Dragonsbane (Book 3) (49 page)

“I don’t have to
warm
my meals, dragoness. My jaws are powerful enough.”

“Suit yourself.” Kyleigh took her meat from the blaze and tore off a large chunk with her teeth, grinning smugly at him while she chewed.

Silas finally relented. He thrust his deer among the flames and pulled it back with a huff. “It isn’t working,” he grumbled, jabbing it with a finger. “Why isn’t it working?”

“You have to leave it in there for a moment, you silly cat. No, look …”

She grabbed his wrist and bent him, forcing the leg to hang just right. His neck craned all around and he shifted worriedly on his haunches the longer Kyleigh kept it in. “Now, dragoness?”

“No, not yet.”

“But —”

“Patience,” she growled.

At last, she let go. Silas crammed the leg against his lips. “Ow! It’s hot!” He stuffed a fistful of snow into his mouth and tried the bite again.

Kyleigh rolled her eyes at him. When she saw Kael approaching, she leaned back. “Where are you off to?”

He sighed heavily. “To battle all the forces of the under-realm and the winter.”

She grinned. “Send her my love.”

He tugged on her pony’s tail as he passed.

Gwen had a small shelter to herself in the middle of the wildmen’s camp. Its mouth was covered in a thick blanket of bear and wolf. The bear’s head crowned the shelter’s arch and seemed to snarl at him as he approached, bearing all of its jagged teeth in greeting.

The light from one of the craftsmen’s makeshift lanterns glowed beneath the pelt door’s bottom. “Gwen? Can I talk to you for a moment?”

“Fine,” she growled.

“It’s about tomorrow. I just wanted to make sure you remember what you’re supposed to …” His voice trailed off. He’d been so focused on battling his way past the pelt door that it took him a moment to realize what he was looking at.

Gwen stood before him, turned away — and she wore nothing but her leggings. Every muscle in her back was visible: they coiled as she bent to scoop her tunic off the floor. He could see where the swirling designs on her arms ended near the base of her neck, giving way to pale, slightly freckled skin. 

A ring of scars bent around her right shoulder blade like a bow’s arch. Each one was almost perfectly rounded — and about the size of a large tooth.

“Kyleigh really bit you,” he said, though he could still hardly believe it.

“She could’ve sent me to the under-realm with a roar and a burst of flame. But instead, she slung me into a cliff side,” Gwen muttered as she pulled the tunic over her head. The soft material fell down her back, covering the scars. “It took me an hour to dig out from under all the rock and snow — and my father kept me locked inside the castle for the rest of the winter while my wounds healed … but things certainly could’ve been worse.”

She smirked as she turned around. She rolled the tunic’s sleeves up to her elbows, all the while keeping her eyes on his. “You must be the only man in the Kingdom who would walk up to a shirtless woman and ask after her
scars
.”

Heat singed Kael’s face. “Well, I … you said I could come in.”

“I did.”

He didn’t understand why she was still smirking at him, or why her eyes shone so fiercely. But it took every ounce of his courage to keep from sprinting outside. “I wanted to talk to you about —”

“I’m not pleased with your plan, mutt,” she said, crossing her arms. “I don’t see why we ought to spend so much time piddling around a battle we could easily win.”

He’d lost count of how many times he’d had to explain it to her. “It’s not just about winning — it’s about keeping our people safe.”

“
Our
people?”

“Yes. Your wildmen might be able to hurl themselves over the gates and come out unscathed, but my friends aren’t as strong. I won’t put them to harm when there’s a better way to do things.”

She raised a brow. “So destroying my castle is better?”

“Castles can be rebuilt,” he said evenly.

“So can bodies.”

“That’s not …” He tugged roughly on his hair, but his frustration still came out as a growl. “I’m doing what’s best. For once, will you please just trust me?”

“I don’t think so. I need to be convinced.”

He was nearing the rather frayed ends of his patience, and anger bubbled in a pit beneath it. Still, he tried to hold on. “No, you don’t need to be
convinced
. You need to shut it and do exactly as I say. And when all this is over, you can thank me.”

She sauntered closer. “Why would I do that?”

“Because Titus will be dead, and you’ll never have to see me again. You and I will shake hands and part ways — and your people can go straight back to chasing imaginary creatures through the mountains.”

“Why don’t I just thank you now?”

“I wish you woul …”

Kael couldn’t breathe. It took him a moment to realize
why
he couldn’t breathe. He got his answer quickly when he tried to take a breath and Gwen’s lips pressed harder against his. They were every bit as strong as she was, moved as roughly as her grip. Her fingers twisted his jerkin about his chest; her teeth scraped down his lip.

Then she shoved him away.

“What in Kingdom’s …?
Why
?” he gasped.

She shrugged. “I admire you.”

“Well, that’s no reason to just — just … I don’t love you, Gwen!”

She looked at him as if he was stupid. “I don’t love you either. Love has nothing to do with it.”

“Nothing to do with
what
, exactly?”

Her arms crossed over her chest. Her eyes were level with his. “Where will you go, when all this is done?”

He hadn’t exactly thought about it. He supposed it would be best to stay in Tinnark, now that the Countess knew about him … but
could
he stay in Tinnark? After having seen the Kingdom in all its many shades, could he go back to shriveled brown and iron gray? What would he do with Amos and Roland? And Kyleigh hated the mountains — he couldn’t ask her to stay with him in Tinnark.

“You have a home among the wildmen, if you want it.” Gwen’s eyes moved sharply across his face, picking his struggle apart with ease. “My people listen to you. My brother loves you. If you stay with us, you can teach him how to rule as Thane —”

“So you won’t have to? So you can spend your days killing beasts and mounting their heads on your wall? No thanks,” Kael said firmly. “I’m not going to give you an excuse to disappear.”

“I won’t disappear,” she said with a smirk. “I’ll come back … on occasion.”

“What do you mean?”

A slight red blossomed down her neck as she shrugged. “You and I are a good match. Just because we don’t love each other doesn’t mean we can’t … work together.”

It took Kael a moment to figure out what she’d meant. But when he did, he couldn’t believe it. “I’m not going to marry you, Gwen. I don’t want to rule the wildmen or live in a frozen castle, and I certainly don’t want to spend the rest of my life at the summit.”

“Then what
do
you want?”

“Kyleigh.” Her name burst from his lips like sparks from shifting coals. She was always there, always smoldering at the pointed base of his heart. He didn’t regret admitting it — not even when Gwen laughed.

“The
pest
?” Her neck arched back as she laughed again, revealing the blue veins that snaked down her throat. “Oh, you poor fool.”

Kael had to clench his fists to keep from punching her. “I’m not a fool. I happen to love her.”

“You can’t
love
her,” Gwen gasped, still chortling. When she saw the look on his face, she stopped. Her voice immediately grew serious. “The pest is a beautiful creature, I’ll admit that. But she isn’t human. She can’t give you what I’m prepared to: a wife to grow old with, children to carry your name —”

“I don’t care about having children,” Kael said vehemently. He thought back to the memory of Setheran and Amelia, about how heartbroken they’d been when they’d seen the symbol of the Wright in his eyes.

He certainly didn’t want that life for his children. He wouldn’t want them to have to carry the same weight that crushed across his shoulders even now, the guilt that made the ground go cold beneath his feet.

He’d rather they weren’t born.

But Gwen wouldn’t relent. “What will happen when your skin starts to wilt, and the pest stays as beautiful as ever? Will you let her hold you through your twilight years? Let her spoon broth past your toothless lips?”

“There are ways a whisperer can live for lifetimes,” Kael said, thinking back to the story Baird had told him, the story of Calhamos the Healer. “I can tell my heart to keep beating.”

“Not without a reason,
craftsman
. You’re the mutt who couldn’t topple a tree because you thought its roots went too deep.” Gwen’s lips bent into a smirk. “What reason could you possibly find to convince your heart to beat forever?”

He wasn’t sure. But he knew one thing for certain: “I’ll find one.”

“Sure you will.”

He could bear her smirk no longer. If he stood there another moment, he’d fight her.

“Have your fun with the pest,” she called as he threw the blanket aside. “But someday you’ll come to your senses — and when you do, my offer still stands.”

Kael stormed out into the snow, trying to shove her taunts aside. He breathed deeply as the thick flakes melted against the rage boiling beneath his skin. His anger had so blinded him that he didn’t see Silas coming until it was too late.

He slammed his shoulder hard into Kael’s. “Out of my way,
human
,” he hissed as he passed.

Kael was too furious to care. He sat on the ground beside Kyleigh and hardly noticed when the snow began soaking into his trousers. “If there’s a more insufferable woman across the six regions, then I’ll quit right now. I’ll jump off the mountains rather than risk ever having to meet her.”

Kyleigh said nothing.

So he ranted on: “How does she do it? How does she take a perfectly pleasant evening and twist it into the most frustrating, horrible —
she’s
horrible. That’s the problem. She’s completely —”

“Right,” Kyleigh said quietly. “She’s right, you know. She’s right about me, about … everything.”

He watched in disbelief as she tossed the deer’s bones into the fire, as she stood and straightened the hem of her black jerkin as if nothing was at all out of place. “What are you saying? You think I ought to go be with Gwen?”

“I think you should consider it,” she said curtly. She tossed the flap over her rucksack and set it to the side. Then she stooped to wrap her arms about his neck. “You and I will always be friends, Kael … and more than anything under the stars, I want you to be happy.”

Chapter 45

Fate’s Shame

Kyleigh was gone.

She was gone before he could reply, before he could even fathom what she’d said. She was gone before he could tell her that she was wrong. Kyleigh slipped away into the frozen darkness, leaving Kael with all the things he wanted to say still burning upon his lips.

It took him a moment to realize why he hadn’t spoken sooner: there were no words. All the many searing, twisting things that might’ve become words were still far too raw. They were glowing lumps he had no way to shape — a weight that sagged his chest. He didn’t have the slightest clue what to do with them.

For a moment, he’d been certain … he thought she might’ve, perhaps … well, he thought she might’ve grown to love him back. He thought that if he was patient and didn’t press her that she would finally admit it. At the very least, he’d expected to battle her over it for years to come.

But he’d never expected her to shrug and walk away.

The strange feeling in his blood might very well have consumed him. It might’ve crushed him with its emptiness. But at the moment when his head dropped its lowest, he saw Kyleigh’s rucksack out of the corner of his eye.

Its flap lay clumsily over its opening — its contents weren’t quite hidden. Kael didn’t have to lean much closer to see the red spine of a familiar book sticking out of its top:

Tales of Scales: The Complete Catalogue of Dragons
.

He realized it must’ve been the copy she’d stolen from Baird. She’d stolen all the dragon books from Lysander’s library as well — he was fairly certain she’d nicked the first copy of
Scales
out from under his hammock. And it made him wonder …

What was Kyleigh hiding? If she truly felt nothing for him … why did she go to such great lengths to make certain he never read
those
particular books? Kael knew he might never get another chance to find out.

He glanced to make sure she hadn’t crept up behind him before he grabbed the book. His hands trembled as he flipped it open, as he dug through the first few pages to the passage he’d drifted off trying to read a year ago:

Long have the race of men warred with the dragon, long have they envied him. Though the King bears his image upon his heart, he knows not the dragon's strength. He is Fate's first child and the most ancient of all beasts. His life stretches into the thousands of years, swor
d nor arrow can pierce his skin. The fire that boils in his belly is more fearsome than the core of flame.

But even a dragon’s breath is paled by the fury of his love. It
burns in his heart, sets fire to every drop of blood. The dragon loves most fiercely: none but the one he chooses can withstand his inner blaze. He protects his chosen with all of his strength, with every mighty fiber of his soul. He will bear her pain as his own. He gladly suffers her wounds. 

For though the dragon’s eyes may gaze upon the passing of an age, his heart loves only once …

*******

It was near dawn before Kyleigh worked up the courage to return to camp.

The last watch of the night greeted her sleepily from their posts. Hardly any noise came from the cavern shelters. Their fires had been doused by a heavy fall of snow. She’d sat so long beneath the stars that she’d had to brush several inches of white from her lap and the top of her hood. Now she faced the prospect of having to dig her rucksack from the drifts.

She thought she might’ve found it when Gwen emerged from her shelter. The wildwoman stretched her arms high above her and shot Kyleigh a wicked grin. “Have a good night, pest?” she called as strode towards the watch.

Kyleigh didn’t smell any other bodies within the mouth of her shelter. “Where’s Kael?”

“How should I know where that mutt’s run off to? The last I saw, he was storming out and swearing vengeance.”

Well, that was a relief. She’d been angry the night before — not at Kael or even at Gwen, but at herself. She shouldn’t have listened in. She shouldn’t have given the human in her any more reason to lose its grip. When she saw Kael marching away with black paint smeared upon his lips … well, Gwen was fortunate that Kyleigh thought to be angry with
herself
.

It was in her anger that she’d shoved Kael towards Gwen. Now that the night had passed and the sun crept towards dawn, she realized that Gwen would never make him happy. It would be better if he waited for a human that could give him a life full of the love he deserved.

Kyleigh planned to find him and tell him all this. She planned to apologize for the way she’d behaved. But first, she needed to find her rucksack.

No sooner had she managed to drag it free of a pile of snow than Eveningwing greeted her from above. The chill morning wind whispered across his stormy-gray feathers as he circled overhead.

He had something to show her — and he wanted her to follow straight away.

She could read the excitement in the arches of his turns, and found it was impossible to refuse him. “All right.”

He took off with a delighted screech.

Down the slope they went. Kyleigh picked her way across the mountain’s slippery ridges and waded through knee-high drifts, a corner of her eye fixed upon the circling shadow up ahead.

Eveningwing led her to a monstrous rock. It stuck out of the ground like a fang, nearly swallowing the earth beside it. A narrow ledge protruded from the rock’s base — just wide enough to edge around. Kyleigh caught the scent of open air and wide, boundless skies as she crept across the ledge.

“Have you come to show me the sunrise?” she called. “It’s beautiful from up here, isn’t it? With the peaks and the sky, and the whole realm beneath …”

She stopped.

The sun
was
rising. Its blush spread through clouds between the peaks, staining their every bump and rift in shy swathes of crimson. A few paces ahead, the world simply ended. It plunged into the roiling clouds beneath the summit — the ironclad couriers of winter’s rage. Had she not known where she was, she might’ve thought she stood upon an island between worlds.

But as beautiful as the sky was that morning, it was another sight entirely that stopped her short: the sight of Kael standing at the edge of the earth, smiling like she’d never seen him smile before.

Her next few steps were halting, startled. The smile she’d always known was there, the one he’d kept tucked so carefully behind his eyes was suddenly out for the world to see. It was a fierce thing, a sight carved into the mountains that made her feel as if she’d fallen through the clouds.

Then she saw the bright red book clamped between his hands, and her heart dropped to her middle. Every ounce of warmth fled her skin as she whispered: “Where did you get that?”

“I stole it out of your bag, you insufferable dragoness. Why didn’t you tell me?” He held the book high, his voice suddenly accusing. “Why didn’t you tell me you bloody well loved me?”

Her heart shuddered; her stomach twisted in a knot. “I’m not supposed to love you. It’s Abomination.”

He laughed.

“I’m serious, Kael.” Had she not been so angry with him for laughing, she might’ve lost the struggle against her tears. This was the moment she’d been dreading from the hour she first knew she loved him. This would be moment it all came to an end. “I can’t love you. It’s one of the tenets of my people:
to bond with any but your own is Abomination
.
And upon all Abomination, Fate will loose her brother — Death
.”

Kael didn’t look at all troubled. In fact, he rolled his eyes. “Well, I think Death will have a difficult time hunting me down, given that Fate can’t see me.”

Kyleigh scowled at him. “Do you honestly believe that Fate’s forsaken you just because of the day you were born?”

“Do
you
honestly believe you can’t love me just because some great crone in the sky says it’s Abomination?” he countered with a smirk.

Her heart began to thud indignantly from where it’d fallen. She couldn’t believe he wasn’t listening.
Why
wasn’t he listening? Why could he think everything twice over, and twice again — but couldn’t be bothered to take Death seriously? “If I love you —”

“According to
this
you already do,” he said, waving the book. “That’s why your blood doesn’t burn me, why you can heal me. You take my pain as your own because you love me — that
is
how a dragon loves, isn’t it? And that’s why you’ve been so desperate to hide these books. Well, it’s all over, Kyleigh,” he said with a grin. “Now I know your secret.”

In three strides and one furious swing, she’d knocked the book from his hands.

His mouth fell open as he watched it flutter into oblivion. “Baird’s not going to be happy about that.”

“I couldn’t care less. I can’t love you, and that’s the end of it. Because if I do …” She glared to keep her eyes from stinging. “If what I feel is truly Abomination, you’ll die.”

“
If
? How could it possibly …?” The exasperated words he’d been about to speak faded quickly. He looked at her if he’d only just noticed the tears welling up in her eyes, the anguish on her face. And he sighed heavily. “Sometimes it’s a
question
that keeps us grounded — not the height.”

He spoke so quietly that she knew she probably wasn’t supposed to have heard him. But before she could wonder what he’d meant, Kael went on:

“I know that you’re worried about us not … fitting. The fish know each other by their scales, the birds by their wings. Every creature in the Kingdom has got somebody it’s meant to be with.” He dragged a hand through his curls. The lights flickered madly behind his eyes. “By that measure, you and I aren’t
meant
to be. There’s nothing written in the stars that say we belong together, there’s no predestination or prophecy. In a lot of ways, we simply don’t fit.

“But in spite of all we’ve got against us,” his smile returned as he took a step towards her, “to the shame of Fate and Death and every force in between, against all the laws of beast and man … we love each other. And it isn’t much, but I believe love can be a prophecy in its own right.”

Sometime while he spoke, she’d lost track of her heart. It wasn’t until his hands twined in hers that she was able to feel it beating again. “I won’t let you die.”

He shrugged. “What does it matter, Kyleigh? The wildmen are going to win. Titus is going to fall. Amos and Roland will be free men once more. Whether I live or die isn’t going to make the Kingdom one bit of difference. We can spend the rest of our lives staring at each other, always a few paces apart … or we can be brave.”

There was a warmth beyond reckoning between them — an eternity wound through their fingers and made the lights in his eyes brighten for every year. He offered her all of that light, the whole of that eternity.

Kael was giving her a choice.

“If we die today, I want it to be because we fell. I won’t let a question keep us from climbing. Be brave with me, Kyleigh,” he whispered.

His lips formed so firmly around those words; his eyes held her with such certainty. They stood not only at the edge of this world, but at the edge of the next. And she realized with a fire she saw reflected inside his eyes that in whatever world they woke, she would love him all the same. She would never stop loving him.

And so she was brave.

Time halted. The mountains fell still. Kyleigh held him by the sides of his face, held his lips to hers. She felt Kael’s arms wrap around her: he pressed her at her back, at her middle. He crushed her tightly against him, prepared for the fall …

But it never came.

Slowly, time began to turn once more. Something roared through Kael’s veins — she felt its fury rising as his lips moved against hers. Her body tumbled from the sky. Wind ripped through her flesh and the thrill of the plunge filled her heart with a scream.

All the fire in Kael’s blood rushed to meet her. Its power consumed her — roaring, raging. The flames lifted her out of the plunge. They held her suspended over the world’s edge; they stormed against her soul. She lost track of the earth, of the sky, of the heart thudding against her chest and the arms wrapped so tightly around her waist.

There were only those lips, that storm — the gales that sang the song her voice could not. Then all too soon, Kael pulled away.

She blinked against the harsh light of the rising sun and flinched at a murmur of the wind. For a moment, she feared he was gone. Then Kael’s lips were at her ear. His voice was there, too. Her grip tightened about his curls as he growled:

“Who would’ve thought? I suppose Fate has better things to do than smite us.”

He was teasing her again. Oh, he was going to pay for that.

“
What
is happening, here?” a voice called from behind her.

Sometime while they’d been tangled, Elena had sauntered out from behind the rock. Now she stood with her arms crossed and her mask pulled down to her chin, watching with a smile that made Kyleigh want to throttle her. She likely would have, had Jake not been standing at her side.