Page 121 of Ensnared

“I snuffed it out,” Azar says. “One of the flip sides to making fire is the ability to control it. If not for that, I could destroy everything around me unintentionally.”

Which means that when he burned that neighborhood, he meant to do it. Ugh. I quickly shove my thoughts along, hoping he didn’t hear that one.

“Soon, I’ll teach you how to harness that power.” Axel’s still on the fireball. Thank goodness. “You’ve been entwined for, what? A day?”

It feels way longer than that. “You chose the wrong human for this.”

“I think I found exactly the right one.” He looks serious.

Uh oh. Time to bail before he starts asking for more kissing lessons. “I should get some sleep.” I back up. “I barely slept last night, we were out so late looking for the kiddos. How about you stay here, since you don’t need to sleep? Tomorrow, when I wake up, the very first thing I’m doing is learning whatever I can about the bond, about the ensnared, and about what I can do with them. Maybe I can, I don’t know, learn to transfer a bond.”

I hate how sad that suggestion makes Axel look.

“You didn’t know I could throw a fireball until I did. Clearly we don’t know what I can do, and I’ve learned that lots of things people think girls can’t do, we can. Lots of things people think fighters can’t do, we figure out. No matter how many times I get knocked down, I always climb back up.”

And I’m monologuing. . . A pep talk for myself.

“Liz.”

My shoulders droop. My heart wilts. Moments ago, I was soaring on the back of a dragon who could destroy the world, thinking how much my life had changed. Now I’m right back to square one.

I can’t do anything.

The world sucks.

Strong arms suddenly sweep me up, one under my knees, one behind my shoulders, and Axel’s carrying me toward the elevator bay. “You’re right. It’s time for bed.”

Bed.

Something about the way that word sounds in his mouth has me all strung out. “I really need to sleep,” I say.

“I know you do,” he says. “You will sleep.”

“I’ll sleep better if you stay up here.”

“Patently untrue,” he says. “Do you really need to go downstairs alone to realize that?”

I think about the discomfort I felt earlier, just when he went outside. I grit my teeth. “You know, we have a word for this. It’s called co-dependent.”

“What does it mean?”

“It’s when people can’t function alone, and they need the other person to feel complete.”

“I like it,” he says.

I shake my head. “No, you shouldn’t like it. It’s bad. It’s a kind of human dysfunction.”

He shrugs. “Maybe dysfunction for humans is high function for dragons.”

It’s like arguing with a lamppost.

“I’m smarter than a lamppost,” he says.

“It’s not fair for you to argue with my thoughts,” I say.

“Fair is irrelevant. I’m stronger than a post that holds lights on the street. And I can defend you much better than any inanimate object ever could.”

He’s absolutely absurd. “The point is that we need to work toward finding our independence again.”