Page 10

Raelan

ALINA IS THE LAST STUDENT out of the classroom. She says nothing as she breezes past me into the candlelit castle corridor. It’s a gray day, and the sky has been darkening for the last hour as I’ve been standing outside Alina’s elemental magic classroom. After Alina screamed, my dragon was so worked up that I had to focus all my attention on the clouds I could see through the windows in this corridor. I tracked their movement across the sky while taking steadying breaths, trying to calm my beast, to convince it that Alina was okay.

Now, though, as she stalks down the hallways ahead of me, her pale blue hair drifting behind her as she goes, I get the feeling she’s not okay. Something must’ve upset her during class.

Or maybe I’m the one who upset her. Seems that’s usually the case .

But I’m not going to ask. Every time Alina talks to me, my dragon gets riled up, and it’s becoming physically exhausting having to fight my urges down, having to ignore the mate bond screaming through my veins for her.

So instead, I remain silent, my boots clipping along with hers as she navigates the busy corridor.

As we walk, the students eye me—some warily, others with unmasked interest—and Alina. But mostly, they keep their eyes away from Alina, as if they fear me lashing out simply because they expressed curiosity in their princess. And I know this bothers her. She wants to be treated like the other students, not like the king’s granddaughter. That’s not so easy to do when you’ve got a knight following you around.

At least I’m not in my armor. Alina absolutely forbade it after I tried to wear it to the welcome ceremony. Now I wear a crisp dark tunic beneath a sturdy cloak and trousers tucked into my polished boots. Simple and unassuming. It still doesn’t stop the stares though.

We’ve only been here for a few weeks, but I’ve got Alina’s class schedule perfectly memorized. She has half an hour before her next class, Magical Anatomy 101. It’s her last class of the day, and when it’s finished, she’ll head back to her dormitory briefly to clean up and prepare for dinner in the dining hall.

Typically, Alina goes straight to class. She’s one of those academic types who likes to be early so she has time to look over her notes and ask the professor questions before the other students arrive.

But today, instead of heading straight to class, she descends the spiral staircase into the grand hall, moves hastily across the marble floor to another hallway, and proceeds down it, heading in the complete wrong direction.

My eyes narrow at the back of her head. Still, I say nothing. I follow in silence.

And I’m still silent as Alina makes her way to the botany wing, where her Herbology and Potion Making 101 class is held on Mondays and Wednesdays.

Maybe she needs to speak with her professor?

Instead of stepping into the herbology classroom, she walks to the end of the hallway and pushes through one of the double doors into the side gardens, which hold numerous greenhouses and pots and raised beds overflowing with plants of all types.

I follow a few steps behind her, my boots clipping on the stone stairs. The air is crisp, bordering on cold, and the clouds overhead move swiftly across the sky, dark gray and heavy with the scent of rain. It’ll start falling soon, bringing with it the first true days of autumn.

A few students rush past us, headed back into the castle, but once the door closes behind them, Alina and I are alone. She strides to the middle of the garden, then stops. I halt behind her, my gaze flicking around, assessing the greenhouses for any movement. Still, I see no students or faculty. Perhaps everyone feels the incoming storm and is seeking refuge inside the castle’s sturdy walls.

Everyone except for us.

My eyes find Alina again. She’s facing away from me, clenching the strap of the bookbag hanging over her shoulder. It looks incredibly heavy, bulging with the books she’ll need for all four of her classes today. I’ve offered to carry it for her—multiple times—but she refuses. I’ve since stopped offering.

Thunder rumbles far off, pulling my focus. As I tip my face to the sky, the first few drops of rain start to fall. They’re heavy and cold, the way early-autumn storms so often are. I relish the feel of them on my hot skin as they pelt my face and slip down my neck.

Being around Alina has become somewhat easier—I’m not in excruciating physical pain every time I see her—but I’m still in a constant state of heated agitation, to the point that I often wander the castle corridors at night, restlessly memorizing them in lieu of sleeping. And when I do sleep, it’s Alina’s face I see, her breath I feel as she whispers things I wish she could say in my waking hours.

The cold sensation against my skin helps chase some of the heat from my veins. I take a steadying breath.

Still, Alina says nothing. The rain pelts her blue-trimmed robe, turning the shoulders a slightly darker shade of black. I can tell she’s cold based on the way she starts to hunch in on herself, and her long hair is snapping in the wind, along with her academy-issued skirt.

As the sky opens up above us, I strip quickly out of my cloak, then step up behind her and lift it above her head. I’m careful not to touch her, and I turn my face away when I get close, trying not to breathe her in.

Her scent is intoxicating, like fairy wine. Just one strong whiff sends my dragon roiling.

I’m not looking directly at her, but I see her in my periphery as she moves to quickly smack the cloak away .

“Stop, Raelan!” she snaps. When she looks up at me, her brow is furrowed, her eyes burning with blue fire.

And it does something to me. It makes me want to crush my mouth to hers, to run my tongue along her lips until they’re no longer twisted into such an angry scowl. I want it so badly that I flinch from the desire singing through my veins.

I step back from her as my dragon rages, making the chain around my neck flare with heat.

“Stop what?” I finally force myself to say. To my credit, my voice doesn’t tremble the way my insides are right now.

“Just... stop . You don’t have to treat me like a child, don’t have to come running for every little thing.”

The rain falls around us, slowly soaking Alina’s hair so it sticks to her flushed sandy-brown cheeks.

My eyes narrow slightly as rivulets of rain run down my cheeks and drip from my chin. “You screamed. Of course I came running.”

“It was just Lyra’s rat. She startled me is all.” Alina waves a hand, then uses it to brush the wet hair from her cheeks.

“Protecting you is my duty,” I say, clutching the cloak in my hand as the rain soaks us both. “It’s the entire reason I’m here. You are the reason I’m here. And you constantly fighting that fact is doing neither of us any good.”

“Yes, but—” Alina bites her lip, and I have to try very hard not to react to it. She has no idea what such a subtle gesture does to me. “But I want to be normal while I’m here.” Some of the anger has gone from her voice, and she glances down toward her feet. “I’ve been the princess my whole life. Here, I just want to be another student. And that’s hard when I’m the only one being accompanied by a bodyguard.”

Thunder rumbles again, closer this time. I need to get her out of the rain. She could catch a cold being out in the weather like this.

I draw in a deep breath, then let it out slowly.

“I understand,” I say.

Alina’s pale eyes flash up to meet mine. One of her sky-blue brows arches in the corner, like she doesn’t really believe me. “You do?”

“Of course.” I flex my jaw, trying not to show Alina how unhinged her close proximity makes me. Even now, my chain burns, biting into my flesh as it forces my dragon down. “But that doesn’t change what I’m here to do. I still have to protect you, regardless of how either of us feels about it.”

“Protect me? From what?” She lets out a short laugh, but it’s not one of her real laughs; those sound like magic, while this one just sounds cold. “No one here wants to hurt me.”

“You don’t know that.”

She narrows her eyes at me, then bites her lip again. I tear my gaze away, trying to distract myself. Instead of looking at her, I watch the plants in the raised beds thrash in the wind as it batters the garden.

“Fine,” she concedes. “I don’t know that. But I know I need some space. I can’t have you breathing down my neck all the time; it’s driving me crazy.” She reaches up again, this time to wipe rainwater off her forehead. “Grandfather doesn’t need to know exactly how many feet you stand from me at all times. If we’re stuck together, a little distance might help us get through this.” The anger in her eyes flickers and softens. “Please?”

At first, I think to tell her no, like I have every time she’s asked in the past. But the look in her eyes stills the words on my tongue.

She wants to be normal for once in her life, and I get that.

I know how it feels to be the outcast, the odd one out. I know how it feels to lie awake at night wondering what it would be like to have a friend, even just one. My father taught me to stay away from the other children lest I accidentally shift and harm them. I thought he was being unnecessarily cautious and ruining my life with his incessant worries.

Until I saw what he did to my mother.

Giving Alina some space could be good for me too. I’d like to be able to sleep at night without dreaming of wrapping my claws around her and branding her with my mark, without wondering what it would feel like to rest my weight between her thighs and taste her mouth with mine.

Just the thought of it sends my cock hardening in my trousers, and I quickly shift the cloak in my hand to hide what’s happening to me.

This is so unprofessional.

“Okay,” I say slowly. And it’s impossible not to see the joy it brings to Alina’s eyes. I quickly add, “But I’ll still be there at all times. I’ll just try to... back off a bit. ”

Now her joy shifts into a smile. Meanwhile, I’m still trying to imagine anything except my teeth sinking into her flesh, marking her as mine. My cock is still hard.

Fuck.

“Thank you, Raelan. Truly.”

And now she’s using my name. Again. I really wish she’d stop doing that. It’s more powerful than any spell she could cast over me.

I nod once, clenching my teeth so hard my jaw aches.

Alina takes a step closer to me, and I take a step back.

“Are you okay?” she asks, head tipping to one side. The movement sends her wet hair sliding, revealing her smooth throat. “You’re... steaming.”

Shit, she’s right. I got so overheated thinking about the things I absolutely cannot do with her that the rain is now evaporating as soon as it hits my skin, turning to steam on contact. I’m lucky it doesn’t sizzle like eggs on cast iron.

I clear my throat and take another step back. “I’m fine. I just run warm. Now, Your Highness, if you’d please.” I use my free hand to gesture back toward the castle.

“For the last time, I told you to call me Alina,” she says. But her voice isn’t laced with anger this time, and it looks like she almost gives me a smile before finally heading for the double doors back into the castle.

This time I give her an extra few feet of space as I follow her into the candlelit corridor, where we both drip water onto the stone floor. And I think this will be good for both of us. Perhaps it’s even necessary .

Because if I don’t get control of myself soon, I don’t know what the fuck’s going to happen. And I absolutely cannot let anything happen. Because my family is depending on me to not mess this up. And I’m not going to fail them.

Even for my fated mate.