Page 17 of Court of Embers (Dragonesse #2)

Chapter

Nine

M y head was aching when we woke, a sledgehammer pounding away behind my eyes.

Some of it was probably from the stress and flight of yesterday, and my cells still felt poisoned from that smoke we’d breathed.

But mostly it was because my head was packed with suspicions and thoughts I had never wanted to entertain.

I was suddenly, irrefutably sure that my father had been aware, at least on some level, of Yura’s taboo habits. For years, since the day I was pulled from my home and brought to a creaky, salt-rotten ship floating in a harbor on the Empty Sea, I’d questioned how my father could have exiled me.

Until that day, I would’ve sworn by Larivor’s wind and Naimah’s fire that he loved me.

That he was broken inside, never to be repaired, but he still loved the child he had made.

That the same dragon who had tucked me in at night, read me stories about the elder days of the first Ascendants, and kissed me on the forehead and tickled my toes before sending me to sleep, would have fought to his last flame for me.

I had nearly fractured to pieces after the exile, wondering what I had done to deserve that sentence.

Wondering how he could have sent me to Mistward without even looking me in the eye and having the decency to tell me I’d failed as a daughter and that he was so ashamed of my existence, he never wanted to see me again.

It had never once, in my entire time on that hell island, occurred to me that he hadn’t exiled me out of some sudden, unforeseen hatred, but out of love or desperation.

And the only thing that made sense to me was that he had seen a danger in my future, and in his twisted, fractured mind, sending me to a place where I might just as easily die was somehow the lesser of two evils.

I wanted to go to his grave and demand answers, but the dead had nothing to say. I wanted to dig through the brain that had irreparably shattered the day his mate died, and try to understand what his thought process had been.

It was all beyond me now. If he hadn’t told Rhylan, his own hand-selected future Drakkon, of his suspicions, he had likely told no one else. I could only guess and pound my head against the wall, wondering at his motives.

And possibly my own. Did I believe this new idea because it made sense…or because deep in my heart, I wanted to believe my father had never stopped loving me? Perhaps I was only positive because I couldn’t stand to live thinking he’d despised me for no reason I could fathom.

You’re going to wear yourself out, going in circles like that .

Rhylan emerged from the bathroom, wearing nothing at all, precisely as I liked him.

The muscles in his taut back rippled as he dug through the saddlebags, pulling out a new set of riding leathers for me, and some soft pants for himself.

I can’t help it. I’ve always wanted to ask him, and now that I can only guess, I feel like I’ll lose my mind .

I watched the light play over the silvery circular scars in his back, frowning despite the view.

I needed to rip my own brain away from the endlessly circling questions. Rhylan, how did you get those scars?

I had always wanted to ask that question, too, but it had felt too presumptuous…until now. As a bonded mate, I could presume as much as I liked, and vice versa.

He stopped rifling through the bag, and lifted a shoulder in a lazy shrug. But I felt the sudden sharp turmoil in him, a stab of muted panic.

I don’t remember . He smiled at me over his shoulder, but it was forced. I was drunk when I woke up with my back mutilated.

I couldn’t stand that look on his face, the barely-hidden rage and dread in his eyes. You don’t have to talk about it.

I really don’t remember, though. It was just after my father died, and I thought I’d lost everything.

I thought you were dead. Mother was dead, Loralei was dead, and then my father was dead.

I was still in the Training Grounds. I went out to the lake that night with Doric and just drank myself into oblivion.

Something happened…but I have no memory of it.

When I woke up, Doric had wandered off and fallen asleep in a bush.

I was lying there on the lakeshore, the water scarlet all around me, and these… these huge, swollen holes in my back.

He shook his head. I don’t drink anymore. Kirana lost her mind when she patched me up, and I was still plastered out of my mind and bleeding everywhere.

You don’t think Doric did it? I thought before I could stop myself, but even as the idle thought floated through my mind, Rhylan shook his head again.

No. He was as furious as Kirana, wondering what had gotten past on his watch. But we were both blasted. He was only drinking with me so I wouldn’t be alone to do something stupid.

Rhylan … I reached out for his hand. “I’m so sorry. For all that you’ve gone through.”

“That’s life, isn’t it?” he said, and his voice was rough. “Everything goes to shit, and you just hope you can make it through.” His fingers tightened around mine, almost hard enough to hurt. “But I’m glad I got one thing back. I have you and Kirana. I didn’t lose it all.”

He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and exhaled.

“I need to go to Loralei’s grave today. It’s been a while since I’ve come by. If you don’t want to—”

“Of course I’m coming with you.” I twisted his hand around, and pressed a hard kiss to his knuckles before getting to my feet.

I pulled on the new leathers, stretching to loosen the joints, and braided my hair back before looping it into a crown around my head.

Rhylan waited for me on the balcony, leaning on it as he looked out over Sylvaene. A faint line had appeared between his brows, his mouth downturned.

I smoothed my thumb over the line, leaning against his arm. “You know I’m here for you, right? Through thick and thin. Through anything.”

I know . He turned, taking me into his arms and pressing his cheek against the top of my head. That’s what keeps me going. After all we’ve been through to get here together, the way I always wanted…there’s nothing that could come between us. I won’t allow it.

Neither will I . My thoughts held a ferocity my voice could never carry.

We stood there for a long time, wrapped in each other’s arms so tightly that not even a dragon could have pulled us apart.

We need flowers , Rhylan sighed into my mind. I need to bring her flowers. When she was planning her bonding ceremony with Jaien, she wanted moonflowers all over. I try to come here once a year, and bring her what she would’ve wanted.

I nodded, and felt his temperature rise against my skin as the dragon beneath his male flesh struggled to release itself, fighting against his pain.

Backing away, I let Rhylan duck under the harness, shedding his man-like skin for the massive ebon beast within.

His relief to let go and take that form crashed into me like a wave.

I buckled the straps into place, tugging them hard before I mounted.

We found the moonflowers out in Sylvaene’s forest, climbing tree trunks in the dense under-canopy shade.

I took a basket from one of the many fruit-harvesting stations, and filled it to the brim, climbing in dense undergrowth Rhylan was too large to fit into.

We shared a wordless thought between ourselves, more of a feeling, that neither of us wanted him in male form out here, away from the relative safety of the eyrie.

We avoided the areas blasted by the dead dragon’s spit. The wind had dissipated most of the stench, and the dragonfire had cleansed it, but the black spots of blight in the forest still gave me a jumpy feeling.

When the basket was crammed full, Rhylan waited until I’d gotten my grip on the saddle, and lunged upwards through the canopy. He drifted over the valley, with almost lazy sweeps of his wings, flying back towards the eyrie.

We glided around the enormous tree, following the valley’s hills upwards, over branching paths that led to a wide lake.

The ground here was soft and green, the trees thick with vines and lacy moss.

It draped like veils over the cairns formed near the lake’s edge, each pile of stones painstakingly arranged and nestled in the plush greenery like they had grown there naturally.

I dismounted when Rhylan touched down, balancing the basket on my hip, and kept a hand stretched upward to touch his shoulder as he led me further from the lake, beneath the canopy.

Here in the dappled light, there was a wall of stone behind the trees, gushing water into a pool through a massive crack in its face.

Nodding flowers leaned over the pool, and there in the shadows was a cairn of perfectly round, white stones.

The ground around them was softened and trampled, foot- and clawprints filled with tiny pools of water.

Rhylan rumbled, settling onto all fours. He laid his head in the grass, stared at the cairn for a long moment, and closed his eyes.

I waited with him for a moment, and brought the basket to the stones.

As Rhylan’s mind went muted, wandering through a hazy corridor of memories with Loralei smiling, Loralei climbing his wings, Loralei jumping on his bed, gushing about her bonding ceremony plans, I tucked the moonflowers around the stones.

The thick white petals were the same shade as her cairn. I breathed in their scent as I placed them, thinking of the little I’d known of Loralei—she had been a sweet draga, but a little spitfire in the Training Grounds, several years behind us.

For Rhylan’s sake, I wish I’d known her better, so I could share in the burden of memory.

Instead, I gave a prayer to Sunya, hoping she had weighed Loralei with grace and sent her into the Eternal Cycle.

She’s there , Rhylan said, his mental voice still muffled. I believe it. She had light in her soul.

I reached out to him, letting him have his moment in silent peace.