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He gave a snort of humour.

“Yes. I do not think I could bare to spend a day in this world without you.” Rurik turned his head down to look at her and released her arse cheek to tenderly cup the side of her face while being careful of his sharp claws. “But if you do not wish to be alone, you could always come with me, and we could walk to the afterlife together.”

“You would kill me yourself?”

“No, I doubt I would have the strength in my old age before death. But it is not an uncommon request among my kind to ask for assistance from another Dragon. When you have spent most of your eight-hundred years with someone, it is hard to imagine your life without them.”

Yet, Rurik knew there was also another possibility.

One where he could return home on a hunt so injured that he knew he was going to pass not long after. There would be no time to ask another Dragon for assistance, and he would make the offer to do it himself if she didn’t want to be without him.

It would pain him, but there was a spell they could do that required both of their assistance to perform it. Grief was a heavy burden to bear, and he didn’t want to leave Amalia on her own to try by herself.

I do not want to leave her on her own.

If she wanted to live on without him, he would be content as long as he got to take in her scent with his final breath. As long as she was the last thing he held onto, whether that was in his large paw or in his arms, her voice was the last thing he heard, and her radiant beauty and innocence was the last thing he saw before he left this world.

And yet, she has almost left me twice.

“I am sorry,” he said to her softly.

Her lips pursed as she frowned.

“For what?”

“I have not been able to spare you of pain.”

She cupped his scaly face again and gave him a small smile.

“I did not mind sacrificing my life to give you a chance at escaping, Rurik.”

He shook his head as he brushed his claws through her hair to untangle them before he reached down and gently drew them over her leg.

Not a day had passed where Rurik hadn’t regretted not preventing her from being placed at the stake.

“If I had not been so hateful of your kind that night, even though you had done nothing to receive my hatred, I would not have left you to be taken by the humans.” His eyes searched her face with the need to drink her in. She was alive and well with him now. “You had gone out of your way to save me, and I had intended to abandon you and my blood debt to you when I knew something was wrong. I should have fought to protect you then when I could see you were kind.”

The tears that began to well in her eyes pained him, but he refused to look away from her. She brushed her thumbs over his scales on his cheeks, and despite her tears, her expression appeared so gentle.

“I am glad you did not.”

He gave a humourless laugh. “I thought you did not utter lies.”

“Rurik, I would have willingly placed myself in that fire if I knew I would be able to have a moment such as this with you.”

“But your fear...” Even now he could smell it subtly rising in her scent.

“Yes, but would you have brought me here if I was not in need of healing?”

Rurik thought for long moments as his eyes fell away.

“No. I would have killed those human soldiers and then left.” He slowly brought his gaze back to her. “But I would have also revealed what I was to you. I may have taken you regardless.”

“And what if you did not? I am here now, and I am happy with you. I no longer care how I got here, or what pain I had to suffer through first.”

“I love you, Amalia.”

With every piece of his firey heart.