Chapter 11 Just Another Bully
Chapter eleven
JUST ANOTHER BULLY
Nuala
“Are you sure sending her with Ciaran was a good idea?” Carrick asked Rian in concern, still gazing at the doorway through which Ornella had just gone.
“I suspect it may actually be good for her,” Rian told him as he moved further into his tent with those beautiful eyes locked on me. “How are you?” he asked.
I could not respond at first. I was too mesmerized by the slow and methodical way he moved, by the grace and power of him, and by his confident intensity.
I had never actually experienced attraction, so I only understood what he made me feel from glimpses of my future.
But he was so beautiful it was almost gut-wrenching and impossible not to simply stare at him sometimes.
In all the years that I had been having visions of him, I’d never actually seen his face until he came to me in a dream the night before he freed me.
But I’d known it was him when my very soul screamed for him.
I should have expected he would take my breath away like that because high fey were legendary for being beautiful.
But nothing could have ever prepared me for his rose-gold toned skin, his elegant and angular features, or his tall and muscled form that I was already eager to explore.
I had never seen a man with hair so long it brushed his thighs when he knelt on the floor across the fire from me.
It was a stunning ombre, auburn at the top and golden at the tips.
He had tucked it behind his delicately tipped left ear, which was adorned with several gold piercings.
His eyes were a remarkable emerald colour that sparkled with hints of amber when he used his fire magic.
It was almost unbelievable to know this magnificent creature was meant to belong to me… a mere mortal.
His elegant brows rose, reminding me that he’d asked me a question just before he knelt down.
“I am fine. Ciaran was pleasant,” I finally spoke up.
“All the same, I am sorry. I made a promise, Nuala,” Rian reminded me with a hint of frustration in his voice. Not with me but with himself for leaving me unattended with someone that he assumed I would fear.
“I must go with you to the aes sídhe camp,” I said, changing the subject. Rian was surprised at first and then became concerned by my request.
“If you are nervous to be left here alone—”
“It is not that. There is something I need to See there. Something I cannot fully sense yet, but I know if I can get closer to whatever it is, then I might be able to grasp it.”
I knew he’d be torn even before I saw his expression tighten with indecision.
We both had a lot of work to do before we could be the versions of ourselves that I’d seen in my visions, but I already had a good comprehension of this man.
I knew that he would be caught between the importance of my visions to his war efforts and giving his family all of his attention during this difficult visit.
I also knew that he had some personal insecurities in regard to his people, which he would not yet share.
“Nuala, this will be a very sensitive visit. Perhaps we could return after—”
“I promise to stay out of the way. This feels urgent.”
“You are never in the way,” he clarified, seeming upset that I would think this. “I meant to leave Darragh here to oversee the camp, but perhaps he can accompany you?”
I nodded my acceptance of his compromise with an eagerness that made him smile in amusement.
To be able to see that smirk instead of merely imagining it against my skin in the dark of my dreams was still wildly surreal.
He was at once a stranger and someone that I knew more intimately than anyone else.
And I ached for him. It broke my heart to hold back, knowing that if he had any idea of what we were to one another, he would pull away.
Rian glanced over his shoulder at Carrick to confirm that he was agreeable to this plan, and his uncle nodded.
Satisfied, Rian stood and held out his hand to help me to my feet and then guided me into the antechamber.
I stood quietly watching him as he unearthed the warm boots and cloak that I’d worn when we moved the Aes Mirr.
It still bothered me to see him on his knees lacing up my boots, but I held my tongue this time.
Although I would be a liar if I tried to deny that the idea of this powerful creature down on his knees before me alone did not please me just a little.
I could tell he was distracted as he tightened my boots. And before I could think better of it, I reached down to gently press my thumb against the pensive knot between his brows to try and ease it.
Rian jerked his head back in shock and tilted his face up toward me in question.
“Are you alright?” I asked him, twisting my hands in my skirts so they would not succumb to the urge to touch him anymore.
My concern seemed to startle him, but he recovered quickly and blinked away the emotions on his face.
“I will be when we get him back,” he said, but I knew his melancholy was due to more than just losing Sage.
I wanted to tell him that I understood how much he hated going home.
How in the depths of his reticent heart, he wanted nothing more than to slip away to a quiet and secret place.
How his soul was heavy with the burdens his parents thrust upon him when they realized how special he was.
How he loathed the responsibility and yet could not shed it in good conscience.
How he felt alone and feared by the very people he loved so much that he would sacrifice every part of himself for them.
But I kept my mouth shut because he was not ready.
The sudden stirring of chilly air and fragrant scent of nutmeg and chrysanthemums alerted me to an incoming rider just seconds before a portal materialized next to us.
It shimmered, a vortex of frosty mist that swirled with red and gold streaks like autumn leaves caught in a whirlpool.
I shivered in the cold, but Rian seemed unbothered.
Darragh, a silver demidragon shifter, stepped into the tent after presumably having been called by Rian via their rider mindlink.
He was not fey but was just as striking with his luminously pale complexion, diamond-like eyes, and crystalline scales on his knuckles.
Half of his silvery, shoulder-length hair was tied into a bun, which revealed his human-shaped ears, one of which was pierced.
“Nuala,” the dragon shifter greeted me with his deep and deceptively tranquil voice.
I knew better. I had dreamed of the living destruction that was slumbering within. His docility was a facade that kept everyone around him from running away screaming in terror of what lay in wait beneath his skin.
“Thank you for agreeing to accompany me,” I said, dipping my head with sincere gratitude and humility.
My seriousness seemed to amuse Darragh. The shifter was typically apathetic, but his full mouth curved slightly on one side to expose a handsome smile.
“There is no need to thank me so earnestly, my lady. You should know that I am merely following orders.”
“And yet we both know you do not answer to anyone unless you wish to do so, Guardian.”
Darragh appeared mildly surprised, as did Rian when he rose and tugged my cloak snug around my neck so he could lace it closed. He raised his brows at me before glancing at Darragh over his left shoulder.
“She is not wrong,” he pointed out.
Rather than confirm anything, Darragh merely grunted noncommittally and turned to walk into the main room of the tent. Once he was gone, Rian returned his attention to me with slightly narrowed eyes.
“Why do you call him ‘Guardian’?” he asked.
“That is what he is. What he was before,” I explained, and Rian nodded as he continued to lace my cloak.
“There are stories,” he began softly, almost to himself. “Tales of silver dragons that guarded the Sylvan Princess who became the first of the Fallen Elves.”
I swallowed nervously and nodded when he lifted his eyes to mine to check whether his suspicions were right, but I could not bring myself to speak of such things.
“He also seems enamoured of you. He is not often so accommodating to anyone but me,” Rian added.
“I think perhaps I remind him of… her,” I admitted, avoiding his eyes when Rian nodded as if I had confirmed another of his theories.
“It was so long ago that the details have mostly passed into myth. I do not know enough of the story to know what happened to her,” he admitted.
“All I know are the glimpses that I catch in his eyes. Memories of a dark prison, not unlike mine, where he was forced to watch her be broken, her Light dimmed.”
Rian lowered his eyes quickly and gave another swift nod before he finished fastening up my cloak and lifted the voluminous hood over my head.
“What I want to know is why he gives you an illusion of control over him,” I admitted as he took my hand.
“You do not already know the answer, my wise Seer?” he teased me, making my cheeks flush in pleasure.
“Not with perfect certainty. But I think it is because he trusts your judgment better than his own. He… feels that he failed in his purpose. And his kind do not feel empathy or remorse so he relies on you to be his moral compass. He trusts you to decide when to wield his power gently and when to unleash him upon the world.”
Rian looked momentarily surprised, which I supposed meant he had not been aware of this aspect of Darragh’s perception of him. After a moment, he cleared his throat and turned, tugging on my hand to guide me back into the main room where Darragh and Carrick were waiting.
“Ready?” he asked his uncle, and I realized, from the tone of his voice, that I had upset him. I immediately felt foolish for not anticipating how it would make him feel to know how much Darragh relied on him when Rian was already so suffocated with obligation.