Page 23 of Flameborne: Fury (Emberquell Academy #2)
~ brEN ~
Two hours into the flight the clench in my belly drew so tight I worried I’d make a fool of myself. Surely if the males could endure this, I could?
It had been decided that I’d ride Kgosi with Donavyn.
I wasn’t sure if that was Kgosi’s directive for Akhane’s sake—her scales glimmered and glowed with heat, and she was agitated, tossing her head a great deal as she flew—or if Donavyn merely wanted to keep me close.
But as we rode the rise and fall of the storm and gusting cross-winds battered all of us, I was grateful for the circle of Donavyn’s arm.
The problem was, with Akhane’s desire increasing and Donavyn’s heat at my back, my body was demanding as well. I shivered with want.
Unable to resist, I pressed myself back into Donavyn’s chest, my need fed and fueled by the sensation of his warm strength behind me.
Kgosi tilted, banking slightly into a wind-gust and the tendrils of my hair whipped around my face, stinging my cheeks. I tipped my head back to rest it against Donavyn’s shoulder and his chest expanded with a deep sigh.
He dropped his chin until I felt his breath on my neck and my skin pebbled all the way to my knee on that side.
“I haven’t forgotten that we didn’t get to talk,” he muttered. “But—”
“Not now,” I said quickly.
He nodded, but that rubbed his stubbled jaw against the sensitive skin of my neck and jaw. I swallowed hard.
“I still want to hear your story,” he said softly.
I nodded, but my stomach twisted. It all seemed different back in the cave when we were alone, with time and space. Yet, now…
“But,” he continued, “right now, I think I should be the one to talk.” His voice was low, like he’d hide the words, even though we both knew the sharper-sensed dragons could hear us even over this wind.
“About what?”
Through the bond, I felt something twist tight inside him and tense. But he wrapped an arm around my middle. “Nothing for you to be afraid of,” he murmured. “I want to anticipate what we might face, make sure you know I’m not leaving you. Ever.”
I swallowed hard and didn’t respond as he began to murmur, his lips close enough to brush my ear, his breath fluttering in my hair even over the thunder of the wind that wanted to toss us off Kgosi’s back.
“I’ve worked with enough Flameborne coming from difficult homes or pasts to know what it means when you flinch, Bren. I know someone laid their hands on you. And that makes me more angry than I can articulate.”
I tried to keep my voice even. “The Furyknights fight and get aggressive with each other all the time—”
“That’s different.”
“How?” I scoffed.
“Because it isn’t a man of strength using his power against someone weaker.
Don’t get me wrong, you’ll see fights among your brothers.
Perhaps even higher ranked men at times.
Real fights. But when two Furyknights clash, it’s…
an assertion of dominance and strength. Two bulls fighting to prove who’s stronger.
It can be stupid and mindless, but it’s strength meeting strength.
Men test each other that way. But any man of honor would never use his strength against a woman. ”
I frowned. “I’m a Furyknight, too.”
“Not the same thing,” he growled.
I bristled. “Why not? You said I’d be real Furyknight! You said—”
His hand tightened on my stomach. “I didn’t mean your rank or achievement, Bren. I meant… No matter how strong you become, you could never be a fair fight against one of the men.”
I struggled with that. Wanted to argue. But I remembered how easily Ruin used to overcome me, even in play, even gently. He’d never even had to breathe heavily to pin me down. Even when I struggled my hardest to get away.
Now, I was stronger than I’d ever been. But I hadn’t forgotten the moment when Faren pinned me against that wall. I’d been unable to shift his grip. I could have kicked him in the balls if he wasn’t quick enough to block me, or used a weapon to threaten him. But hand-to-hand?
One time, I’d watched Harle and Voski wrestle in the dirt—both playing! But it had made me shudder, knowing I’d never have been able to stop either of them from pinning me if they got their hands on me. The best I could have done was flee before they had me in their grasp.
“A strong, honorable man—or woman, for that matter—doesn’t pick a fight with someone they know they can beat. Their strength isn’t a weapon to intimidate. But to protect,” Donavyn said darkly. “The fact that you’ve learned to fear a man moving quickly near you makes me sick, Bren.”
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t want to talk about my father now, or the things that happened with Ruin. But Donavyn’s words, his care, fed something in me.
I squirmed in my seat, but that rubbed my ass against his groin and he cleared his throat.
“Bren, I don’t pretend to know the details,” he said in a guttural rasp that, coming from anyone else, would have terrified me.
He sounded furious. Menacing. “But I suspect that other men may have laid blame for the events that frightened you at your feet. I want to make this very, very clear: No matter what has happened, what was done… I do not.”
I sucked in a deep breath that felt like the first I’d taken in months. My eyes stung. I prayed it was only the wind.
“Bren—”
I turned to look at him over my shoulder, searching for the words that would express the torrent of emotions roiling through me, but I couldn’t find them.
He stared down at me, jaw tight, but his eyes dark with promise—for me, and for anyone who harmed me. And that easy breath in my chest caught. Not in fear, but in need.
“Donavyn,” I murmured. But there were still no words. So, without hesitation, I kicked one of my legs up and over Kgosi’s withers, slipping my boot under the safety strap so I could turn.
“Bren, what—” Donavyn was alarmed and grabbed to steady me, but it was a work of moments to turn to face him, to let the clip slip to my back and bring my knees up and hook them over his thighs where he was seated between Kgosi’s wing ridges.
Cupping both hands behind his neck, I stared up at him, moved and touched and afraid and thrilled. He stared back, concerned, but silent, searching my eyes.
“Thank you,” I whispered, uncertain if he could hear me, but sure he felt my gratitude in the bond. Then I took his face in my hands, drew him down and kissed him.
Then, against every dragon rider’s protocol, the General of the Furyknights released the neck-strap of his dragon in flight and wrapped one arm around my lower back to hold me hard against his body, then took my chin in the other hand, tilting my head and holding me into his kiss.
The desire that had coiled like a sleeping snake in my belly struck, an explosion of power and need that speared out of the center of my chest and into his, pulling me closer, making me needier. Urging me on.
Akhane screamed and Kgosi roared, immediately banking, spiraling towards the ground.
I knew I’d been irresponsible. There were much more important problems afoot than my past. But I couldn’t let him go. Couldn’t break that kiss. And it seemed he couldn’t either. With every pass of his lips, every tease of his tongue, the fire inside me burned higher.
It was the only way to express how he’d made me feel.
He gripped me to him, one hand in my hair, the other at my back. Held me against him as Kgosi wheeled down to find a landing place, calling with Akhane in high, resonant cries that vibrated in my belly and made Donavyn groan.
And when finally, finally, we made it to ground, it was with heavy breaths that we hurriedly dismounted, and, with shaking hands, were forced apart to unharness the dragons.
As the last straps fell free and Akhane slipped towards the trees, screaming at Kgosi, I stood in the long grass of a meadow with the unrolled harness still hanging from my fingers, and turned to face Donavyn, to watch him tug all that heavy leather from Kgosi and allow Kgosi to ripple away in pursuit.
Then our eyes caught and neither of us moved.
But I smiled.
Donavyn dropped his harness and ran towards me.
“I haven’t rolled it up proper—”
But he reached me and didn’t even slow. Just swept me up with a growl and carried me away so that I forgot anything to do with Akhane or the harness or anything else. Except him.