Twenty-seven
Ariadnne
What was the point of wings if you couldn’t use them?
An idea had been brewing in Ariadnne’s mind all afternoon. A reckless, foolish idea. A way to see Nieve again, that night.
Her mate. The very idea sent her reeling. She’d known from the minute she laid eyes on Nieve that she was different. Special—but mate? She hadn’t thought that possible. Melixanthe had said mates were a myth…
She needed to see Nieve again.
Her dragon demanded it.
Melixanthe retired early after her meeting to rest and heal. Ariadnne wasn’t sure if her handler’s ability to shrug off serious wounds and keep going was an admirable trait, or sheer stubbornness. At least, for once, she was listening to her healers’ advice.
A little voice in the back of Ariadnne’s mind whispered that Melixanthe’s absence was fortuitous.
The voice dripped with guilt. Melixanthe was too shrewd not to notice Ariadnne’s unrest, her distracted thoughts and the lightness in her step.
There was no way Ariadnne could have summoned the composure to avoid her handler’s questions that afternoon.
She’d barely had a chance to dwell on the arrow. She couldn’t shake the feeling that Sol had been involved. There was something odd in the way his face had hardened at the sight of Melixanthe on the ground—she just couldn’t fathom why.
She wouldn’t hesitate to kill him if she could prove his guilt.
For now, though, she had a daring stunt to plan.
Sascha came and went with her dinner tray and Ariadnne stayed glued to her window. Her room looked straight out over the cliffs. Far below, cresting waves crashed against the rocky cliff-side, the waters wild and chaotic.
When she was a fledgling, and both significantly smaller and infinitely more reckless, she had tried to take the matter of freedom into her own hands once or twice.
She had leapt from this window at night and shifted mid-air, catching the wind in her wings in the nick of time to escape a grizzly fate on the rocks below.
Skimming over the waves she would imagine what would happen if she kept flying. She’d never made it far.
It had always been Lucius who caught her. And while he had always been gentle—infuriatingly so—Melixanthe’s threats of what the Council would do to her if they found out had soon put an end to the flights.
Lucius wouldn’t be able to catch her now, but the Guild would find her eventually, if the curse didn’t get her first. She would undoubtedly lose every privilege and semblance of freedom she had earned over the years.
They weren’t above hurting others to punish her, either. Like Sascha, or Nieve—
No, running was not an option, but she could still use her wings.
She had not attempted this feat for over ten years. Her inner voice berated her for considering it, but there was no other way out of the room unseen.
She licked her lips and eyed the rocks below. She was now a lot more dragon. It would take all her skill to pull this off.
Then there was the second hurdle—how to get back into the main yard without being noticed?
She was somehow going to have to scale the cliff as a dragon and find a way to shift back before dropping into the yard.
Many parts of her plan were foggy at present and there was a high chance the high she was riding wasn’t letting her think straight...
Eventually, the sun disappeared over the horizon and the sky filled with stars.
Ariadnne took a deep breath. She removed her clothes, folding them on the arm of the couch.
Then, she climbed onto the windowsill, the stone cold under her fingertips, breeze lifting her hair from her neck as she forced her shoulders through the narrow gap.
As her heart pounded, a jangle of worry pinged through the bond.
Nieve sensed her anxiety and was fretting.
Ariadnne tried to send reassurance back, but she had no idea if Nieve felt it.
She banished the second thoughts creeping across the back of her mind. They didn’t affect her dragon, who uncoiled eagerly, excited by the prospect of imminent release.
With tightly coiled limbs, she sprung from the window into the chilly air and seized the shift, pushing the magic to work faster as she plummeted.
Mere metres from the rocks below, her wings unfurled, the tips brushing the jagged, rocky edges of the cliff.
With an almighty backstroke she forced her domination over gravity just as her tail was drenched in spray.
She almost swallowed her heart—it had come so far up her throat—as she glided along the base of the cliff.
Staying low, she skimmed the waves until she was beneath the wall to the yard.
With a flick of her wings, she twisted her body so that her claws scrabbled against the cliff side for purchase.
For a horrible moment she thought she was going to slide into the sea as every bit of rock she grasped broke away under her weight.
Eventually, she found her footing and held on tight.
As delicate as an eighty-foot beast could be, she edged herself up.
Somehow, she also needed to scale the wall of the castle itself without crushing it.
The brickwork was smooth with little for her talons to grip, and the sound of her scrabbling would surely bring guards.
With a sinking stomach, Ariadnne acknowledged she would have to shift back and pray to the gods she could hold on while doing so. She closed her eyes and muttered a promise to Dianea to be a better, more devout person as she tentatively pulled on her tendril of power.
Her stomach swooped as she fell against the cliff, grappling frantically for handholds as her arms formed.
It was an ungainly scrabble, but the rocks were much easier to grip with hands and fingers and she didn’t fall far.
She clung to a rocky outcropping and regretted her plan as she viewed the climb ahead.
Thirty minutes later, her arms trembling and bleeding from a multitude of scratches, she pulled herself over the lip of the wall above the training yard.
Her bond tugged frantically at her chest. Nieve was beside herself with worry, experiencing every ounce of fear, pain, and exhaustion alongside Ariadnne; a two-way street of feelings that would take a lot of getting used to.
Ariadnne surveyed the drop into the yard below, fatigue making it seem like a long way to fall.
She prayed it wasn’t high enough to do any serious damage as she lowered herself over the edge to hang from her fingertips, then let go.
Landing with a grunt, she crouched in the shadow of the wall.
The yard was empty, but Ariadnne felt very exposed and wished she’d had a way to bring clothes...
She followed the edge of the wall until she got to the stone archway leading to the barracks. Here there was more noise and Ariadnne was careful to stay in the shadows as she tried to find her companies’ building.
She stumbled against its rough brick, resting her limbs.
Then, holding her breath, she crouched beside the first window and tilted her head to peer inside.
Finnick. Damn. She ducked back before he could notice her and moved on, checking each window she passed until she finally found who she was looking for.
Nieve paced back and forth, pausing intermittently to run her hands through her hair in a frustrated gesture Ariadnne was getting to know. She was wearing a simple shirt and breeches and looked… beautiful.
Wishing she had something to wear, Ariadnne knocked on the window. She must look a state, covered in scratches from the climb and hair falling from her braids.
Nieve’s eyes darted to the window, widening as she saw Ariadnne. Within a heartbeat she was there and scrambling to open the panes.
‘Ariadnne! By the gods… I’ve been so worried for you. What in nine hells did you do…’ She paused, her breath catching. ‘You’re n—where are your clothes?’
‘In my room… umm. Could I borrow a shirt?’ Ariadnne gave her a crooked smile.
‘Of course!’ Nieve turned hastily to rummage in her wardrobe and returned as Ariadnne succeeded in hoisting herself through the window, landing sprawled on the floor. Nieve crouched next to her and held out the shirt, lip curled, amused.
‘Thanks. Not the most graceful entrance, I know…’ Ariadnne muttered and accepted the shirt—it was barely long enough to cover her.
‘I can’t believe you’re here…’ Nieve touched her shoulder, as if reassuring herself that Ariadnne was real. ‘The bond… I was scared for you. I was worried you were being punished or tortured or something...’
Nieve sat so that they were both leaning against the wall under the window and turned her head towards Ariadnne squeezing her hand.
‘Well, you see,’ Ariadnne said with a grin. ‘There was someone I couldn’t keep away from. So, I scaled a very unforgiving wall to see her... We seem to be making that sort of thing a habit.’
Nieve punched her arm. ‘You beast! How did you actually do it?’
‘I’m not sure you want to know; it involved falling from a window and some very ungainly scrambling. But I’m here now.’
‘Don’t you dare frighten me like that again.’ Nieve made an exasperated sound. ‘But yes, yes you are. I know it’s only been a few hours, but I’ve missed you.’
‘I missed you enough to risk plummeting to my death…’ Ariadnne joked and Nieve punched her again, harder this time. ‘Ow. Okay, I won’t joke about that.’
‘You’d better not.’ Nieve brought her hand to cradle the side of Ariadnne’s face.
Closing her eyes, Ariadnne leaned into the touch, shivering as Nieve moved to gently trace the scars that littered her abdomen through the gap in her shirt. She lingered over the scrapes still healing from the climb, inhaling softly before releasing a breath.
‘I spent the afternoon asking about Melixanthe.’
Ariadnne turned to her.
‘Don’t worry, I can be subtle.’ Nieve’s eyes widened as Ariadnne snorted. ‘I can. She’s very well respected, even if people feel she’s strict. No one I spoke to appears to have any negative feeling about her, but I’ll keep asking around.’
‘Thank you, it means a lot that you’re doing that.’
Ariadnne wondered if she should ask her to talk to Sol but decided she didn’t want to put her in that position. Nieve’s finger pulled along another scar that wound around her forearm.
‘I hate that you’ve suffered so much,’ she said sadly.
‘Not so much anymore...’ Ariadnne breathed. Nieve’s touch was leaving a trail of pebbled skin in its wake, making it hard for her to concentrate.
‘Each mark is a testament to your survival. I want to know every beautiful scar.’ Nieve’s pupils dilated as she followed the pattern of scars across her chest. ‘I only hate that you received some of these here, at the hands of people I respected,’ she muttered.
Her eyes lingered on the band around Ariadnne’s neck, but Ariadnne didn’t want to talk about that one.
‘And what of this?’ Ariadnne’s finger traced the bumps of a long, jagged scar that ran down Nieve’s collarbone, disappearing under the collar of her shirt. ‘Who gave you this?’ she asked quietly.
Nieve growled in response. ‘That’s from the first man I gutted.’
Anger clenched in Ariadnne’s gut. ‘He was one of those that hurt you?’
Nieve nodded.
‘Then I hope his death was slow and painful.’
Ariadnne blinked and Nieve’s mouth was on hers, demanding and fierce. She groaned, unable to get enough of this. Of Nieve.
A thought struck, and Ariadnne pulled away.
‘Is it the mate bond that makes my need for you so strong?’ she questioned, searching Nieve’s eyes for answers.
‘Yes, but for all the right reasons.’ Nieve bit her lip. ‘We were meant to happen, Ariadnne.’ With a small smile, Nieve took Ariadnne’s hand and got to her feet. ‘Come on,’ she said, and led her gently towards the bed in the corner of the room. ‘How long can you stay?’
‘As long as you’ll have me.’
‘Then I think I’ll keep you all night.’ Nieve’s eyes creased as she gave Ariadnne a dazzling smile.
Her eyes reflected the light from the flickering candle in the corner of the room, making her ethereally beautiful.
She sat on the edge of the bed and pulled Ariadnne next to her, tilting her face to meet Ariadnne’s gaze.
‘I’ll make every minute count,’ she promised.
Ariadnne didn’t need to hear another word, instead she stopped Nieve’s mouth with another kiss, this one deeper and hungrier than the last.
Pine and snow filled her nostrils, Nieve’s sweet, heady scent.
A shiver rippled through her as she reached to undo the buttons of Nieve’s shirt, her mouth finding Nieve’s neck. She kissed the snow-smooth skin there, nipping and teasing. Nieve moaned beneath her touch, the sound reverberating through Ariadnne’s body.
Nieve would be her undoing.
Releasing the last button, Ariadnne ripped the shirt free to expose Nieve’s pale skin. She traced her fingers down the side of her jaw, then down her neck and across her collar bone, loving the way Nieve arched towards her.
‘Ariadnne…’ Nieve started but was stopped by another kiss.
‘We have all night,’ Ariadnne murmured, ‘no need to rush.’
A high-pitched bellow ripped through the quiet of the barracks. Ariadnne pulled away with a frown, her heart pounding. Someone was sounding the call to arms.