Chapter Three. When the Boy You Hate Comes to Live with You
CHAPTER THREE
WHEN THE BOY YOU HATE COMES TO LIVE WITH YOU
FARREN
I don’t know why, and I don’t know how, but for some reason after I saved James Murphy’s life, I’ve been able to sense when he’s staring at me. Probably because he’s never subtle about it.
So even though I’m in the vast fields of my family’s dragon sanctuary, dozens of miles outside of town, five feet off the ground atop Hort—that eerie feeling that I’m being judged from roots to boots creeps down my spine.
I twist in the dragon saddle, already chastising myself.
James Murphy didn’t come all the way out here.
He’s not standing behind you critiquing your technique while you ride his dragon.
But I turn anyway, and lo and behold, he is standing there, all good posture, windswept auburn hair, and freckles. He’s even sporting that smug closed-lip smile he refuses to leave home without.
I’m not the type to yell or even gasp. But I do flinch. In fact, I flinch so badly adrenaline-soaked fear pricks across my skin and Hort encases himself in silver.
Hort whips around, ready for whatever scared me. When he sees James, chaos reigns as the two-thousand-pound dragon beneath me recognizes his rider. The silver recedes as swiftly as it came, leaving his natural bright orange scales in their wake.
Then I have all of two seconds to panic before I’m flung off Hort’s back in his pure excitement.
Pain and dirt bite into my shoulder before training kicks in and I tuck and roll.
Righting myself into a crouched position, I’m only ego bruised and embarrassed red.
My glasses have fallen off though, and anything not ten feet in front of me blurs.
Unfortunately, that means eight feet away I can still make out James staring, the smugness turning to a judgmental wince.
My stomach flops. There’s no denying it. He really is here. And he really just saw that. We remain staring at one another, me kind of glaring, as Hort leaps at James like a horse-sized puppy. There’s nuzzling, spinning, and even cute wing flapping.
James strokes Hort’s head and the dragon’s scales puff out in happiness.
Shards of silver metal still flash over his orange scales, indicating Hort was truly frightened when I flinched.
I forget how sensitive racing dragons are until I see them startle at their own shadow or sheathe in metal at being patted the wrong way.
Sadness pings in my chest at the stinging memory of him fully silver plated when he fell through the air two weeks ago.
“Hey, buddy. How’s the wing?” James asks.
I jump to my feet, thinking of Hort’s injuries, how all that uncontrolled wing flapping is going to tear open the stitches my father and I spent hours on. “Not going to get better if we can’t calm him.”
James whistles, a sharp high note. Once he’s captured his dragon’s attention, all he needs are two words, “Hort. Calm,” and the creature bred for the brutality of racing halts all movement.
Damn, I’ll admit it. That’s impressive.
“Why are you here?” I ask. It’s hard to imagine James just drove an hour to the outskirts of civilization.
Pastures stretch between the only two buildings in sight, my house and the barn.
Nearby the ocean beats at pillars of black stone piled atop one another until they descend into angry surf.
People don’t call this place the cliffs of isolation for nothing.
“They sent me to come get you.”
“They?”
He ignores my follow-up question. I guess I can surmise he means my parents and that he ventured here to check on Hort, review his progress, then report back to his strict father. With summer in full bloom, maybe this won’t be the last check-in. What an absolutely horrifying thought.
His eyes rove over my dirty frame. “That was a strange dismount. You okay, Savior?” Of course he says you okay like he couldn’t really care less. And of course he’s still touting around that two-week-old nickname.
I brush off muck and grass from my riding pants, tightening the straps on my leather chest guard out of sheer irritation. “I’d believe your sincerity more if you had helped me up.”
James steps forward like he can suddenly remedy his rudeness. A crunch of glass rings out. We both look down to his shoe crushing my glasses beneath his foot. For a moment all lies still, my reaction delayed. His too apparently because his foot slowly lifts like that can fix it.
My eyes hook into his. “Did you seriously just…?”
“I—I didn’t see them.”
“Says the guy with perfect vision.”
“I didn’t purposely break your glasses, Walsh.” He leans down to gather their remains and I jolt, not wanting him touching them. He beats me to the mess of glass and now we’re both kneeling in the grass like two kids digging for mud pies.
He holds out the black frames I’ve had since year nine, the ones I painstakingly infused bits of copper into for emergencies like this.
James notices the embedded copper at once, because of course a silver-crafter would notice simpler metalworking.
“Is this copper? I can—” Without another word, his fingers stretch out to craft.
The copper responds with ease, snaking over the broken bridge and fastening to another piece. Seamless. Perfect.
“There. Fixed.” The typical smug pride of James Murphy shines on full display. Absolutely awful.
“I could do that myself,” I bite out as I snatch my glasses from him. The frame repair job is perfect. I should break them in half to spite him.
“Yeah. But…”
But he thinks he could do a better job because he’s higher class than me. The metalwork isn’t the problem here though. Even James sees the main culprit, left lens thoroughly cracked. So not fixed. “I’ll buy you a new lens,” he supplies.
Because James Murphy can buy himself out of anything, even an apology. One he has yet to give, by the way.
“I don’t need your money.”
“Doesn’t that sound familiar,” James half sighs, half huffs.
Hort nudges James shoulder, upset he’s not the center of our attention.
Or maybe he knows James’s last remark relates to him.
How the Murphy family has been trying to buy our sanctuary for rescued dragons and transform it into a training and breeding facility.
It’s simple economics. Stealing the metal covering a dragon’s scales, racing them into a state of absolute fear so they produce more metal—it all turns more profit than collecting their metal naturally.
Hort’s recovery here is bankrolling us for the next six months.
Hort prods again, hard enough to throw James forward.
I catch his shoulders, so he doesn’t fall into me.
My left hand snags on the strap of his sling.
I never signed James’s cast, but all the hearts and get-well-soons scrawled across the plaster scream of his popularity.
I also haven’t been this close to him since I pulled him out of the water during his last race.
And we’re close, his mouth right in front of mine.
James’s eyebrows arch. “You trying to kiss me again, Savior?”
The moment comes rushing back, a permanent stain on my memories. The fear. The compressions that didn’t seem to be working. His wet salty mouth when I felt like all was lost.
I refuse to count it as my first kiss. It wasn’t a kiss at all. I was saving his damn life. But it was lips touching lips …
I lurch away, both physically and mentally. I can’t let him provoke me. “Pretty sad if you thought that was a real kiss, Murphy.”
I stand, broken glasses pressed into my palm. “You used to be so quiet before I saved your life. Let’s go back to you not talking to me.”
James rises from the grass as well, more of that amusement etched around his mouth. “I don’t think that’s going to be possible after today.”
“What’s today?”
He looks at me—hard. “You don’t know yet,” he says, surprised. A slice of concern flashes across his face.
“Know what?”
Dad calls from the porch, his voice boisterous yet still muffled by the distance.
I turn, then spin back to James. “What’s going on?”
“That … I think your dad should say.”
His hesitation drives dread into me. Dad wouldn’t have said yes.
He wouldn’t have given into Murphy’s demands and the excessive cash offer.
Not with what we have here. Not now. Dad’s life mission is to save as many dragons as possible.
He wouldn’t concede to helping the races expand when they’re one of the reasons these wonderful creatures are being harmed, their lifespan cut in half.
I quickly tie Hort to a dragon post. We received one silver-plated pillar for Hort specifically and he nibbles on the metal like the youngling he still is.
Without another word to James, I stash my glasses in my back pocket and run.
As I near the house, my vision focuses. One of the Murphys’ fancy metallic silver cars sits parked on the gravel drive, the ultimate status symbol gleaming in the sunshine.
It appears out of place alongside our small old house, porch chipped, off-white paint peeling.
My family aren’t fancy car people. Us Walshes aren’t even acquainted with fancy car people.
Well, I guess we do know the Murphys. But they have only ever come here the once.
Anxiety builds in my belly.
I linger on the porch to shed my chest guard and rip off my muddy boots, frayed laces abandoned for quickness. The leather and metal clasps thunk against the wood. Right when I open the screen door, James waltzes in like he owns the place. Typical rich guy behavior.
I’m three steps behind him, rushing into my own living room to find our parents.
There’s Mom, all gracious and warm honey grins.
Jeffrey, Dad’s right-hand man and dragon trainer, clutching his hat, the one article of clothing that never leaves his person.
Then Dad himself talking with the Murphys, both well shined like their car.