CHAPTER 25 #2
We passed Dane, who stood with arms crossed and eyes locked on his son. “Where’s your brother?” he asked.
Wep’s grip tightened around my waist. “I’m not his keeper.”
“He hasn’t returned to port.”
At that, I turned. “Ell was sent out?”
“Aye, Daughter. He was with me when the messenger arrived.”
Something about that tugged at me, but I couldn’t place what. With a gentle nudge, I allowed Wep to guide me back into the keep. I tried very hard not to dwell on the fact that all my fears were wrapped up with the man at my side, while not a single thought had crossed my mind for my betrothed.
BACK IN my rooms, I sat in my bath long after the water turned frigid. My mind was completely blank.
“It’s time, Small One.”
“I can’t do it, Vaya’la. I can’t. I’m supposed to learn to trust Eldreth, not Wep.”
“He is ready to know the whole truth. The time is near when it will be evident to all. This is as it should be.”
I abandoned the cold tub. Callagh, seeing how weak and shaken I was, helped me into a soft cream underdress, far thicker than the light fabrics I’d grown accustomed to.
“I got you something special on my way in today before all the commotion.”
A pang of true regret pinched my brow. I squeezed her arm. “I’m sorry to have worried you.”
She shrugged. Her eyes shone with light as she pulled a thick lavender coat out of my wardrobe.
It was plush, soft, and long…and completely impractical.
A coat like that would be filthy in seconds and useless against the frequent autumn rains.
Still, I loved it. I slipped into it like a dream, and Callagh closed the fasteners down the front.
“It’s a robe,” she explained, admiring the finished product on me. “An indoor coat.”
“Ohh. It’s heaven.” I was familiar with Inraen dressing robes, worn loose and open at the front. This hugged my body like the softest blanket without being restrictive. Forget Wep, forget Eldreth, I was in love with this coat.
“I set your tray in the sitting room next door. Wep has asked you to join him.”
“Have you heard anything more of Ell?” I don’t know why his absence bothered me, but it did. Anxiety flashed through me, dissipating just as quickly.
“He’s not yet returned. You won’t be interrupted.” A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “What are you suggesting?”
She grinned. “Nothing. Is there something on your mind?”
I still wore my scowl as Callagh led me to the sitting room. It was the door immediately next to mine, and yet, it had never been opened to me before.
I pushed inside and gasped at its magnificence.
Two gorgeous couches faced each other and were capped by four large chairs, two on either end.
The set was astonishingly carved with graceful lines and a faint imprint of dragon scales.
The cushions were as thick and plush as those of the Relaxation Room, and the chairs and couches were each stacked with pillows.
The entire room was a mix of deep, rich green and dark, rusty red from the tapestries on the walls to the coverings on the ottomans.
Even the rug sprawling across the center of the room was shaped into two mirrored dragons, one in red and one in green.
There were accents of gold and cream scattered throughout.
How could I only just be seeing this room?
“You humans are easily distracted.”
“And you dragons are surly busybodies.”
Vaya’la chuffed as I turned to Callagh. “It’s Midwinter Day every day.”
She chuckled. “I think it’s meant to be symbolic.”
“Of me and Eldreth.” The realization dropped on me with the weight of a boulder as I stepped through the threshold.
The more I looked at the room, the more astonished I became.
There were golden sconces on the walls and matching golden candelabras scattering the room—though none were lit yet, given the afternoon light.
Above the mantel was a piece of metalwork art that resembled dragon wings arranged like the petals of a rose.
A long, stone bench jutted out from the hearth, and it was so highly polished that light from the crackling fire reflected off it.
The door opened, calling my attention. Wep entered wearing a thick tunic that exactly matched the forest green of the tapestries with heather gray pants.
He scanned the room, and his eyes crinkled when they rested on me.
His hair was damp and loose, and a small pouch on a long leather cord hung around his neck.
“Cold?” he asked.
“Not anymore. Is Drakh still under threat?”
“No. One ship escaped, but we captured the other. Port Drakha will remain on alert, but we’re safe for now.”
“Oh, good.” I didn’t have the heart to ask if the ships were Volaachi or Inraen.
His head turned to a waist-high table that stretched out along the wall opposite the hearth.
“Excellent,” he muttered and went straight for the trays atop it.
He opened the first lid and barked out a laugh.
“I think this one’s for you.” He replaced the lid and went to the next tray.
Whatever was inside suited him. He scooped it up, brought it to the couch facing the doorway, plopped down, and began eating.
Inhaling was a better word for it. He took bites a size I didn’t even know was possible to fit in a human mouth.
It was some sort of stew and flatbread with a side of greens and berries.
“Hungry?” I asked.
He grunted, not stopping long enough to form a single word. I was amazed it all made it into his mouth rather than the floor, the couch, his lap, maybe even the ceiling.
I wanted to laugh, but my stomach growled, reminding me that I hadn’t yet eaten for…
“How long was I out there?”
“As long as we needed,” Vaya’la replied. “Less than a full day in the Mortal Realm.”
I sucked in a breath. No wonder Wep had panicked when he found me. How long had Callagh and my ranng been searching?
I collected my tray and moved to the opposite couch.
My mouth watered as I lifted the lid. Babi.
There were six small buns lined up, two topped with rosemary and salt flakes, two that had been rolled in seeds before baking, and two with a chocolate drizzle across the top.
Each pair had a small bowl of dipping sauce beside it.
They were so beautiful, I wanted to cry.
“I can leave if you two need time alone,” Wep teased, eyes finally on me instead of his meal.
“That’s up to you, but if you stay, I make no promises to be quiet.”
His eyes darkened in a way that a less famished version of me would have appreciated. Instead, I pulled my legs up onto the couch, tucked my feet under a pillow beside me, and dug in. Wep returned to his tray, but I didn’t miss the way his eyes kept flicking toward me.
When our bellies were full, and the trays were set aside, he poured us both a mug of honeymead, and we reclined on opposite couches.
“Where’s the bird?”
I smacked my lips at the sweetness of the mead. “Out flying.”
“With clipped wings?”
Oh, right. I discovered during my bath that his wings had made a miraculous growth spurt. It seemed my panicked healing episode earlier had affected someone, just not the someone I originally thought. “They grew back.” I shrugged.
He sat up a bit straighter. “You?”
I nodded.
He ran a hand through his still-damp hair. “Can we…talk about your blessings?” He rested an arm over the back of the couch. Even here, in a room far different than his Training Hall, he looked at home. Then again, he had lived in this castle his whole life.
“I brought you this.” I withdrew my green journal from a pocket in my robe and passed it across to him.
He set down his mug and cracked it open, flipping through several pages. “I can’t read this.”
“Sucks not speaking the right language, doesn’t it?” A smirk stole across my face before I could stop it. Of course, I’d used my native tongue for my notes, but I’d also drawn some pictures I thought might help.
His lips pressed together, and his eyes darted up to me, then back to the page. “Your Rihtish is coming along well.”
“What can I say? I have a gift.”
“Fluency in a matter of months is a gift, to be sure.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say I was—” I cut off and gawked at him. I hadn’t registered it, but our entire conversation was in Rihtish. It was as natural to me as speaking Inraen. How long ago had I switched?
“Is this your magic?” I asked Vaya’la.
“It is the knowledge of those who came before you, seeping through.”
“But you speak Inraen.”
Vaya’la laughed. “No, Small One. I speak in the language of thoughts.”
“Another thing to add to your list?”
I nodded.
“A quarter of this is full. How much have you been keeping from me?”
I crossed my arms. “You don’t have a claim on what I choose to tell you.”
“It’s a trust issue, then,” he said neutrally. I opened my second sight, and he pulsed lightly with aquamarine. Curiosity. As always, his lifelight was more brilliant than any other I’d seen.
“It’s not my trust you have to win—it’s Vaya’la’s,” I lied.
Wep sucked in a breath, and my journal thudded to the floor. Every inch of his body stilled. His lifelight exploded with brilliant cyan. Shock.
“Don’t worry, you have. I think she likes you.”
His face went ashen. His lips parted, but otherwise, he was frozen.
I sat up, not sure what I’d said or done.
“He reveres me like the goddess I am, unlike you, petulant one.”
“Don’t be an ass.”
“How easily you prove my point.”
He still hadn’t moved.
“Knock it off, you’re scaring me.”
Wep closed his mouth and swallowed. He leaned back and ran both hands through his hair. He sat forward again, bracing his elbows on his knees. Then, he stood and walked to the window behind his couch and leaned against the arched stone frame.
“Wep?” I rose and stood there, unsure what might help.
“I just need a minute.”
I could do that. Except one minute in my head gave space for way too many thoughts. I could’ve filled the rest of the pages in my journal with the scenarios I ran through, each one more senseless than the last. I resorted to clenching my teeth to avoid disrupting his moment of peace.
Wep stood there, forearm against the windowsill, looking out over the forest. His breath was deep and measured. Despite reading him constantly, this time felt like a betrayal, but the temptation was too great. I focused on my second sight.
His lifelight was a rainbow. He flickered through emotions so fast, I could scarcely keep up—sadness, shame, guilt, rage, confusion, fear, pride, elation, desire, and back to fear. It was dizzying.
I shuttered my sight and turned myself inward. Blackness seeped into the Violet Sea as I soared above. The land was already a blight—withered to ash and darkness. It was not burned, it was decayed. With a great breath, I unleashed my living flame upon the land.
“You’re Dragonbound.”
His words snapped me back. The term stirred something in me, a connection I had not quite made—a kinship to the figures in the tapestry on the Relaxation Room walls.
I was bound to Vaya’la, and because of that, I’d shared the dreams and knowledge of her previous Bound, but to think I was akin to these shapers of the world?
A shiver ran down my spine. The task she’d given me, which I barely understood, carried a new weight.
“Tell him,” Vaya’la prompted.
“But he already knows.”
“He needs to hear it from you.”
“Yes,” I said simply. “I am.”
He nodded. “Her name is Vaya’la. All this time, we thought her name was lost, but it’s been right in front of us. I’ve heard a thousand songs about Veyhallah’s halls.”
My brows rose.
He shook his head once, and his eyes dropped to his boots. “Legend of where warriors go after death. Doesn’t matter.” He stood there for several more moments, hands in his pockets, leaning against the wall, before his eyes finally flicked up to me.
“You can heal,” he said.
“I guess so.”
“And talk to birds.”
“No, not talk. I can just sort of…sense him.”
The corners of his mouth turned downward. “The vines.”
I nodded.
“And what else?”
I bit my lip. There was no reason for me to hesitate, but reason rarely played a part in the choices I made. At last, fiddling with the fasteners on my robe, I offered, “It might be easier if I show you.”
SHOWING WEP, it turned out, was far more difficult than telling him.
Having him as my audience when it was his opinion I cared about most was a brainless idea.
I was able to produce absolutely nothing in the opulent sitting room.
I cursed Vaya’la outright, but in return, she gave me only her patience.
“I think we need to go outside,” I admitted with a sigh.
Wep eyed the fading light from the windows and nodded.
He brought me to his alcove in the training yard.
It was safer than risking the gardens again, especially with the attention we would draw sneaking out together.
He kept his hands in his pockets and his thoughts to himself.
He never moved from where he leaned against the eucalyptus tree, but the whole time, he looked at me like I was the center of the world.
I showed him the flowers and vines I could make.
I showed him the life I could give to plants.
I grew him a handful of cherries that he clutched to his chest before slipping them into his pocket.
I even demonstrated healing on the tree since neither of us was wounded.
He responded by slicing open his hand to give me something to practice on.
The weight of his faith in me made me buckle.
When all was done, he thanked me for my trust and walked me to my door. He did not try to kiss me or touch me.
“Do you want to come in?” I asked. “We could probably both use another glass of mead.”
His lips pressed together as he shook his head. “Not tonight,” he said, but I heard the truth behind it. There was something final in his gaze, and it threatened to break me in two. Now that he knew the full extent of what I was, I doubted he would ever look at me the same again.
Behind the safety of my doors in my empty bed in an empty room, I cried. Not even Sprakt was there to temper my tears.
“He will always be beholden to you, Small One. Let that be enough.”
At Vaya’la’s words, I cried harder, wishing I could turn away from her, too, just for a moment, and be left to my tears in peace.