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“How do you know?”

“I was out hunting long before you woke, my mate.” He gives me what has become his default smile, part grimace, part fang but with all the best intentions. “I scented it and it made me think of you.”

He has a pair of my knickers sticking out of his pocket, so I expect he probably checked. The image of Fenrother scenting the heather and then comparing it to my used underwear, like wine tasting, fills my head and I shake it away.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been compared to heather before.”

“Then it is about time you were,” Fenrother says as I take the proffered clawed hand and he walks with me through the great hall, into the main vestibule and out into the courtyard.

I expect him to change into his Wyrm form, as he so often has when we go out onto the moors surrounding his castle, but this time he does not. Instead he walks towards a door I alwaysthought led into the Duegar area of the building. It opens ahead of him, and as we step through a short, dark passage, we are suddenly outside in the sunlight.

“What?” I exclaim. “Has this been here all this time?”

“If it was, would you have used it to escape me?” Fenrother says.

“Could I escape you?” I tease.

He leans into me, all of the Wyrm visible on his face. “I’d like to see you try.”

Excitement runs through my veins. With the fresh scent of the moor in my nostrils, I feel like I could do anything, go anywhere, and in particular, I feel like running.

I grab my skirts and take off at a pace I know won’t outrun Fenrother, especially if he cheats and turns to his Wyrm form, but it’s still fun. It’s still wonderful to fill my lungs with fresh, clean Yeavering air and bound over the heather in a big floaty dress like some character in a romance book.

Overhead, the sky darkens, and I know exactly who it is, the Wyrm thumping down ahead of me and becoming Fenrother once again, his arms folded and sunlight playing over his scales. His tail lashes behind him, light flooding through the soft membrane of his wings.

I run past him, laughing like an idiot, and I’m rewarded by his deep, resonant chuckle, a set of claws trying to catch me and failing.

A soft, fragrant breeze blows as I run further up the hills away from the castle. Behind me, I hear Fenrother crashing through the heather as he easily outpaces me, running ahead and clearly hardly even breaking a sweat.

As for me, I’m flagging in my constricting dress and with the heather getting deeper the higher we go. I’m not sure I’ve seen the sky so clear since I’ve been here, nor such an azure blue. It’s acolour reflected in Fenrother’s wings as he beats them out at the top of the fell.

I collapse onto the heather bed as I reach the top, my lungs burning, my leg muscles screaming at me, and I stare up at the sky attempting to get my breath back.

Fenrother’s face pokes into my vision, staring down at me with a half quizzical, half amused expression.

“What?” I query.

“I wanted to know why you are so beautiful,” he says. “Far more beautiful than the sky or the heather.”

“I can’t answer that.” I’m already flushed from the exercise, but his stark, sweet words make me colour deeper.

“I can,” Fenrother says confidently. “You are my mate.”

“Well, that explains it.” I laugh as Fenrother hauls me to my feet and slides an arm around my waist, pulling me against him.

“It doesn’t explain anything. You were not here and the sky was beautiful, but now you are and you eclipse it.”

“Doesn’t your text give you any indication?” I ask.

In the past few weeks, some pages have become visible to me, mostly the ones on how to handle a rutting Wyrm. It’s the reason I haven’t given up underwear completely.

“No.” Fenrother looks out over the heather, over the fells, towards the river valley which winds its way towards Moranik. “All I know is my chest hurts when I look at you, and my Wyrm would kill to keep you safe.”

ALICE

If Fenrother’s chest hurts, my heart has pushed its way into my mouth, all too eager to see the monster…the man…who is stealing it away and claiming it as his own.

I can’t really speak. The overwhelm of emotion isn’t something I was prepared for. My life before the Yeavering was simply a process of existing and drifting, not knowing where I was going, not knowing what would happen. I maintained a hope my aunt might accept me, perhaps once my trust paid out. But it wasn’t anything tangible. What happened after I came into my money was as distant as the hazy purple heather at the top of the fells rolling away from us.