Chapter 21 Calytrix
TWENTY-ONE
CALYTRIX
“I’m your ryder, aren’t I?” My mind worked through the details in overtime, but it also felt sluggish. Like this couldn’t be real. I didn’t know how I understood the fact, but I just knew it to be true.
“You are,” he confirmed.
My heart raced, thudding in my ears and drowning out all other sounds. Every feeling I’d started to attribute to madness clicked into place and finally made sense. The unexplainable pull to him I’d experienced. The life-long feeling that there was something more for me than this life I was given.
I was a ryder. He was a dragon. We were destined by the Seraphic to fly together and combine our magic into something great. It’s the kind of escape I'd always dreamed of, but I could never have imagined it would come in this form.
“Why then are you avoiding me?” I asked, incredulous.
His face fell, and I reached out for him, but he stepped back like he couldn’t bear for me to touch him.
“Talk to me,” I demanded. “You cannot leave me in the dark any longer. I will not allow it.” I backed him into the railing of the ship. He’d have to fly away to avoid me again, and if he did, I might just grab on to him and try to go with him.
“What would you like me to say?” His words were cold.
“I want you to explain yourself. In the Sun God’s name, I think you owe me that much.”
He lifted his chin, almost indignant. “There is nothing to explain.”
“Why have you not embraced me as your ryder? I thought the First Kingdom was desperate for dragons to feed its war.”
“Isn’t it your war, too?”
I scoffed. “Hardly.” But I wasn’t about to get into politics. “Isn’t this the greatest honor the Gods bestow? Why would a dragon avoid his ryder?” That was the only part I couldn’t make sense out of.
“Surely you can work it out.” He shook his head, still refusing to so much as look me in the eye.
“Spit it out already.” I grew weary of the evasion and the secrets and having to live like I was the problem.
“You’re the future Queen.”
“And?”
He laughed without humor. “Do you think any King would let his wife go to war?”
I blew out a breath, ruffling my hair. “Not when the King himself wouldn’t ever show his face on the battlefield. The coward.”
“Shhh.” He glanced around. “Do you want to get me hanged. I’m already in enough trouble.”
I almost wanted to laugh. Or strangle him. But I was still reeling. “So you’re going to just let them lock me up in the palace?”
“I don’t see what choice I have.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I could finally taste freedom, and it had come far too late. What was the Gods’ plan here? Bond me to my dragon when I was already promised?
“And you’re going to what?”
“Get as far away from you and the First Kingdom as I can.” He half sat on the rail, leaning away from me.
“Am I so intolerable? I’m sure I smell like dead fish, but I’ve spent days in the bowels of this ship.”
“I don’t think you’re intolerable.” I thought the exact opposite as it happened. “But do you think he’ll stand for his wife being bonded to another, dragon or not, when that bond would always come before all else?”
“I see your point,” I admitted.
“So what do you think will become of me when your intended gets wind of this?”
“Surely it’s not his right to question the Gods, or his Goddess, whatever nonsense he believes in?” I stepped closer, pressing into him. “And don’t tell me you think you can fight this connection.
His dark brows pulled, shifting the freckles dusting his cheeks, and his voice softened. “It’s better if we don’t make this worse.”
“You can’t just turn this off.” I poked a finger into his chest.
He dropped his gaze to where my finger stabbed his tunic. “I know.”
“And you wish to live this way?” He moved to grab my wrist like he suddenly forgot, but as soon as his fingers closed around my skin, he recoiled.
But his eyes dilated, and smoke filtered between his full lips. “I don’t have a choice.”
Why couldn’t he touch me?
Did he think we’d suddenly meld, and this would all be worse?
Even I knew that wasn’t how it worked. If I had my facts right, the meld happened once our souls accepted one another.
We’d said maybe five sentences to each other before this conversation.
We were not there yet. There had to be more he wasn’t saying.
Then it hit me. Was he—were we—?
I grabbed his wrist to test my theory.
He growled low in his chest. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
“Why not?”
“Because part of me wants to tear you apart for ruining my life, and the other part of me wants to take any innocence you might have saved for the future king.”
Warmth pooled inside me. “What if I want both?”
He flexed his jaw, closing his eyes again. “Do you want me hunted to the ends of the Twelve Kingdoms?”
“We can leave,” I said impulsively.
Confusion washed over his face, and he opened his eyes, revealing their pools of oranges and yellows. “What?”
“Right now. We can leave. Why are we even going to the First Kingdom if neither of us wants to be there?”
“You know that’s treason, right?” he asked, and I couldn’t believe he cared.
“You are going to leave anyway.”
“And?” He breathed out more smoke, flames licking around his teeth as he spoke.
I’d never wanted to be set ablaze more in my life. “You clearly don’t give a toss about remaining for your duty. Why subject me to mine?”
“It’s different.” He grabbed me and moved me back as gingerly as possible, which was quite disappointing considering how easily he accomplished the task. He pushed past me and headed for the stairs.
“It’s no different.” I followed him below deck.
“I made a vow to Nyx to bring you back safely, and that is what I’m going to do. It’s better if we don’t interact. It will be easier on both of us,” he said when we were below deck.
“That’s ridiculous and you know it,” I said low to avoid rousing any crew.
“No, it’s the only solution.” He turned to head for the hold and then met eyes with Nyx.
He stopped dead, and Nyx just glared. He was enraged, I could feel it vibrating from him, and I didn’t know how Faolan would deal with it. Would he make an excuse for me?
“I found the future queen above deck. I am escorting her back to the hold.”
Arsehole.
But I didn’t get a chance to kick him for it or reintroduce him to my blade as he quickly turned and disappeared, leaving me with a very annoyed Nyx.
“I just needed some air,” I said, knowing it was a pathetic excuse.
“I am well aware that your current conditions are not ideal, but we are in a very precarious situation, and I would appreciate it if you would give your cooperation to our efforts to ensure your safety,” Nyx seethed.
I had no words to respond with. I simply nodded and returned to my box like a youngling under punishment. Leaving Nyx to probably go and tear a strip off Faolan for being a part of my escape. Why had I thought it was a good idea? I felt worse now than before.
“Where were you?” Nova asked when I climbed back into my cot. “I thought you left.”
“There’s no way off this damn boat. Where would I even go?”
Kol laughed from his hammock just outside the crate. “You won’t get another chance now either. Nyx will be on top of you at all times.”
I made a frustrated sound and sank into my bedroll. “Did you know about this?”
“What?” Both Kol and my sister said at the same time.
“About Faolan.”
Nova frowned, puzzled, because, obviously, she didn’t know. My question was for Kol.
“Oh,” Kol looked a little sheepish. “That.”
I shook my head. “Does everyone know except me?”
“What do you speak of?” Nova asked.
“I wouldn’t say everyone,” Kol said in a woeful attempt to soothe. “Only the dragons of the group.”
“And me,” came Alaric’s voice from the other crate.
“And me,” Zaria said from her hammock.
“Oh, great, so everyone.” I threw my hands up.
“Not me!” Nova cried in frustration. “What about Faolan?”
“I’m his ryder,” I admitted out loud to another person for the first time. I had hardly admitted it to myself.
“You’re what?” she all but screeched, then clapped her hand over her mouth to silence herself.
“You heard me.”
“But th—that’s… How?”
I shrugged.
She blinked, still processing. “I just—wow. What are you going to do?”
“What can I do? One cannot control these things.”
“One cannot avoid them either,” Kol said knowingly.
“I would never avoid a calling from the Gods,” I told him pointedly
“By all the Gods of Light, Caly, you’re really a ryder? I can’t believe it.” Nova said, still processing the news and completely missing the subtext of the conversation.
If that blew her mind, what would she think if I told her that I suspected our bond was actually more than just ryder and flyer?