothe me as they once had. I wasn’t sure they ever could again.
‘So it’s your wing of the castle, once we walk out?’ Alec asked, still trying to come up with a plan of action, even though the conditions were unpredictable.
Nodding for the hundredth time, I agreed. It was his nervousness that kept me polite. ‘I don’t get too many people on my side, so we should go unnoticed if we stay quiet.’
Just as we prepared to step through the portal, it flared to life.
Stepping back, River and Alec unsheathed their weapons and powers as a figure in a navy-blue cloak emerged, eyes promising trouble.
In a voice rough and sophisticated beyond his station, he accused, ‘King Dracon of Fogoya, the Elders have been informed that you are harbouring unregistered fae in your court.’
My stomach dropped.
Trouble found us faster than expected.
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